Page 8 of Diluted Truths
“Well, he took me. That’s why I left. I guess I thought you would want to know about him,” Joey responded nonchalantly.
Taking the opportunity to learn as much as I could from him, I continued my questions. “Will you tell me about him, so I know everything I need to know?”
“I’m sorry, I can’t,” Joey responded almost apologetically. “He said you have to figure it out on your own.”
Janice, Oliver and I all looked at him with confusion and a bit of shock.
“Sweetheart, you can tell her,” Janice explained to her son. “She’s here to help us.”
Joey shook his head in protest at his mother’s words. “I can’t, he won’t let me. When it’s her turn, she’ll learn.”
“Her turn for what?” Oliver asked.
Joey turned to Oliver, completely stoned faced as he responded, “To go away, like I did.”
Once again, we all looked at Joey, confused and concerned. It was obvious that his disappearance affected him greatly.
He quickly stood up and ran to the bathroom. Janice followed, giving me an apologetic look as she and her children walked away.
“What the fuck?” I stated, in almost a whisper, mostly to myself.
“That kid is really screwed up. I think he was projecting what happened to him onto you,” Oliver responded, clearly concerned by the boy's comments as well but trying, as usual, to be the voice of reason. “What’s this?” he asked, pointing to the photo in front of me.
I looked over to see him observing the picture Janice had given me earlier of the drawing. “It’s a picture of Joey’s closet after he went missing,” I responded.
“Creepy.” I nodded to Oliver in agreement as he continued, “I think I recognize it.”
“Really? I did too, but I can’t figure out from where,” I stated, excited that he may be able to answer the question for me.
He nodded as he responded, still looking at the photo. “Yeah. Well, not the photo exactly, but in school I read a description about a cult’s sigil and this would be it.” He began to gesture towards the picture as he continued, “The sixes, the pentagram, all of it is like the description.”
Oliver was currently getting a masters degree in anthropology from the University of Oregon. He was in his last semester and had just started prepping for his midterms. Following the tests, he would jump into the final eighteen months of schooling where he would then get his doctorate in the same field.
“What’s the cult?” I asked.
“Ummm…Cult of Creation, I think?” he responded as we watched Janice and her kids come back towards the table. “I have my textbooks back at the office, we can look into them when we’re back.”
I nodded in agreement as I turned to Janice. “Everything okay?”
“Yes, I’m so sorry about what Joey said. He’s been off ever since he came home. I’ll talk to him,” she stated.
“It’s really okay. Don’t worry about it. I think I have everything I need for now if you want to wrap this up,” I responded, wanting to get back to the office to look into the cult angle.
Janice agreed and we exchanged phone numbers before parting ways. Oliver and I drove back to the office in comfortable silence as we both considered the case in front of us.
As we entered Fibonacci Files, we made a beeline for Oliver's office.
He rummaged on his desk for a moment before pulling out the textbook. “Here you go, this is where the description is.”
I took the textbook from him and began rifling through the pages before coming to the description of the Cult of Creation’s sigil. It was described as a pentagram without the outer circle and there were three sixes drawn surrounding the top of the star. It was also noted that the sigil was always drawn in red, just as it was in Joey’s closet.
“This has to be connected to Joey’s case,” I said as I read and reread the description.
“What’s connected?” Oliver and I turned to see Fai leaning in the doorway.
“Hey Fai!” I stated, excited to share my findings with him. He was my mentor and there was a large part of me that wanted to impress Fai. Show him I was worth the chance he took on me all those years ago. “There was a drawing in Joey’s closet. We have a picture here. See?” I said as I handed him the polaroid. “And the drawing matches the description of a cult sigil. Although, there is barely anything on the cult. Oliver, is there anything else with more information?”
Oliver began to look around his bookcase, trying to find something that would offer more information on the cult. “Not in that book. I may have something, but I’m not sure. My professor only brought it up because he said he found it interesting and even said there was barely any documentation on it.”
