SOS009 was a direct communiqué to Tom to head back to his old hometown. It stood for Survivors of the Original Solution with Tom’s designation as a member of the top cell, number nine out of the twenty. They had earned their way into the inner circle by surviving the slaughter of the original plan. The original strategy had been put into motion across Europe in 1918 after the First World War. Its origins were with German Jews who had faithfully served the Kaiser only to watch him sell out to the ever-growing menace which had nicknamed itself the Management.
Many of them had seen what happened in the pogroms of Russia and were determined to see a different outcome this time. Jewish residents of Berlin banded together and spread the word through the synagogues. They would create their own network and call it the Circle or Kreise.
Norman’s grandfather, Isaak, held some of the first meetings in his parlor. But Management had found out about the plan and came up with a solution to their problem. It began across Germany in November of 1938 with Kristallnacht and by the time it was over in 1945 most of the original members had died in camps or as part of the underground.
The SOS, as they came to be called, escaped with their lives, erasing enough of their heritage to go undetected as the remnants of the first great design to overthrow the Management. Only twenty members remained and one of them was Norman’s father and his brother, Tom’s namesake. Thomas took his young wife and left immediately for America with the help of some unusual allies.
By 1942 a new plan started to evolve and right underneath the noses of everyone who had conspired to murder the Circle. The twenty young men and women who had survived the Holocaust were smuggled to America through an underground created by a chain of sympathetic Episcopalian nuns and priests. Together the twenty vowed to build again and learn from their mistakes.
Management was learning from its past mistakes as well. They had learned to coat their threats with promises of power and money and began working with smaller governments in an ever-growing number of countries, creating bands of insurgents when they ran into too much opposition. A vast system eventually grew over the past decades until it was difficult for anyone but the few at the top to know just how far Management’s reach extended. Most members of either side assumed it was everywhere.
That was when the Circle looked for a new entity to cultivate those who were disregarded by Management and seen as useless, at least by them, and beyond saving. The Circle started with the large orphanages spread out across the states, using some of Management’s same techniques of recruiting and offering a chance at a better education, more opportunity, but without the threats or the dangerous clause.
Management’s greatest weakness had always been their inability to see that those with nothing to lose could still believe in something better. The Circle’s losses in the past taught them that and laid the groundwork to foster and care for the thousands of forgotten children as they built a new counter of force that could spread across the globe.
The plan quietly grew as they waited patiently for two generations to grow older and relinquish their power. Management grew as well, infecting every government across the globe until they believed the fight was all but over. As far as they knew, the Circle had been contained and was seen as an ineffective nuisance.
Tom was to go and see his handler, the number two member of The Circle.
Things must be bad, he thought, to risk putting anyone from the top twenty within shouting distance of each other. He turned his phone back on and hit the speed dial.
“Wallis? It’s your favorite brother in law, Tom. I’m coming for a visit. Need to relax a little, away from the busy streets of New Berlin. You got room for one more?”
Wallis hung up the phone, wondering what that was about. Tom rarely left Wisconsin as far as she knew. She went in search of Norman to tell him the string of strange occurrences hadn’t ended just yet.
“It’s not even a holiday,” she mumbled, trying to recall if Yom Kippur was imminent.
“Does your brother, Tom celebrate Jewish holidays?” asked Wallis. Norman was sitting at the kitchen table poring over the local paper. The sections were spread out as if he were sampling from each one, simultaneously.
“What? Not that I recall. That was a good one. Normally, your questions have a lot more to do with something relevant.”
Wallis smiled and raised an eyebrow. “They still do. I’m far too practical to start asking for random bits of information. If that’s what I wanted I’d read the local paper too.”
Norman didn’t look up but Wallis thought she detected the faint beginnings of a smirk.
“Okay, I’ll bite. Why the interest in Tom’s eternal soul or what’s left of it?” said Norman.
“He called and said he’s coming for a visit. I was trying to figure out the why.”
Norman looked up from the paper.
“Now, that is interesting. You didn’t ask Tom why he was gracing us with a visit?”