by Jim Miesner
A man tossed a Molotov cocktail, and it seemed to travel in slow motion, end over end until it exploded against the wall next to the guards. Fire engulfed one man's entire back, as two men next to him struggled to pat out their arms. The one engulfed panicked and ran before collapsing to the ground. Again, the man lifted another cocktail as weapon fire tore through his body, and it slipped from his fingers. Flames spread out in every direction. Men and women ran as drones peppered them and they collapsed where they stood.
“We need to get the kids out of here before it’s too late,” said Emmanuel. “We need to…”
Sam put her hand on his shoulder. “None of it will matter if we don’t find the necklace.”
She looked into his eyes and could see the worry in them. She took a breath. “Okay, go save Daniel. I’ll find it.”
He looked down at the fight below them again, sighed and shook his head. “No. You’re right. We can’t get sidetracked.”
They jogged down the corridor again, Sam was looking up at the signs that hung from the ceiling when Emmanuel grabbed her. She looked down to see the next step was a couple hundred feet to a smoking power station. She leaned back into his arms. Automated fire hoses had put out much of it. This elevated walkway must have been right under the ship when it crashed into the power station below. It had been torn completely away.
She turned and looked back at where they had come. “This way,” she said and ran down the hallway until she stopped at an intersection. “This will take us there, too.”
Emmanuel was a few steps behind but managed to keep up with her. He looked tired and though he tried not to show it, the knife to his thigh had hobbled him some. There was a hint of Frankenstein’s monster to his jog.
“Just a little farther,” she said.
The walkways were usually busy at this time of the day. It was so strange seeing them empty. They were rounding the corner of the building toward the final walkway to the green tower when a blast tore past them. Emmanuel and Sam ducked out of the way, only to glance up and see him standing there with a weapon. He peered at them as if he didn’t recognize them. His eyes crazed and his bandanna missing.
“Don’t shoot, Kelly!” Emmanuel yelled.
Kelly paused before he smiled and pointed his glowing weapon toward the sky.
“Looks like your stupid little plan wasn’t so hot, was it?”
“What are you doing here? Where’s Marlena?” Emmanuel asked.
Kelly sighed and shook his head. “Right after you ran off, they came at us out of nowhere. We got split up. I told you this-”
Sam pushed him aside and ran down the corridor, right through a set of broken double doors that rattled on impact. It had been a long time since she had been here.
A light flickered down one end of the hall where it looked like someone had tried to shoot it out. There were several blasts along the wall in fact.
She looked right and left as Emmanuel and Kelly caught up with her, then chose right. Toward the end of the next wall was a double door that didn’t budge when she pressed against it. It shouldn’t have been locked. Why was it locked? Then she remembered the power was somehow back on. She didn’t understand how they did it so quickly but it meant a few locked doors ahead, along with an untold number of drones and guards.
She looked back at Emmanuel. “Can you get us through this?”
He stepped forward and Kelly put his hand on his chest. “Let a real man take care of it,” he said. Then aimed his weapon at the door.
“Stop,” said Sam, but it was too late and he fired.
The lock tore off along with half the rest of the door as smoke rose from the hole it left.
“Are you kidding me? Now anyone within a half mile knows we’re here,” said Sam.
Kelly shrugged his shoulders and Sam shook her head and pushed it open. The whole door was hot, and it stung her palm. She began to run down the hallway and had rounded the corner of an intersection when they came across two guards. Emmanuel fired, the guards ducked and Sam and Emmanuel ran back the direction they had come. This time they took a different turn at the intersection but still ran into three more guards. They pivoted quickly this time and turned back the way they had come when they ran right into Kelly’s Bowie knife. He stood there with a smile on his face and two guards behind him. The footsteps of the other guards got closer until they surrounded them on all sides.
“What are you doing?” Emmanuel asked.
“Taking care of myself,” he said. “Someone has to.”
CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
Kelly pushed them forward. Among the guards appeared two other crew members who had been on board their ship. An older man and a woman, Sam had thought were husband and wife.
“Did you find her?” Kelly asked.
“No sign of her,” said the woman.
Kelly growled. “Keep looking.”
“You’re making a mistake,” Sam said. “How can you do this?”
He stared off into space then smiled and raised his eyebrows. “How can I do what?”
“Betray your people.”
Kelly let out a loud laugh. “I could say the same thing about you. I guess we’re two peas in a pod.”
“She’s nothing like you,” Emmanuel said. “Why are you doing this? You, of all people?”
“Me of all people? They've had your brother for two hours, try two years. See what decisions you make then when you're given that chance. What you'll do to be with him again.”
"You know a side effect of the Sacrament is long-term memory loss, don’t you?" Sam said. "You won’t remember anything about your son, holding him as a baby, his first words, his first steps."
“Shut up,” Kelly said. “You think I haven’t thought about that? I don’t care. We’ll get to be together again. If I have to choose between that or memories, I choose that.”
“You can’t do this,” said Emmanuel.
Kelly rammed his fist into Emmanuel’s stomach and he crumbled to his knees as he groaned.
“I said shut up.”
“Millions will die,” Sam said.
Kelly stared at her as one guard pushed an elevator button. The door opened almost instantly and Sam felt a hard shove. She found herself on the floor as they threw Emmanuel in alongside her. Kelly and three of the guards followed behind. As they did, one of the guards held out their hand and Kelly placed the Bowie knife in it, before the doors closed.
“This isn’t the only way to get your son back,” said Sam.
“Yes, it is.”
“No, it’s not. We can beat them.”
He looked around at the three guards. “Even if you do, then what? Like the pilot said, what if they make a copy? Or what if they just find some other way to destroy us? I know when to quit while I’m ahead.”
The elevator doors slid open on the top floor. Four guards stood around a large fountain that was at the center of a huge room covered by a glass dome. The room was filled with a variety of tropical trees, plants and vines. Stone paths, benches and large sculptures of animals were also interspersed around it. Sam had never been here before but something about it was familiar.
The yelling and weapons fire below was distant but still audible. Sam imagined them on both sides. People she had gone to school with, or saw passing on the street. People she had seen selling beets at the farmers market, buying wool, fleeing the fires. Then the doors of the room opened and more guards entered along with someone in a red bio-suit. It took a second to realize it was Wexler, the woman from the council with the dreadlocks. Alongside her hovered a drone.
“The Covenant Thanks you for your service, Mr. Kelly,” she said.
“When do I get to see him again?”
“Soon. After we’ve cleaned up this mess.” She crouched down to the ground. “Hello, Samantha. I’m glad you’re safe. I’m sorry we're meeting under these conditions.”
The drone shot out a holographic projection of councilwoman Saunders, the woman with the yellow glasses and
beady eyes. She was smiling. It looked strange and out of place, like an animal trained to do so.
“Some of my contemporaries didn’t think much of you. I have to admit I had my doubts but deep down I always knew we would end up here, Samantha. It was inevitable.”
“You can’t do this. It’s genocide.”
“Oh, Samantha. Was the asteroid that killed the dinosaurs, genocide or the first humans who out-hunted the Neanderthals? It's natural selection. They’ve had their time and now it’s ours.”
“It’s not natural selection. There’s another choice.”
Saunders pursed her lips together and nodded before her face disappeared. An instant later it was replaced by a bird's-eye view of the city. Rocks rained down around a group of guards pinned behind a building, another angle showed a limp guard being dragged through the street.
"Can you rationalize this, Samantha? That’s the alternative. A world ruled by chaos, war, and violence. It’s been going on for thousands of years. It will never stop. The old ways mean eternal suffering. We make a tough decision now so billions will one day live in peace."
“They are just fighting for their children.”
“No, they aren't. I am fighting for their children.” There was a fire in her eyes now as the vein bulged in her forehead. “They’re fighting because that’s what they are. They can’t control their nature. Today it’s their children, tomorrow their crops, the day after that politics and power. It never ends.”
“All because they eat.”
“It’s not about what they ingest, Samantha. It’s what they don’t.”
“The Source.”
She nodded.
“Humanity is weak. It always has been. It makes bad choices. Poverty, suicide, infidelity, obesity, anorexia, depression, rape, gambling, murder, addiction, domestic violence, famine, divorce, diabetes, crime, racism. I could go on and on. Some are worse than others but they’re all part of the same curse.
“They once called it sin. The big religions tried to fix it with rules, the governments with laws and wars, both failed. Nothing could cure it. Civilization almost wiped itself out because of it.
“The Source was first created simply as an alternative food source. It didn't take long to see the possibilities though, that it could do more than just sustain us. It allowed us to move beyond our own destructive impulses. It unified us but more importantly it cured us from the curse.
“In just one lifetime we wiped out all the pain and weaknesses that have festered inside us since the beginning of time. Because of the Source we were able to rise from the ashes of destruction.”
“And now you will wipe out millions?”
She shook her head.
“That was what those other fools focused on. They couldn’t see beyond today. They only cared about what it would look like. Focused on today and not generations to come. When they learned about Jenny, they wanted to begin trials to reverse the Sacrament. To tear down everything we've worked so hard for. We couldn’t allow that.”
“So, you killed them.”
“We’re not any different, Samantha. You protected Jenny the same way we are protecting our people. If she was in danger wouldn’t you kill to protect her? Maybe you already have?” A wry smile curled at the corners of her lips.
“We’re not the same.”
“All the work you have been a part of. The work you were so passionate about. Giving better lives to children out there just like Jenny. Lives that will never have to know the suffering that plagued mankind since the beginning. Lives that can grow up free from jealousy, hatred, obesity, and depression.
“We’ll be able to give that to more children in a few days than we have since we’ve begun. Grow enough source to sustain us and allow them to feel the bare sand between their toes outside the Shell. The best of both worlds. It’s everything you’ve worked towards. The world they deserve. All this virus is, is a culmination of our work… your work.”
Saunders turned her head at the sound of the shouts and violence outside.
“I wanted to give you one last chance. An opportunity to join us. All of you. We’re willing to give you and your small army a gift. They can be saved from the coming destruction. They can hold their children again. Never have to know hunger, violence or loneliness. We will treat them as if they have always been here. All you have to do is tell them to stop fighting. Lay down their weapons and join us as brothers and sisters of the Covenant. Choose life instead of death.”
“Never,” Emmanuel said. “Not in a million years. We would rather die.”
Saunders glared at him for speaking out of turn and looked back at Sam.
“I was hoping you might come to your senses. Just as Tesla and your other friend here did.” She glanced around the room and began to pace. “In a hundred years all those people you’re fighting for will be dead and forgotten. It won’t matter what happened to them. What matters is the world we leave behind. The legacy we leave.”
She breathed out through her nose as she cocked her head and stared at Sam.
“No answer? Very well,” she said and waved her hand as a guard stepped forward and raised a weapon at Sam’s head. Sam felt a cold wand against her temple for the second time in less than an hour.
“No, her rude friend first. I want her to see the consequences of her choices.”
The guard’s weapon shifted to Emmanuel.
Saunders wrinkled her nose. “All of your struggle, all of your fighting, your stubbornness. It’s all been a waste. This is what happens when you stand in the way of progress. When you stand in the way of destiny.”
The guard’s wand glowed.
Sam lurched forward but hands held her back. “No,” she screamed.
“Wait,” Kelly yelled and stepped in the way.
“What are you doing?” Saunders asked.
“I want this,” he said. “I’ve been waiting for this moment a long time. It should be me who does it.”
Saunders looked at him and then to Emmanuel, the guard, Sam and back to Kelly. Her eyes twitched as she peered at him before she shook her head.
"No, step out of the way, Mr. Kelly."
Kelly nodded and turned his body before he ripped the weapon from the guard's hand. There was almost no time to react as he pressed it into Emmanuel’s forehead.
“Don’t do this,” Sam said. “You’re making a mistake. You’re on the wrong side.”
Kelly smiled. “Wrong side? There’s no such thing as the wrong side. There’s just the winning side and the losing side.”
Emmanuel closed his eyes as the three guards that had ridden on the elevator with them spread apart behind Kelly.
“Please!” Sam yelled. She struggled against the guards’ arms as they held her back. “You’re better than this.”
“I know,” Kelly said. Then he winked at her before he spun around and pressed the weapon into Wexler’s throat.
CHAPTER FORTY-THREE
“What are you doing?” Wexler asked as her posture stiffened. “Stop this foolishness.”
Sam felt the arms let go of her as Kelly pulled Wexler into his body. He walked backward using her as a shield. The other guards pointed their weapons at Kelly, except for the three that had ridden in the elevator with him. They pointed their weapons at the other guards who shifted uneasily between them and Kelly, uncertain what was going on. Taking advantage of the distraction Sam took hold of Emmanuel’s hand, and pulled him behind a large snake sculpture that serpentined the small gardens around the room.
“Kill them,” said Saunders.
Wexler’s eyes bugged out of her head. “What? No.”
“It stops here. We can’t afford any-”
The drone exploded, and the hologram vanished as the air sizzled with weapons fire. The arm of a guard also landed on the ground next to it, still clutching their weapon. Sam wasn’t sure which side they were on as they cried out and blood sprayed everywhere. They grabbed at bones and tendons that just a moment ago were attached
before they collapsed to the ground.
Kelly, Wexler and one of the guards joined them a moment later as they dove behind the concrete snake. A blast tore off the tip of its tail close to Sam’s head, the concrete chips stinging her cheek. Kelly let go of Wexler, stood up and fired before he ducked back down. Wexler covered her head with a cringe frozen on her face. The blasts chipped away at the sculpture, and the stone chips and dust rained down around her.
“How do they breathe in these things?” the guard said with a huff. Then they took off the helmet and shook away hair to reveal it was Marlena.
“What’s going on?” Sam asked.
“Completing our mission,” Marlena said. She stood up again and fired over the top of the snake before ducking back down. “The others are on their way to get the kids. This was the only way for us to get up here. Sorry we had to keep you in the dark.”
“It was my idea,” Kelly said as he jumped up, fired and crouched back down again.
“So, you aren’t betraying us?” Emmanuel asked.
Kelly raised his eyebrows. “I’d be lying if I said I didn’t consider it.”
More stone crumbled all around them. Wexler kept her eyes shut tight as she covered her ears, her forehead drenched in sweat and then Sam ripped one of her hands away.
“Where is she?” she asked.
Wexler looked off into space and Sam grabbed her collar and shook it as her head rolled on her shoulders.
“Where is she?!”
Wexler looked her right in the eyes. “You will never make it. We’re all dead.”
Marlena pointed her weapon at her. “Some quicker than others.”
Wexler didn’t so much as flinch. She starred at Marlena, defying her until Sam pushed the weapon away and Wexler’s eyes turned back to her.
“Even if you could get past all the guards you would never get past the doors. They’re reinforced. No one gets in there. No one sees her. The woman is a recluse.”
“What room?”
“The next one over.”
Kelly stood up, fired and ducked back down as everything crumbled around them. They couldn’t keep this up forever, they could hear more guards entering the room as the fire intensified. Sam’s eyes focused on the windows on the other side of the room as the curtains ruffled in the breeze. Outside she could see a balcony railing.
