by Jackson, Gil
Max Stenna — not a man to be trusted when dealing with their like! — published anyway, with a banner headline across the New York Post: NOT FOR GOD AND AMERICA BUT FOR SATAN AND THE WORLD’S PERVERTED. And what with the strange lessening of Spannocs’s powers combined with the damage to his reputation as a corporate superman; for the first time since the Angel of the Lower East Side’s daughter had decided on his destruction, he was shitting himself.
The President’s Personal Private Secretary unobtrusively slipped a note to me asking me to see the President in private before I disembarked for the USAF Base, White Bear. (Wherever the hell that is.) Apparently my list and verbal ranting was well known and too long to be dealt with around the table. Oh, and while I think of it, apart from a guy called Nathaniel Johnson, Head of Special Surveillance Operations, no one with the name of Claypole was introduced at that meeting. Smile please. Wonder how that guy got to be as old as me?
PART THREE
CHAPTER 30 – 1997
OVAL OFFICE II ROSE GARDEN
Who would have believed such a mess as this? I have been speaking with the PPS to the President; apart from Becland, two more States of America that have been taken out; not one part of the world has been left untouched by this infernal chase. Last count, some 2 billion people dead. And she’s got to take some responsibility for keeping the funeral profession in business, if they were able to carry out their trade. Which they weren’t — not very well anyway. Nobody was bothered. Why should they? To the populace they had been left to damnation, or seemed to have been, which amounted to the same thing.
The President has put Sister Annie Carter in charge of our contribution to events. Obviously trying to bring some rationale and credibility to proceedings. (Couldn’t really blame him.) He had made no mention of administrative (annex ii-38) gov.pen; apart from: You’ll be needing a pension too when this is all over won’t you, Charlie? As far as I’m concerned, I’m not done with them. Shooting me outside might have been one way of reducing America’s pension deficit, but I think there might have been a bit more to it than that. They are still charged with overall control of this, what could only be described as some shambolic episode of humanity controlled by an elite of officialdom not being fit to shuffle papers let alone save the world from what it has allowed. (And that was pensions!) Oh yes, We are all responsible! The President accepted my view on that one. Although we can’t, in all fairness, blame some nose dribbling, fly infested pot-bellied child sitting in some drought ridden desert scratching around for seeds that are past their sell by date for any of this; but apart from that turn-your-back on them kind of innocence....
And what of the President’s assessment of me? With what I know now, I would have had more luck trying to hold back the proverbial tide. Me being the some ‘officialdom’ (according to Henry Clancy Montgomery III) on matters that any one else seems to have little knowledge of (providing the former maintains responsibility should an outcome to all of this ‘of a positive and peaceful settlement ensue’, [some hope there]). He didn’t say what would become of me if it didn’t. At least he had the sense to realise that it wouldn’t matter any way, if it didn’t. (And so it wouldn’t.)
Did I tell you that Henry Clancy Montgomery III had agreed that the experiment was to continue in the ‘entrapment’ of whatever is out there using a citizen of the United States?
‘Citizen! I suppose we should thank him for small mercies, he didn’t choose a Mexican, or—’
The President gave me the old fashioned look of someone that had had his toys taken away and was sulking in the corner.
‘Mr. Spannocs has kindly agreed to take that part in any arrangements that the investigators deem necessary in the furtherance of scientific knowledge. And if that should restore some kind of world order.... He’s also agreed to put his organisation at our disposal...’
Hello— Has anybody been reading the newspapers lately?
‘Well, we’ve nothing to worry about, Mr. President. A known dealer in the flesh of children and a virus running the isolation unit in the District General.’ I felt like adding out loud the rest of my script.
‘Well, you’re entitled to your opinions, I’ve no evidence on that score, Mr. O’Hare, but I like to give a man a chance to prove himself, it wouldn’t be fair of me to demonise Mr. Spannocs, he has after all done a lot for this country in the past.’
Have I missed something here? Talk non-irony, non-pun, non-historical categorisation being settled on FS by HCMIII — as he signs himself — (and that sounds like a fooking virus in itself, so it does!). And, after all this time I’ve reasoned that Frederik Spannocs’ assumed name is an anagram. Talk about fancying yourself. He’s certainly charmed the President. Or one of them has.
‘Hamilton Fitch and Sister Annie Carter have been requested by my secretary to speak with Head of Special Surveillance Operations; as clearance by Director Johnson has ‘kindly’ been afforded them ... And may your God go with all of you.’
* * *
The USAF base White Bear last used during the Cold War to house air-to-ground missile attack fighter jets in the event of Russia deciding on an invasion of Europe through Norway’s side door. Primarily and strategically a rear attack station into the Soviet Union’s air defence systems designed to take out their radar installations. And much too every Russian president since Tsar Alexander II sold Alaska to America for $7m: everyone of them since: their chagrin.
Arriving in helicopters; hitting the snowy wastes of the Alaskan landscape, rear wheels first, then fronts. Vast rotor blades hacking the air, exhaust pipes the size of dinner plates blasting the once silent but still freezing air, causing people to stop talking out of sheer surrender. Doors opened throwing out people and equipment (including the three of us). With heads and bodies crouching down we ran through swirling snow from the down draught of the Sikorsky. And there through the blizzard a massive complex surrounded by more security guards than a White House Reganesque last night performance of Sinatra on Tour with his Clan.
Met by clan leader, Director Nathaniel Johnson, who explained to all of us gathered in the largest hangar White Bear had to offer that this housed one of the largest magnets outside CERN anywhere in the world, needed to power the equipment capable of trapping and holding whatever life form threatens the planet from an Alien attack from the stars; and in place to hold whatever may come in from the other side and save what’s left of earth. Designed by scientists sympathetic to The Order of the Most Divine Third Circle, built and financed by Ocean International – and its main man, Frederik Spannocs. (That must have been the bit him helping the United States.)
And there he was. Flesh and blood, or should I say what we would respectfully assume to be if one didn’t know the awful truth about such flesh and blood. Standing there like some superior being, which, I suppose he was from a flip-side evil versus good point of view. But he held no immortal reverence from my stand-point. He was still a lip-spitting little pervert from the wrong side of Lower East Manhattan’s tracks; I don’t care how many American people of influence hold him in respect they’ve all of them put money in the hands of a dodgy turf accountant from the Curragh.
Standing there in his wide-lapelled double breasted grey suit, slicked back blonde hair tied into a ponytail with that ridiculous black ribbon. Like some slippery finance director from Enron. He came up to me with his hand out to shake mine. Shouted out my name, smiling at everyone, as if we were drinking partners from my old country. Right little charmer: I nearly reciprocated with some good old Irish violence. I called across to Johnson. ‘And you’re giving him the run of this, Nathaniel?’
Spannocs whispered in my ear. ‘Come and see where mankind’s at, Charlie boy. I’ll introduce you to a pro-active God, that doesn’t ask for adoration behind a cloak of invisibility.’
No! Charlie, Sergeant, O’Hare, pain-in-the-arse, bane of his life ... where mankind’s at? What the hell does he think he’s talking about. I was not prepared to allow this moron to
take control, in spite of the President’s wishes that Mr. Spannocs and Director Nathaniel Johnson of the SSO would need to work closely on this if we’re to save what’s left of the world. The President did say that Frederik Spannocs had said to him how sorry he was that he had not been aware of the consequences of some of his, ahem, business experiments. (Three billion dead! Not a problem, Frederik. Please help yourself to a Congressional Medal of Honour. Over there in the box.)
But it was not his presence that gave me the strength to face him down. Nor being frightened of him even though conscious I was speaking to two beings. It was the look of a man that had left confessional without the absolution that would allow him forward. For his priest was not of this world and a poor substitute for any other. And he, thinking he would have exoneration from the sin that no one in heaven or earth had the power to forgive; his only eventual salvation Hell! and carried on a hand-cart to boot. Forgive the man not the sin is a common cliché; but they forget to mention there are conditions, and that particular sin is not capable of separation from man. Satan was never an absolver in any instruction manual.
‘You are every bit as responsible as myself, Charlie O’Hare,’ he said to me. I wholeheartedly agreed. Past times Sarah had blamed me; and he being the expert in sin and retribution, I was in no certain position to argue with a demigod (fallen or otherwise) that is — oh yes — God’s Creation for purpose!
Still, I could not go against my conscience, ever mindful that HCMIII had made the presidential decision to run with, whatever evil bastard he is, for the benefit of the world grateful or otherwise, even if I did see his reasoning. We all have to run with this. As far as I was concerned it was for God Himself to elect an outcome. And if it is a Roman emperor’s thumb’s down; and His demigod gets the appointment — assuming He hadn’t fooked off some 2,000 years hence leaving a deputy to sort the mess — then he starts 9 o’clock tomorrow morning.
Frederik Spannocs continued the argument. ‘So, where do you stand with me on this, Charlie?’
He read me like a book but I was not for being drawn. ‘I’ve accepted yours and the world’s sins as my own. As any Christian humanitarian would. The difference is I didn’t commit them: and clearly didn’t do enough to show any lack of endorsement for yours. That’s Man’s Cross. And I’m just one of them.’ I shrugged.
I reasoned sometime ago that the demigod could never take on the whole world. He was both cast out and allowed conscience. Conscience for good reason. That would reduce with furtherance of sin. That’s his dilemma. It would be Man that would bring him to his knees; not he them. What was left of that conscience ate at his throat. That he would be allowed to return to Paradise would keep him from going all the way. God knew that. (As does every State governor with the responsibility for the welfare of his charges, whether Hades or the Penitentiary.) But he had. That conscience was at the point of extinguish; with no hope of redemption; and to go all the way with nothing else to lose was all he and us would have left.
‘Then I’m sorry for you and your world,’ he said. ‘For it’s your Angel that will harvest the whirlwind. Not I.’
Neither would I be on that statement. I could not be his judge, wouldn’t want to be. I tried to keep as much compassion out of my voice as I could, but I sensed something not right. Had God struck a bargain here? I played along bringing the conversation back to earth. ‘And I for you, Marco. We both started as Jesuits, didn’t we? Your reasoning and excuses, whatever they were, for what you have become, condemned you from day one; you must have known that a man with the sin that you’ve accrued could never return to the fold. God and Satan will be done with you, and I am sorry for you, Marco Giuseppi, for good Mankind has long washed its hands in its resolve to redress the balance! You’re a powerful man, but you fell not for Satan’s influence at the first, but earthly greed; and those are the two charlatans that have been pulling your strings and not the other way round.’
He came into my face space. It might have been the yellow glow from the lights caught his eye and gave him the look of a demon, I cannot be sure. He let loose a combination of expletives in a whisper, then turned and went and was still there at one and the same time leaving a sense of vacuum. I knew what it was.
Annie came over shaking her head. She’d seen something. Hamilton, was at her side. ‘Problem?’
I didn’t let on, I could still be wrong. ‘Don’t know, make my excuses, I have to leave.’ I deliberately raised my voice. ‘None of us can be sure of what the outcome will be, best to let the experts have their way.’
Annie nodded. But said nothing. She knew me, and played the game.
Director Johnson came over. I turned to him. Tried a last useless appeal for better judgement. ‘It might, will, cost a probable million souls, but you’ve a need to stop this. Now—’
* * *
Hamilton chased Charlie across the runway’s forecourt; trying to keep up said. ‘What’s going on, we’ve a right to know. You’re leaving us with all your known enemies?’
‘Don’t worry, you’re both perfectly safe, believe me.’
Hamilton gave him an old fashioned look.
Charlie smiled at him. ‘Would I tell you a lie?’
He hurried toward the waiting Sikorsky; and to Hamilton, its presence seemed pre-arranged.
The pilot seated on a collapsible chair, a closed laptop computer across his knees nodded with Charlie’s approach.
‘Presidential base one, straightest possible line, New York. And something fast when we arrive—’ Charlie said.
‘With a shamrock, I suppose. Got the code?’
Charlie nodded.
The pilot opened the aluminium laptop. Charlie passed him the plastic flash key and the pilot inserted it. He tapped some keys.
‘Pass phrase?’
‘The Virus Is Airborne.... Four caps—’
He tapped in the idiom, the screen colour changed, the computer bleeped, the pilot nodded, said. ‘That’ll do nicely, sir. Come on, can’t argue with the Seal of the President of the United States of America.’ Charlie was helped in the door, he went one way in the aircraft and the pilot the other. Seated. ‘Airborne, tower? Thank you.’ He turned to the co-pilot. ‘Rotating.’
The co-pilot turned to the rear and Charlie. ‘That’s what passes for proper procedure in this wasteland ... And do your seat belt up! We’ll dispense with ditching procedures—’
Charlie saluted a wave to Hamilton and in thirty seconds the rotors reached lift-off speed and the craft overcame gravity. Charlie shouted out above the din from within to Hamilton as the door was being pulled closed by a ground crewman.
‘JUST ONE MORE THING, HAM.’
‘WHAT?
‘DON’T BELIEVE ALL YOU SEE.’
‘What’d you mean? ... CHAR-L-I-E!’
* * *
Back in the hangar events were underway. A group of white coats were at their stations and Annie Carter was seated among some of her and Charlie’s people allocated by the FBI.
Frederik Spannocs seated in a tinted Plexiglas box. For this was AG-MX-960 the third generation of Magnet-Ometers built by Ocean International. The box Spannocs was seated had two massive coils sleeved in an oil-cooled system. Ionised air between them was capable of holding a being of flesh or matter. The magnetism it could produce was thousands of times greater than the earth’s gravitational field; could pull a plane from the sky; the same as previous Mks; but unlike them that failed on previous occasions, was capable of holding a spirit for longer, draining whatever energy an alien creature, or something from the other side, for long enough to download its brain into the large computer memory.
Unlike its predecessor — last used in the subway of Brooklyn Central — that couldn’t quite hold the entity on that occasion, this really was the business.
* * *
Hamilton had asked Annie Carter, shortly after seeing the Angel, of her thoughts. An article — Time, perhaps. Not her religious ones, her own. A written account? She had replie
d that it did depend on where your readers’ were coming from faith-wise, as to what she might be. A Roman Catholic slant would encompass a fair percentage of the earth’s population, but that it would not for the remainder.
Hamilton remarked that fundamentally all three religions had worked remarkably close, considering. Practically, if not in theory.
‘What like Christianity and Judaism? ... What of Islamism?’
Hamilton went on to say that he would be prepared to meet her half way. He would go with Revelations as an example of an Old Testament story within the New. A pre-cursor to the books of Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Zechariah.
She looked doubtful. ‘And Jesus?’
He had to think about that one. Mmmm. Legend, myth, and doom watch. Perhaps Revelation wasn’t such a good example.
He was a journalist who had always been interested in the other person’s point of view. ‘He was Jewish. I’ll run with him on that.’
A Jew running with a man that a billion people thought to be the Son of God. She smiled. A nuisance to the old order. Shopped to Pontius Pilate on a trumped up charge of being a malefactor. Undermining Caesar. Crime in particular? Well, um, ah, we don’t know exactly — but we can’t try him because putting people to death goes against our religion. Nothing pre-supposed there. No skin off my nose, says Pilate. King of the Jews? Caesar might be bothered, I don’t know. Wouldn’t have thought he’d particularly care. Whatever, we’ll try him if that’s what you want. Found guilty and crucified September 15, 0004. As was customary, Pilate stuck a notice on the woodwork with his crime: Jesus of Nazareth the King of the Jews.... That didn’t go down with the High Priests they wanted it to read: He says, I am the King of the Jews. Pilate says, You can’t have it both ways, that’s what he was convicted with, according to your laws,...
