The Revelator

by D W Bell

  At first John thought it was a plea for him to stop his work and spare the body he read in Xing’s eyes, then eye, but later it felt strangely as if his victim was pleading a halt to the proceedings so Smith may save his own soul.

  Once Xing was gagged the operators had both grabbed an arm and dragged the body into the cavernous interior of the luxury accommodations from the balcony. Freya teased the wall controls into shuttering the transcendent view with stabbing fingers; there would be no hopeful horizon in the suite turned tomb.

  Seeing all was in place she had excused herself with a sarcastic curtsy to the battered flesh on the floor, retired to the sumptuous master bath with its jetted marble tub and intimate harbor vista, slithered out of her sheath dress, and prepared a private bubble bath. Her part in this portion of the mission was complete.

  Although it had only been going on for a couple hours, it felt like days to John, and must have been an eternity to Xing. All was quiet now. For the first hour John had railed and thundered in his anger as an agent of divine retribution, describing and then exacting revenge for each individual picture from the mission file that burned in his memory. He was lost in his righteous fury, causing the first breaks and wounds to be the most savage. Then he began to sense that somehow his victim pitied him.

  The tears running down the bruised and bloodied cheeks of this immoral animal were from pain to be sure, but a fair measure seemed to stream from caring eyes, eyes that seemed to understand more of the situation than he the operator did and lamented his ignorance. Confused by the emotion he plucked out one of the eyes and crushed it in view of the other, but the momentum had shifted. The remainder of the mission was accomplished in detached, mechanical silence as John banished the ghost of doubt with the fortitude of duty. Smith would complete the mission. He was, after all, just following orders.

  ―

  Xing lay naked, spread-eagled in a pool of blood on the marble floor in the center of the suite. He looked like the pale stamen nestled within a crimson flower. His wasted body had turned a pale alabaster with blood loss; there was no need to bind him as none of his limbs articulated in the proper direction anymore. The gag was still in place, but the only sign of life was the shallow, wheezing respiration through a ruined nose aspirating bloody vapor.

  John began to set the stage for the final performance, moving a chair in front of a suitably blank section of wall (truly a shame to ruin one of these hand-embroidered armchairs, but Boudreaux had insisted on a bloody throne for the production values), and setting up the small tripod and camera for Freya’s little Q and A with the guest of honor.

  Burying himself in the minutiae of the tasks he didn’t register the first softly weeping electronic tones beginning to emanate from the pile of clothing discarded from the broken body. He turned to investigate as the sounds became noticeably incessant and grew in volume and insistent urgency. A phone.

  The screen was locked and required some sort of passcode or series of gestures to activate, John just stared at it dumbly. As the phone reached crescendo at the technological limits of its amplification and stridency a muffled, very unladylike curse shrieked from the sleeping quarters of the suite, and seconds later an exquisitely naked Freya burst through the double doors into the living room clad only in luxurious bath products and panic.

  “Bodyguard!” was all she could vocalize as she gestured frantically at the screeching smartphone in John’s hand. Jolted from his stupor he reacted instinctively, smashing the noisy thing on the ground and crushing it under his boot heel as if he had been holding a venomous snake in his hand. Both stood petrified and statuesque in the comical stillness of their last pose, listening intently for the crash of the main door being kicked open, one dripping soapy suds and one dripping thickening blood. The master of the suite and owner of the phone didn’t seem bothered at all.

  After a few frozen seconds they relaxed a little and looked at each other with uneasy sighs. Just maybe they had destroyed the phone in time as no assault team breach seemed to be forthcoming. Just maybe they could quickly complete the mission and extract quietly.

  All maybes were shortly made moot, not by the violent crash of the main door being battered down, but by the nearly silent whisper of the service door from the private kitchen just off the dining area swinging open.

  The fearsome Tie Quan stepped through the forgotten entrance, overrunning their unguarded flank and assessed the situation with a grim countenance. The naked Freya screamed into action attacking the intruder with a dazzling flurry of strikes, all effortlessly slipped by the emotionless man in the dark suit, who proceeded to land a resounding blow, perfectly placed between her exposed breasts, launching her bodily into the air and sending her sliding across the room in her now grimy soap bubbles upon crashing to the marble floor; with no more regard than he would have given swatting a buzzing fly.

  Removing his suit jacket and hanging it neatly on the back of a dining room chair, he unbuttoned his shirt cuffs, rolled his sleeves, and turned slowly to close with John; jaw set in his customary disappointed scowl.

  ―

  The fight ranged all over the room. To call it a fight was a kindness as it mostly consisted of John giving ground and desperately battling to deflect the impossibly heavy fists of Tie Quan’s relentless, dead-calm assault. John was painfully overmatched. When he finally did land a sloppy, glancing blow he almost wished he hadn’t.

  Tie Quan’s cold eyes suddenly caught fire at the audacity of the touch, and John was astonished at the increased power this slight insult added to his opponent’s onslaught. His sagging guard was handily battered down and a full force strike to the solar plexus sent him crumpling to the deck, soundly beaten. The impact not only stole his wind but felt as if it actually burned and scorched his lungs from the inside.

  The slightest of smiles twisted the corner of Tie Quan’s fierce visage as he unfolded the stunned and subjugated insurgent flat on the floor before him. He dragged John’s barely protesting body with some reverence to lie next to his expiring master in the center of the room, as if Smith was a funerary offering to the soon to be late, great man. He came down hard to kneel on John’s abdomen, grinding his knee into soft organs, extracting an anguished grunt as he reached for the sacrifice’s throat, gripping with a claw that felt like steel. He raised his other palm high, hard and heavy as iron, and focused his energy to split John’s skull.

 

  Instead of the wet, popping snap of his victim’s cracking brainpan, Tie Quan was surprised to hear the shattering of a large vase being broken over his own head. Momentarily stunned he turned instinctually to address this new threat, which exposed a gap in his nearly impenetrable defenses to the barely conscious John.

  Just lucid enough to recognize this all-or-nothing moment John reached for a blade he had been using to work on Xing and plunged it deep into Tie Quan’s body cavity, slipping between the lower ribs, venting the spleen of his caustic assailant.

  The previously impassive face was now overwhelmed with shock as the bodyguard turned back to regard what before had been his helpless prey. The stupor of his final moments broken, John began stabbing Tie Quan again and again in a wild, messy frenzy regaining strength vampirically each time the blade drank. When it was done the body slumped to the floor next to its master where their draining lifeblood intermingled and coagulated.

  John, fighting for air after his savage exertions, gazed in wonder at the avenging angel who stood nude above him resplendent in her still wet skin, the base of an exquisite Chinese vase in one hand and its disembodied neck in the other. The area between her perfect breasts where Tie Quan had struck was already going purple and in some spots turning black. Her voice was pained and raspy when she spoke, “Finish this so we can get out of here.”

  John nodded and struggled with help from Freya to his feet, body wracked with pain and difficult breathing. Together they were just able to get Xing upright and into the chair. He did not protest as he hovered at the brink o
f death, his body too ruined to register any further pain.

  They filmed the interview as directed, but the man had no answers. Xing just sat with his head lolling to the side; the only thing keeping the near corpse from slumping out of the chair was John’s grip on his shoulder. John stood behind the former skin merchant with his face hidden in a black balaclava and a knife in his hand.

  When the proper cue was given he ended the farce by grabbing the once immaculately coifed boyish hair, yanking it back to raise the chin and expose the throat, and slicing through artery, vein, muscle, tendon, and trachea all the way to the bone. Just as the cold edge first pressed against the blood-mottled skin Xing’s eyes fluttered open to meet John’s and he managed to gurgle as his life left, “You poor bastard…”

  “What about his penis? Weren’t you supposed to cut it off and put it in his mouth or something?” Freya had been unable to wriggle back into her sheath dress due to the excruciating pain of her chest bruising so she now wore Xing’s suit, at least the less bloody parts.

  “No, it’s enough,” John closed the lid of the remaining eye as he couldn’t stand it looking at him.

  They had no time to contemplate the target’s last words as they gathered the mission critical items and painfully ascended, dragging each other up the stairs to the helipad. Thankfully, the blacked out and muffled helicopter had been loitering just offshore and was able to swoop in and extract the wounded team without delay. The heady perfume of fresh death mingled with the heavy fog as it rolled in to cloak the Fragrant Harbour. Mission accomplished.

  Chapter 8

  “Doctor, welcome! Please come in.” Boudreaux greeted the client with a handshake and pat on the shoulder, “The trip out to our little office was pleasant I trust?”

  “Those country roads are a little bumpy, but other than that it was quite nice.” The new customer looked around the lavish office suite, “Never would expect such a palace by looking at that ugly old brick outside.”

  “Yes, one must keep up appearances, or a lack thereof in our case,” both men laughed a little courtesy laugh. “Besides, some of the existing equipment in this facility suits our professional development needs very well. I’m sure the entity that referred you to us gave some indication of our business, which of course requires discretion above all things. May I offer you coffee, tea, something stronger? It may be a bit early for some, but the sun is always over the yardarm in my corner of the empire.”

  “Scotch, please.” The doctor ambled around the room admiring the works of art gracing the walls and shelves.

  “The Lagavulin, I believe?” Boudreaux poured the drink without waiting for an answer and presented it to his guest with a beaming smile.

  “My personal prescription. Thank you, Mr. Boudreaux,” the men exchanged a silent toast and the host gestured to the opulent desk and its comfy chairs with a welcoming smile. Once seated and comfortable the two sipped their drinks in contemplation, each taking the measure of the man before him.

  “So, Doctor,” Boudreaux leaned forward and rested his forearms on the desk surface with his fingers interlaced in a practiced pose of attentiveness, “how may I be of service?”

  “I need some commercial nuisances eliminated.” The doc fired straight across the bow to begin the negotiations, Boudreaux was delighted.

  “That is within our realm of expertise. All of the services we offer solve problems for some and cause problems for others in one form or another. Perhaps you can expound upon your challenges and I may guide you in your selection with better understanding. I am intrigued.”

  “Since you know my preferred single malt I guess you know the line of work I’m in.” Boudreaux assented with a polite nod to allow his prospective client to continue, “Pharmaceuticals in the U.S. is a very competitive and cutthroat racket on its best day, but it gets even worse when outsiders that don’t understand the industry barge in and fuck up the natural order of things.”

  “Do tell,” Boudreaux sipped his drink at the same cadence as his guest and leaned back in his chair as he felt the doctor becoming more comfortable, as evidenced by his casual profanity.

  “Well, for example,” the doctor relaxed back into his chair to match his host, “the goddamn cannabis craze, medical marijuana. We kept it down for years and suddenly the hippies caught traction. I mean, why can’t they just wash OxyContin down with booze to feel good like the rest of the great unwashed?” he gulped his scotch as if to illustrate the point. “But that’s not even the bad part of it, these motherfuckers don’t respect the game. Any asshole who can remember to water their window box these days thinks they’re fucking Hippocrates, it’s ridiculous. If every jackoff with a garden starts cranking out remedies our margins go to shit.”

  “I see. Well, the medical marijuana movement is quite large, but I know a few names that would slow it down if they were missing. Did you have a list of specific individuals in mind, or are you looking for a slash-and-burn, salt the earth sort of thing?”

  “No,” the doctor looked downcast into his liquor, “that ship has sailed. I’ve made my peace with it. Cannabis will be legal everywhere in a year or two, but we’ve maintained a small hold on it through synthesizing and compounding, people will still want the convenience of pills. It’s the lesser known stuff we’re after now, amateur botanists and chemists working in their mom’s basement on the verge of the next breakthrough.”

  “Ah! I have it,” Boudreaux regarded the doctor with a droll smile, “you want us to use our vast intelligence network to find these young geniuses so you may recruit them to infiltrate the dark side of corporate medicine to rehabilitate it from the inside, brilliant!” Both men shared a dark chuckle.

  “Not quite. I would like your organization to find these kids messing around with alternative therapies and nip them in the bud. As a matter of fact, I have one in particular I’d like you to start with. He’s dating my daughter. Met her on a fucking computer game, however the hell you do that.” The doc tossed back his drink and gestured for another. His host was only too happy to oblige.

  ―

  Vine, short for his screen-name Vinestalker, didn’t research and create alternative therapies from medicinal plants in his mom’s basement, he lived there. He worked in the attic. The natural light from the single window was good for the plants, and him. That dank basement reeked of bong water and funk, so the bit of fresh air upstairs did him no harm either.

  In stark contrast to the den of iniquity under the house, which was all worn-out couches, bean bag chairs, and empty, residuey baggies, Vine’s attic office/research facility was downright clinical in its cleanliness. While the plants were allowed to sprout forth with reckless abandon under the grow lights, some of the climbing vines had already commandeered the roof rafters for their use, the shelves and baskets cradling them were organized in neat rows and meticulously labeled.

  The other half of the attic space was dedicated to his lab. A few rickety, old tables lined the walls, strewn with an odd confluence of sterile beakers, potsherds, and clean but worn gardening tools, the whole lot dusted with a fine layer of organic potting soil. His computer was set against the back wall.

  As his work was literally watching grass and other plants grow, Vine spent a lot of time at his machine playing MMORPGs. In the world of massively multi-player online role-playing games he was not a failed pharmaceutical lab technician living in his mother’s basement, he was the mighty druid Vinestalker: Guardian of Nature with the power to shapeshift and the ability to call upon Mother Nature herself to assist him with plant and beast to heal and protect.

  Healing through Nature was his talent focus in real life as well (or IRL as it was termed in-game). In addition to his game clients, mods to customize the user interfaces, and illegal hacks to cheat and win, Vine’s hard drive was chock-full with digital scans of archaic medical texts from ancient cultures all over the world, translated by Google. It was also brimming with pornography, but that was just for when the servers were down, a m
an has needs. Working in the veritable plant orgy that was his attic, with all the free pollinating and shameless budding, made him a little hot, to tell the truth. He loved plants, he was a little weird that way, so the porn helped to ease any curious urges for hot, inter-phyla action.

  He got plenty of species appropriate action, albeit mostly sexting and Skype; he fancied himself quite the digital Don Juan, a chat-screen Casanova if you will. Vine had even managed to lure one of his computer conquests down to his basement lair, but it felt weirdly unreal IRL for both, so they now exclusively pursued their prolific fornication digitally, manually pleasing each other through the digital interface, sticky fingers on sticky keyboards.

  Her cute little cough had caught his attention on voice chat in-game, and the natural herbal remedy he was able to prescribe for it stole her heart. He didn’t know until later that the beautiful flower he had been wooing online was none other than the barely legal seed of the CEO who had fired him from the pharmaceutical firm. This made their erotic indiscretions all the sweeter for him with each carnal limit they pushed, and she, like most all daughters of overbearing fathers, was a very dirty and receptive little girl.

  ―

  “You’re certainly proud of your services, Boudreaux. Are these figures for just the one liquidation or a package deal?” The doctor sat forward in his chair poring over the agreement Boudreaux had placed in front of him through his gold-rimmed reading glasses. “I above all people understand you get what you pay for, but this is a good deal steeper than I had anticipated. What do I get for all this?” he removed his glasses and sat back in the chair.