Messiahs

by Matt Rogers

  ‘Fuck,’ King muttered.

  He shoved past the guy on his aisle, who still hadn’t moved.

  ‘Hey,’ the guy started. ‘What the—?’

  King was already gone, out in the aisle, shouldering past the disciples who were in his way.

  Grayson made it to the exit. The back of his shirt sported an enormous sweat patch, a dark oval that encompassed most of the material. He stepped out into the late afternoon light and strode fast for one of the outbuildings, hoping to lose King in the maze.

  King made it past the first few disciples closest to the exit doors and broke into a light jog, like he had somewhere to be but wasn’t in a huge hurry to get there. It was a calculated risk, but Grayson hadn’t been willing to go there. He didn’t want to run at risk of arousing suspicion, so by the time he made it to one of the bunkhouses on the perimeter King was on his tail.

  Grayson ducked into the shadows.

  Behind the building, the sun melted into the prairie.

  The commune glowed orange.

  King ducked into the building after the young man who’d tried to kill him.

  62

  Slater found Alexis and Violetta out the front of the church, amidst the few dozen disciples still milling around in the shadow of the building.

  Aware of keen ears all around them, Alexis made it seem nonchalant when she asked, ‘Where’s your friend?’

  Slater scanned the commune, looking for any sign of King.

  He came up empty-handed.

  He tried not to sound overly concerned. ‘I don’t know.’

  Violetta said, ‘What’s his name again?’

  It meant nothing, but it added to the believability that they’d only met once in a bar.

  Slater turned to her. ‘Jason.’

  He masked the worry in his throat.

  63

  Damp with stale sweat, Grayson shouldered a door open and hurried through into one of the rooms, guaranteed to be empty.

  Its occupants would still be milling outside the church, and there was no reason for them to return to their quarters before finalising their daily tasks.

  King saw the man go in and took a deep breath.

  Subdue, he told himself. Don’t overreact.

  He ran down the hallway.

  Subdue.

  The door had swung back closed, so he pushed it open again, refusing to allow Grayson a moment to compose himself.

  Subdue.

  Grayson had another knife. It must have been hidden under his mattress, or tucked into his meagre belongings, because he’d only been in the room for a few seconds. In that time he’d managed to retrieve the backup weapon — a crude cutlery knife that would do the job regardless — and he swung it at King with desperate abandon.

  All notion of minimising the damage fell aside.

  King’s life was on the line.

  He threw himself back into the door frame and narrowly missed the blade hacking into his face. The only light in the room came from a tiny window beside the bunks, and the metal glinted in the lowlight. King rebounded off the doorway and snatched hold of Grayson’s knife hand. The other arm was useless, hanging limp by his side, the wrist broken.

  King tried to simply smash the intact limb into the bunk frame and spill the knife from his grip.

  Grayson ripped his hand free with surprising strength.

  Inhuman strength.

  Bodhi was firing all his nerve endings, tunnelling his focus. He was tapping into the primal survival instinct, and he used it to break free from King’s hold.

  He geared up for another wild slash.

  Enough, King thought.

  He backed up a step, putting himself just out of range of another swing, and pulled Grayson’s first switchblade from his own pocket.

  He flicked it open.

  Grayson lunged.

  Eyes wide, face oily, teeth clenched together.

  He came down with the knife from ceiling to floor, an effective approach to a two hundred and twenty pound target in a confined space. There was little chance he’d miss.

  King dropped to the floor, as if cowering away from the stabbing attempt, which he effectively was. The key to survival in life-or-death situations is abandoning your ego. It might look exciting to try to parry the lunge with his forearms, but there was a significant chance he’d lose a hand in the process.

  Grayson’s knife slashed through the air inches above King’s hunched back.

  Missed by next to nothing.

  But it doesn’t matter if it’s an inch or a mile.

  A miss is a miss.

  King rolled and swept Grayson’s legs out by slamming his shin into the delicate ankle joint, sending the disciple spilling to the floorboards. The man landed on his back and came close to knocking himself out by lashing the back of his skull against the hard floor, but he stayed lucid. He scrambled, coming up into a sitting position for another slash of the—

  King shoved the switchblade into the left side of his chest, tearing through into his heart.

  Grayson’s pupils swelled to a crescendo and he broke a couple of teeth from their gums by clenching them in his death throes.

  King left the knife in his chest to prevent massive blood loss. That way, the room would avoid the crimson pools of a crime scene. King kept pressure on the stab wound, his hand wrapped around the hilt, and looked into Grayson’s eyes as the man died.

  Under his breath, he muttered, ‘What is it about this shit that makes them kamikazes?’

  He wasn’t expecting a response.

  Grayson sucked in a deep, rattling breath, then blood ran out through his teeth as he said, ‘Because dying doesn’t matter when you feel like this.’

  He smiled as he slipped away.

  64

  The sun was close to touching the horizon as King went into overdrive.

  There might be witnesses around within seconds, so he wasted no time. He burst into action, slipping Grayson’s unblemished kitchen knife under the mattress of the lower bunk, then returning pressure to the switchblade in his heart.

  He got his hands under the body’s armpits.

  Grayson was close to two hundred pounds, but it was light work for now.

  Adrenaline was a potent stimulant.

  King steeled himself and dragged the corpse out into the hallway. He looked left, then right. The door facing the prairie was closed tight. An orange glow spilled through the window set above the door handle. The door facing the commune was still half-open from where Grayson and then King had thrust it open. King could see a sliver of the central buildings, and a decent chunk of the open space between them, but so far no one had populated it. All it would take was a single disciple stumbling onto the scene and King’s cover would be shattered.

  The vein in his neck throbbed double-time as he dragged Grayson down the hall.

  He found a door set between two of the rooms and tried it, hoping it was unlocked.

  It swung open.

  Supply closet.

  There was barely enough space for the body, and someone would find it eventually, but it was the best on a list of bad options.

  He dumped Grayson beside a large mop in a five gallon bucket of dirty sudsy water. The bucket hadn’t been emptied yet from the day’s labour, and someone would do that eventually.

  Leaving the building with the dead man was out of the question. The bunkhouse was positioned on flat ground, distanced from its surrounding buildings, and any exit he took would expose them to anyone on this side of the commune. They’d be seen. There was no way around it. And the rest of the rooms were bedrooms and bathrooms, which would be populated well before someone checked the supply closet.

  The corpse was a ticking time bomb.

  King looked down into Grayson’s wide eyes, unseeing and unfocused.

  Who put you up to this?

  Dane?

  Maeve?

  Elias?

  Or any of the other two hundred followers, potentially envious of the ne
wcomers, jealous of the attention they were receiving despite the lack of work they’d put in on the grounds.

  He had endless questions, and zero answers.

  So he forgot about it. What he couldn’t control didn’t matter. Right now all he could do was stay alive, regroup with Slater, Violetta, and Alexis, and figure out when to strike.

  They’d have to do it fast.

  Aim to overwhelm.

  King elected to go find the others and swung the supply closet door closed, sealing Grayson into darkness.

  Revealing the rest of the hallway leading out to the commune.

  There wasn’t as much light anymore.

  King looked over.

  Dane Riordan filled the corridor.

  65

  King’s heart jolted but he didn’t outwardly react.

  Without missing a beat, he ran through a mental image of what he’d seen in the supply closet, focused on what wasn’t there, and said, ‘Looking for a dustpan and brush. You know where I can find them?’

  Dane watched him closely.

  Scouring for any hint of deception.

  King wasn’t fazed.

  He couldn’t allow himself to be.

  Dane said, ‘They should be in that closet.’

  Were they there? King thought. Did I miss them?

  He stuck to his guns. Retreat was surrender. Surrender was death.

  King said, ‘I looked. They’re not there.’

  ‘Check again.’

  King rolled his eyes and reached for the handle.

  Dane smirked. ‘I’m messing with you. You’re off the clock.’

  ’The workday’s not over.’

  ‘You’re right,’ Dane said. ‘But you’re still off the clock. You’ve earned it.’

  King nodded his satisfaction. ‘Appreciate it. What’s planned for tonight?’

  ‘I’ve got dinner with your friend,’ Dane said. ‘That should be interesting. After that, we’ll talk business.’

  ‘Not before?’

  ‘You’re in the clear. You’re the man for the job. Will … he’s a wild card. I want to sort him out before I move ahead.’

  ‘What’s Maeve’s opinion?’

  ‘Why?’

  King held up his palms in an attempt to disarm. ‘That wasn’t supposed to be an insult. I’ve insulted you enough and you’ve held strong. In my book that makes you an ally. I hope you understand it was never personal. I was just … wondering if she had input in this decision.’

  ‘No,’ Dane answered bluntly. ‘Not for this. She’s in charge of the narrative, I’m in charge of protecting us.’

  ‘“The narrative”?’

  Dane winked. ‘Our little secret. Don’t spoil it for your friend. I’m going to indoctrinate him tonight.’

  King found that hard to believe.

  Slater wouldn’t buy the philosophy of Mother Libertas for a second.

  Dane didn’t move, like he was calmly playing the waiting game, like he knew…

  King didn’t have a choice.

  To save face, he had to act like he didn’t have a care in the world.

  He walked out of the building, past Dane, leaving the man alone in the bunkhouse.

  66

  Dane waited until King was out of sight, then sauntered down the corridor.

  He came to the supply closet and paused in front of it.

  Reached out, twisted the handle, and slowly opened the door.

  Grayson’s blank glassy eyes stared up at him. His mouth was agape, and a trickle of blood ran from the corner. A switchblade was shoved up to the hilt into the left side of his chest. It would have killed him in seconds, plunging straight into his heart.

  What the fuck? Dane thought.

  The kid was new. They’d gone to great lengths to make sure he assimilated well. His nosy sister had been making too much noise in Gillette, so they’d sent Brandon and Addison to silence her. Grayson had been a disciple with strong potential, easily exploitable, buying into every word that came out of Maeve’s mouth.

  And now this.

  Why?

  Dane realised raising the alarm would be unwise. He’d already harboured suspicions about the newcomers, but he hadn’t had the chance to pry deeply yet. Tonight was his chance. Isolate Will, the more unhinged of the pair, and get the truth out of him. That wouldn’t happen if he turned this into a war. There were questions that still needed answering — namely, how had Jason silently killed this man a minute after the service had concluded? — and if they were experienced combatants, he didn’t want to lose a dozen disciples to the pair before the sheer numbers overwhelmed them. Casualties weren’t something they could afford right now. Each man and woman here was an important building block of the foundation.

  Dane stared at the body a moment longer.

  This was something different. This was a new level of skill. Something he hadn’t seen in the flesh before. Whoever had trained Jason … they’d been undeniably brilliant.

  And who has those sorts of resources?

  He had a call to make.

  So for now…

  Sleep well, Grayson.

  Dane closed the door on the corpse.

  67

  Dane found Maeve in the sacristy behind the church’s altar.

  It was the same room she’d converted Grayson in only a week earlier. That felt like an eternity ago. Dane realised his mistake: expanding too quickly. They’d done zero proper background research on the new arrivals, their attention consumed by how perfectly Jason and Will fit the description of who they needed.

  But perhaps that’s what the newcomers had been going for all along.

  Maeve looked up from her desk. ‘What is it?’

  Dane expunged all memory of the body in the supply closet from his mind, then scolded himself for his idiocy.

  She can’t read your mind.

  But she was looking at him with a dark glint in her eye.

  ‘What is it, baby?’

  He said, ‘I’m going to test Will. At dinner.’

  She raised an eyebrow. ‘You think that’s the way to go?’

  ‘He’s unstable, unhinged, angry at everyone. But any obstacle can become an advantage. It’s all a matter of the right perspective. We’re chipping away at Jason, and he’s already close to being on board, but it’s a smooth slope for him. His head’s screwed on right. With Will, it’s going to be zero to a hundred. I want to turn it up to a hundred.’

  Maeve nodded. ‘Very well.’

  ‘And I’m going to call Connor.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘I need a deeper background check on them before we trust them fully.’

  ‘A background check from Connor?’ Maeve said, perplexed. She put her elbows on the desk so she could lean forward and stare into his eyes. ‘What do you know that I don’t?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘You’re lying.’

  ‘I’m not,’ he insisted. ‘But I get that vibe from them. You read the report that came back from the hospital. You saw what they did to those boys in Gillette. That’s not normal. Ordinary veterans don’t do that. I think they’re a cut above.’

  ‘There’s a big gap between soldiers and Connor’s world,’ Maeve said. ‘They’d have to be several cuts above.’

  Dane remembered the knife buried in Grayson’s chest, the smile on the corpse’s face. ‘I think they are.’

  Maeve shrugged. ‘Suit yourself. But I trust my intuition. I’m telling you they’re clean.’

  ‘How do you know?’

  ‘I sense it in the earth. Mother speaks to me.’

  He looked at her.

  She was dead serious.

  And she was ready to put up a fight if he mocked her for it.

  He walked out with his stomach sinking.

  She’s in deep now, he thought.

  A terrifying thought struck him.

  You’re on your own.

  Out in the church now, he stood at the altar so he could overlook the dozens of empty pe
ws. Every footstep echoed in the colossal space. It had taken two laborious years and thousands of hours of manual labour to build. They’d had to swear the building team to secrecy, and then killed a couple of them at the end anyway because they didn’t trust they’d keep their mouths shut.

  But Maeve had stressed its importance.

  ‘We need it,’ she’d said. ‘Every religion relies on monuments that inspire awe. We’re the same. It’ll help the image.’

  He’d said, ‘We’re going to be a religion?’

  Her eyes had widened, alive with excitement. ‘Baby, you have no idea how big this is going to get.’

  Back then she’d known the Mother Libertas rhetoric was made-up nonsense.

  Nowadays, the lines were blurring.

  He missed the old times. The simple times.

  He fished out his sat phone and called Connor.

  The young man took a few rings to pick up. ‘Hey. Sorry.’

  ‘No problem,’ Dane said. ‘Work got you on your toes?’

  ‘It’s crazy right now. More ops than ever that need intel.’

  Dane said, ‘I’m going to provide you with the exact physical description of two men. I believe they might have been involved in your world, once upon a time. I want you to scour the system for them.’

  ‘I can’t do that without triggering alerts.’

  ‘Then find a way around,’ Dane said. ‘I hope you understand what’s on the line here.’

  Connor inhaled.

  Dane knew the man would do anything to follow through.

  A monthly supply of Bodhi hung in the balance.

  68

  Slater was en route to the bathroom when King came out of nowhere, grabbed him by the wrist, and hauled him aside.

  They moved silently through the building, went out the back door, and surveyed the landscape again.

  The sun was halfway hidden below the prairie.

  The grasslands glowed gold.

  Slater lowered his voice. ‘What?’

  ‘I killed a guy.’