by James Frey
The woman gulps. “I thought I heard you say something about the ‘new world.’”
The PA chimes and the seat belts click off. People stand and gather their things. A baby several rows forward begins to cry. One on the other side of the plane lets out a peal of laughter.
Hilal smiles. “I didn’t realize I’d said anything. But yes, I suppose I did mention the ‘new world,’ my sister.”
“You don’t actually believe it, do you?” she asks breathlessly.
“Believe what?”
“This thing about Abaddon?”
Hilal bristles at the ancient word. “I’m sorry. What thing about Abaddon?”
He knows the word well. In the Tanakh, Abaddon is a reference to hell. But for the life of him Hilal cannot wrap his head around why this woman is saying it now.
Because in the Aksumite line, Abaddon is yet another name for Ea.
“Haven’t you been watching the news?”
“No. I’ve . . . I’ve been traveling for the last twenty-four hours. And . . . well . . . my burns are fresh. The . . . accident that caused them was not much more than a week ago.”
“I can tell.”
Hilal sees that she wants to ask what happened. Before she can, he says, “They used to say I was beautiful.” He snorts. There is a smell like smoke in his nostrils. “I always thought it was a strange thing to a call a boy—beautiful.”
The woman doesn’t know what to say. She thinks maybe Hilal is a little crazy.
“Tell me more about Abaddon, if you don’t mind,” Hilal says.
The woman shrugs. If he is crazy, he is at least polite. “It’s all over the news. This email leaked from some guy at NASA. He was writing his sister in Massachusetts, warning her that she had like eighty days to get the hell out of there or her kids and her family would all die.”
Hilal’s interest is piqued. “What would kill them?”
“Abaddon. That’s what the NASA dude called it, anyway. Some kind of humongous asteroid on a crash course for Earth. He said it could . . . he said it could kill a lot of people. Like a real lot. Change everything.”
“A new world,” Hilal mutters.
“Yeah, that. But you know, most people think it’s a hoax. Least they want to think it’s a hoax.” She pauses. A heavyset man standing in the aisle shoots her a disapproving look. She lowers her voice. “Still, others are starting to worry because no one’s denied it yet—and there were the meteors that killed all those people, and that crazy thing at Stonehenge that no one knows what happened. And that freaky guy on the TV talking about some kind of game.”
“Yes. That I do know about.”
“Shit’s screwed up, you know? This Abaddon email—everyone’s read it and no politician has said one word about it. Not one. That’s messed up, right?”
“Yes,” Hilal says thoughtfully.
The fat man in the aisle shakes his head, dismisses this conspiracy talk, walks forward.
Hilal could take his turn and stand and say good-bye to the young woman and leave as well. He probably should.
But instead he looks at her seriously.
He leans forward. His eyes blink. One blue. One red.
“Listen to me. What this NASA email says is true. It is true. I can’t say how I know this—and if I told you, you would laugh—but Abaddon is real. And you should prepare. Prepare for this new world that’s coming.”
The woman pulls away and gives Hilal a wild look. “Oh, no. I don’t need to hear that shit.” She waves a finger in the air and stands, pushing her way awkwardly past Hilal’s knees. Her purse hits him on the shoulder. It stings horribly, but he doesn’t call out. “I don’t need to hear that shit at all,” she insists.
Hilal understands: the truth hurts.
The young woman hustles into the middle of the plane and exits as quickly as she can.
Hilal sits in his seat as the other passengers leave the plane, again lost in thought. Whatever happens with the Abaddon news, whether the world decides to believe it or not, it doesn’t matter. Endgame is here, and the world is already changing.
He gets out the device from the ark. Even though it is an ancient artifact of Maker origin, no one gives it a second look. It’s just another screen in a world full of screens.
He holds it. It glows to life. He points it toward the city of Las Vegas, expecting to see the caduceus.
And he does.
But his eyes widen and he breathes in sharply.
For now that he is closer to his quarry, the sign is brighter and bigger.
And most alarmingly, it is doubled. There are two. Two signs of the devil, both right here in Las Vegas.
What could it mean?
A flight attendant steps next to him and says, “Sir, will you be needing a wheelchair?”
The question shakes Hilal from his thoughts. “Excuse me?”
The flight attendant indicates that the plane is empty. “Will you need a wheelchair?”
Hilal slips the device into his shirt. “No, ma’am. Sorry.”
He stands and steps into the aisle. Reaches into the overhead compartment and removes a small backpack and two canes with snake heads for handles.
The Rod of Aaron. The Rod of Moses.
The weapons that will destroy the Corrupter, if he can get close enough to use them.
He walks slowly down the aisle. The captain is waiting at the cockpit door.
“Have a nice day, sir.”
“You too, Captain,” Hilal says.
Off the plane, up the Jetway, into the terminal.
A terminal unlike one he has ever seen.
Not because it is designed differently than your average American airport, or because he can hear the bell-like music of a slot machine signing in the distance, but because it is eerily still.
It is late afternoon and the terminal is filled with people, only all of them are frozen, as if zapped by some kind of ice ray. None walk to their gates, none talk on their phones, none chase after children.
They all stand, necks craned, watching the televisions mounted at intervals around the gates.
On the television is the president of the United States. She sits at her big desk in the Oval Office. Her face is dour, her voice strained.
It quavers as she says, “My fellow Americans, and my fellow citizens of Earth, Abaddon is real.”
Audible gasps ricochet around the hall. One person wails.
The president continues to speak, but Hilal doesn’t need to listen.
This is Endgame.
He has to find Ea.
He takes his canes, and his resolve, and he carries on.
He is the only person moving through the terminal.
The only person moving through this frozen, terrified, new world.
Eighty-nine heads of state give coordinated televised speeches announcing Abaddon. Eighty-nine heads of state solemnly tell their people that they cannot say with 100 percent certainty that the asteroid will strike Earth, but that it is likely. They don’t know where it will strike, but if it does, it will affect the lives of every single organism on the planet. They say it will not be the end of the world, but the end of the world as we know it. They say it will mark the beginning of a new era.
An unprecedented era in human history.
“Today, we are no longer Americans or Europeans, Asians or Africans, Eastern or Western, Northern or Southern,” the US president says toward the end of her speech, her sentiments echoed across the world by each of the other leaders. “We are no longer Christians or Jews, Muslims or Hindus, Shiites or Sunnis, believers or nonbelievers. We are no longer Indians or Pakistanis, Israelis or Palestinians, Russians or Chechens, North Koreans or South Koreans. We are no longer terrorists or freedom fighters or liberators or jihadis. We are no longer communist or democratic or authoritarian or theocratic. We are not scholars or priests or politicians or soldiers or teachers or students or Democrats or Republicans. Today, we are all simply the people of Earth. Today, we are reminded that we are the most
remarkable species on the most remarkable planet. Today, every point of contention, every grudge, every single one of our differences has been washed clean away. We are the same. A people that can and will unite to meet the challenges of an uncertain and unexpected future. We are the same. And we will have to depend on our good graces, our charity, our love—and our humanity—if we have a chance of surviving this possible calamity with any measure of success. We are the same, my friends. May God bless each and every one of you. And may God bless this planet Earth.”
ALL PLAYERS
America. Germany. India. Japan.
Sarah and Jago and Renzo watch the president’s address from aboard Renzo’s Cessna Citation CJ4. Both Renzo and Sarah were ecstatic to see Jago on the old tarmac back in Lincolnshire, and Jago made sure to smooth over their differences—or at least set them aside. They took off as soon as Jago explained that he’d dived under the train and hid in a large drain under the tracks until the coast was clear. He was not mad at Sarah for leaving him, and told Renzo he shouldn’t be mad at Sarah either. They were just Playing, and both had survived the day. They stopped for a day and a night in Halifax, Nova Scotia, to refuel. And now, despite Renzo’s protests that it’s childish and unsafe, they’re heading to a secret Cahokian compound in eastern Nebraska to meet Sarah’s family.
She needs to see her parents, explain to them what she did to Christopher, confess what happened when she got Earth Key, and try to explain her mental state. Maybe they can calm her brain, maybe there’s one last lesson they can impart to their Player. Teach her how to deal, smooth out her anxieties, bring her back to her senses.
And while she’s home, Sarah wants to visit Tate’s grave. Her brother. Another casualty of Endgame.
She watches the president’s speech with silent tears. When it’s over, she excuses herself to the lavatory to cry more.
The president’s words do not touch Jago or Renzo. They’re ready for Abaddon, and for whatever comes after.
“You need to take Earth Key and ditch her, my Player,” Renzo whispers as soon as the bathroom door closes.
Jago strokes the scar on his neck. A habit. He’s thinking.
“I can’t.”
“You must. Time is of the essence. The world will not be an easy place soon. We need to go to our ancestral home. To your home. We need to take Earth Key to Aucapoma Huayna and receive her wisdom.”
“Renzo, you aren’t listening to me.”
“I always listen to my Player.”
“Cut this obsequious shit. I know you’re right, but I won’t leave her. And I won’t leave you either. I’m going to need your help, not your doubt—do you understand?”
Renzo shifts in his seat. Looks Jago in the eye. Chin up. Man to man. He nods. “Yes. I understand, Jago.”
“Good. Now. You’re right that we can’t waste any more time. But Sarah can’t either. Something’s wrong with her, and I don’t think going to her family will help. She’s too fragile. Seeing them will only break her up more.”
Renzo stabs his finger at the back of the plane. “Maybe you take her to see a psychiatrist, huh? We got time for that?”
Jago raises his hand. Renzo is silent. “We will reroute the plane for Peru, but we won’t tell her, understand?”
Renzo lowers his hand. Gets his emotions under control. “We’ll have to refuel again.”
“I know. We can stop in Valle Hermoso, in Mexico. Maria Reyes Santos Izil is still there. She’ll top us off. Feed us. Let us sleep in comfort and safety.”
Sarah angrily pounds something in the lavatory. The wall. The sink. They hear her sobbing.
Jago looks at the door. Sarah’s one of the strongest people he’s ever met, and yet one of the most vulnerable too. He strokes his scar some more.
Renzo gives him a questioning look. “She’s a killer, Jago. I saw that firsthand in England. But she is no Player. Not anymore.”
“Enough, Renzo. Leave her to me,” Jago says with a twang of bitterness. “Prepare the nav computer and leave her to me.”
Aisling Kopp watches from the backseat of the armored CTS as it crosses the George Washington Bridge. Greg Jordan sits next to her, McCloskey is in the front passenger seat, Marrs drives.
“Good speech,” Marrs says.
McCloskey snickers. “Sure, but it won’t count for anything. Some real Hobbesian shit’s about to go down.”
Aisling agrees with McCloskey. Jordan and Marrs do too. None of them say so.
Alice Ulapala sits on the bed in her hotel room in Berlin and watches the German chancellor give her speech. Alice speaks German (and French and Latin and Malay and Dutch and middling Chinese, not to mention half a dozen Aboriginal dialects), so she has no trouble understanding. The speech starts at 10 in the evening. It lasts 17 minutes. The chancellor cries at the end. During the broadcast Alice runs a small sharpening stone across the edge of one of her boomerangs.
Over and over.
Back and forth.
Over and over.
“Well, that’ll make things interesting.”
Maccabee and Ekaterina watch a live stream of the Polish president. They say nothing throughout. Just stare, as rapt as every other person in the world. “I’m glad we had that bottle of Krug when we had the chance,” Maccabee says several minutes after the speech ends.
“Me too.” Ekaterina pauses. They revived Baitsakhan earlier in the day, but he was still groggy and bedridden. “Should we inform your friend what’s happened?”
“No,” Maccabee replies, looking at the closed door behind which the Donghu rests. “Baitsakhan doesn’t care about this kind of thing. I’m not sure he knows that other people even exist as, you know, people.”
Shari and Jamal watch the Indian prime minister give her speech from their simple room in the mountainous Harappan compound, , in the Valley of Eternal Life. If there is one place in the world that can survive an asteroid impact—provided it isn’t a direct hit—it is .
Little Alice also watches. While she’s only two, she seems to grasp the gravity of the prime minister’s words.
So young, so knowing, so understanding. So intelligent, Shari thinks. And the thought chills her to her bones.
“This is about my dream, isn’t it, Mama?” Little Alice says partway through the speech.
You mean your nightmare, Shari thinks before she says, “Yes, meri jaan.” She squeezes Jamal’s hand.
“Will Abaddon hurt us, Mama?”
“No, meri jaan. It will happen far from here.”
“Your mother and I—your whole family—are here to make sure that none of us get hurt, my little dove,” Jamal says.
“Okay, Papa.”
The speech goes on. Shari is racked by fear, but not fear of Abaddon. The Makers will see that it hits as far from Sky Key as possible.
For if Little Alice dies, then Endgame dies too.
They are safe for now.
Until the others come, they are safe.
An is in Japan, in Chiyoko’s hometown. He watches an illegal stream of the Chinese president on a brand-new laptop. He squats on the floor, looking more like a day laborer on a smoke break than a trained killer. He wears nothing but a pair of black underwear and Chiyoko Takeda’s analog wristwatch.
His head is no longer bandaged. A star-shaped cluster of stitches holds his skin in place where he was shot. His ribs curve around his sides like a birdcage. His hand is sore where he dislocated his thumb, the skin purple and blue. He has another bruise shaped like a mango on his right thigh. He doesn’t remember how he got that one, but doesn’t care.
His eyes are narrow and dark as they watch the bespectacled leader in his pressed suit and red Communist Party tie talk about the impending end of days.
The words do not shock An, or make him sad or nervous or terrified. A giant asteroid is what he expected. He also expected to enjoy this moment. He fantasized about it often during the grim years of his training, the day when everyone’s fate would become as bleak as his own, when they�
�d all look death in the face.
If only he had not met Chiyoko.
If only he had not . . . fallen in love.
Absurd. He. The Shang. Who was incapable of love.
No.
Instead of finding joy in the president’s words, he finds anger.
For An, anger is his beating heart. A constant rhythm. But this anger is different. This anger is new and more intense. More focused. More rooted in the love that he’s lost, but that he’ll never be able to recover. It’s an anger tinged with longing.
For her.
And while he can’t get her back, he has a plan. It’s unorthodox, but it’s right. He knows it is. He knows Chiyoko would think it’s right too. He hopes that her line agrees. That they will see the wisdom—the justice—in his plan.
You play for death. I play for life.
Her words.
Chiyoko.
An works something in his hands as he watches the end of the speech. A black braid of silken hair, half an inch thick, a little more than a foot long. In the middle it broadens into a V-shaped net the size of a small hand, woven like a spider’s web. Attached to the web are two pale flaps of skin the size of a quarter, and two shriveling human ears.
He holds it up. It is nearly done.
A necklace made of the pilfered remnants of his beloved. Her hair. Her flesh.
He watches the speech.
The Chinese leader, like every leader in the world that day, ends with the same words:
“We are all the same.”
The picture fades to black.
An shuts the laptop with a muted clap. He chews a piece of dry skin off his lip and spits it on the floor.
“No,” he says in Mandarin. He stifles a barely perceptible shiverBLINK. “You are wrong. We are not all the same. Not even close.”
viii
ALICE ULAPALA, MACCABEE ADLAI, EKATERINA ADLAI
Eastern Terminus of Heldburger Straße, Lichtenberg, Berlin, Germany
Alice sits under a neglected linden tree, her back against the trunk, her knees tucked to her chest. She peers through a small but powerful set of binoculars, scanning the area. She whistles “Waltzing Matilda” as her toes tap the time in plastic flip-flops.
