by David Beers
The body Luke possessed had been born years earlier, but the soul of the man was conceived that day.
“WHY THAT SCENE?” the other asked as the television screen went black.
Christian didn’t turn around, but stared at the TV.
“How many times have you watched it?”
Ten. Christian knew the answer, though he didn’t say it. He didn’t know why his mind kept going back to it, nor why he enjoyed it, either.
“Shall we do another? Perhaps something a little different?”
Christian looked at the yellow tinged box in front of him, the screen still dark. Would it keep going, or was that it?
The television flickered on, and Christian went back inside.
LUKE THINKS of the priest as ‘the preacher man’. He knows at eleven years old how sacrilegious that is, and how severely his mother would punish him if she ever heard him say it aloud.
He won’t say it though—not where she, or anyone else, can hear it.
The preacher man isn’t old; Luke knows he’s 52, and also that he makes a lot of money from his parish. From Luke’s mother.
From Luke and his brother, as well.
Another focal point looms close by, and Luke feels this one. Some might blame it on the Mexican summer heat, but Luke knows better. Something is going to change, and very soon.
Every Sunday and Wednesday, Luke’s mother brings him and his brother to mass. Sometimes they go twice on Sunday, to the morning mass as well as the evening one.
Luke’s mother’s name is Maria Santiago. His brother’s is Mark. Neither of them know their father, and Maria never speaks of the man. The only father either boy needs is Father Marquez, also known as the preacher man.
It is time for Luke’s confession. He gives confession once every six months, his mother writing down the date and time with the fervor of someone who truly believes heaven can be achieved if they just work hard enough. Her boys will make it to heaven if it’s the last thing Maria Santiago ever does. Some mothers want their children to attend college, some to marry well. All Maria cares about is their eternal soul, for that is most important. Colleges and marriage certificates will burn when the end of time arrives.
Christian knows all this because his mind has recreated Luke’s childhood to the best of its ability. Christian finds it odd how similar Lucy Speckle and Luke’s mother were. Large differences existed, of course, but their belief in an afterlife dominated their lives.
Luke steps into the confessional booth, and he knows the moment has arrived. He will know this for the rest of his life, when those few seconds that define a person approach. When he encounters them, he will meet them with a ferocity similar to his mother’s … only Luke’s ideas on heaven will differ wildly as the years grow longer.
“Forgive me, father, for I have sinned,” Luke says once seated. The preacher man is on the other side of the booth, a thin wooden screen separating them. Murder hasn’t crossed Luke’s mind yet, and won’t for quite some time, but he does wonder why that screen is there. Is it to protect the preacher man? He smiles at that, given what the preacher man has done over the past decade. As far as Luke is concerned, the whole parish should have constant armed surveillance to keep the preacher man away.
“Tell me your sins, my son, and we will plead with God to forgive you.”
“I’ve thought evil thoughts, father.”
“About who?” the preacher man asks.
“You.”
A brief pause as the preacher man understands what Luke just said.
“What about me?” his voice is harder, and Luke knows all he needs to. The kindness that the man showed when Luke first sat down is only a facade. He knows as well as Luke what he’s doing to the parish, and perhaps the guilt weighs heavily on him. Luke has not said a word, yet suddenly the preacher man is defensive. Maybe it’s not guilt, though—maybe it’s fear of being discovered.
“Six months ago, I gave you five hundred pesos at confession. I found old history books in the library, Father, and the Catholic Church condemned that practice over a century ago.”
The silence which comes next is longer. The preacher man is quiet and Luke thinks it’s because he’s trying to hold down his anger. He could be determining a response, but Luke thinks this man is far too arrogant for that. He is wondering just what in the hell this kid thinks he’s doing, questioning a priest.
“Libraries also have books that say the Catholic Church is evil, that all our works should be judged based on the worst actions of the worst people to ever be members. Should you listen to those books as well?”
A shot of dopamine spreads across Luke’s brain at the verbal joust the priest gives.
“If what the books told me matched up with my own experience, yes, I suppose I would.”
“Then you are a fool, young man. I am God’s beacon and to have thoughts against me is to have thoughts against him. Do you have your money today?”
The moment is here and Luke knows it.
“No, Father, and you will receive no more money from my family. Not from my mother or my brother. Not from me. Any money that you receive will be through alms, not through purchasing our soul for God.”
“Purch—” the preacher man tries to get the word out, but nearly chokes on it and begins coughing. After a second, he gains control of himself. “Son, you go home to your mother and tell her to bring me a thousand pesos. Five hundred for your soul and five hundred for the blasphemy you’ve said in here today. If I don’t have a thousand pesos by the end of the week, I’ll go to her myself.”
“No more pesos, Father,” Luke says. He stands from the confessional booth and steps outside. He listens to the other side of the door, wanting to see if the preacher man will follow quickly or wait inside. Luke hears no movement and then walks through the empty cathedral.
He did well and he knows it. He spoke truth to power. Luke knows there is a God and that such a being would never receive money in exchange for someone’s soul. Such a being must be good, or how could He be God? The preacher man is not part of that God or His love. Luke spoke truth to power and the preacher man will leave his family alone now.
That’s what Luke thinks as he leaves the church. He would understand later that even though another important moment in his life had passed, and he had met it true, his youth had been full of naiveté.
THE SCREEN TURNED black again and Christian came forth from his trance.
He looked at the wall behind the television. The letter Luke had written about that confessional booth was spread large across it, in digital form.
Some parts of Luke’s life Christian had to piece together himself, knowing that those were less accurate than the ones Luke wrote about. This one, the one with the priest … Luke had thought it important enough to tell Christian himself.
DEAR CHRISTIAN,
I AM of the belief that you can fool me once, but that I’ll never be fooled again. As I’ve grown older, the chances of someone fooling me the first time have lessened considerably, but it is still there. The chances of someone fooling me a second time is essentially zero.
God fooled me once, but never again.
I used to love God. Do you believe that? Do you find it odd, that someone you consider a monster once held complete faith in the greatness of God—the genuine goodness of him? In fact, I used to capitalize words like ‘him’ when even discussing the creature.
Life disposed me of that notion.
And as these things normally go, a priest—a messenger of God—was the first to show me the truth.
My family was poor, Christian, though I’m sure you’ve figured that part out by now. We weren’t poor in the American sense, where the lowest among you walk around with phones connected to the Internet. We were poor in that my brother had one pair of pants all the way through the fourth grade. My mother hand washed them once a month in order to keep the material from growing too thin. By the time my brother reached fifth grade, you could practically see through
his pants.
That sort of poor is what I mean when I discuss my family’s finances.
And this priest, for the first 11 years of my life, took thousands of dollars a year from us in exchange for eternal life. We weren’t special in that regard; the preacher man (as I used to call him) did this with his entire flock. He really loved us all, I suppose, willing to take loaves of bread from the mouths of children in order to save their souls.
Once I understood the inherent evil in this act, I could abide by it no longer. I told the preacher man the same, but like most men with power, he refused to listen. He wanted his payment every six months and was going to get it. At least that’s what he thought at first.
There will be records of what happened to that preacher man.
My mother never paid another cent to him, but you might say my soul was damned afterward. Personally, I don’t think that’s true in the conventional sense of the phrase. My soul’s damnation came later (if it can be damned at all, which I reject the notion as God has no right to it in the first place, but I digress), though I would love to hear your thoughts on the matter.
Perhaps I will one day, Christian. Perhaps you can tell me where I went wrong, and how I ended up here, alone and intent on watching you burn.
It’s in your burning that you’ll reach your potential. You don’t see that yet. You think your freedom, your greatest moment, will come when you look down upon my dead body. I tell you now that is false. It’s in our pain when we grow, Christian. You must feel pain to finally grow into the beautiful person I know you are.
YOURS,
Luke Titan, MD, PhD, Special Agent for the Federal Bureau of Investigations, Top Ten of America’s Most Wanted
“AND HOW MANY times have you read that letter?” the other asked.
Christian stood from the chair. He didn’t know why, exactly, but he thought he should leave his mansion now. Something was … amiss back in the real world.
“You feel it, too?” the other asked. “I’ve been thinking something was wrong for a few minutes, but I didn’t want to interrupt.”
CHAPTER 8
C hristian opened his eyes. He didn’t wear a watch and didn’t need to check a clock to understand the time; his mind never lost track of it. He’d been in the mansion for two hours and Tommy should be in his office by now. He would have recognized what Christian was doing when he arrived and not disturbed him.
Why do you feel like something’s wrong? There’s nothing out of the ordinary happening.
He still didn’t know, but didn’t care either. Something wasn’t right here.
Christian got up from his desk and walked out of the room, turning into Tommy’s.
“Hey,” he said, “Is anything going on upstairs?”
“What do you mean?”
“How long ago did you get here?”
“An hour.”
Christian closed his eyes, still standing in the doorway.
“What are you doing?” Tommy asked.
Christian didn’t answer. He was trying to push out any distractions, wanting to focus on what his mind knew but couldn’t tell him. Why did he feel so nervous? What was he missing?
It was in the air. The smell.
Christian opened his eyes. “Simone. We’ve got to find Simone.”
SIMONE GOODFRIEND STEPPED from her car about five minutes before Christian came out of his mansion. The parking lot was growing congested, but she was still able to get her usual spot. Her attention wasn’t on parking when the world erupted in fire around her; she was focusing on Christian, hoping that the man had gotten some sleep the night before.
She worried a lot about Christian and Tommy, even if she showed it by berating them. She had to do it like that, though, or else she’d be run over. The FBI wasn’t inherently sexist, but crime fighting was a male profession—and Simone was okay with that. A feminist, she was not … at least not in the sense that all female shortcomings could be blamed on the patriarchy.
She knew a lot of what had transpired between her two partners and Luke Titan. She had never met Titan and didn’t want to, but if she did, she would be one of the first to fire a bullet at the bastard. He’d destroyed two men, two good men, and the world was short on those as far as Simone was concerned. At 33, she was unmarried, though in another life she might have seen herself being able to settle down with someone like Christian.
Not in this life, though.
The time for settling down had passed Christian by, probably around the time Titan plunged a knife into his face.
He needed more sleep and Tommy needed more therapy. Simone couldn’t help—or rather, she couldn’t help with everything they needed. She did what she could, though it wasn’t enough. It would never be enough, not as long as Titan lived.
Simone flashed her badge at the card reader and then reached for the front door.
It sounded like a thousand hands clapping at once behind her.
She turned around, her eyes wide, and she saw what made the noise.
Fifty white vans had surrounded the building. She didn’t know where they came from, having been deep inside her own mind during the walk from her car to the door, but they were here now. The ‘clap’ had been all of the doors opening at one time.
Other people stood in the parking lot. They had all stopped and were staring just like Simone.
The vans formed a semi-circle across the parking lot. Simone’s eyes followed them from one end to the other, and she briefly wondered if the other side of the building was the same.
A crazy thought, given how weird all of this was.
Men swarmed out of the vans, both the front doors and the back, which was when Simone realized exactly how weird the situation was—except weird no longer described it. Fucked was a better word.
The men wore heavy vests and each one held large, automatic rifles.
A small breath escaped Simone’s mouth.
“RUN!” she screamed, the first sound to break out across the parking lot.
The next was the sound of bullets exploding from barrels.
“WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT?” Tommy asked.
“Why isn’t there an alarm going off?”
“Christian, I’m not understanding.”
Christian still stood in Tommy’s office, though he knew he had already wasted too much time. The smell was growing stronger by the second.
“There’s gunpowder in the air. Do you smell it?”
Tommy sat rigidly still as always, but his eyes flicked away from Christian to the wall.
“Oh, God,” he whispered.
At that moment, an almost excruciatingly loud siren started booming from the walls. It wailed across the entire floor, interspersed with a calm woman’s voice.
“This is not a drill. Code nineteen. This is not a drill.”
“Simone,” Tommy said, his words almost completely lost in the noise around them. “She’s upstairs. She probably just got to work.”
Christian stopped speaking. He turned and ran, unholstering his weapon as he did. He had no idea what was happening, only that Luke was behind it.
He also knew that enough people had died because of he and Luke. Simone wouldn’t be another casualty.
SIMONE HADN’T DONE field work for the FBI, but she wasn’t an idiot either. She dove inside the building, hitting the floor with a bone creaking slam.
The windows exploded behind her, glass flying through the air as if a tornado roared in the parking lot.
Simone looked up, hair covering much of her face, and saw people still standing in front of her. They looked like deer in headlights, except instead of lights, they were staring at guns. Bullets tore into them and Simone watched as large red patches bloomed on blue and white shirts. She watched a skull explode just in front of her.
She knew him. His name was Frederick.
How many times had she talked to Frederick as she walked past security every morning?
She could hear nothing except for the sound of
miniature explosions ripping through the air behind her. Simone dropped her head to the floor and saw blood leaking across it. She followed its path to a fat woman who lay slumped halfway down on the floor—her upper body sitting upright against the security check-in station. Her leg below her right knee was missing, only white bone and red flesh jutting out like some kind of slaughtered animal.
Simone didn’t cry, and later she would find no pride in that fact—thinking she had only been in shock. She began to crawl. Her only thought to move away from the danger.
She didn’t know if people were running in behind her, only that bullets still flew overhead like tiny missiles. She had to get away from them. That was what mattered.
Screams, glass, and blood filled the air, as Simone crawled deeper into the building.
“THIS IS FUN!”
Charles could barely contain himself. The first three television stations showed live coverage of the attacks. The two way radios sat on the coffee table, each one filling the room with different voices. Charles didn’t care about them anymore. He was too interested in the televisions (halfway wondering when the last news channel would get with the program) and the carnage on them.
Aerial views looked down upon the parking lots, helicopters flying overhead. Each building looked relatively similar, only the surrounding landscape appearing different. White vans sat across either streets or parking lots, with the men inside having emptied out. They formed loose circles around the building, and were slowly tightening their nooses, moving in as they continued firing.
Charles could even see when the men ran out of ammunition, watching them drop their clip and load another one.
An explosion lit up the far left television, someone having thrown a grenade into the building. Fire and smoke rose at the bottom of the structure.
