by Greg Ness
Bruce sat beside the lake. The sun’s beams spread around him but the shade-providing tree protected him. The lake had become a favorite spot of his. A spot of reflection. A spot of peace.
Bruce’s eyelids slid down and covered his eyes. Blackness. He imagined Elpis sitting next to him, under the shade of the tree. He thought of her curly blonde hair blowing in the wind as she looked out at the lake with him. All he had to do was focus. Focus.
“Hey Elpis,” Bruce muttered. When he opened his eyes, he saw her smiling face sitting next to him.
“Hi Bruce,” she responded. “What happened?”
Bruce’s spirit visibly fell, “I convinced him. Stephen told me he wasn’t going to say a word. Everything was great. And then news of the ILD came out… I don’t know what happened…”
Elpis wrapped her arm around Bruce. “You did your best.”
Bruce gazed into her blue eyes. “So what now?”
Elpis sighed. She didn’t like what Bruce was going to have to do. “You’re going to have to join them. You’re going to have to infiltrate them. And then… kill all of them.” Elpis slipped a folded piece of paper to Bruce. When he unfolded it, he saw nothing but gibberish. The letters formed words he couldn’t read.
“It’s Latin,” Elpis said, “You’re going to have to memorize it. The leader will let you in if you recite that and then…” Elpis’s eyes filled with pity. She didn’t want it to come to this. But there was no other choice. “…then you’ll have to kill one of them to take his place.”
Bruce was befuddled. “What are you talking about?”
“Do you remember in the forest? When we met? They were there the night before.”
“So was I,” Bruce said.
Elpis’s brows furrowed. “Is that why he chose you and Stephen?” she mumbled almost inaudibly.
“Huh?”
“An old… friend… of mine, his name is Moros. He’s setting everything up. He wants to destroy the planet. Destroy humanity. He’s using everybody, including Stephen, to get it done. And the group you have to join is his last step. He’s giving them the power to wipe out everything.”
“Why give them the power? Why doesn’t he just do it himself?”
“He can’t do it himself. But he figured out a way: use others to do it for him.”
“Why would he want to destroy the world? How does that benefit anyone?”
“He wants revenge. That’s the only thing that’s been driving him for the last two thousand years.”
Bruce stared at the lake. He was as baffled as he had ever been in his life. He liked Elpis. But what if she was just plain crazy?
Bruce asked, “If that’s all the problem is, why don’t you just kill this guy?”
“It’s not that easy. It takes a special set of circumstances for him to die.”
Bruce took a deep breath. “So there’s a guy who’s thousands of years old. He wants revenge on everybody. And he’s going to use this cult to finish it up?”
“That’s a basic version of it,” Elpis said.
“How could I possibly believe that?”
“Where do you think the ILD came from? From Stephen? He was just a pawn. We’ve known about the concept of the ILD for centuries. Moros knew what would happen if everyone learned about it. And now he’s found the perfect group of people to use the information. He’s convinced them to give everyone a chance to ‘start over’.”
Elpis gripped Bruce’s hand. Surprisingly, she started to tear up. “We’ve all made mistakes, Bruce. And mine prevented you from living a normal life.
“I’m sorry.”
Elpis’s innocent, bright face was replaced with a somber one. Bruce wrapped his arm around Elpis and caressed her. He stared into her defeated blue eyes that were focused on the sparkling water in front of them. Bruce leaned forward and softly kissed her on the cheek.
Her smile briefly reappeared but vanished just as quickly. “It’s a dangerous job, Bruce. You’ll see things you don’t want to see. Innocent people will die. You won’t be able to stop that. You won’t be able interfere. You will have to become one of them.”
Elpis looked into Bruce’s eyes and squeezed his hand. “I don’t want to lose you, Bruce.”
It warmed his soul. Together, they rested their foreheads on one another. Elpis closed her eyes, focusing on the warmness resting within her. Bruce closed his eyes and rubbed the back of her head. On the surface, they were like two lovers enjoying the nice weather at a park. If only it were that simple. Almost involuntarily, their lips inched close together. Elpis placed her hand on Bruce’s cheek. There was something that brought them together.
As their lips rested inches apart, they pulled away.
Bruce declared, “Whatever you need me to do, I’ll do it.”
Bruce and Mikey pounded fists. The nightmare was almost over. Bruce did all of this, dealt with the cult for 2 years, for Elpis. To stop Moros from destroying the world. Who was Moros? Bruce didn’t know. But he knew in his heart Elpis was on his side.
The outsider, whose face was covered with a hood, stood patiently in the middle of the dome-room. The disciples anxiously waited for X to begin his questioning. Mikey squinted, doing his best to see the action. X yelled to the disciples, “You can come out! There’s no need to hide from him.” Mikey looked at Bruce with concern. Bruce calmed him. “It’s fine. He wouldn’t have been surprised by us. No need to worry.”
As the 12 disciples stood around the hooded man, X stood in front of him and ripped the hood off his head.
When the hood was gone, Mr. Ixley was left looking at X. Mr. Ixley’s eyes darted around and he saw some of the disciples he had known so well through the years. Mr. Ixley smiled in the face of death.
X smiled back. “Hello again, Mr. Ixley.”
Mr. Ixley confidently acknowledged him, “X.”
Bruce, dressed casually, knocked on the front door and waited. The door opened and Mr. Ixley appeared. He still wore the same nerdy glasses but had aged considerably. The stress of losing Sara had no doubt robbed him of a few years of his life.
“Hey, Mr. Ixley.”
“Bruce! I told you… Call me Wayne!”
Bruce laughed. Mr. Ixley swung open the door and hugged his old friend. “What brings you here?”
“X.”
Mr. Ixley’s eyes widened so much they nearly popped out of his head. “What do you mean?”
“You know what I mean, Wayne. X. I’m with them now.”
Mr. Ixley felt an abrupt pain in his skull. He grabbed his forehead in disbelief, “Oh no.” Mr. Ixley saw the serious look in Bruce’s face. His demeanor was much different from his goofy, nonchalant self. “So you’re here to kill me then?”
Bruce laughed. “No. I’m here to ask for your help. I’m going to kill them. All of them.”
This was all too much. Mr. Ixley almost collapsed under the weight of these revelations. He worried Bruce had lost his mind. Nonetheless, he was intrigued. “Come in.”
Mr. Ixley held out his hand to his beloved sanctuary chair. “Sit down, please.”
“That’s your favorite spot,” Bruce said. Even he knew of the importance of that chair.
“It’s only a chair, Bruce.” Mr. Ixley insisted, “Please.”
Bruce sat in the once majestic reading chair. Mr. Ixley sat across from him on the couch. A flood of memories rushed into Bruce. The last time he was here was on prom night.
“Why do you want to kill them?” Mr. Ixley asked.
“Do you know a man named Moros?”
Mr. Ixley hung his head and paused. Perhaps sitting and chatting wasn’t appropriate for this meeting. “Why don’t you come with me? There’s something I should show you.”
Mr. Ixley left the confines of the family room and proceeded toward the stairs. Bruce followed. As they climbed the stairs, Bruce noticed the family pictures still hanging on the wall. In them, Mr. Ixley was smiling with the lights of his life. Rachel Ixley. Sara Ixley. In hindsight, the pictures were h
eartbreaking. Mr. Ixley had lost so much and done nothing to deserve the heartache he was forced to endure. At the peak of the stairwell, Bruce noticed a new picture: A high school Sara and Bruce hugging and smiling with their cheeks rubbed up against one another. Bruce stopped in his tracks. The image sent chills down his spine.
Mr. Ixley said, “That picture was on her desk. I especially like that one.”
Bruce’s eyes tugged and tears forced their way to the surface. He rubbed his eyes, trying to prevent an outburst but the picture of the two of them, smiling carefree at the camera, simply overcame him.
Mr. Ixley tried to comfort him. “She loved you more than anything.”
Bruce asked as his voice cracked, “Do you know who killed her?”
“I don’t know. But it wasn’t suicide, I can tell you that.”
Bruce wiped his swollen eyes. He needed to regain his composure. “What did you want to show me?”
Mr. Ixley headed toward his bedroom. Naturally, they headed straight for the closet. At the end of it, the X door awaited. So much had happened through the years, Bruce nearly forgot about that room.
The X door was just as daunting as it had been on prom night. Mr. Ixley casually opened it. “The leader of the group is called ‘X’. It is not a name. It is a title. I was X for many years. It consumed me. So I created this room.” Mr. Ixley reached his hand on the inside wall and flipped on a light.
The inside of the room illuminated a dark blue color. “Just give it a minute,” Mr. Ixley said. The blue light became brighter with every second that passed. Bruce peered into the room with keen curiosity. In a flash, the blue light clicked into regular fluorescence, illuminating everything inside.
Mr. Ixley said, “Come inside.”
Bruce followed Mr. Ixley inside the secret room.
As he stepped inside, his eyes shot around. This wasn’t just a room; it was a mini-shrine. On the back wall, a crucifix extended from the ceiling to the floor. Jesus’s limp body hung from the cross. In the middle of the room was an altar covered with a white cloth. In front of him, at the base of the entrance, was something that caught his attention: a statue of a head propped on a white pillar. The statue extended down to the man’s shoulders. Bruce didn’t recognize him. There was little special about his face: he had a strong jawline, short hair, and no facial hair. The statue’s eyes were well defined, staring creepily ahead.
Mr. Ixley remarked, “That was carved by Michelangelo during the Renaissance.”
It was as stunning to hear as anything. “I’m sorry… what?”
“The angel that visited Michelangelo toward the end of his life…”
Bruce shook his head and held up his hand. “Hold on a second. You have a piece from… Michelangelo. How?”
“Does it matter?” Mr. Ixley smiled. “Surely you must have more pertinent questions for me than that.”
Bruce looked around the room. On both sides of the shrine, on three poorly built shelves, was an endless array of religious artifacts jumbled together. There were golden crosses, tabernacles, and wooden… somethings. Everything in the room seemed to pertain to Christianity in some way. The collection in the room was probably priceless. The shrine was not what Bruce expected to be in the secret X room.
“What is this room for?” Bruce asked.
“It’s where I used to pray.”
“Used to?”
Mr. Ixley bowed his head and sighed. “When Sara died, I ran out of things to pray for. Ran out of things to be thankful for. Ran out of things to hope for.”
Mr. Ixley pointed to the wooden floor next to the altar. Bruce saw the remnants of a circle, as if something used to be there.
Bruce said, “The X-circle.”
“Yes,” Mr. Ixley confirmed. “It’s called an Occor. I removed it when I left them.”
“The cult,” Bruce said.
“If you want to call it that,” Mr. Ixley said as he removed his glasses and placed them on the altar. Bruce had seldom seen Mr. Ixley without glasses. He must’ve been getting serious. He continued, “There are hundreds, thousands, of cults in the world. But our group, The Xlympians of Christ, was different. No cult has what we had.”
“And what is that?”
“The book…
“…You’ve seen it before, Bruce. When you came into my office and noticed the symbol on the cover. You knew what it was. That was when I knew about you. You were going to be a part of this whether I liked it or not.”
Bruce tried to get Mr. Ixley back on track. “What is the book?”
“The book contains three chapters. The first two: written in Latin. The third: written in a language that doesn’t exist. There is simply no deciphering chapter three. No one knows what it says. But the first two chapters… they told us how to assimilate. Among other things, those chapters told us how to build the Occor as a means of talking to angels...”
Talking to angels… What kind of book was this? Bruce asked, “Can I see it?”
“I don’t have it,” Mr. Ixley said. “Whoever maintains the title of ‘X’ has it. X is the leader of the group. X dictates when the group meets. X receives his instructions from the angel.”
Bruce looked at the remnants of the circle on the floor. Whatever the X-circle was, it was apparently used to talk to angels.
“I was X for almost 20 years. When I left, Ronnie became X.
“Ronnie was lost in the darkness after Sara died. He loved her for years. But she told him she wouldn’t marry him. She loved you, Bruce. If anyone knows anything about foul play in her death, it’s Ronnie. She broke his heart. Who else could it have been?”
Bruce kept quiet. There was no way Ronnie knew anything about Sara’s death. Not when he turned the cult into a personal mission to find her killer. But the more Mr. Ixley resented the cult, the better.
Mr. Ixley continued, “Ronnie’s friend, Matt, the old Michigan State quarterback, joined the Xlympians a couple years after Sara died. Matt encouraged Ronnie to join. And of course, he did. Who wouldn’t? Every joining member is promised a one-way trip to heaven when he dies. What God fearing man wouldn’t want to join?
“Man is not meant to be alone. In Ronnie’s darkest hours, he found someone to love. He found God.”
Mr. Ixley was starting to sound just as crazy as the members of the Xlympians of Christ. Bruce asked, “And you believe all this?”
“I did,” Mr. Ixley said. “The book told me how to speak to angels. And I did just that. You can’t dispute what you see. The book allowed me to see things most people wouldn’t believe even if they saw it with their own eyes.
“But there is something more going on than meets the eye.”
Mr. Ixley sighed. The topic was filling him with regret. “The Bible speaks of Jesus’ return to the world. Christians have been waiting for thousands of years. The Xlympians was supposed to be about facilitating the return of Jesus Christ to the world. It was supposed to be about getting the world ready for His return. Every couple nights, we’d gather. Sometimes in the forest, sometimes at someone’s house. And you know what we did? We prayed. We stood around an Occor, praying in Latin, and hoping an angel would visit. We prayed for Jesus’ return to save the world. But you know what? Jesus is dead. He’s never coming back.”
There was no telling if Mr. Ixley actually believed that or if he had been so shaken from Sara’s death that he had completely lost all faith.
“When you join, you’re a member for life. Ronnie couldn’t wait for his turn. So he killed one of our members, just so he could join immediately. Killed him. In all the years the Xlympians of Christ had been around, that never happened. And nobody seemed to care. ‘It was all for the return of Jesus Christ,’ they said. That’s when I knew it was pointless. Our ‘cult’ was no better than any other. We no longer cared about following the Commandments. Now we allowed murder.”
Bruce asked, “How did you get out?”
Mr. Ixley smiled. “There are always ways, Bruce.”
Whatever
that meant.
Bruce said, “Moros is going to destroy the world. And the Xlympians are helping him.”
Mr. Ixley turned and glared at Jesus hanging from the cross on the wall. “Who is this Moros? Is he a demon?”
“As far as I know, he is just a man.”
Mr. Ixley turned and locked eyes with Bruce. “No. The Xlympians don’t do the bidding of men.”
Bruce caved in and reluctantly declared, “Then he is a demon. Either way, they have a weapon… a weapon with supernatural technology. And it’s almost ready to go.”
Mr. Ixley hung his head. His hands extended and gripped the ends of the altar. It was hard to tell what was going through his mind, but his face had tightened and thoughts were clearly dashing through his head.
“I’ll do it.” Mr. Ixley said, “I don’t agree with killing. But… I’ll do it.”
Mr. Ixley was face to face with X: It was the old X and the new X.
“Fancy seeing you again,” X said.
Mr. Ixley smiled. “I see you’re still waiting for Jesus.”
X laughed. “Jesus will come when he’s ready. We got bigger plans now.”
Mr. Ixley responded with sarcasm, “Destroying the world… that’s going to help things.”
Matt, standing behind X, removed his hood and shouted, “We’re giving everyone a second chance! It’s what the angel wants!”
Mr. Ixley turned and stared him down. “Ending the world won’t bring back your pathetic football career.” Matt, an ex-star quarterback at Michigan State and Lisa’s old boyfriend, flinched at those words.
Mr. Ixley turned his attention back toward X. “And it won’t bring back Sara. She’s dead… because I killed her.”
X’s eyes widened and his heart dropped to the floor. He was stunned to hear Mr. Ixley say it. And with such conviction. Before X had the chance to use his staff to exact revenge, Mr. Ixley punched him square in the nose. As X stumbled backward, Mr. Ixley ran toward the long corridor.
Several of the disciples chased after him while some conspicuously stayed behind. Mr. Ixley ran past several metallic doors of the corridor. Behind him, the sound of screaming and pounding feet closed in. His ex-disciples no doubt clamored for the chance to get back at him.
