On the roof, he bowed over. There was only a small ridge around the edge of the roof, perhaps a foot tall. He gestured for Serafina to get down as well, then he crawled on elbows and belly to the front of the roof. Peered over.
The car that had followed them had just parked at the curb. The priest jumped out. If he looked up, they were in trouble.
John trusted that he wouldnʹt. People rarely did.
Another bit of trivia. Another tidbit of knowledge useful only in very limited set of circumstances.
Serafina pulled at his sleeve. John looked at her. She shrugged her shoulders: ʺWhy are we here? What are we going to do?ʺ the gesture said.
He held up a finger. Wait.
He looked back down. The priest shouldnʹt be able to get through. He should give up and go around, looking for a way through the rubble. When he did that, John and Serafina could get down and run through a building on the opposite side of the street. Theyʹd know which way the priest had headed and could steal some wheels and go the opposite direction on a street he had no idea they were even on.
The priest, though, had other plans. Other resources they didnʹt know about.
He spent a few seconds examining the blockage that John had created, then apparently came to the desired conclusion: impassable.
He went back to his car. Leaned in. But didnʹt drive away. Instead the trunk popped open and he walked to the back of the car.
He disappeared behind the trunk, and when he emerged he was carrying an assault rifle. John didnʹt understand what he was going to do with it for a moment: shoot at the sky in frustration? Save them some trouble and blow his head off?
The priest did neither. He aimed at the rubble of the restaurant. And that was when John saw the extra tube hanging like a squat stinger under the main barrel, and he understood.
He dropped behind the shallow protection offered by the edge of the roof. Yanked Serafina down as well.
There was the deafening pound of the underbarrel grenade launcher and the even more deafening sound of a high-explosive round blasting apart concrete and wood and plaster. Bits of a building rained down on them. A few cut Johnʹs cheek. Blood flowed.
ʺHoly–ʺ began Serafina. John clapped a hand over her mouth and glanced over the roof. Then he was tempted to say the same thing. The only thing that stopped him was the idea that he would look ridiculous slapping his hand over his own mouth.
There was no way through. So the priest had created a way over. Marching up steps he had created by blasting holes in the rubble.
Faster and more efficient. And truly amazing. The more so because most HE rounds armed only after a minimum of fourteen meters. The priest had stood just outside that zone, risking death or maiming by the blast blowback and the shrapnel thrown up by the explosion.
John leaned over. The black-frocked man was already halfway up, then three-quarters of the way. Truly dedicated.
Desperate?
The thought flew in and out of his mind. What could push a man to take this risk?
Regardless, his plans had to change. Quickly. The priest would get to the top in moments. Drop down the back. Scan up and down. Heʹd see the cars, see nothing moving. Heʹd also see the fire escape and check it out as a matter of course.
The priest climbed to the top. Dropped down.
John and Serafina had only one move.
ʺCome on.ʺ
He grabbed her hand and scrambled to the edge of the roof. He jumped into the rubble of the restaurant, lost his footing, and rolled head-over-heels the rest of the way down. He hit the back of the still half-buried Toyota with an ʺoofʺ and then hit the harder sidewalk with a ʺuhhhʺ that slammed the wind out of him.
Serafina came tumbling down a moment later. Luckily for her, he cushioned her fall. He wasnʹt sure how glad he was about that.
She got off him, bruised and bleeding from a multitude of lacerations sheʹd won on the way down. She helped him up. Seemed to already know what they were to do.
She headed to the priestʹs car. Was halfway in the passenger side before he managed to fully get to his feet.
He slammed the trunk shut, then ran around the car and got in the driver side.
The car was still running.
Thank Heaven for small miracles.
ʺWonʹt they be able to track it?ʺ said Serafina.
ʺProbably. But right now I just want to get away from this guy.ʺ
He didnʹt ask who she thought ʺtheyʺ might be. Immediate survival first. Interesting questions later.
He slammed his door. Then slammed the accelerator down so hard he wouldnʹt be surprised if both pedal and foot pounded right through the chassis and hit the street below.
It didnʹt happen. Instead the car leaped forward so powerfully that if they hadnʹt enjoyed the benefit of the leather headrests, both John and Serafina probably would have suffered whiplash.
He risked a smile. They were away, and the priest had no wheels. He had no doubt the man would get new transportation–probably quickly–but for now they were ahead. And every turn of the wheels took them farther away.
ʺHow did he find us?ʺ
Johnʹs smile disappeared. ʺGood question.ʺ It wasnʹt like their mysterious hunters could have known which way they would flee, could have planted a tracking device on the Toyota. Nor did that car have GPS–it barely had a motor in anything but the strictest sense.
So how…?
ʺThe traffic cameras,ʺ he finally said.
ʺNo,ʺ she answered. ʺThat would mean they completely owned the government. Like, all of it.ʺ
ʺYeah.ʺ
ʺAnd theyʹd need some kind of facial recognition software that could just pick us out as we drove past.ʺ
ʺYeah.ʺ
ʺAnd that program would have to be loaded into every government-tapped camera in the area. Maybe the country.ʺ
John paused a second, but finally said, ʺYeah.ʺ
The air seemed cold. It had nothing to do with the perfectly-functioning air conditioning.
He looked at Serafina. She looked so stricken, so terrified, that he longed to hold her. To hug her and whisper it would be all right. To be friend and father and lover all at once. But he could do none of those things. He had to drive.
So he looked away.
Glanced in the rearview mirror.
The rubble was still behind them. A few people were on the street. Folks whose curiosity had finally outweighed their terror to the point they came out of hiding to see what was going on in their tiny part of the universe.
And a figure. Standing atop a roof that John knew.
John saw the figure. Far back, but not too far. Not for a driven, desperate man more skilled than should be possible.
John twisted the wheel. Serafina screamed as her head whipped sideways.
It didnʹt matter.
It was almost a whisper. A strangely soft sound, like a mother cooing. But that was a lie. It was Death come to call.
The priest launched the explosive round from what had to be the very edge of the maximum firing range. A place where aim was supposed to be impossible. Just a shot and a prayer and blind luck.
But John knew that whatever luck there was in the world, the priest would have it. That and maybe more. Because he was a man of God, wasnʹt he?
The explosion slammed into the pavement right behind them. John had an instant to appreciate that fact: a direct hit would have ended them, without fail.
Then something bucked in the back of the car. He realized the priest had pulled his weapon from the trunk. Realized he had failed to look inside the compartment before shutting it.
Wondered what else was back there.
The wheel whipped back and forth in his hands.
Then the caged beast that the trunk had held burst free. There was a flash of yellow and orange.
John hadnʹt buckled his seatbelt. Normally unlike him, but this one time he was glad.
He was going to die.
He flung himself acr
oss Serafina.
He was going to die.
She was warm under him.
He was going to die.
Perhaps she wouldnʹt.
That would be enough.
NINE LIVES
From: POTUS
To: 'X'
Sent: Friday, May 31 5:40 AM
Subject: Germany
The Bundeswehr is going crazy. Any reason why a ʺdefensiveʺ military force looks like theyʹre preparing to invade everyone in Europe at the same time?
***
Isaiah felt like a cat.
Cats could climb trees like nobodyʹs business. Straight up, no problem. Coming down, though, they more or less sucked. Their claws hooked down and in, which meant they could capture prey, could grind their way into bark and yank themselves up vertical surfaces. But that curvature, the same curvature that made them efficient predators and enabled them to go so many places that other animals couldnʹt, worked against them on descent.
Isaiah was a big guy, and climbing up the roof of the building he had pounded to pieces hadnʹt been a problem. His mass grounded him, his feet dug in and held fast.
Coming down, though, he stumbled and constantly felt on the verge of falling.
Like a cat.
Heʹd had a cat when he was young. Before it all went to crap, before he ended up in juvie and then met Nicholas and life came together for a few blissful years of serving others and late-night cribbage games. Before the short good years, the longer bookends of the bad, heʹd had a cat.
Isaiahʹs cat was always getting caught in trees. Always needing him to get it down. One time he couldnʹt. He asked his father for help.
His father got the cat down by shooting it.
Cats had nine lives, but either that cat had already used his other eight or he didnʹt want to risk them on the psychopath who had wasted one of them because Isaiah never saw it again.
That was the last time Isaiah had a pet.
He was a cat now. He wondered if he was going to end up shot. Probably. And that would be no more than he deserved.
That blue eye–that one beautiful blue eye. Theyʹd both be blue if it hadnʹt been for me.
No. He didnʹt have time for pity. Not for himself, not for others. He could save her, to the extent salvation could be had. His was long gone, but even in her twilight damnation, the limbo in which he had placed her, he had to believe she had a chance. He had to believe that maybe he could save Katherine.
But he absolutely couldnʹt do that if she was dead.
Dominic was probably going to kill her. Isaiah knew that. But he also knew that right now his only chance was to find and kill John and Serafina.
Besides, he had seen the people sickened in their wake. The men who had threatened Katherine might actually be working for the good of the world. Might believe their threats were necessary–and might be right in that belief. Sometimes the end did justify the means.
That was his motto, his creed. He could hardly blame others for sharing it. Was he not a priest, if only a fallen one?
He made it off the roof, and neither fell nor was shot by the ghost of a father who pushed him into the beginnings of a life he cursed every day.
The car he had shot sat several blocks away, a dark shape in the middle of a bright halo of flame. Isaiah ran to it, covering the distance quickly and easily. Once he would have panted to run a tenth of that distance. Ironic that his damnation had brought better physical conditioning than anything he had ever enjoyed previously. The temple of his body had grown strong even as the spirit within rotted in its own corruption.
A bystander called out to him. An elderly man who apparently still believed in the old ways enough to trust that a man with a white collar could give answers. ʺFather, whatʹs going–?ʺ The old man broke off when he saw still-smoking Steyr assault rifle in Isaiahʹs hands. He crossed himself and backed away. But he didnʹt go back inside the building he had come from.
ʺAre you here to help?ʺ he said in a quavering voice.
ʺYes,ʺ said Isaiah. He hoped it was true. And he saw no reason to frighten an old man even more.
The phone he had been given had a camera function–they all did now–and he was going to take a picture of the charred bodies, send it, and demand Katherineʹs release.
Then the world would be safe.
Then his penance could continue.
Then…the real hunt would begin. The men who had taken Katherine would die. Justice would come for them, as it came for all.
He arrived at the car.
A burning skeleton. Too hot to get near.
But he could get close enough to see.
The passenger door was open. The car was empty.
He stared at it in shock. Not sure how long before he swiveled around, looking for the dead man and woman who had somehow left the explosion and subsequent inferno.
They were nowhere. Not in the car. Not in the street.
Gone.
He dug the phone out of his pocket. Thumbed the ʺ1.ʺ
As before, a voice he had never heard answered. Male this time. Isaiah wondered how many people monitored this line.
ʺYes?ʺ said the voice.
ʺI need a new car.ʺ
The voice sighed. ʺAnother one?ʺ
GOOD FATHERS
From: POTUS
To: 'X'
Sent: Friday, May 31 5:45 AM
Subject: France
And more good news: not only has Germany gone insane, but a source inside the French Directorate-General just informed us that France is mobilizing the ENTIRE Gendarmerie and has its AF doing flybys so close to the German border that they could toss water balloons into Berlin.
Okay, we couldnʹt keep this secret forever, but this isnʹt a first response to a possible external epidemic. Theyʹre acting like their neighbors all turned into Nazis overnight.
I NEED ANSWERS. CNN is going to run with this, which means Fox already knows about it and thereʹs no way we can contain it. My head is going on a platter and if it does I swear to God Iʹll find a way to take you down with me.
From: X
To: Dicky
Sent: Friday, May 31 5:45 AM
Subject: RE: FRANCE
Interesting choice of words. I like the water balloons image. Did you come up with that yourself, or is it going to be in your speech when you hold a press conference later today?
Iʹll email you some suggestions for your speech. You know I always come through on things like that.
But Iʹd rethink the threats. They are counterproductive and just make you seem like a schoolyard bully. Being a bully is fine until you come up against a bigger bully.
***
Melville was his only name.
He had had another name–once, a long time ago, before he had been found. Then his old name was taken from him, and another was given. Melville.
He barely remembered his old name, and that was fine. He liked his new name. It suited him.
Along with his old name, his old identity, his old family, everything he had once had and once been, had been stripped from him. Some had been simply taken, others he had had to give up himself.
It had been harder than he had thought it would be. The part where he shot his mother in the face had been the hardest part. Satisfying–he had always hated the old bitch–but hard just the same.
He had wanted to do it slower. More personally.
But Mr. Dominic had given him much more than he once had. Had taken a man whose only aspiration was to kill his parents in a way that left him comfortably set for life off the combination of the money they had and the insurance their deaths would bring, and had turned that man into…
…Melville.
And Melville was a much, much better thing to be.
As Melville, he was a ranking member of every branch of the armed forces, a
senior agent in the NSA, FBI, CIA. He was the entire government, save only the Congress–a bunch of weak old men and women, hobbled by special interests to the point of being powerless–and the President.
Melville had no desire to be the President. It would be a huge step down.
All thanks to Mr. Dominic. The only man before whom Melville would ever bend his knee again, and that wasnʹt too hard on him since Mr. Dominic gave him the run of an entire world in return.
Melville could shoot a woman in Times Square in broad daylight if he wanted to, and no one would ever punish him for it. He would never even be found.
For a while, he had done exactly that sort of thing. That, and much better. Mr. Dominic hadnʹt minded; indeed, he had seemed to approve of it to some degree. ʺWorking it out of his system,ʺ he called it.
Melville decided then that he loved the other man. Not in the way that he loved the men and women and children who screamed for him, or even in the subtler, cooler way that he loved the dead ones he sometimes kept in his home. No, this was a deeper, more sure love. A love that would never depart, just as Mr. Dominic would never leave him.
Mr. Dominic was his everything, and Melville was determined to live up to that great blessing and even greater responsibility.
Sometimes it was hard. Sometimes Mr. Dominic told him not to kill. But usually Mr. Dominicʹs orders were easy and even fun, like when he told Melville what he would ʺhaveʺ to do to the retard who drooled and pissed her way through the trip they were taking.
Drool and piss did not bother Melville. They were exciting.
He sat in the back of the SUV, in the third row. The three other agents who were left after they had shot one and pushed him out of the car kept glancing back at Melville. He made them nervous. That was fine. They thought he sat back here out of deference to their feelings, but it wasnʹt that.
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