It was this man that smiled at the silent cue of the red light blinking to life above the tiny lens across the room.
"My fellow Americans, I speak to you now, in a moment of chaos and crisis. A moment of terror for me and all of my fellow citizens. I speak to you now, to tell you, you are not alone. You are not adrift. But also, I assure you, you are not a fool. No, I am not here to tell you, the people, that you didn't see what you saw. I'm here to tell you that what you saw, wasn't true."
He paused and smiled, picturing the masses, frozen in their terror, wanting to trust him. Waiting, hoping for the assuring words, carried across the ether by unseen waves to their living rooms and bedrooms, to screens on their phones as they rode the subway, or the tablet screens that the held in their hands as they sat on the toilet.
"I know this because, no matter how real it seemed, and believe me, when I watched it myself I was taken in by the reality - the appearance of reality - what you saw was a fiction. I know this not because of any flaw of production or fact that proves fraud. No, even I cannot say to have found a single glitch in the piece of film shown over and over on every channel of every television, on every screen. I know it to be false, simply because I was not there. I know I didn't kill that man, or say those things, because I am me - but you are not. So, how am I to convince you? Is it enough to point out that the video clip begins with the image of a man, Jacob Rothschild, who we all know to be the dead leader of a defeated Shadow Army? And are we to believe that when he says the word "Nestor" that he is truly speaking into the eyes, and therefore the camera installed into the head, of Nestor Bravo? Nestor Bravo, a man who has long been relegated to the world of myth? Or is it enough to say that for a decade I have been your President, your humble servant, and in that time I have never shown cruelty or viciousness?"
In the darkness Miho and Flores stood unblinking watching the man weave the reality around him. Flores always had to fight the urge to reach for his gun when October did this. He felt October's words, like oil that adhered to his skin, reminding him of the fireside tales his father had told him of sorcerers who used words of control to bend the will of men.
Miho stood motionless beside Flores, at most, admiringly amused.
"No. That's not enough, but, unfortunately it is almost all I have to offer - but for this: my humanity. We are the same. We are the survivors of the Great War, the last of humankind. We are the same. We have survived and struggled together, and now in our greatest moment, men of myth and of a cruel and vicious past have arrived to question that humanity, to question us in our greatest effort of survival, to question our motives. But, we are the same.
"Whoever made this film made one simple mistake. He forgot what you and I will never forget: that while nature and time may be cruel and heartless - humans, humankind, humanity, the thing that links us all, the thing we sacrifice so hard to preserve - is kind and good. People elected me to lead them, because I am one of them. That which attacks that, that humanity, be it disease or wayward science or a man with a camera and the technology to create fiction on the screen, will never succeed, never win, never defeat us.
"We know the truth. We know a lie when we see it and we feel the truth when we hear it. And this is that truth: I will never hurt mankind. Though I may fail in my attempts to save mankind, because like all men I am fallible, I will never quit, or hesitate, or waiver. And where I fail, you will rise up and survive and thrive and prosper, because you are mankind, you are the good of this world, and that good will never be extinguished. Goodnight, my fellow Americans and God bless you all."
The little red light over the lens went black.
Chapter 17
***
The flight attendant opened the door slowly and then stood back. Jacob sauntered onto the plane with a smile, followed by Arian and two large Indians.
"You may relax, my dear, you did the right thing. And trust me, the bad man in front of the plane with rocket launcher is very unlikely to blow up the plane now that I'm on it. Now, do me a favor, you and the rest of the flight staff get off of the plane for me, okay?"
The attendant nodded, as Jacob moved past her to stand in front of the passengers.
“Hi everybody, I’m sorry to have interrupted your little migration here, but I need a word with our friend, Dr. Thomas, in seat 5-B. I assume you know who I am, Doc?”
“Are you here to kill me?”
Jacob laughed at the man who sat shaking, his skin dripping with the sweat of fear, causing his glasses to slide ever so slightly down his nose. His hand shook as he reached up to resettle the frames.
“Yes, I am here to kill you,” Jacob said moving slowly down the aisle.
“Please, please don’t...”
“Well, you killed me first so… I’m going to kill you. I mean, you can’t just go around giving people injections that kill them and expect them not to kill you in a really terrible way.”
“Oh God...”
Jacob now stood in front of Dr. Thomas' row. He reached down and unbuckled the seatbelt of the man between him and Dr. Thomas, then stepped aside to allow the man to move out of his way. He then sat down and put his hand on the arm of the shaking, terrified doctor.
“Do you really believe in an interventionist God? Did you believe that you were doing God’s work when you designed this evil little toxin? Or that He just wasn't looking? Do you think He let you kill millions, but will stop me from killing you?”
“I don’t… I don't… please…" the small man tried to continue, but fear made him silent.
“You see, I don’t have the ego that you do," Jacob smiled. "I don’t believe that God gives a shit about my little life or what I do, anymore than I would care if the ants in my childhood ant farm were racist. I mean, you hope they’re not racist ants, but you don’t try and listen to their conversations - because they're ants. But, I tell you, I do feel that if God knows what sort of nasty shit you’ve done, He probably isn’t going to stop me from cutting pieces off of you.”
Jacob felt the presence of a large man to his side. He turned and looked up with a smile, recognizing the old man as a Supreme Court Justice. In the corner of his eye he saw Arian pointing his gun at the Judge's head.
“Listen, Jacob, we all heard the President's speech," the brave justice said in a rich bass. "We all know that The Shot isn’t fatal. You can’t fool us. We’re the most intelligent people on the planet. That’s why we’re on this plane!”
Jacob laughed and lit up a cigarette.
“You're a brave man! Justice Gaines, right?”
“Yes.”
“Say what you will about the Apocalypse, no one cares if you smoke. Anyway, nice to meet you, I'm Jacob Rothschild, we haven't met before, but I'm sure there is a great deal of mutual respect here nonetheless. I’m well aware that this flight is filled with intelligent people. I watched them load the plane. I also watched the one that left before you, the one with the potent women. Boy, sure makes a guy wish he’d studied harder so he could have gone to a good school and be headed to The Island, but when I was a kid, I just wanted to kill people so I joined the most elite fighting force in the world. Foolish. As for the President's speech, well, I happen to know that he’s a very good liar. Now Dr. Thomas, why don’t you tell the Supreme Court Justice how The Shot works? If you don't lie, and by the way, I know the truth so I’ll know if you’re lying, I won’t shoot you in the crotch, right here.”
Jacob didn't bother to turn, he simply held the justice's eyes and waited.
“It accelerates the body," Dr. Thomas mumbled, "the internal organs and the brain. With no drastic change to appearance on the exterior, the interior runs itself ragged. After a year, it’s as if the inoculated man is ninety, or a hundred years old. Heart-attack, cancer, liver failure, Alzheimer's... in a young man’s body he’ll die an old man’s death.”
The plane grew silent. The justice opened his mouth, but no words came out. He moved back as Jacob stood. Jacob moved into the aisle and smiled at the
doctor, waiting. Dr. Thomas eventually managed to stand up and walk down the aisle to where Arian and the Indians stood waiting, guns scanning the seats.
“Listen up folks, I’m taking Dr. Thomas here with me to do some work," Jacob said through a cloud of cigarette smoke. "You are free to go to The Island and impregnate all those pretty women in honor of saving mankind. As we all know, this is a very big honor, and a very expensive honor, since all of you bought your spot. Most intelligent men you said, Justice Gaines? Well, the most intelligent who could afford to be here, I say. In any case, you could also get off the plane, in a show of unity with all of us who couldn't buy a seat and now have fatal toxin in our veins. Talk to the press. Show that you’re with "the people". That you don’t agree with the mass murder of every young man left in America.”
Jacob looked around the plane. No one moved.
“No one? Fair enough. Come now, Doc.”
Once on the tarmac Jacob steered Dr. Thomas past the corpses of the various security guards that he had killed while approaching the plane. Arian moved away to say a few words to the flight crew, who stopped their walk towards the plane and instead ran off in the opposite direction. Dr. Thomas and a giggling Jacob got into a limo and waited as Arian and the other members of the Shadow Army joined them. The last one laid a rocket launcher at his feet before getting comfortable.
Dr. Thomas looked nervously over the faces of these soldiers. It took him a moment to register that they were all American Indian, except for the heavily tattooed and branded black man. All of them were smiling.
"Everyone good? Good on leg room?" Jacob asked the men. "Great. Really good job guys, I'm so glad to be back with you boys, those grunts we were with earlier, well, they just didn't know how to soldier. Anyhow, gents, this is Dr. Thomas. Dr. Thomas is the guy who put poison into you. Doc, say hello to a few of the Shadow Army's finest."
Dr. Thomas couldn’t find enough air or moisture to speak, but no one seemed to mind. The car pulled away as a laughing Jacob Rothschild pulled out a small pink trigger with a little smiling cat on it. Jacob, still laughing, looked at Dr. Thomas and pushed the button on the trigger and behind them the plane they had just left exploded.
Chapter 18
***
Night had fallen. Nestor lay perfectly still, his eyes unblinking, his Barrett .50 caliber sniper rifle with silencer enhancements held in his hands, aimed at the door, finger on the trigger. He'd been in this spot for 27 hours. Sneaking in before the Presidential Guard's arrival, he had buried himself almost entirely under dirt and leaves. He hadn't moved once. Even when a guard had stood inches in front of him, his focus hadn't switched. It wasn't that he was invisible. Nestor just knew how to become a part of the ground, rather than blend in with it.
Nestor had once told Jacob that the trick was to realize that there was no ground, that there was no Nestor. Jacob had just laughed.
Nestor's focus stayed the same. He didn't move his eyes off the door. The guard outside the door leaned back against the wall. The guard wore Kevlar, but the Barrett could put a bullet through a cinder block, so it wouldn't matter. If he was shot at this moment the guard would slide silently to the ground rather than falling loudly from a straight standing position. Nestor knew this to be true.
He squeezed the trigger softly and firm. His finger didn't squeeze one moment past the shot. He exerted no excess energy and he did not blink.
In five more minutes another guard came out the door. The guard saw the body of the other guard and leaned over to see if he was okay. If shot at this moment he would collapse silently onto the other body that would muffle the sound of impact. Nestor knew this to be true.
Nestor squeezed the trigger. There was no sound. Even the birds in the trees above went on chirping undisturbed. Voices began. Two guards came out the door, walkie-talkies at their mouths. Nestor did not kill them. It was time to let the chaos start.
At the sight of the bodies the guards disappeared back into the doorway. They reappeared momentarily with flashlights attached to the top of their drawn pistols. They moved cautiously out of the doorway covering opposite sides of the building. Alarms began to sound. Lights came up all over the compound. Nestor waited until ten guards had begun to comb the area. He never bothered to check the windows. The President wouldn't be going near them. Ever. He was a smart man.
Nestor shot five of the guards before the flash of his muzzle gave away his position. By then he had raised up to a knee, the blood rushing through his legs making them numb, the burning of pins and needles seconds away.
The muscles of his thighs painfully clenched making movement impossible. From his knee he killed three more men. Two were now under the cover of the trees and he let himself fall forward behind a log that lay a few feet in front of him. He kept his gun positioned forward as the pain of the pins and needles coursed through his body as it woke up. He knew that it would be a minute before he could rise up and move well. Shooting from a stationary position that had been exposed would be a mistake. Instead he went still, knowing that the quiet would lead the guards to believe he was moving into another position. He knew that they would begin by shooting at where they had seen the muzzle flash, but they would quickly spread a wider net and the safest place to be would be where he was, as long as he wasn't shot in the first five second volley.
He kept still as bullets hit around him. He slowly reloaded his rifle.
After the minute of stillness, which seemed endless to the guards, they moved out from behind their cover thinking that they must have found their mark and killed the sniper. Nestor rose up firing on refreshed legs. Once all the guards were dead, Nestor stood still and closed his eyes. On the back of his eyelids burned the flash of the guns he'd only moments earlier seen as he was shot at. He waited patiently for the lights to fade away. He could hear shouts and yelling. He heard the beginning of helicopter rotors.
He breathed in once and let the black of his eyelids envelope him, then, knowing that his night vision had returned, he opened his eyes and broke into a dead run through the surrounding woods, towards the back of the house where the helicopter pad was.
He kept his eyes on the ground as he ran. He briefly glanced up at the trees around and in front of him, aware of the shadows cast by the compounds security lights, but never risking his night vision with a single glance in their direction. He knew that a trip over an unseen root posed a greater risk to the mission than the many bullets that security was spraying in the woods around him.
When Nestor could hear that he was within five hundred feet of the helicopter he stopped mid-stride and went to a knee. He breathed through his nose, the dead sprint not having raised his heart rate at all, his hands remained steady as he took aim and killed the helicopter pilot and the copilot in two shots. He then shot the engine block and listened to the rotor wind down as he reloaded.
A mass of people that had been en-route to the helipad from the house froze. The ten or so security guards that shielded the President's body undulated with panicked breath. Ten more security agents came out of the house and shot into the direction of the woods. One bullet took off a piece of Nestor's right ear. He focused on the sensation. He considered the fact that with this injury he would soon start losing dexterity, stamina and strength. His cognitive thinking would be impaired by the blood loss. His breathing and heart rate would increase by the minute. He leaned back against a tree and watched the bullets hit the forest around him.
He unhooked a flash bomb from his belt, closed his eyes and threw it over his shoulder towards the shooters. He heard the explosion and knew that they would be blind for the next ten seconds. He also knew that guards, that highly trained, would attempt to continue shooting in the direction of the explosion. He knew that they would expect him to move during those ten seconds. Nestor did not. He moved his legs into the lotus position and felt his heart beating slowly in the wound of his ear. He focused on his breath and slowed the beating of his heart as much as he could.
He
could distantly recognize the sounds of people moving in the direction of the helicopter. Nestor took one final breath. He stood up and turned around the tree branch, already squeezing the trigger as he moved. He shot between two of the guards and shot the President in the liver. He knew that the shot had given away his position to the guards who'd been searching for him a few hundred feet away. He ignored the inevitability of their bullets and shot the President once more in the left eye.
As a bullet hit Nestor's stomach he knew that the President was dead. Nestor passed out when the next bullet went through his chest.
Chapter 19
***
“You still gonna do your set?”
It took Nicolette a moment to realize that the words had been directed at her. She managed to pull her eyes from the wall screen, which had now gone silent, and looked at the man who had spoken.
“What?”
“Your set, you still gonna perform it?” the man said with a raise of his eyebrow.
"You serious?”
“Yeah.”
“Didn’t you just hear that report? The damn world is ending!”
“Well… not right now. We have some time.”
"But it's going to end!"
"Well yeah, but that's always been the case."
Nicolette tried to gather herself. She tightly gripped the edge of the bar, feeling unbalanced and unsteady. The man, the bartender, poured her another vodka tonic and placed it on a white coaster in front of her.
Monsters of the Apocalypse Page 5
