The Power of We the People

by Diane Matousek Schnabel

  More freaking traitors, Ryan thought, frustrated by minimal facts and mounting questions.

  “Mr. President?” Sebastian repeated, verifying that the connection hadn’t been lost.

  “I don’t owe you an explanation, Winthrop. I don’t answer to you. I answer to the American people. And I opted to tell them the truth rather than embroil them in a thermonuclear war with Russia.”

  The Brit’s breathing became audible, embittered and impatient. “LIT Society members have risked their lives fighting against The Consortium since before you were born.”

  “Longevity does not obligate me to heed your counsel.”

  Frowning, Rone strode closer to listen in, but Ryan declined to switch to speaker phone. The last thing he needed was to get tag-teamed.

  “If not for the efforts of the LIT Society,” Sebastian protested, his voice rising in decibel and pitch, “you and your entire nation would be mind-controlled puppets right now.”

  Agitated, Ryan thought, It wasn’t your ass on the line, sneaking into White Rabbit, then he sucked in a calming breath. “Winthrop, I appreciate your intelligence contributions, but as President of the United States, I have an obligation to put America first.”

  Sebastian harrumphed. “You simply cannot shatter lifelong perceptions and core beliefs and expect society to continue functioning. The masses won’t be able to handle it.”

  “With all due respect,” Ryan said, put off by the Brit’s hubris, “treating the American people like children strengthens The Consortium. Why should I play into the bogus reality they’ve constructed through fake news and popular culture?”

  “Because it’s preferable to panic, civil unrest, and economic collapse.”

  Peripherally, Ryan noted Rone’s pinched eyebrows, and the Admiral’s head shook in an unspoken reprimand.

  “Deception and secrecy are how The Consortium got so powerful in the first place,” Ryan insisted, letting a hint of exasperation seep into his tone. “Don’t you get it? Ignorance is an existential threat to this nation.”

  Sebastian snickered and the irritating sound crawled under Ryan’s skin.

  “You are foolish and naïve, Mr. President. The truth is that most people don’t care. They just want to watch mindless entertainment, idle away their time on smartphones, and plunge themselves into debt to sate their materialistic desires. They won’t appreciate being jarred from their slumber and thrust into a harsh new reality.”

  “You are grossly underestimating the American people,” Ryan told him. “And the truth will be like a vaccine. In the short run, it will sting like hell. But in the long run, it will inoculate us against tyranny.”

  Silence persisted for several beats, and Rone made a slashing gesture across his throat, imploring him to end the discussion.

  “That sting, as you so eloquently put it,” Sebastian huffed, “will be societal collapse and an end to rule of law—precisely the conditions The Consortium seeks to cultivate.”

  “I guess we’ll just have to agree to disa—”

  “Look,” the Brit interrupted, “I’m not suggesting that you retract your previous statement. Just wait a few days and announce that the terrorist cell has fled to Antarctica. Order a few air strikes, publicly declare victory, and then allow the LIT Society to dismantle The Consortium, quietly and from behind the scenes.”

  Resentment and burgeoning suspicion were festering inside Ryan. He didn’t trust the LIT Society or this smooth-talking Englishman, and he decided that Rone was right.

  “I’ll take that under advisement, Winthrop. Thank you for calling.”

  “Mr. President,” Sebastian fumed, “if you persist, this won’t end well for you.”

  Ryan flinched, and his spine became ramrod straight. “Is that a veiled threat?”

  “Interpret the statement as you will.”

  “If you think I’m going to allow some anonymous, unelected group of people to set policy and function like secret police—in violation of the U.S. Constitution—your intel on me is deeply flawed.”

  The Brit exhaled an ominous sigh. “If you press forward with full disclosure, details regarding Athenian Grove WILL come to the fore. And you will have to answer for the assassinations of Senator Conn, the CEO of Gaggle, the bishop of District Nine, a Centcom General, and Gorka Schwartz. Is that really what you want?”

  78

  Riyadh, Saudi Arabia

  BRADLEY TOOK AIM AND squeezed the trigger, atomizing Amad’s pedophilic art collection until the battery petered out, then he cast aside the useless weapon and lunged at Hellhound.

  He tackled the sixty-year-old and slammed his head against a mahogany bookcase. Straddling his paunchy frame, Bradley pummeled the bastard with an unrelenting barrage of punches. Blood spurted, tissue swelled, teeth scattered, but it wasn’t enough. He wanted this son of a bitch to suffer the way his mother had, to experience the pain, helplessness, and humiliation; to endure the terror and agony of that five-year-old who’d been abused and de-gloved for the sake of a snuff film.

  And then he heard Gramps’ raspy voice shout, “Stop!”

  Panting, tears streaming down his face, Bradley gazed down at his blood-soaked hands in horror.

  Are these the hands of a killer? he thought.

  Did my genetics predispose me to becoming a Sniper?

  Am I really any different from HIM if I was taking orders from the same Consortium masters he serves?

  Bradley crawled away from the man who’d sired him and began to retch, heaving up air and bitter water as if trying to expel a demon from deep inside him.

  “You’re a fucking pussy!” Hellhound’s lips were torn and pulpy; and his eyes, despite hemorrhages and swelling, still gleamed with contempt.

  Huffing and sniffling, Bradley wiped his face with his sleeve and slumped against a bookcase. He stared blankly at Amad’s computer monitor, grappling with an intense moral dilemma.

  I should just off him and chalk it up to collateral damage, he thought.

  Ryan won’t care if I dispatch Night Sector’s most barbaric commander; and neither will Abby or Rone or the Judge Advocate General ... I’d be doing the world a favor.

  His conscience replied, “How about your sons and daughters? Will they care? Will they think you’re like him?”

  “Fuck me,” he muttered, squinting at an array of colorful circles on the monitor. It took several seconds for him to realize what he was looking at, real-time images of the sun in various angstroms.

  What’s the Dopey Prince’s interest in solar physics? he wondered.

  A hobby? Or another secret weapons project?

  “Man up, Bradley!” Hellhound bellowed. “And finish me off!”

  “I am nothing ... like you!” Bradley said, spitting the words at him. “So you can stand trial and rot in a fucking jail cell for the rest of your pathetic life.”

  A spiteful, wicked smile revealed blood-coated, broken teeth and gaping dark holes. “One other thing, son. Abby’s miscarriage was neither spontaneous nor natural.”

  How could Hellhound possibly know? She hadn’t told anyone about the pregnancy, not Fitz, not the crazy shrink, not Ryan, not even her parents.

  “My asset within Andrews’ inner circle spiked her milk with a chemical cocktail,” the bastard boasted. “Mifepristone to block hormones that allow a pregnancy to progress. And misoprostal to stimulate uterine cramps and bleeding.”

  Memories reconstituted. The way Abby had looked at baby Isabella, her face aglow with maternal awe, her lips curled into an adoring smile; the way she’d cried in Bradley’s arms; the way each teardrop had felt like a ten-ton truck compressing his chest.

  Will the truth alleviate her guilt? Or will she berate herself for not detecting the tampering?

  “Yes, son, I sacrificed my unborn grandchild to Moloch. And as payback for the raid on Athenian Grove, I threw in an hCG antigen to render Abby sterile.”

  Nausea resurged, and Bradley’s recent promise screamed through his skull, battering
his heart like a wrecking ball.

  We have our entire lives ahead of us; and we are going to make lots of babies ...

  Will Abby still want to marry me when she finds out that I have the DNA of a monster coursing through my veins?

  Will she blame me for the miscarriage?

  And her sterility?

  Bradley didn’t feel the rage and overpowering need for vengeance that had gripped him earlier; he just felt ... empty.

  “You really don’t have the stones to shoot me, do you?” Hellhound asked, reaching into the breast pocket of his suit.

  Bradley’s pulse skyrocketed.

  Did the asshole smuggle a weapon past Amad’s security? he thought, drawing and leveling the sights of his .45 caliber on the swollen, blood-crusted blob that used to be Hellhound’s nose. His fingertip grazed the trigger, wishing the bastard would pull a weapon and give him an excuse to scramble his brains.

  Instead, Hellhound produced a glass ampoule coated in brown rubber the size of a pea. “My insurance policy,” he said, popping it into his mouth and biting down on the capsule. “A lethal dose of potassium cyanide.”

  “You’re a fucking coward!” Bradley shouted. “You tortured and murdered innocents and you can’t even face the consequences.”

  Hellhound gave him a long stare, and he couldn’t shake the notion that he was contending with a supernatural entity, a demonic force that was repulsive yet seductive; threatening yet amiable; loathsome yet attractive. A dark shadow enveloped Bradley, and the evil presence made hair follicles stand on end. Every square inch of skin prickled. He opened his mouth to speak, but struggled to make a sound. It was like being choked by an invisible hand.

  “My only regret,” Hellhound panted, “is that I failed to sacrifice you,” and within seconds, he lost consciousness, succumbing to a peaceful and painless death that he didn’t deserve.

  Epilogue

  Day 727

  Wednesday, February 15th

  79

  Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Brookham

  Oahu, Hawaii

  ARMS FOLDED ACROSS HIS chest, brow furrowed in frustration, Ryan Andrews’ frown shifted from Rone to an analog clock.

  I have to make a decision, he thought, dreading the impending deadline.

  After Bradley had rendered the triumvirate harmless, Winthrop Sebastian had removed “the mask” and bolstered his opening blackmail threat with an even more ominous ultimatum.

  “The United States will succumb to our governance,” the Brit had told him. “And you, Mr. President, merely wield the power to choose whether that transition is cooperative or confrontational.”

  “I wield the power of the U.S. military,” Ryan had shot back, drawing a condescending chuckle.

  “If you oppose us, we’ll plunge the nation into an economic coma. No communications, no banking, no commerce—until your beleaguered population grows hungry enough to accept our governance. You’ve got twelve hours to make your decision.”

  Ryan belted out expletives, cursing himself for dismissing his gut instincts. The LIT Society, although founded by patriots like Volkov, had been infiltrated by rogue actors whose objective was not to eradicate The Consortium but to co-opt it.

  It was a hostile takeover, he thought bitterly, and I played right into Sebastian’s scheme.

  Concurrent with the raids on Cythraul Island and Altahaluf Palace, the double-crossing Brit had tasked an elite squad of mercenaries with confiscating the wealth of the triumvirate, which included thousands of tons of gold looted during the 9/11 terrorist attack and the regime-change wars in Iraq and Libya.

  The golden rule, Ryan thought. He who has the gold, makes the rules ... And Crooked Carter Sidney evaded justice again.

  “Plan Z is our only viable option, sir,” Rone said, his tone subdued yet thrumming with ire.

  Could the American people endure another tribulation?

  Would they stand on principle, in support of the Constitution, despite hunger and fear?

  Or submit to a dictatorship in exchange for promises of food and security?

  “If I implement Plan Z,” Ryan said, “the American people need to know the truth ... about everything.”

  “Mr. President, I know your intentions are noble, but we can’t have armed vigilantes doling out justice. We have a duty to protect our citizenry from chaos.”

  Their gazes met, fire clashing against ice, and the tension ratcheted higher.

  Ryan harrumphed, keenly aware that his efforts to insulate Franny had resulted in her abduction and that his attempt to protect Sybil had gotten her shot.

  “Secrecy is precisely how we got into this predicament!” he snapped. “It enables the criminal and endangers the innocent.”

  A cellphone chimed like a bell signaling the end of a boxing round, and Rone glared at an incoming text message. “People are already taking the law into their own hands,” he said, casting a video feed to a wall-mounted monitor. “This is real-time satellite footage from District Three.”

  Thousands of civilians had stormed Anolachia Air Force base and surrounded a VIP military jet. Half the mob was armed with rifles and shotguns; the remainder, with broomsticks, baseball bats, and crow bars.

  “What instigated this?”

  Rone minimized the video, replacing it with a Patriot Anon post.

  Military secrets sold to Chinese?

  Uranium sold to Russians?

  Treason?

  Crimes against children?

  Where is Anolachia AFB?

  What is a UC-35A?

  Who is about to escape justice?

  Ryan gaped at the stomach-turning image attached to the post. An elated Carter Sidney was peering through a gruesome mask—the surgically removed face of a five-year-old boy.

  “How did Kyle’s secure devices get hacked?”

  “They didn’t,” Rone stated flatly, switching back to the satellite feed. “It appears as though your predecessor intentionally incited this.”

  From the wings forward, the mob was slapping the aircraft with open palms, and Ryan cocked an ear toward the monitor. “Where’s the audio coming from? It sounds like they’re chanting lock her up.”

  “Python activated the mic on Carter Sidney’s cellphone.”

  “... I don’t care!” the former Vice President was shouting, her voice shrill and edged with desperation. “Take off and tar the runway with those fucking deplorables!”

  The drone of the jet engines abruptly cut out.

  “What are you doing ...? I told you to take off, you inbred misogynists!”

  The forward cabin door swung open, displacing protestors and sending a rippling wave through the crowd, then Carter Sidney shrieked, “Are you insane? Those crazed Nazis will tear us apart!”

  Ryan’s breath caught in his throat.

  Would the mob assault the Pilots? Beat Sidney to death?

  Would the violence set off a chain reaction of chaos in other districts as Rone predicted?

  The airstairs dropped toward the tarmac, the Pilots descended, and instead of jeers, there were cheers; and handshakes in lieu of punches. Then the sea of bodies inexplicably parted like a zipper slowly sliding open, and it took Ryan several seconds to realize that the mob wasn’t clearing a path for the Airmen. They were yielding to Military Police and District Three law enforcement.

  Are they legit? Ryan wondered. Or Consortium wolves in police clothing attempting a rescue?

  Two officers boarded the aircraft. The MPs assumed positions beside the stairs, keeping dutiful watch over the shouldered long guns.

  “What took you so long!” Sidney griped. “Disperse this mob at once. And prosecute the ringleaders!”

  One of the officers cleared his throat and said, “Carter Michelle Sidney, you are under arrest. You have the right to remain silent ...”

  “Do you have any idea who you are fucking with? I have—owww! You’re hurting my arm ... don’t you dare handcuff me ... you ... you ...” Her belligerent voice dissolved into a sob.


  “... Do you understand these rights?”

  “Your life is over!” she wailed. “You’re a dead man!”

  The officer perp-walked her down the airstairs and a triumphant roar rumbled like a clap of thunder. Some civilians were shedding joyful tears as they recorded the event with Chi-phones. Others stood dumbfounded as if they couldn’t believe that justice was being served, and a few well-deserved barbs rose above the celebratory ruckus, epithets ranging from murderer to traitor to pedophile.

  No one is above the law, Ryan thought, smirking, then he said, “You need to trust the American people more, Rone. As long as our justice system actually delivers justice, they won’t take the law into their own hands.”

  The Admiral’s brown eyes glimmered with relief and darted toward the analog clock. “We’re out of time, Mr. President. Are you going to appease Sebastian? Or implement Plan Z?”

  80

  Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Brookham

  Oahu, Hawaii

  BRADLEY STRODE ONTO the tarmac, squinting against the brilliant morning sun. It was a beautiful February day in Hawaii, seventy-eight degrees with clear skies and a leeward breeze, but he was too distracted to appreciate the weather.