The Brimstone Diaries

by Rick Jones

  Kimball moved forward, as did Joshua and Jeremiah, the Vatican knights closing the gap and firing, their shots now finding their marks, all spot on.

  Bullet smashed bloodless holes in the bodies of Salim and Jamal. The two now dancing awkwardly like marionettes on a puppeteer’s strings. Jamal went down first, the man finally taking a fatal shot to center mass. Salim, however, dropped his weapon, fell to his knees, and stayed at that position until the Vatican Knights were on top of him. Joshua kicked the weapon aside, whereas Jeremiah and the remaining Carabinieri officer scoped the surrounding area.

  Salim looked at Kimball and noted the Roman Catholic collar around his neck.

  His breathing was becoming ragged and labored as blood started to ooze from the corner of his lips. Then he pointed to the collar. “A ...priest.”

  “Hardly.” Kimball got to a bended knee and got close enough to smell the metallic scent of Salim’s blood. “Where are the others?”

  Salim’s breathing became even more ragged, more like a rattle in his chest.

  As Salim started to drop his head, Kimball placed his forefinger underneath the boy’s chin and raised it so that they were eye to eye. “Listen to me,” he told Salim, “you’re going to die and nothing’s going to change that. If you truly want to save yourself, then you need to tell me what I need to know.” With his finger still holding up Salim’s head, Kimball leaned forward so that the tips of their noses were nearly touching. “The one called Abdallah Kattan,” he said softly. “Where is he?” Salim, in what was an involuntary reaction to Kimball’s question, unknowingly allowed his eyes to wander toward the direction of the Reliquary of the Holy Crib, before he caught himself and redirected his gaze into Kimball’s eyes. But it was all that Kimball needed to know. Nodding, Kimball said, “Thank you.” As if on cue, Salim, with his chest offering one last death rattle, closed his eyes and fell forward.

  Then into his lip mic, Kimball said, “Isaiah?”

  “Go.”

  “Have your team check for rogue targets and have them clear the rest of the church. I’m heading for the Reliquary of the Holy Crib. Meet me.”

  “Copy that.”

  Kimball, now getting to his full height and telling his team to clear the basilica alongside Isaiah’s team, began his slow progression toward the top of the reliquary’s stairs.

  * * *

  Kattan was hunkering down by the altar when the firefight ended. The silence was unnerving as he gripped his assault weapon tightly, the weapon suddenly heavy in his hands. From his position he caught a glimpse of two shadows at the top of the stairway—one large, one small—before they disappeared off to the sides of the railings. Kattan waited in silence that seemed eternal. Inside the crucible on the altar behind him, the clock continued to wind down. Then from the top of the stairway something metallic clicked and bounced off the stairs as a flashbang made its way down into the reliquary. As Abdallah Kattan raised an arm to shield himself from the blinding and concussive blast, the grenade went off. In the subsequent moment of its explosion, Kattan could see nothing but a flash of white light that stunned him to the core. His senses went dull, his way of thinking numb. The world around him seemed to spin and spiral out of control in this great illumination, after his body had been knocked to the floor from the concussive waves.

  When his eyes started to focus, and as the pinprick bursts of light began to fade away, he ultimately became cognizant enough to realize that he was facing the dual points of automatic weapons that had been leveled inches from his face. When his gaze moved on from the mouths of the gun’s barrels and to the Roman Catholic bands in their collars, he immediately realized that he was in the presence of the Vatican Knights.

  Beside Kattan and to his right was his weapon, which he had lost during the blast.

  “Go ahead,” said Kimball. “Reach for it.”

  Kattan focused on the mouth of Kimball’s weapon, saw the darkness of its hole that was waiting to spend a round. Then he raised his hands. “I don’t want to die,” he said.

  Kimball moved closer and pressed the point of his MP7 against Kattan’s forehead. The metal was hot to the touch. “Abdallah Kattan,” he said. “Brother to Mabus.”

  “Whom you killed.”

  “Your brother was an animal who deserved nothing less.”

  “You separated his head from his shoulders and placed it upon a pike.”

  “To show the people of the village that they no longer had to fear the man who terrorized them. I wanted to let them know that they were free.”

  Kattan swallowed as a bead of sweat trickled from his hairline and down his temple. Behind him the clock within the crucible continued to countdown. All he needed was twenty minutes. What he got instead was seventeen.

  “I don’t want to die,” he repeated.

  “You won’t,” Kimball told him. “But you’ll probably wish you were after you reach a Blacksite.”

  “I don’t think you understand,” said Kattan. “It’s inevitable. Us dying.”

  Kimball suddenly caught on.

  The Vatican’s planted Sacra Culla was on the reliquary’s floor, whereas the artificial relic that had been provided by Kattan sat upon the altar. The real Sacra Culla that contained the Holy Crib was safe inside Vatican City.

  Then from Kattan: “Surely you were apprised by Father Ferrano,” he said. “Who betrayed our position the moment he had been compromised.”

  “You mean Faisal Naba?”

  “No. Father Ferrano. A man of true Syrian blood would never betray his people. And as you know, Father Ferrano came from an American father and a Syrian mother. It was the paternal side who deceived us. Not the Syrian side. Therefore, the American in him, this Father Ferrano, was the coward who betrayed us. Not Faisal Naba?”

  “Whatever.” Kimball stepped around Kattan, who continued to raise his hands, and went to the replica on the altar. It was a splendid rendition of the real Sacra Culla, thought Kimball, an exact duplicate. The artistry of its metallurgy was precise in every detail.

  After removing the lid, Kimball’s breath hitched, the sudden sucking sound catching Isaiah’s attention.

  “Kimball, what is it?”

  Kimball’s face had a red hue to it from the light shining up from the digital display. He immediately diagnosed the unit for what it was. He recognized the burnished sphere. The wiring. The triggering mechanisms. It was close to the Russian models of the Cold War era, he considered, when small-yield nuclear devices were condensed down to fit in five-gallon canisters.

  Kimball read the timer as it ticked down to detonation.

  ...00:02:16 ...

  ...00:02:15 ...

  ...00:02:14 ...

  “That son of a bitch lied to me,” he said.

  ...00:02:13 ...

  ...00:02:12 ...

  ...00:02:11 ...

  “Did he now?” Kattan commented. “Perhaps the Syrian side of Father Ferrano did not betray us after all.”

  When Kimball nearly cleaved the man’s hand in half, Father Ferrano, or Faisal Naba, confessed to everything right down to involvements from those within the church in a well-thought-out conspiracy that was meant to dismantle the Vatican from the inside. It had taken years of planning, years of patience. And that Abdallah Kattan, the brother to Mabus, spearheaded the drive with furious ambition after he had learned that it was Kimball Hayden who had murdered his brother.

  ...00:02:09 ...

  ...00:02:08 ...

  ...00:02:07 ...

  Kimball closed his eyes. No matter its yield, the weaponry of mass destruction was too close to Vatican City. In two minutes, he knew that the Vatican along with half of Rome would burn to ruins.

  There was nothing he could do.

  “Isaiah.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Faisal Naba lied to me,” he stated evenly. “It’s not filled with low-grade explosives at all, as he had stated.”

  In his agony, Father Ferrano told Kimball a partial truth, which also happene
d to be a partial lie, that the replica would be filled with low-grade explosives to make the Vatican believe that the pieces of the Holy Crib were destroyed in the blast, when in reality it was being sold on the black market in order to fund ISIS in future operations. With the Vatican believing that the remnants were destroyed, then there would be no need for a papal investigation to find what no longer existed.

  “What is it?” Isaiah asked him.

  “It’s a low-yield WMD,” he answered.

  ...00:01:56 ...

  ...00:01:55 ...

  ...00:01:54 ...

  The moment Kattan heard what he believed to be defeat in Kimball’s voice, he allowed his eyes to gravitate towards his weapon on the floor. As self-preservation started to take control, as his cowardly traits began to surface, Abdallah Kattan reached for his weapon by diving for his assault rifle. But Isaiah was equally as fast as he drove a foot down on the back of Kattan’s hand and pinned it to the floor. As Kattan cried out, the Syrian swung his leg around to cut the Vatican’s Knights legs out from under him. But Isaiah leapt over the attempt, landed, then drove the butt of his weapon into Kattan’s face, rendering him unconscious. After kicking the weapon aside, he went to Kimball’s side to look inside the crucible. Red numbers were counting down.

  ...00:01:33 ...

  ...00:01:32 ...

  ...00:01:31 ...

  “Do you know what that is?” Kimball asked him.

  “I can hazard a guess, but I really don’t want to.”

  “If you were to hazard a guess, you’d probably be right.”

  ...00:01:27 ...

  ...00:01:26 ...

  ...00:01:25 ...

  When Isaiah went to his lip mic to warn the others, Kimball stopped him.

  “They can’t run fast or far enough to get away from its blast,” he told him. “I don’t want them to know what’s coming. It’ll be over before they know what happened to them.”

  Kimball then turned at Kattan who was lying on the floor with his mouth slightly agape, before turning his attention to Isaiah. “I want you to know that you have always been a great soldier, Isaiah. But you’ve always been a greater friend.” Isaiah nodded his appreciation at this before saying, “And it has been an honor, Kimball, to both serve you and be your friend at the same time.” They turned to the digital timer and watched the red numerals count down while feeling no greater impotence.

  ...00:01:17 ...

  ...00:01:16 ...

  ...00:01:15 ...

  “Now the mystery will finally be answered,” Kimball said, though Isaiah wasn’t sure if he was talking to him or to himself.

  “There is no mystery, Kimball,” Isaiah told him. “And this is certainly not the end.”

  “We’ll see.”

  “There is the Light.”

  “We’ll see.”

  “And you have earned the right to enter it.”

  “We’ll see.”

  “All you have to do, my friend ...is believe.”

  Kimball Hayden remained quiet as they watched the last moments of their lives tick away.

  ...00:00:03 ...

  ...00:00:02 ...

  ...00:00:01 ...

  ...00:00:00 ...

  Chapter Fifty-Two

  ––––––––

  Master Kang dreamed of a life far from the madness of the crowd, only to pop his weary head out occasionally to see what opportunities there were to keep him going financially. Abdallah Kattan had offered him that opportunity, a sweet financial windfall that would keep him off the radar for years to come. But for him to blend in, he would have to seek out Asian countries where he could disappear. First, he thought about the Philippines; too dangerous, though he could live like a king for many years, if not a lifetime. But that was too close to Islamic extremists in the south, should Kattan decide to send troops to hunt Master Kang down. Then he thought about Thailand, a country with a stable government. But considered against it. Instead, he set his sights on Japan, a leading nation in the world with a great institute of education, finance, a First-World country that could provide a lot of protection. Even though his finances would not go as far in Japan as it would in the Philippines or in Thailand, he was sure that he had made the right choice. With money he had earned from Abdallah Kattan, and with the proper investments, Master Kang could still live a good and luxurious life that had avoided him when he was the minister of science in North Korea. No more living like a pauper for me. Looking out the window and seeing nothing but darkness below, the ocean a bed of absolute black, Master Kang still fumed over the way he had been treated by Abdallah Kattan. The threats. The lies. The man’s ambition was so great that he was blinded by the fact that all power began and ended with the Master. So, if Kattan wanted to push his weight around, then Master Kang would push back with passive aggression. With no additional funds added to his account as promised by the ISIS leader, Kang would proffer an incomplete device until all funds were paid in full.

  Master Kang looked at his watch.

  In Rome, it was zero hour.

  And the North Korean smiled.

  No one gets the best of Master Kang in a deal, he thought.

  If Kattan wants the weapon enabled instead of the timer, then he would have to forward additional funds into his account to receive the necessary instructions to fully engage the device. This time, because of Abdallah Kattan’s deceit, he would triple the asking price.

  But in the weeks to come, Master Kang reached out to couriers to contact Abdallah Kattan, but the Syrian who once adorned the clothing of a cardinal would never be found.

  Nevertheless, Master Kang remained a happy man until members of the North Korea’s espionage unit discovered his whereabouts in Tokyo, where they took care of him in a manner that Kim Jong-un expected.

  Like Abdallah Kattan, Master Kang was never heard from again.

  Chapter Fifty-Three

  ––––––––

  The Basilica di Santa Maria Maggiore

  Rome, Italy

  The weapon had not gone off. Inside the crucible, the digital timer read zeros across the board.

  “I don’t get it,” Kimball whispered.

  “Maybe it’s a counterfeit to distract us from the real placement of the real weapon.”

  Kimball, however, dismissed this. There would have been no reason to create a second replica because Kattan had no idea that he had been compromised, or that he would be. “No,” he said. “This is it. This is the device.” It simply did not go off.

  Which begged the question of ‘why?’ Miswiring perhaps? A dysfunction within the operating mechanics itself? There were so many questions but no answers.

  Getting onto his lip mic, Kimball contacted the Carabinieri command post and informed them that a WMD had failed to go off, and that an experienced team was needed to neutralize the weapon immediately.

  And suddenly the whole of Rome seemed to be galvanized.

  * * *

  The bomb experts were surprised to see a piece of weaponry so expertly designed with the capability to level a part of Rome and Vatican City, and they were startled to discover that the device had not gone off for one simple reason: it had not been activated; only the timer. Once the WMD had been neutralized, Kimball found himself alone inside his chamber at the Vatican, thinking how close they were to complete and absolute annihilation. This place, this walled-in room that had been created with castle stone that was the color of desert sand centuries ago, was his home and a place he adored. No bigger than a jail cell and quite spartan, he nevertheless found it peaceful. On one side of the room was his cot, his military manuals, a nightstand and a lamp. On the other side was a place for worship, such as a kneeling rail that had never been knelt on, a votive rack filled with candles that had never been lit, and a podium which held a Bible whose pages had never been lifted or turned. In the middle of the room and high up on the wall was a stained-glass image of the Mother Mary who held out her arms in invitation, which Kimball never accepted. I
have never been good enough to accept your embrace, he told himself. Then laying on his cot with his hands pressed behind his head as a makeshift pillow, he looked ceilingward and engaged in thoughts about his future. Could he surrender such a life at the Vatican and move on? Did he want to move on?

  He closed his eyes.

  In his mind’s eye he saw a counter life far from this room and far from Rome.

  He was in the United States working an honest labor for honest wages. He lived in a small house with white-picket fences surrounded by beds of flowers that bloomed in a riot of colors. The grass was as green as Irish hills and well maintained. A dog barked, a yellow Lab, or perhaps a mini-schnauzer, whatever dog Shari Cohen loved more was fine by him. Then he saw her dazzling smile from rows of teeth that were ruler-straight and as white as pearls, as she beckoned him with a wave of her hand. As he neared her he could see the luxurious texture of her skin that was the color of tanned leather, and eyes that shined as if they were newly minted pennies.

  And then the image faded...

  ...And Shari was gone.

  Behind his closed lids there was nothing but darkness, a horrible emptiness.

  Opening his eyes, they eventually fell upon the stained-glass image of Mother Mary.

  “Why do I see nothing beyond her beckoning me? Why won’t you let her accept me?”

  As expected, there was nothing but silence.

  Turning over on his cot, Kimball, in time, fell asleep inside a chamber that was no larger than a jail cell.

  Chapter Fifty-Four

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