A Vial Upon the Sun

by James Codlin

  “General, it seems I put my confidence in the wrong man.”

  There was a long silence, finally broken by Mello.

  “Mr. Moto, you are welcome to try to find someone else.”

  The circuit was broken.

  Chapter THIRTY-THREE

  Gina methodically interviewed Lenin and Alejandra until they all heard the high-pitched scream of a jet fighter, followed by a muffled blast as a bomb exploded on the roof of the palace. As plaster showered down from the ceiling Dennis looked at the panel and saw all the signal monitors at zero.

  “Shit!” he shouted. “They got the dish.”

  Dennis looked around the room. He spotted an aluminum case the size of a coffin, threw open the lid, and began rummaging through the contents.

  “Get Kobe on the horn,” he called to Lenin. “Tell him we need his APC. We’re going mobile.”

  *

  The armored personnel carrier rumbled along the street, shaking its occupants as it lurched around corners and bashed up and over curbs. Gina held tight to Martín. Vice President Saavedra sat next to her, looking disheveled but resolute. Lenin, Alejandra, and Colonel Kobe sat on the troop seats opposite them. Between them were two mobile television cameras on tripods and a stack of audio and video control units. Dennis climbed down the steel ladder from the vehicle’s turret, unrolling heavy cables as he descended.

  “I got the flyaway set up topside, but with all this driving, I’ll never be able to keep it on the bird.”

  “What’s a flyaway?” Gina asked.

  “A small dish used by camera crews broadcasting from fifty k’s south of Woop Woop—they’re aimed manually to transmit directly to the satellite. Colonel Kobe, can you get us to a park or some open space so we can stop and aim the dish? I need to be clear of these tall buildings to get line of sight on a satellite.”

  Kobe thought. “Union Park,” he said. “It’s risky, though. We’ll be in the open and susceptible to an air strike. The vice president is my security priority right now.”

  Vice President Saavedra, a tough-looking woman in her mid-fifties, shook her head. “Without getting the truth out, I’m just ballast in this damned tin can. Do what you have to do, Colonel.”

  Kobe went forward to talk to the driver.

  *

  All over San Juan Diego people tuned their televisions to BBC cable news. A few had been watching it when Colin Blackwater, the news anchor in London, told viewers they were picking up a remarkable broadcast from the capital of the Latino Union. Those few who were watching saw the familiar face of their president’s daughter, and were stunned by the story she, an Argentine professor, and a Spanish law student told from a studio in the presidential compound. The viewers called and texted friends and relatives, telling them to turn on the BBC.

  Then the BBC had lost the video signal. Blackwater assured viewers that the BBC was working to restore the link to continue the remarkable story alleging treachery and deceit at the highest levels of the Latino Union government, even involving Pope Pius and King Carlos of Spain.

  Word spread quickly. Soon thousands of homes, bars, coffee houses, and restaurants were tuned to the BBC. As Colin Blackwater recapped the story and replayed the digital recording made while the satellite link was still operating, a Spanish language voiceover was added to translate for viewers in South America. People listened in dumbfounded silence to the allegations about leaders who had been considered gods and heroes only hours before. The sounds of jet aircraft streaking over the capital and explosions rocking the quiet city called to mind too many military coups, too many despots, and too much palace intrigue from years past.

  People became angry.

  With millions of Latin American viewers now tuned in, Colin Blackwater announced, “I’m told we’re again receiving that broadcast from San Juan Diego in South America, this time from the inside of an armored personnel carrier.”

  The video broadcast cut from Blackwater to a dim picture that frequently broke up. The faces of Gina Ishikawa and Teodoro Lenin emerged from the obscurity.

  “I am continuing the broadcast that Mr. Waro Moto and King Carlos are trying desperately to keep you from hearing,” Gina said into a handheld microphone. “I have with me Architect Martín Ibarra Paz, who served with distinction on the managing board of the San Juan Diego construction project. Architect Ibarra, please tell me in your own words about these past few days when you were in the custody of the New Spanish Inquisition.”

  “Thank you, Ms. Ishikawa,” Martín said. “I have been a victim of the culmination of centuries of mind control technology amassed by this demonic institution. Let me explain…”

  *

  Waro Moto called the command center. “You damned idiot, they’re broadcasting again!”

  “Yes, they’re in an armored personnel carrier.”

  “You know where it is?” Moto demanded.

  There was a pause before Mello answered. “Yes.”

  “Then blow it up!”

  “Mr. Moto… there is citizen support growing for those people… and for Vice President Saavedra.”

  “I don’t give a bag of shit for their support.”

  “Mr. Moto, people have taken to the streets. They’re riding on top of the APC and forming a human shield. If we strike the target, there will be thousands of civilians killed.”

  “I don’t care about civilians, General, I care about protecting a very large investment. Do what you have to do!”

  *

  Colin Blackwater’s face looked out from millions of television screens all over the Latino Union. “You have been listening to Ms. Gina Ishikawa’s extraordinary broadcast indicting King Carlos of Spain, Pope Pius, and industrialist Waro Moto. You have heard a firsthand account of a victim of a modern Spanish Inquisition employing horrifying techniques of mind control and mind alternation. While the stories Ms. Ishikawa, Doctor Lenin, and Mr. Ibarra have presented have been compelling, there had been no independent corroboration.

  “Now, however, I have made telephone contact with BBC news correspondent Russell MacMillan, who is in San Juan Diego to cover what was to be the inauguration of the new capital city. Russell, what can you tell us about the situation in San Juan Diego?”

  A photograph of a mid-thirties balding man with a bushy beard appeared over Blackwater’s shoulder.

  “Colin, I’m in the Sheraton Hotel near the center of San Juan Diego. Things were pretty much business as usual until about an hour ago when I could hear small arms fire and then the detonation of heavier ordnance around the city. From my window I could see military vehicles moving, so I went to the lobby to leave the hotel. There I ran into a cordon of soldiers who refused to let me out.

  “Just five minutes ago I had a call from a highly placed source at the Ministry of Defense who claimed to have a recording of an encrypted radio transmission between Waro Moto, who has been cited by Ms. Ishikawa in the conspiracy, and General João Mello, who we all heard Mr. Moto describe as a loyal army officer. Let me play that recording now.”

  *

  “My men tell me there are more than fifty thousand people here in the park,” Colonel Kobe shouted over the diesel engine, “and we’re right at the center of them.”

  Loudspeakers had been jury-rigged throughout Union Park, and the BBC audio echoed everywhere. People gathered in tight knots around smartphones to see the video. Through questions and answers, Gina, Alejandra, and Lenin listed all events starting with the Fourth Angel document written by Torquemada up through the people killed to keep the conspiracy secret. This, on top of the intercepted radio transmission from Waro Moto to General Mello, stirred the crowd into a low-grade fury. Citizen leaders were emerging and calling their compatriots to action.

  *

  Deep in the steel belly of the APC Gina and the others felt the air vibrate with the whump-whump-whump of heavy helicopter rotors. Kobe pulled himself up to the turret and looked out of the hatch.

  “Gunships!” he called down to the others.


  A voice electronically amplified to ear-blasting proportions intoned, “Citizens of San Juan Diego, the Latino Union Joint Military Command is declaring martial law. Until further notice, no public gatherings are allowed! You are all in violation of the law.”

  “Tanks are moving into position around the park!” someone on top of the APC cried.

  “Clear the park immediately. If you do not comply, our helicopters and tanks will open fire in ten seconds.”

  *

  “Russell, we’re hearing a loudspeaker announcement in Spanish. What are they saying?”

  MacMillan’s voice sounded strained and he puffed loudly as he said, “It says the army’s going to open fire on men, women, and children in ten seconds if they don’t clear the park. I’m with a camera crew on our way to the roof so we can look down into the park and give you video… Okay, we’ve got the door open, but the ten seconds are already up. I have a very bad feeling about what we’re about to see.”

  Colin Blackwater said nothing while he listened to MacMillan huffing over the telephone.

  “We’re running to the other side of the roof… fifty meters to go… almost there.”

  Blackwater’s face, pinched with concentration as he strained to listen to the phone patch, filled millions of television screens.

  “Russell?” Blackwater asked. “Russell, what do you see?”

  “I don’t believe it,” MacMillan wheezed, trying desperately to catch his breath. “I don’t believe it.”

  “What do you see?” Blackwater repeated more urgently.

  “I see… Mardi Gras, Carnival, New Years in Time Square, and a World Cup victory party all rolled into one big celebration. Military units have broken ranks and the crews have come out of their tanks! They’re singing and dancing with the civilians in Union Park!”

  *

  The thundering rotors of the helicopter gunships beat the air above the APC so hard that Martín could feel his rib cage vibrating. He stared blankly while holding Gina against him. Lenin, Dennis, Alejandra, and the vice president looked up at the open hatch. Suddenly the rhythm changed and the roar died away, replaced by a different reverberating cacophony—the distorted blasts of amplified music and the combined bellow of thousands of human voices.

  *

  “Russell, your video’s coming through now,” Colin Blackwater said.

  The television screen filled with human tumult as seen from above at a high angle. The camera lens zoomed in on the APC.

  “Russell, it looks like people are being pulled out of the armored vehicle.”

  “Yes, Colin, they are being pulled out and put on the shoulders of the people in the crowd around it and carried as heroes. There’s Vice President Saavedra, who will be sworn in as president as soon as the death of President Ishikawa has been confirmed.”

  “Speaking of the broadcasts,” Colin chimed in, “there’s Dennis Prinn now. Our satellite television links are thanks to Prinn, an Australian freelance technician.”

  “That’s right, Colin, and believe me, I’ll thank him and the others properly when I get a chance,” Russell MacMillan said. “I guarantee that none of this lot will have to buy a drink in this town for a long time. Right now, we’re hearing a huge round of cheers for Gina Ishikawa, daughter of the president, as she’s being lifted off the APC and onto shoulders of admirers.”

  “Russell,” Blackwater said, “from your close-up, it looks like some of the well-wishers around her are crying.”

  “Yes, Colin, that’s what I’m seeing through my binoculars. This is a celebration of the defeat of despotism, but it’s also an outpouring of condolence for Miss Ishikawa over the presumed death of her father, who apparently gave his life to destroy that nuclear missile. He was always an admired man, and now he’ll forever be a hero to the people of San Juan Diego.”

  MacMillan continued, “That young man you see coming through the hatch now is Martín Ibarra, the Cuban-American architect who headed up the project to design and build this capital city that has seen some destruction today by the military action. I think we were all spellbound when we saw this young man on that shocking television broadcast of the auto-de-fé conducted by the Inquisition.”

  Blackwater said, “Yes, Russell, that was chilling to see such a thing happening in the twenty-first century, and until now no one really knew if Mr. Ibarra was alive or dead. I’m hearing reports that Ms. Ishikawa was instrumental in saving Ibarra’s life. What do you know about that?”

  MacMillan said, “I’m hearing those same stories and here in Union Park in San Juan Diego they are the Romeo and Juliet of this crowd of thousands. At this moment you can see that he and Gina Ishikawa are being carried by the crowd, side by side.”

  Colin said, “It looks like the crowd is forming a long line, Russell.”

  “Yes, Colin, and if my experience at other world class celebrations serves, that’s a conga line. The music we’re hearing here in Union Park is grabbing everyone, and they’re dancing. We’ve zoomed in on the attractive young woman out in front leading it—it’s the Spanish law student who helped describe the conspiracy on the broadcast that has held our attention for the past hour. And I’d have to say she’s one of the best dancers I’ve ever seen! Onscreen you can see the crowd is carrying Martín Ibarra and Gina Ishikawa in a victory lap around the park. What a hold Ibarra has on her! It doesn’t look to me like he’s ever going to let her go.”

  EPILOGUE

  Waro Moto slowly pulled the headset from his ears and laid it on the seat beside him. King Carlos and Pope Pius each did the same, their faces ashen.

  “Five hundred years of planning,” Carlos murmured. “Five hundred years of careful execution. Five hundred years of waiting to realize Christ’s rule on Earth.”

  Moto’s face filled with contempt.

  “Don’t waste even a second of my time trying to make me think you really believed that religious rubbish. You were in this for the power—not for the ‘glory forever, amen.’”

  Carlos stood and pulled himself up to his maximum height.

  “You are a crude barbarian, Moto, and you have squandered my opportunity to correct a grave historical error!”

  The industrialist laughed crudely. “Listen to yourself. You call me a barbarian? What about that mass execution you staged in Mexico City? For television, no less. That’s the ‘bread and circuses’ of your European ‘civilization.’”

  The two men glared at each other. The pontiff was slouched over in his seat, head buried in his hands. As he rocked back and forth, a muffled whimper of anguished torment burbled forth.

  “Over!” he cried out. “It’s all over!”

  Moto and Carlos exchanged a glance, their mutual contempt overshadowed for the moment by their disgust for the pathetic, naked emotion on display in front of them.

  Moto’s satellite phone rang, startling both men. The pope continued to quietly sob. Moto looked into the king’s eyes, then over at the phone, and then back again.

  Carlos nodded, and Moto picked up the phone. His thumb clicked on the speaker, and he grunted at the handset.

  From the phone emerged a language that neither of them spoke, but both recognized immediately. The thick accent was all-business, but carried with it the unmistakable air of barely disguised amusement. Carlos had just enough time to share a shrug with Moto before another voice cut in—female and in English. It droned without emotion as it translated.

  “Are you done with your childish games now?” the female voice intoned. “Did you really think that it would be so easy to establish a new world power, just because you had piles of money at your disposal and some religious zealotry to use as a catalyst?”

  The male voice cut through with laughter, and then resumed speaking, followed a few moments later by the translator.

  “Gentlemen, do not get me wrong. I very much admire your audacity, but watching you play this out over the last two days made me somewhat sad for you—like watching a puppy slowly drown after fallin
g into a toilet bowl.”

  Moto’s fists balled, and his face reddened. “How dare you reach me on my private line to insult me like—”

  “Nyet!” the male voice shouted. A few beats later the female voice chimed in neutrally with “no.” Moto and Carlos stared down at the handset in silence, Moto stewing and the king wide-eyed in anticipation as to where this conversation was going. The Russian resumed speaking, his voice once again calm, yet commanding attention. The female voice followed.

  “We do not have much time. Or, rather, I should say that you do not have much time. If I am correctly understanding everything I have heard in the public domain—and what my intelligence sources are busy confirming—at this moment the men aboard your private jet still have access to an enormous fortune. Enough of a fortune to retire a superpower’s worth of debt and still have plenty left over to assert global financial domination. If this is true, then it is your only opportunity to survive.

  “Your access to this fortune is now in grave jeopardy. The nations of the world—once they are able to ascertain the veracity of the impossible things that they have now been told—will begin the process of freezing the assets that you have access to, and for the next five hundred years they will wrangle impotently over what to do with the money. Some of it will simply disappear, but most of it will waste away, doing nothing for anyone. I am here to give you a final opportunity to rescue your colossal failure from the ashes of history—to give meaning to the remainder of your lives instead of spending years in prison.

  “Instruct your pilot to turn off your plane’s transponder. I will send coordinates to you. They are for a remote airfield in the Cayman Islands—you should have enough fuel to get there, I believe. Land there and then board the unmarked plane waiting for you. Once aboard, you will immediately begin working with us to secure as many of the accounts as we can. You also have a great deal of technological infrastructure in place that we could make very good use of. There will be so much to discuss.”

  Moto and King Carlos looked into each other’s eyes, searching, and the two men immediately and wordlessly found common ground.