Prisoners of Paradise

by Brandon Lars Erikson

  Ailanian Standard Time: 1300 Hours.

  Moke didn’t remember the last ten minutes. His brain was a blur. Within seconds of leaving the back of the limo, he had contacted Audrey, Jack, and several other coordinating specialists, who were, by now, used to this sort of thing. Audrey was leading the team who was sent to protect High Senator Ulu Jinkua. Jack was told to cover Karamotzain, while Captain Robert Kalawai was covering Klunka. All of them were now racing to get to the location where the real bomb was now supposed to be located.

  The plan was to insert multiple bomb squads into the stadium, while the concert was going on, and hopefully dismantle and neutralize it, before any civilians even knew what was happening. Moke looked at the tactical map on his ReadyFile. Kaiser Field was ten minutes away. Moke had ordered every bomb squad, a special weapons and tactics team, and nearly a dozen different emergency action teams to the site.

  “Oh gods!” Moke mentally bit his fingernails since he couldn’t do it through the gloves he was wearing. The aircraft’s pilot was also dressed in a set of dull, black fatigues. Moke didn’t even remember putting his on. He just now realized that he had forgotten his utility belt.

  “Goddamn it! Can’t this thing move any faster?!” He screamed.

  “Sir! We’re almost in position,” The pilot said.

  Moke clicked on his com, “I want three teams at the entrance! NO COPS! Only emergency workers for first aid! No one is to be arrested for anything! I don’t care if you see Immorals selling people kilos of Cutz! NO ARRESTS! This crowd is going to be an angry one! We need to try to keep what we are doing a secret as best we can! Just control the crowds so our bomb squads can do their searches! Hopefully we can find this thing right away and neutralize it before anyone in the crowd even knows what’s happening!”

  “Those goddamned punks!” Moke’s brain buzzed as he thought to himself about The Evil. “I sympathized with them when they said that they wanted my Aunt Ulu dead…but this makes no sense! Why would these people want to kill Chief Tipsy?! He’s rock and roll, he’s hip-hop, he’s the spokesman for a disgruntled generation that teeters on the Immoral edge! He wants a free Ailana! He wants people to be able to do what they please! I don’t understand it! “

  Moke glanced out his window and spoke into his com, “How many people are in that stadium, Agent Welks?”

  “We estimate one hundred thousand, sir,” was the reply.

  “Good gods! I hope we have enough medical supplies!” Moke screamed to himself. “This makes no sense! Why Tipsy? Why are they doing this?!”

  “Sir! I have a visual of the concert,” Another voice said as it was piped into Moke’s ear via the com in his black helmet. Moke activated the monitor in the control panel and began to observe the ground below. Several hundred yards away from the stadium, he saw nearly two thousand security officers in riot gear. Their clothes were black and baggy their helmets were black and sparkled in the bright sunlight. They had clear shields that could be electrified and a number of stunning weapons on their utility belts. Moke told them to stay as far out of sight until they were needed. Just outside the stadium he saw the hundreds of medical personnel all dressed in orange and white jumpsuits. Large white ambulances hovered around the parking lot in strategic areas.

  Moke scanned the inside of the stadium. In front of the large, tapestry covered stage, where Chief Tipsy and his band were playing sensual music, was a sea of people, dancing, singing, and jumping around. Moke felt his chest tighten as he realized that these innocent citizens had simply come here to seek out a kind of freedom, and temporary relief, from their daunting everyday lives. He saw how they wore their hair long and shaggy. They wore brightly colored, baggy clothes and sported tattoos. They raised their hands in the air and chanted.

  “Oh my gods…”

  Moke saw happiness on every face as the monitor panned over the crowd. He saw people drinking alcohol and smoking Makani and Cutz, which they had snuck into the stadium. Moke swallowed the fear in his throat as he realized how sorry he felt for all of them. He felt his eyes burning with the beginning of tears as he realized that these people were happy and free at this very moment. His mind ached with sadness as he realized how their happiness, could potentially come to a disastrous end.

  Moke pulled his com from his jacket and began frantically dialing his sister’s number.

  “Come on Kara! Answer! Pick up!” He screamed internally. “I know how angry you must be right now, but this is no time to be giving me the silent treatment!”

  Location: Kaiser Field…Township of Waihenalu…Ailana.

  Ailanian Standard Time: 1300 Hours.

  Kara Kalapana stood in a small production management area behind the stage. Her face was serious as she looked over the legal brief on her ReadyFile. Despite the loud music that filled the air, she heard a familiar voice.

  “Excuse me…Miss Kalapana, can I speak with you for a moment?”

  Kara turned around and smiled as she saw a young, human male wearing a flannel shirt and a pair of brown jeans. The young man was a light-skinned Native American with long, black hair. The young man was an Earthling, who had been born on Ailana. Kara remembered how his Cherokee parents died when he was in kindergarten, and how local Kupano people had adopted him, claiming that he looked like a son of theirs’ who had died young.

  She also recognized him instantly as a local music reporter, whom she had gone to school with several years ago. She seemed pleased as she said, “Wanu Ka’aluu? Wow! It’s been ages! What are you doing backstage?”

  The young man said, “I’m here because I’m covering this concert…for an online magazine. We’re looking for opinions about Chief Tipsy and what kind of impact he has made with his activism on Ailana.”

  Kara’s smile turned to a sudden frown, as she realized her com was ringing. She took it out of her pants pocket and frowned even more as she realized who it was from.

  “Not now Moke…some of us are trying to have a good time here today,” She thought while she turned off the com and stuck it back in her pocket. She then looked at her old classmate and said, “Well, right now Chief Tipsy is doing the greatest service he can do for these concert goers. He’s freed them, even if it just for a moment. For the time being, these people are free from the fact that they now face the worst job market Ailana had ever seen. They are free from the fact that one out of every ten Ailanians commits suicide on a daily basis. They are free from the fact that one out of five Ailanians are arrested and imprisoned for being jobless and in debt. Out there in the crowd, there are young kids who are free from the fact that their parents fight about money, and the fact that their unemployed fathers beat their mothers during drunken rages.”

  Kara paused and looked out at the sea of faces before her and said, “In the audience there are people, both young and old, who are, for the moment, free from the fact that their friends and family members have been imprisoned for producing illegitimate children. Right now, there are young people, and older people alike, who are momentarily free from the fact that over half the money they make goes to pay for second class housing that they don’t own. They are free from the fact that the recession stole their jobs and businesses. Many are free from the fact that they will never be able to buy their own home because of the soaring inflation and interest rates, which were the result of all the real estate scams that have happened on Ailana since the Moralists took control of the High Senate. Many of these people are free from the fact that they are stuck in dead-end, low-paying, unsatisfying jobs which will never allow them to achieve their dreams of financial freedom. Out there, in that crowd, the slavery of our world has been abolished…even if it is just for the afternoon.”

  Wanu said, “Wow…you make our cause sound so…inspiring.”

  Kara’s face seemed sad and a bit guilt ridden as she said, “Today, even if it just for a moment, these people are free from the fact that their society i
s crumbling because of divisive and bigoted politics. What Chief Tipsy has done for them today, is to give them a positive message of hope, and one day of fun. We should all just take a moment to thank him for this one day of rejoicing for the flesh, and a revitalization of the spirit, before we all have to go back to the pain of the daily grind, and the painful realities of living in a world that could be a paradise, if we all just set aside our differences and worked together for once. It’s not enough to simply live…there has to be a reason for living…and I think he’s showing us how possible that is.”

  Wanu smiled and said, “I couldn’t agree with you more. But I think that there is hope. I just know…that something big is going to happen on Ailana…real soon.”

  The young man’s smile turned a bit sinister as he looked under the stage and focused on a small, blinking red light that was pulsing in the darkness. He then looked at Kara and said, “It’s been real nice seeing you again Kara. I’d better get going, but trust me…this show…will be a blast.”

  Location: 200 meters above Kaiser Field.

  Ailanian Standard Time: 1310 Hours.

  “COME ON KARA! ANSWER YOUR COM!” Moke screamed in fear and frustration as he drove his fist angrily into the arm rest of his chair.

  “I don’t understand it! Why a Chief Tipsy concert?” Moke fumbled in his mind as his pilot slowed the aircraft down, and the stadium below began to exponentially increase in size. The stadium looked like a giant, golden cockroach, with its insides hollowed out. It was an open air stadium and the mass of people inside looked like rolling water in a disturbed swimming pool.

  Moke could hear the Chief singing in a loud, sweet voice. “One love in which to give up!”

  “I don’t understand it!” Moke cried to himself

  “One voice in which to rise up!” Tipsy sang out.

  “This has to be another hoax! This has to be a hoax!”

  “One people! One voice! One paradise!”

  Moke heard himself shouting, “Oh please, sweet gods above, let this be a hoax!”

  Chief Tipsy’s voice was like that of an angel as he sang, “ho people we need…one love!”

  Location: Kaiser Field…Township of Waihenalu…Ailana.

  Ailanian Standard Time: 1310 Hours.

  Chief Tipsy stood on the stage like a god. His large belly and big Balguran frame made his long, multicolored robe visible to everyone in the stadium whose eyes were transfixed upon him. “Ho people! We need…one love!” He sustained the last note he was singing and raised one plump fist in the air and then used his other fattened hand to hold his microphone out toward the crowd who echoed back to him the words, “ONE LOVE!”

  “One heart!”

  “ONE HEART!”

  “One soul!”

  “ONE SOUL!”

  “Ho kumi kulu aina ku mau tai!” Tipsy ended the verse with a spine tingling vibrato, and then let his twelve man band play a series of very catchy riffs that sent the crowd into a tizzy of pure hysterical joy.

  However, deep in the crowd, one young man in a flannel shirt and a pair of brown jeans was looking very serious as he tried to quickly walk away from the stage through the dense forest of people. The young man had long, black hair. He appeared nervous and was breathing heavily as he thought to himself, “it’s just about time. It’s just about time…our revenge and our victory is about to happen very soon. Jacob my friend, I’m so sorry that you couldn’t be here to see this…”

  Wanu Ka’aluu untucked his flannel shirt from his brown jeans. He ran his hands through his black hair and turned around. He walked as fast as he could to large tunnel, at the side of the stadium, where the crowd would walk to a vendor’s area before they exited the stadium. He walked briskly past booths selling T-shirts, music in computerized digital files, as well as food and drinks. He jogged over to a door and opened it with a pass key that had the word STAFF engraved on it in bold letters.

  He shut the door quietly and began walking down a tunnel that ran below the stadium’s bleacher system and eventually lead to a maintenance room with its own exit. The light in the tunnel was dim, but continuous. The only footsteps he could hear were his own and he could feel the beating of heart slow down a bit as he realized that he should be able to escape the stadium on time. His co-conspirators would pick him up in the parking lot and they would disappear into Polynea’s massive, underground structures.

  His breathing had almost become normal, when he heard something similar to the sounds of swords being removed from scabbards.

  “Shit…” Wanu thought as he froze dead in his tracks, “they warned me about this guy…”

  He turned around and saw the face of a burned corpse with glowing, red eyes staring at him. The disfigured man wore a black trench coat and tried to hide his scarred face with a broad-brimmed hat. When he saw the long, silver blades sticking out of the man’s hands, Wanu realized what the man in blacks intentions were.

  “Well, if it ain’t the boogey man himself,” Wanu said as he felt a surge of adrenaline priming his muscles for the challenge of battle.

  The man in black just stood there, his burned face was stoic and machine-like.

  Wanu saw there was no fear on his opponent’s burned face. He took a deep breath and said, “I was warned about you…but trust me, sir…I am not afraid. I know why you are here…but first, let me explain a few things…I am very much like you…only, I’m much prettier. I’ve been living among the Ailanian Immorals since I was a child. I found out who I was, just like you did. The men in black came for me when I was a teenager and showed me how much of my skin could get cut with a knife and I wouldn’t bleed to death because of my tissue has an ability to heal faster than a normal human.”

  The man in black noticed the scars on the back of the young man’s hands.

  “Oh yeah,” Wanu said calmly. “I am just like you…and it’s scary to discover what you truly are.”

  The man in black stared back at the young man as if he were neither entertained nor intimidated as the youth continued talking.

  “I was given Military training,” Wanu said confidently. “I’ve never seen combat…but trust me, I am a formidable opponent. And the last time I went to The Hospital, before I decided to run away from my Military masters, the surgeons blessed me with these…”

  Wanu raised his impressive fists and flexed his muscular biceps as a pair of long blades emerged from his forearms. The young man smiled and said, “I’ve been living among the Immoral people of this great planet ever since I escaped…and they have been good to me. No one knows that I am a freak…because unlike you, I am still nice to look at. I’ve made friends, they treat me with respect…and I know why you are after them. But trust me…they are good people…they have moles and computer programs which allow them to spy on the Ailanian government…they know what is going on.”

  “They do?”

  The man in black looked the young man right in the eye as he heard him saying, “My friends understand what the evil people, who you work for, are doing to this planet…and they just want to stop it. They know what is happening in The Penitentiary. They know what the government is doing in order to profit from the peoples’ suffering and they know what is happening behind the closed doors of our High Senators’ chambers. They have every right to oppose what your masters are doing…and I agreed to help them…because they have shown me what evil really is.”

  “They showed you what evil really is?” The man in black said in a soft, gruff voice. “Are you aware of what your so called, friends, are about to have you do for them?”

  “Yes…the sacrifice of a few…is often needed to save the many.”

  “Really?” The man in black chuckled. “Now I’ve heard everything I need to know about your friends…and now I feel so much better about accepting this job…ever since that job I carried out at the apartment across the street from that night c
lub…I’ve lost count as to how many of them I’ve killed or captured at this point.”

  Wanu sighed and said, “And I can tell that this contradiction of a life that you lead is wearing you down. Do you believe that every single one of my friends are evil and deserve to die because you masters told you so? Let me ask you? Are you here to stop me because you care so very much about what is about to happen in that stadium above our heads?”

  “No,” the man in black said solemnly. “I’m here, because someone paid me to be here.”

  “I imagine whoever paid you to be here supports what our government is doing. I can see your dilemma. You have yourself believing that you’re doing this just for the money…but I can tell that there are a few times when you start to wonder if the people you have killed really deserved to die.”

  “I don’t do this for the purpose of believing in anything…I do this for money.”

  The young man’s face became emotional, “You could still believe in something…don’t you feel that this life is for something else other than making money? Can you imagine that the government, who created us, for the sole purpose of ending life, would have any respect for life at all? I’ve lived as someone’s slave…and I intend to help my Ailanian friends and family stay free. So if you’ve come to stop them…then you are going to have to go through me first…as I see things, you are protecting the wrong agenda my friend and righteousness is on my side.”

  “Well,” The man in black said as he tilted his head and popped a couple of stiff vertebrae in his neck, “may the best man-machine win.”

  “I’m still seventy five percent human,” The young man said as he readied himself for combat.

  “Not for much longer…”

  The screams of joy from the crowd above became a crescendo of anticipation as the two cyborgs faced each other and readied themselves for combat.

  Location: 200 meters above Kaiser Field.