Manifest (The Darkening Trilogy)

by Jonathan R. Stanley

  I can feel the soldiers getting tense. I raise my hand. “Not to worry. I will pay you more than enough to compensate you for this equipment, my good man.” I snap and Val leaves the ship to go back to the limo. He returns with the rest of the first duffle bag and I open it to the seller who pulls out a stack at random to inspect.

  “I assume you want low denominations,” I say. “If you prefer, I have hundreds.”

  “Twenties are preferable,” he says taking out a random sample and inspecting it with a UV pocket light.

  “By my estimations, it comes out to roughly three-hundred thousand,” I round.

  A worker who has been keeping track with a calculator the whole time, pushes the small device into his boss’s field of view. “Three-fifty,” says the seller, also rounding.

  “I’ll give you four-fifty.”

  “Why?” He asks skeptically.

  “Because I want to make sure you stay in business.” As I say this, Val pulls out an electric bill counter and sets it on top of a crate. “Not many others in this area carry your inventory,” I continue. “And I’d like to know that you are resupplied as soon as possible.”

  He looks at me sideways, as he well should. My straightforwardness is a necessity of time, and though I am being honest, my counter-offer should strike him as suspicious.

  “To be clear,” he says. “We are back to zero after this transaction.”

  “Back to zero.”

  He hesitates then nods, yes. I nod to Val who begins loading stacks into the bill counter. It hisses as the red digits, denoting the total, strobe like a gas pump display. The seller continues to check random bills for counterfeits as Val supervises the loading of the crates into the armored truck and limo.

  With the seller is satisfied, we leave the docks and return to the apartment where Sabetha and Bullworth are waiting. They help us unload half of the equipment into the basement of our apartment building. The other half goes into the armored truck which I drive to a high-end indoor storage facility. I toss the rest in their VIP section vault with some other goodies I have stowed away.

  By the time I get back, it’s morning. Val is in the limo with a large coffee in one hand and a razor knife in the other, cutting out the upholstery and unscrewing the seats. The plan is to turn the once elegant dignitary transport limousine into something of an ambulance. Once its back is gutted, Val takes some spray paint and marks sections of the bare metal. I do the same to the back of the armored truck. These will serve as designations for the mechanics who will do the more tedious and time consuming work.

  Back inside the apartment, Val makes a few phone calls. While he makes an appointment to get our vehicles modded, I sit at the dining room table with Bullworth. He stares out the front window for nearly half an hour, probably thinking about nothing, as I imagine he would have to do to keep the beast at bay. I know what it’s like to pass time that way but at the moment I have important mock-ups to draw for the mechanics, specifying more precisely what our spray paint marks mean. My hand swipes across the drafting paper without ruler or square yet with the precision of a computer printer. Val hangs up the phone, done with his conversation and comes over to us, taking a seat. “I assume you heard all of that?” he asks me.

  I nod, having, of course, heard the other end of the phone conversations from across the room. I turn to Bullworth to sum it up. “We have two of the best shops in the city to do the work: one for the truck, the other for the limo. Long story short, we park the vehicles at their respective drop spots where they will be towed to each garage.”

  “Is there any risk that they’ll just take the vehicles?” Bullworth asks.

  “Not unless they get away from you two; we’ll be seeing them all the way to the garages. You’re with Val, I go alone, Sabetha’s our backup.”

  “What do we do till sundown?” Val asks.

  I motion to the dining room table where the AK-47s and Thompsons are laid out in pieces. “Inventory.”

  Sixteen

  That evening, Val, wearing one of his disguises – a generic, security officer uniform – parks the armored truck in a handicap zone and goes into a strip club while Bullworth waits patiently inside the truck’s vault. A little later, the fake tow truck arrives. Val comes rushing out just in time to find the armored car lifted onto its back wheels. He goes through an act of drunken indignation and finally agrees to go along with the tow truck driver. I watch from nearby in the limo and upon seeing everything go down flawlessly, drive to my own drop off spot. In my case, I have “engine trouble.” I make a fake phone call on the side of the road and a hundred and six seconds later the other garage guys show up with a flat bed. It’s marked with the logo of a local, highly-underrated trade school. They throw the limo on the back and then bring me to their garage, a back entrance to the school.

  I don’t even know who it is we’re hiding from, or even if these charades will have any effect if our enemy is the consciousness, but I decide to err on the side of caution for once in my life.

  The trade school is well outfitted, but talent more so than equipment will get the job done. I give them the mock-ups I drew and instructions. If everything goes according to plan, Val will be doing the same at the other garage. Once finished, I go outside where Sabetha arrives to the sounds of not-so-distant sirens and gun shots. There’s a high speed chase going on just three blocks away as I get in the car.

  Apathetic, Sabetha heads for the other garage along the shortest route, one which is going to take us directly into the path of the chase. At the last second I put my hand on her arm to guide her driving and she speeds up and swerves accordingly. Three PIPER cars scream by inches to either side.

  “Nice,” I say patronizingly. “You know, one of these days, I’m going to forget to do that.”

  “Delano please, I go for months at a time without stopping at intersections, with or without your help.”

  “Just head to the other garage. I’m sure they’re waiting for us.” Sure enough, Val and Bullworth are on the sidewalk outside the shop.

  Crammed into Rolla, who lists noticeably to Bullworth’s side, we all drive back to the apartment, eager to begin the uncertain future, but unprepared enough to warrant pause. The car ride is filled with the voice of a news caster going over the day’s events. We listen intently to the monotone voice, trying to pluck out the stories of crimes and riots from the interference of soft,white noise. The news keeps us silent until dinner. I prepare a decadent feast, overly elaborate so as to put my mind to work while we wait for the vehicles. Marshmallow sized scallops in a creamy white wine sauce over penne pasta, and steamed asparagus with thin streaks of balsamic drizzle. For Sabetha, three cuts of human loin, which have been marinating in a peppercorn concoction, served chilled with pearl onions for garnish.

  Val removes the gun oil and metal from the dining room table and Sabetha sets it with a fresh table cloth and silverware. Always weary, Bull stares out the front picture window like a big, pensive gargoyle. Everyone is silent for the next half hour. When we finally sit down to eat, Val takes one look at the plate before him and says, “I appreciate the effort, Delano, but you could have softened me up with a burger.”

  Bullworth pokes at one of the scallops, then, with his arm instinctively placed in a protective arc around his plate, he does his best to eat civilly.

  “No softening intended, though now is a good time to talk strategy. Unfortunately, I have little more to tell you than we already know from news reports.” I say this, painfully aware of how plain my tone, and how dire the conversation, is.

  “The court,” Bullworth says, “is quick to point fingers. Just about everyone is to blame in its eyes.”

  “And what about Lezar?” I ask, hoping I know him well enough to estimate his views.

  “He is afraid – the court makes him that way – but he has not decreed anything yet.”

  “He’s cautious by nature,” I say, “but as I’m sure you’ll agree, Bull, it’s only a matter of time befo
re something forces him to act. We will need his warriors for support, and we won’t get them if they’re crusading against the chyldrin.”

  “How will you influence the whole court?” Bullworth asks.

  I sip my wine then reply. “Since factioning is probably inevitable if the Blood Wars have shown us anything, we know the darkened will split into groups based on their most conspicuous differences. The court will be no different and want to kill anything non-gazer. But we can appeal to Lezar. What we need from him is dissenting opinion.”

  “A shining example of it,” Sabetha adds.

  “We essentially need him to stop a Blood War before it starts. Even if he splits the court and it crumbles into sects, Lezar will still be the best off in Central.” I pause, then ask Bullworth, “How loyal are his men?”

  “Unquestionable at the moment.”

  “Naturally. More to the point: how loyal will they be after a schism?”

  “They rely on Lezar as he relies on them.”

  “So, as long as he can still provide food and shelter, they should remain loyal.”

  Bullworth looks like he always does, a statue, but I can tell he takes this last comment as a sleight. I attempt to clarify. “We don’t want them to have to look for alternative means to feed their pups, which is enough to make any army question its prince.”

  “What we really need is another Maynard Creek,” Sabetha says. “Lezar has always wanted to fill his shoes. Now’s his chance to live up to all that posturing.”

  “I only know the legends,” says Bullworth.

  “The Blood Wars, and the cults for that matter, took us as close to the brink as we thought the city could go,” I begin. “When we stopped them, it was in a bid for peace, even if it was a peace bound by the status quo ante. Already though, the city seems to be on course to push beyond old boundaries. What we know from the past is that chaos is something it tolerates. While revolutions are summarily crushed for the threat they pose, plain old-fashion anarchy seems to be mostly immune to backlash. Senseless violence only casts the old system in a better light.” I stop as if to listen for a response from the city herself. For the moment, she is silent.

  “We are venturing into uncharted area,” I continue, “going both with and against cycle. Damned if I know what will happen. But if we can subtly direct this destruction, or save enough good souls to rebuild Gothica for the better, we may live to see the results.”

  Val looks at me with a mouthful of pasta. “Uh-huh. So what do we do?”

  I realign my thoughts for a fraction of a second. “First step is demolition – which the citizenry should well take care of itself. The riots and fires have to run their course. All we can do is try to keep things moving forward. That’s phase two.”

  “Moving forward,” Val repeats sarcastically.

  “If you’re looking for objectives, we don’t have any. This isn’t exactly a standard op, Val. Every night will be filled with judgment calls.”

  “And the ultimate goal?” Bull asks.

  “To break cycle.”

  “What if we trade it for something worse?” asks Val.

  “What could be worse than eternal hopelessness and torment leading to a wasted existence? At this point, I’d take hell on earth just as a change of pace. And besides, what ultimately happens is far beyond our control. It might be that fact alone that keeps the consciousness from snuffing out our existences this very moment.”

  Val downs the last third of his second glass of wine.

  “Whatever else we agree or disagree on, we must all accept something. There is no turning back. I will die before I compromise with her… I will burn Gothica to the ground before I let her return to her old ways.”

  Bullworth folds his hands at the edge of the table and looks at me. “I am only one warrior, but I will help you do this – with all the blood in my body.”

  The phone rings and Val rushes over to it, getting there on the second ring. He looks at me and I take the receiver.

  “Delano.” It’s Corbin.

  “Go ahead.”

  “Mega cult activity in the north, here. It was all just below the surface. Can’t believe I didn’t see it before. Every church in the borough is spitting fire and brimstone. They’re putting together militias. What do you want us to do?”

  “Get data – something representative – and then move on.”

  “Already collected it. I’ll let you know when we’ve got a synthesis.”

  I hang up. Everyone looks at me expectantly. “Nothing we didn’t already expect,” I say and walk sullenly over to the TV and turn on the news. It’s GCCN, Cynthecorp’s primary outlet of propaganda, headed by a team of “hard-hitting” delusional liars and demagogues, and I truly wish, now more than ever before, that that was an exaggeration.

  We spend the rest of the night watching the various news networks, looking at their diagrams of the city’s hot spots, their statistics and commentaries. I make sure to correct for their errors when I can and to mark down when honest journalism has leaked through the preventative filters and corporate talking-points. As this is one of the only sources for Gothicans, I have to try to imagine what the world looks like through the television set before me. Without my usual encyclopedia of data to reassure me that these circus-spectacle-correspondents represent only a small portion of public opinion, and not a representation of Gothica’s thoughts and fears, I feel a bit nauseated.

  My first thought is that the media’s hysterics are just in response to the extreme events of the past few days. But the truth is, Gothica has always been numbed and poisoned by the punditry. Just three men control all the news organizations in Gothica and it only takes one of those men – a single person – to make a lie into truth in the minds of a hundred million people.

  It makes me wonder for a moment, if we should be nurturing the bottom of society or culling the top? After all, what more power could one person have than to change the reality of others through stubborn repetitious jabbering? Was Gothica’s reality not the product of such distortions – someone willing reality to be contrary to itself… and winning? I scribble down the three men’s names and then begin to make a short list of who would be easiest to blackmail, or most valuable to our cause to kill.

  It makes me realize the options that are available to me. I could shut down the entire media empire as it currently exists. But where to stop? Is my moral compass accurate enough? Am I the best or the worst person to be doing this?

  For so long I thought that Gothicans weren’t capable of anything else and that this pyramid of haves and have-nots built on deceit and extortion was inevitable. For not the first time, but the first time of any significance, I feel like one of the only people in the city who wants something other than cycle. A great ambivalence about my mission washes over me. Do I want to save these people? Do they want to be saved? Can they be? Do they deserve this terrible fate? Do I?

  The phone rings in the background and Val answers it. He says nothing, then hangs up. “Limo’s ready.”

  Dying trying is as good a death as any.

  Before the cash gets within three blocks of the garage, I inspect the work, which, to the trade school’s credit, was done well and done quickly. I can instantly tell whether the materials they used were the ones I specified, the quality of their welding, the PSI in the tires, and so on. The armor plating, a polymer weave I had shipped to them from our friend at the docks, will obliterate our fuel efficiency but soak repeat hits from any small arms fire found on the street. The windows have been replaced with the same stuff and aluminum ribs have been added to allow the roof to support more weight should she roll over. The suspension took an overhaul and the standard tires were replaced with auxiliary-supported run-flats. I wanted a self-sealing fuel tank like we have on Rolla, but none could be found.

  I call Betha to come by and drop off payment once I have given it a thorough inspection. She stops only for a second, hands me the suitcase, and then speeds off to beat the sunrise. I ta
lk to the shop manager, telling him that he has done a great service for the city, even if he was just looking for a paycheck. He has good kids working for him, too. I give him a phone number. If they need something in the days to come, when money has become less valuable than fresh water, I will do my best to help them.

  Every night will be like this, building something, pushing it uphill, generating momentum. A little goodwill or even some hope could have far reaching results in the weeks to come. No doubt, the resources I had shipped to the school and the money I dropped on this little project will add weight to my promise. I take the limo, a lumbering beast, out and drive it around the area, not heading home just yet. I want to scout out some trouble spots and plan tonight’s itinerary.

  Within three miles I come across a hard-hit neighborhood. There’s no shortage of visible damage, and smoke drifts through the streets from the ashes of last night’s fires. Where once there was oneness, blocks after blocks of boxy warehouses and tenement buildings, strip malls, and brick store fronts, there is now an anarchic character carved into the city’s flesh. Blood and ash stain the surface of Central Gothica. Windows are shattered, doors hang by single hinges, and not a few buildings have been gutted by flames. As if society has already broken down, no PIPERs or ambulance drivers are present. Many residents are dead. Others have lasted the sleepless night behind barricaded doors while predators pounded and scratched to get in. Yet the daylight brings silence; a brief reprieve from the hellish storms of night.

  What all of this means and how it will affect so many lives is unfathomable to me. It’s futile to try to imagine a world beyond cycle but I can’t help it. It’s been my job to interpret events and predict outcomes for a more than a few lifetimes. While lost in thought, I drive by an alley way and see a familiar spot. It was the same place where Isaac died during his darkening on that first night. I think back to how I felt watching it all from the rooftop. I couldn’t help him, I told myself then.