by James Frey
He misses his horses.
The shorter man emerges from the alley, trying to run while holding up his pants. A bright thing slashes the air and strikes him in the back of the neck, and he falls face-first and dead onto the ground.
Seventeen seconds later Maccabee is back in the street, his arm draped around the woman. She’s crying. Their faces are close. Maccabee consoles her. She looks at the corpse.
Curses.
Spits.
Maccabee takes her hand, puts something in it.
She looks at his face, stands on her toes, and kisses his cheek. Maccabee says something else and points. He looks insistent. She kisses him again, stuffs what Maccabee gave her—surely an ounce of gold—in the top of her dress, hikes up her skirts, and runs away as fast as she can. Within seconds, she’s swallowed by the night.
Maccabee watches her for a few seconds and disappears back into the alleyway. When he reappears, he holds the rifle and the man’s clothing. He stops next to the smaller man. Reaches down and pulls his precious blade from his neck. Takes a fistful of hair and drags the body toward the Escort. Baitsakhan leans out the window and enjoys the air some more. He closes his eyes and thinks of his horse cantering across the steppe, throwing dirt from his hooves and spittle from his lips. He hears Maccabee’s footsteps, and the man being dragged across the gravel. Maccabee stops.
“Get off your ass and give me a hand.”
Baitsakhan doesn’t open his eyes. “Coming.”
Maccabee crosses to the pickup and throws the man in back. Baitsakhan takes the Kel Tec’s grip and, still lost in his reverie, reaches with his new hand for the orb and wraps his mechanical fingers around it.
And it doesn’t burn.
His eyes shoot open.
It doesn’t burn.
He looks at the Chevy, the engine running, Maccabee already inside blowing heat into his hands.
It doesn’t burn.
He slips the orb into a cloth knapsack and gets out of the car, suppressing a smile, pushing down his excited heart rate.
Maybe, once they get Earth Key, Baitsakhan can do away with the Nabataean after all.
Yes.
He can.
SHARI CHOPRA AND THE LEADERS OF THE HARAPPAN LINE
, Valley of Eternal Life, Sikkim, India
The Close Council of the Harappan sits in a room cut from the gray rock of the mountain, just as every room at is carved from stone. They sit on colorful cushions arranged in a circle. A thick Nepalese rug covers the floor. The center of the rug depicts a four-armed humanoid figure with the head of an elephant—Lord Ganesha—and the wizened figure of Veda Vyasa. The ancient sage dictates the Mahabarata to Ganesha, and the deity dutifully writes everything down. The words of the epic encircle the figures in a spiral that spins out to the rug’s tasseled fringe like the scribed arms of a galaxy.
Ganesha, lord of knowledge and letters, placer and remover of obstacles, the being that governs the forces of the bhavacakra.
Obstacles, Shari thinks.
Obstacles.
The council discusses the developments of the Shang video and the Aksumite message.
The message that, they must assume, every Player has seen and decoded.
“And you are certain it gave our location?” It is Helena, sounding excited and a little scared.
“Absolutely,” Peetee says. “Somehow the Aksumite has found us. I don’t know how. But we are dealing with the mysteries of the mysteries, and as we all know, anything is possible. It is only a matter of time before the others will find us too.”
“My family,” Shari says, “we knew this was coming. We should not argue over the whys and the wherefores.”
The older heads nod. Shari adjusts her position, feels the bulk of the pistol she keeps hidden under in her bright green-and-blue salwar kameez. The gun that belonged to the cousin of the Donghu and that she took from the warehouse where they tortured her. The place where dear Alice Ulapala came and rescued her.
The Koori, the Makers take her.
The gun Shari originally, and foolishly, loaded with three bullets. One for Jamal, one for Little Alice, one for herself.
But then she realized that it is nonsense to put names on bullets. And that killing is hard work, especially this kind of impossible killing, and that more bullets might be needed. What if her hand shakes so much that she misses? What if the first shot doesn’t kill her beloved? What if she has no bullets left to kill herself when she is done?
She does not like thinking of these what-ifs.
All the same, she has loaded the pistol to capacity, and strapped herself with two more magazines to boot.
If it comes to the impossible, she will be ready.
These thoughts fly through her head, and she doesn’t dare mention them. “How are the preparations, my sweet?”
Jamal says, “Good.”
“Please, tell us,” Jov says.
Jamal squeezes Shari’s knee. “As we all know, there is only one path that leads to . It is well guarded. We’ve made two checkpoints along the trail from the river. Each is manned by six men, all heavily armed. There is a third checkpoint at the Elbow”—a hard, angled turn at the end of a switchback trail that can only be passed by going through it—“and if any make it that far, then they will be cut to pieces by the M61 Vulcan mounted in the mountainside adjacent to our keep’s only entrance.”
“They will not make it that far,” Helena says.
Jov looks to Shari. “Helena has offered to go to the second checkpoint to oversee defensive operations.” Jov smiles, no teeth, all joy.
“And I will personally man the Vulcan,” Pravheet says, the ex-Player, the man who has promised never to kill again.
“What?” Jamal and Paru ask together.
“What of your vow?” Shari begs, betraying a tinge of desperation.
A big reason that she’s eschewed violence throughout her training, to the consternation of many, most notably Helena, is because of Pravheet and his vow. Shari has spent countless hours meditating with him and listening to him teach the principle of compassion and the power of love and patience. Her mind is as sharp as it is because of Pravheet. He is the reason she has learned to overcome physical pain and find good in any circumstance—real, tangible good, not just a fool’s imaginings. He is the reason she survived her ordeal at the hands of the little animal called Baitsakhan. Pravheet is the reason that she thinks, if it’s needed, she will have the inner strength to do the unthinkable: kill her own daughter in order to prevent another Player from taking her away, to the Makers, to the end of the game.
Pravheet stares deeply into Shari’s eyes. “If I am ever to break my vow, now is the time, Shari. When you rallied us in Gangtok, you spoke repeatedly of ‘we,’ the mighty and ancient Harappan, working together to win. I believe that you are right, and that we should try to win, and I know that I am prepared to do anything to see that we do—that you do. I still love peace and mindfulness, but if this senseless Event is going to happen, then we should be the ones to survive it. That is what we have been told, that is what we know. I would break every vow to see it happen ten times, twenty times, a hundred times. And when the Great Puzzle is over and you have won and the Earth is scarred, I will return to peace, and that is where I will stay. But for now, I am ready to kill. To kill them all.”
The room is silent for a few moments before Helena belches. “Nice to have you back, Pravheet.”
“There is nothing nice about it, Helena,” Pravheet says quietly.
Jov brings his hands together like he’s going to pray. “I agree with our esteemed ex-Player, and I for one am glad of your decision. There is no shame in your reversal, Pravheet.”
“Thank you, Jovinderpihainu.”
Some more silence. A servant is heard whistling the popular Bollywood tune “Pungi” as he walks down the stone hallway outside the room, his feet slapping the cold ground in time.
“We are ready, then,” Paru says.
Shar
i shakes her head. “There is one thing we haven’t mentioned.” She points a toe at the picture of Ganesha that is woven into the rug. “The elephant in the room.”
Her tone is grave, but nonetheless they share a light chuckle at her joke. Jovinderpihainu leans forward. He breathes heavily. “You mean: What if the Aksumite is right.”
“Exactly,” Shari says. “What if we could stop all of this by . . .”
Jamal cringes. “Don’t say it.”
A long pause.
“The Aksumite may be right,” Pravheet whispers apologetically. The heads swing to him. He talks slowly, methodically. “I don’t know much about it, but their line guards a deep and ancient secret that none of the other lines are privy to, and their knowledge of certain spiritual aspects of antiquity is unparalleled, even by our standards. There is a chance that he speaks the truth.”
“You mentioned him before, Player,” Jov says. “Can you remind us?”
Shari presses down on her knees, as if she is trying to suppress something horrible inside her. Finally she says, “Hilal ibn Isa al-Salt struck me as being unassailably honest.”
“By the Makers,” Jamal says angrily. “You can’t be suggesting that we kill our own daughter, Shari, can you?”
“No, of course not!” She takes a deep breath, wipes her eyes. She’s afraid. Afraid because she might be lying.
This is not the time for lying.
“Jamal . . . I . . . don’t know. Countless people—men and women and children and elders—were sacrificed to the Makers in the history before history, and countless times the Makers approved of these sacrifices, asked for them, needed them. Why wouldn’t they ask for one now? Doesn’t that seem like the whole reason for making Little Alice into Sky Key in the first place? To be grotesque, to allude to the peculiar violence of our shared past with the Makers? Like a coda of Endgame, of our existence, of our ancestry? The human race is born of many things, but chief among them is violence, extreme and supreme violence. Isn’t that what this is? Don’t they want me to do this unspeakable thing?”
Paru and even Helena go pale, and Peetee stares at the picture of Vyasa on the rug. Jamal yanks his hand from his wife’s leg. “Shari, I can’t believe you’re saying this.”
“I’m only bringing it up as a possibility, my love.”
The gun hidden in the folds of her clothing suddenly feels heavier than the sun.
Heavier and hotter and more absolute.
“I have no intention of hurting even a hair on Little Alice’s head, and I will guard her with every fiber of my being and every ephemeral ounce of my soul,” Shari says. “But billions will soon die, love. This is guaranteed. This is the promise of Endgame. The question must be asked.”
More silence.
Jovinderpihainu breaks it. “You are right to ask, Shari. But there is a difference between being honest and being right. Honest men lie all the time, believing that they tell the truth. Much evil is borne on the back of honesty.”
“So you think Hilal is wrong, Jov?” Shari asks. “That he is being misled?”
“I don’t know if he is or he isn’t. But I do know that if we follow his advice and sacrifice our beloved and innocent daughter and the Event still happens, then there will be no possibility of you winning. You will be utterly destroyed on the inside, hollowed out and empty—we all will be. This is a possibility too. That the Maker, which you took pains to point out seemed petty and even bored at the Calling, was merely a living creature. Not a god. Maybe in spite of all the wonderful things they are capable of doing, they are still weak at heart, and vindictive, and cruel. Maybe their motivation for planting this seed in the Aksumite is simply to see us suffer, and to see you break and go mad and take the life of your own child, for the sake of an entertainment. I say it again: If we’re to do what the Aksumite asks of us and the Event comes anyway and the game somehow continues, then how will you win?”
Another silence, its end definitive:
“I will not,” Shari says.
The wise elder frowns. “And for that reason, you won’t sacrifice Little Alice. Not now or ever. None of us will. We will surround her.”
All the heads nod. Shari is so thankful for this logic. It is sound. It is right.
“Bless you, Jov . . . And in a strange way, bless Hilal ibn Isa al-Salt. He has sent these Players to us. He has sent them to their deaths.”
“Yes,” Helena hisses.
Shari brings her fingertips together and forms a circle with her arms and chest. “We will surround her, as planned. We will surround her and we will win.”
Shari stands, and the others stand too. Pravheet helps Jov to his feet. Shari takes Jamal’s hand. She gives it a loving caress. He doesn’t respond.
They file out.
And as they walk, Shari fills with eagerness and fear and hope and terror.
She cannot tell him.
She cannot tell him that she will keep the gun on her person, always, and that even though she won’t sacrifice Little Alice to stop the Event, Shari will kill her if it means stopping one of the others from taking away her one and only baby.
SARAH ALOPAY
Casa Isla Tranquila, Juliaca, Peru
Sarah is not asleep when she hears her door open at 3:17:57 a.m.
But she looks asleep.
She’s in bed on her side, facing away from the door, gun in hand.
Whoever is in the room is silent—or likes to think that he or she is silent. The person has had some training in stealth, but it is not enough to evade her senses.
Meaning it’s not Jago.
Sarah waits for this servant to pick up the tray with the empty plates and glasses, and when he or she picks it up, she will kill and run out of the room and fight her way out of the Tlaloc compound. She has thought long and hard about whether she should hunt down Jago, but has decided that it would be suicide. Not because she couldn’t beat him, but simply because the most important thing for her is to get away, to live.
Even if it means losing Earth Key for a little while.
Even if it means leaving that which she fought so hard for—which she killed Christopher for—behind.
The person creeps farther into the room. She waits for him or her to stop at the table and take the tray.
The person doesn’t stop by the tray.
Sarah adjusts her body like a sleeping person would.
Waits.
The person reaches the bed. Comes to her side. Stops. It is a man. She can hear his breath.
The breath belongs to someone heavier than Jago. Someone older.
She wheels her legs, throwing off her covers, and catches the man across the chin and shoulder with her heels, makes good contact, hears a healthy and painful-sounding pop!
She vaults up and is quickly standing in the middle of the mattress, her gun pointed down and ready to fire. But before she does, the man swipes at her ankles. Her legs go out and she falls onto her side, but the gun does not go off.
The man stabs a hand forward and takes the top of the pistol and pushes it down into the bed and hisses, “Stop it, Sarah. If they hear, they’ll come for us. Both of us.”
It’s Renzo.
“What are you doing here?” she says at full volume.
He leans in to her. She can smell his breath. Wine and cheese and cigarillos.
“Please, whisper.” She can see Renzo’s chubby face in the dim light. His bulbous eyes. His thin mustache.
“Why should I? I can smell Guitarrero Tlaloc all over you.”
“Forget about Guitarrero. Jago wants to see you. Needs to see you.”
“Why isn’t he here, then?”
“He’s busy. And if you want to live through the night you need to shut up and come with me.”
“Why should I trust you?”
“Because I believe in the sanctity of the game. And I believe in my Player. And he asked me to come for you.”
Sarah lets go of the gun and, so quickly that it even surprises her, she reaches
and grabs Renzo by the Adam’s apple. She squeezes.
“Not good enough.”
Renzo’s eyes pop and water. He can’t speak. She steals a look at the door. It’s open. She could do away with this man for good and get out of this room.
She could escape.
She squeezes.
He makes a rasping sound, releases the gun, takes her shoulder, digs in his nails, and holds out a fist, knuckles up, in front of her.
He shakes it.
She doesn’t let up.
He opens his fist. A small thing inside drops free.
Earth Key.
She doesn’t squeeze his throat as hard.
He plants a hand on her chest and pushes away, taking three steps back, holding his neck, gasping.
“He . . . he . . . he told me to give that . . .” He inhales sharply.
Sarah doesn’t speak. She picks up Earth Key from the bedcovers.
“He told me to give that to you.” Renzo straightens. Wipes his eyes. He recovers quickly, showing his training. “It is a token of goodwill. He didn’t want you to be held like this, but he had to go along with it so he could do what he came here to do.”
“Aucapoma whatever-her-name-is?”
“Yes. Now please, we have to leave. It’s not safe for you here anymore—”
“It was before?” she blurts sarcastically.
“It’s even more unsafe now. There’s been a development with the Shang. You’ll see. But we have to move. Jago’s taken the guards watching your room out for a smoke. I sat in for them and watched the monitors before running here.” He points to a spot on the wall, indicating where the camera is hidden. “We have to go. Now.”
Sarah tightens her fingers around Earth Key. She can feel its energy course through her. She can feel her desire to Play.
“Why not just kill me?”
“Believe me, part of me thinks we should. But like I said, I believe in my Player, and he told me not to kill you.”
“Yet . . .” Sarah says.