Exponential Apocalypse

by Eirik Gumeny

  “You bring any marshmallows?”

  Sixty-Four: The Best Laid Plans

  Thor and Chester A. Arthur XVII continued to stand by the Holiday Inn’s main desk talking about the girls, while the girls continued to sit on the couch opposite them talking to William H. Taft XLII.

  Neither conversation was particularly interesting or engaging. The individuals involved were mostly talking to fill the silence—a silence that allowed them to hear a cybernetic hotel manager vigorously hump a vending machine.

  This lack of involvement in their activities actually proved to be beneficial, as four men in dark suits, accompanied by a woman in a dark suit with a dark burlap sack over her head, soon walked into the hotel’s lobby. Catrina, her attention not focused on what she was doing, was able to immediately identify the woman.

  “Judy?"

  "Hi!” replied Judy, waving, and, Catrina assumed, smiling. It was kind of hard to tell, what with the bag and all.

  “What are you doing here?”

  “We’re here for Thor, actually,” she said, walking toward the couch. “We need his help.”

  “I’m sorry,” said Thor, “could you repeat that? My friend here,” he indicated Chester A. Arthur XVII, “is a little hard of hearing.”

  Chester A. Arthur XVII rolled his eyes.

  “We need your help, Thor,” repeated Judy at a much greater volume.

  “That’s what I thought you said,” replied Thor, turning to Chester A. Arthur XVII.

  “Fine,” said Chester A. Arthur XVII, “you’re not completely worthless.”

  “Thank you.”

  “What exactly is it you need Thor for?” asked Catrina.

  “After the incident with subject 37-E, I was recruited by the Department of Science to… Well, not recruited, really. Since we fucked up so bad, the department pulled our funding and took back our building, confiscating all of our research and supplies. And me, ‘cause I was living there. Anyway, I told them about how Thor killed it with lightning and they put me in a cell for a while and then last week they had me tell the story again and then they gave me this suit and told me to go get him. So that’s why I’m here.”

  “That’s great, Judy,” said Catrina, before repeating, very slowly and distinctly, “but what do you need Thor for?”

  “Oh, right. There’s a renegade Mexican god with an army of philosophers marauding up and down the west coast and we need Thor to destroy it.”

  “What?” asked Thor. Although, truthfully, it was more a statement of disbelief than an actual question.

  “Renegade god?” asked Queen Victoria XXX. “What god? What the hell are you talking about?

  “Whoa, new person, hi,” said Judy. “It was a name with a lot of letters. Catcher… Quesa… Quasimodo?”

  “That’s the Hunchback of Notre Dame,” said William H. Taft XLII.

  “Yeah, that’s not a god,” countered Judy.

  “Right, that was my point…”

  “Right.”

  “I don’t…”

  “Yeah,” said Catrina, putting her hand on the shoulder of William H. Taft XLII, “don’t do that. Just follow my lead.” She leaned forward and called to the four men still standing by the door. “Hey, suits, anyone over there not an idiot?”

  Three of the men immediately took a step back and pointed to the fourth man. He looked confused. Catrina hung her head.

  “That explains why they’ve come for Thor anyway,” said Chester A. Arthur XVII.

  Thor smacked the reconstituted genetics of a former president in the back of the head and walked toward the man in the suit.

  “So,” said Thor, “who’s this renegade god then?”

  “Quetzalcoatl,” said the man, similarly walking toward Thor, “Aztec god of assorted things.”

  “Anything in particular I should know about him?”

  Thor and the least imbecilic man in a suit met in front of the couch… and all the people situated thereon.

  “Wait, wait,” said Queen Victoria XXX. “You’re seriously considering doing this?”

  “Sure. Why not?”

  “You’re going to get yourself killed, that’s why not,” said Catrina.

  Thor shrugged, saying, “Not necessarily killed.”

  “Our reports,” said the man in the suit, “indicate that Quetzalcoatl recently manifested himself as an abnormally strong, winged snake-man hybrid with an unverified arsenal of supernatural powers. Plus he has a loyal, downright devout, army of liberal arts majors and hobos numbering in the thousands.”

  “Sounds like killed to me,” said Chester A. Arthur XVII.

  “Wait…” said Thor, “snake-man?”

  “Yes,” said the man from the Department of Science. “Snake-man.”

  “Well, how much snake and how much man, exactly?”

  “I’m sorry?”

  “If you were walking down the street and you saw this guy, would you be like, ‘Holy crap, it’s a giant snake,’ or ‘Oh my goodness, that man has a tail?’”

  “I don’t…”

  “This is very important,” said Thor, grabbing the man in the suit by the suit the man was in, “answer my fucking question.”

  “I don’t know. Sir. I honestly don’t. Please don’t hurt me.”

  “Let him go, Thor,” said Catrina.

  Thor let go of the man in the suit, but continued staring at him hard enough to make the man need a dry cleaner. Catrina, meanwhile, turned her attention to Judy.

  “Judy?”

  “Hey, I don’t know either,” replied Judy, putting up her hands. “We were told that every reconnaissance drone sent out by the Department of Science exploded or otherwise ceased to function. So no one’s actually received a visual yet.”

  “According… according to our research, though,” said the man with the wet crotch, taking a folder from one of the other men in suits and hastily flipping to a page within it, “Quetzalcoatl was traditionally described as ‘the feathered serpent.’ So I’d wager he’s more snake than man. Probably.”

  “Well,” said Thor, with unexpected calmness, “seeing as how you’re all clearly so well-versed in mythology, I’m sure it’s safe to assume that you’re already aware my battle with Jormungand, the Midgard Serpent, is prophesized as a key part of Ragnarok, right? And since the dead have already risen and I was at least partly responsible for killing Fenrir the Wolf, probably, the prophecy is kind of accurate. You know, within interpretation.”

  “I understood maybe half of that,” said Judy.

  “If I fight a giant snake the world will end. For real.”

  “Well,” she said, “maybe you think so. We’ll take our chances.”

  Sixty-Five: This is a Call

  “Quetzalcoatl wants us all to come to Las Vegas,” said Jack, closing his phone and putting it back into his pocket.

  “Las Vegas?” said Jill. “But what about all the missionary work we’re doing? We’re nowhere near finished.”

  Jack shrugged. “Gil says Bill says Quetzalcoatl says it can wait. Something big is going down in Vegas, apparently.”

  “He say what?”

  “Nope.”

  “But we just started here…”

  Jill pouted and looked at the dozen terrified Mormons tied to chairs with rope and extension cord, their eyes duct-taped open and their mouths stuffed with socks.

  Jack shrugged again and began dismantling the video camera and tripod.

  “It can wait. They’ll still be here when we get back.”

  The dozen terrified Mormons began banging the chairs they were tied to around in a frenzy.

  “What the hell’s gotten into them?” asked Jack.

  “I’unno,” said Jill, shrugging.

  Jack and Jill were interrupted by the sound of a door slamming shut. They turned to see Hil trying desperately to hold the room’s entranceway closed as murder-drones battered it from the other side.

  “Uh, guys?” she said, ducking slightly as a spike lodged itself in the w
ood above her head. “We got murder-drones.”

  “Crap,” said Jack.

  “Guess it’s a good thing we’re leaving then,” said Jill.

  Hil toppled an armoire in front of the door.

  “We’re leaving?” she asked.

  “Yep,” replied Jill. “We’re going to Vegas.”

  “Why are we going to Vegas?”

  “Quetzalcoatl said so.”

  “Oh,” said Hil, shrugging slightly, “OK. Well, there’s another exit in the other room.”

  “Good,” said Jack, handing the tripod to Jill. “Let’s get the hell out of here before those robots break through.”

  The Mormons started shouting. Or moaning. Or something. It was probably best described as “making a loud, muffled sound.”

  “Aw, don’t worry, guys, we’ll finish this up when we get back,” said Jack, putting his hand on the shoulder of one of the converts. The man responded by pointing his head fervently in the direction of the killbots.

  “Oh, them?” asked Jack. “You should be fine. I mean, their not after you yet.”

  Sixty-Six: This Plot’s Not Gonna Move Itself, You Know

  “Man,” said Thor, pacing back and forth across the lobby, “what the hell am I supposed to do?”

  “You fight him,” said Chester A. Arthur XVII, “and you kill him.”

  “And then the world ends,” added Queen Victoria XXX.

  “The world’s ended, like, twenty times over, Vicky,” said William H. Taft XLII. “I don’t think this one’s going to be any different.”

  “But Thor thinks it will,” said Catrina, “and I believe him.”

  “So do I,” added Queen Victoria XXX. “This is the first thing he’s taken seriously since we met him.”

  “Maybe, but I’m with Billy. I don’t think one more apocalypse is going to kill us,” said Chester A. Arthur XVII. “Besides, regardless of whether Thor is somehow right or, more likely, just completely insane and more than a little full of himself, Quetzalcoatl is causing some serious damage and threatening what little semblance of order and civilization is left on this planet. If we don’t stop him, he might just end the world himself.”

  “We?” asked William H. Taft XLII.

  “Yes, ‘we.’ I’m not about to leave the fate of my lunch up to Thor, much less the continued existence of society.”

  “Really?” said Thor, his eyebrow raised.

  “Is that a ‘do you not trust me with your lunch’ question, or a ‘are you seriously coming with me’ question?”

  “The second one.”

  “Then, yes. I’m coming with you,” said Chester A. Arthur XVII.

  “Me, too,” said Catrina.

  “And me,” said Queen Victoria XXX.

  “You guys are all fucking crazy,” said William H. Taft XLII. “I’m staying here.”

  “You’re coming with us, Billy. Or I hurt you.”

  “Really, Vicky? How is that helpful?”

  “Shut up and get your rocket launcher out of the car.”

  “Fine,” sighed William H. Taft XLII.

  “OK, so I guess we’re… fighting this guy then,” said Catrina. “To the death. Great. You sure you’re good with this, Thor?”

  “Not really, no,” said Thor, “but the world’s apparently pretty fucked no matter what happens. Might as well at least try to do the right thing.”

  “It’s about fucking time you grew a pair,” said Judy, sitting on the concierge desk. “The helicopter’s just been wasting fuel out there.”

  Sixty-Seven: Sin City

  Quetzalcoatl sat atop the facsimile Eiffel Tower, overlooking the burning ruins of Las Vegas, his tail coiled around the latticework of the tower’s uppermost spire. Phil and Bill sat precariously on either side of him, without tails and huddled against the spire, whimpering slightly.

  “It’s beautiful, isn’t it?” asked Quetzalcoatl.

  “The neon… contrasted against the… inky darkness of night?” replied Phil. “I suppose it does have a certain… aesthetic quality that some might…”

  “I meant all the burning prostitutes.”

  “Oh.”

  Las Vegas had not been in ruins or on fire until shortly after Quetzalcoatl arrived. It had, in fact, been the most prosperous city in the world from the third apocalypse onward. If there was one thing people loved to do during the end of the world, it was panic. If there was another, it was fuck. And if there was a third, it was gamble away their children’s college funds while doing the first two.

  “Do we have to… sit up here, Quetzalcoatl?” asked Bill, searching for something to hold on to. “It’s quite… high.”

  “No,” said Quetzalcoatl, “of course not.”

  Quetzalcoatl pushed Bill off the edge of the Eiffel Tower.

  “What… Why would…” stammered Phil.

  “Quiet,” replied Quetzalcoatl, peering downward, “he hasn’t hit the ground yet.”

  Phil’s grip on the tower doubled in intensity. So did his heartbeat, the fear in his eyes, the certainty he was going to die, and his regret at never buying a parachute or learning how to fly.

  “Oh, there we go. Landed on a Japanese guy. They are never going to get that out of the sidewalk.”

  The latticework dug deeply enough into Phil’s hand to draw blood.

  “So, anyway,” said Quetzalcoatl, “I’m sure you’re wondering why I’ve asked you up here this evening.”

  Phil responded by staring blankly in abject terror.

  “Well, at least tell me you understand the gravity of the situation…”

  Nothin’.

  “C’mon, quit being such a dick, Phil. I’m trying to have a conversation here.”

  It took a few minutes, but Phil eventually remembered how to breathe regularly again. Then he remembered he was sitting atop a half-scaled Eiffel Tower with a sociopathic Aztec god in the middle of a burning city and had to go through the whole gamut of physiological responses to panic all over again.

  The cycle repeated itself a few times, actually.

  “You done?” asked Quetzalcoatl.

  Phil responded with, “Buh…”

  “That’s still more syllables than you’ve given me in the last hour. I’m willing to call it a win. Let’s get down to business.”

  “Guh…”

  “Look, Phil, I love you, but I’m not in love with you. I carried your ass up here to talk strategy. If it wasn’t for you and your… people, I might not be here right now. I figure I at least owe it to you to hear your opinion before I go ahead and do whatever I damn well please anyway. But if you’re not actually going to contribute, you can just as easily join Bill down on the street.”

  “No, no. Strategy good,” elocuted Phil. “What’s… the plan?”

  “Well, for starters, I’m thinking we should probably burn down the world.”

  “I’m… I’m sorry?”

  “It really doesn’t get any simpler than that, Phil.”

  “Why would we… burn down the world? I thought we were trying to… save it from itself… free it from the greed and the… bureaucracy. I thought we were… giving society hope… an open-ended future…”

  “Yeah, about that…”

  “Even… even if you don’t… if your goals…” continued Phil, his synapses not firing quite as quickly as they probably should have been. “Murdering everyone just doesn’t seem productive.”

  Quetzalcoatl pushed Phil off the Eiffel Tower.

  “I don’t know,” said Quetzalcoatl, “I seem to be producing corpses with surprising efficiency.”

  Quetzalcoatl looked from side to side and shrugged.

  “Of course, now I’m sitting up here talking to myself,” he continued. “I must look crazy.”

  Sixty-Eight: Elegy

  “Well,” thought Phil, as he plummeted toward his imminent, sidewalk-splattered doom, “this is it.”

  “Thrown off a faux French monument in the middle of a city in the middle of a desert in the middle of t
he night,” he continued thinking, “by a newly re-deified deity intent on scorching the Earth for as mercurial and ill-defined a reason as revenge.

  “Honestly, I did not see it coming.”

  Phil continued plummeting.

  “It really is beautiful, though. The night, the city. Even the burning prostitutes. Their panic and continued flailing seem almost choreographed. It’s majestic, in its own way. If only I had noticed earlier. Well, not the hookers, per se, but the… beauty inherent in everything. I know I wanted to, but I was trying so hard to get others to think of me the way I wanted to be thought of, trying so hard to make them believe that I could see the angels in everyone, that I completely failed to actually see them. I suppose wanting to be something isn’t the same as actually being something. It’s remarkably simple, really, astoundingly… apt, then, that by simply not trying, by not overanalyzing the approach, that by, quite literally and unfortunately, falling into it, I’m now able to accomplish the task.”

  Phil sighed deeply and continued his fall. He began ruminating on, and, for once, truly appreciating, the beauty of everything he could see from his peculiar vantage point: the neon-lit sky, the latticework rushing past him, the ever-approaching sidewalk.

  Really, the sidewalk was quite lovely. Laid out in perfect lines, each square clean and unbroken. A kind of whitish-grey, with a stucco-like facing. A stucco-like facing Phil’s face was rapidly nearing.

  “Oh, sweet fucking fucking fucking fuck.”

  Phil tried to turn his body in mid-air, only getting as far as changing his jackknife into a belly-flop. He continued the metaphor by hooking his arms and attempting to swim himself out of danger.

  It didn’t help.

  “I don’t want to die I don’t want to die I don’t want to die”

  That didn’t really help either.

  “Sweet merciful crap, I wish I believed in a god. Or that there were gods to believe in to begin with. Other than the one who just killed me, I mean. If only… Oh shit, sidewalk!”