He was right.
“More than anything,” I sighed. “But I saw his eyes when we met back in Switzerland. This crazy, swirling madness…he’s so far gone. Too far gone, maybe. Something has to be done. Something drastic.”
Gavin glanced from side to side as if to scan the bar for eavesdroppers. “So your mind is made up?” he asked, leaning forward. “You’re just gonna whack him?”
“It’s not that simple. I’ve killed people before, but it was different during Arena Mode; it was life or death, me or them. I’m not an executioner, and I’m not going to murder one of my friends, no matter how crazy he’s acting.”
“Then what?”
“I need to try and talk him down,” I explained. “One last time. Maybe he’ll listen to reason.”
Gavin peeled off his suit jacket and unbuttoned his sleeves, rolling them to his elbows. Despite the gloomy weather and chilly temperatures outside, the air was uncomfortably thick inside the pub, warmed from hundreds of sweaty bodies and burning candles.
“I always wanted to start my own business,” he began. “Ever since I could remember. While my friends played video games and hung out in holoforums, I’d spend my free time reading these autobiographies about the most successful businessmen on the planet. I wanted to know how they did it, how they went from nothing to billionaire. As a kid from the Dark Zone I was starting at as close to ‘nothing’ as I could get, so you can imagine these were the stories that interested me most. A lot of them were really fascinating, and some were even inspirational. But then I started reading news stories about exactly how these giants of industry built their empires. It’s scary how similar they are: someone has success selling computers or fast food or popular fashion, and they get a few million bucks in their bank account. They expand over the years, grow their operations, and then, before long, they’re cutting corners; ten-year-old kids sewing their shirts, genetically altered foods soaked in pesticides, employees building wrist-coms on assembly lines who are forced to work so many hours they die from dehydration. All to add a few dollars to their bottom line.
“The guys at the top all started as naïve bright-eyed kids, usually running their businesses right out of their parents’ garages. Most of them kind, well-meaning people just wanting to make a difference. Before long they’re running soulless conglomerates that are doing so much more harm than good.” He shook his head slowly, staring into the freshly-poured amber liquid foaming at the top of his glass. “I’ve always wondered how these guys sleep at night. They must know what they’re doing – the blood that’s being spilled to just to pad their bank accounts with a couple extra dollars that they’ll never live long enough to spend.”
“What’s your theory?” I asked.
“That they surround themselves with ass-kissers who tell them it’s all okay. ‘Group-think’, ‘hive-mind’, call it what you want: it’s a powerful concept, Mox. And a dangerous one. Get enough believers to agree with the same thing and nothing becomes too horrific – no atrocity too great.”
I groaned. “That’s bleak as all hell, Gav. True, if history tells us anything, but very, very bleak.”
“That’s business, my man. And business is life. Kenneth is quickly becoming the president and CEO of his own twisted corporation. And ain’t nobody gonna tell the boss that he’s wrong. No one ever does as long as he’s holding the power. The Living Eye is going to keep getting gold stars from his expanding horde of maniacs no matter what he does.”
I buried my face in my hands. “If I can’t talk him out of stopping, then how do I do it?”
“I think you know. I just don’t know if you can.”
Two more pints and four shots later, Gavin continued to press me. He demanded to know why, exactly, that I’d chosen this particular bar, on this particular night. Being out of Brynja’s mind-reading range was one reason, but he knew me all too well. There was something I’d been neglecting to mention. Once again, he was right – though if I’d told him up front, he would have never come along.
“All right,” I conceded. “The real reason we’re here is making her way through the crowd right now.” With a tilt of my head I gestured towards the crowd at the bar. A pale, narrow girl with flaming red curls and matching freckles gently shouldered her way through the mob of rowdy patrons.
“Damn,” Gavin whispered, letting out a low whistle. “I didn’t know you were gonna hook me up. I’ll never doubt you again.”
“Very funny,” I replied. “Now stay cool and follow my lead.”
He furrowed his brow and parted his lips, but didn’t have time for any follow-up questions. The red-head was already at our table.
“You’re Maisie?” I said, standing to greet her.
“Tony—?” she asked in a thick Scottish brogue. I nodded. She extended her hand, shaking mine warmly. She unbuttoned her long black jacket to reveal a thick wool sweater. She pulled up a chair next to Gavin.
“So, Tony,” Gavin said flatly, “are you going to introduce me to your new friend here?”
“Gav, this is Maisie Calderwood. She’s a recruiter here in Glasgow.”
“I prefer ‘ambassador’,” she corrected me, smiling broadly. “But I understand the confusion. This is all so new, and we’re just sorting out the titles in the early stages.”
Gavin raised his brow again, eyes darting between me and our guest. “And you’re an ambassador for…”
“You didn’t tell him?” she said cheerily. “Ah, that’s all right. I know, it’s a bit intimidating at first, but really there’s nothing to be afraid of. Imagine it? Just the thought of being with him, in his presence day after day…” she clasped her hands over her heart and stared dreamily off into the middle-distance. “I can only imagine how it will change my life. I just want to share that feeling with as many people as possible.”
“You worship Kenneth Livitiski?” Gavin asked with a hint of a sneer.
“The Living Eye,” she said quickly, raising a finger. “And it’s not ‘worship’. I’ve surrendered myself to the cause, and I’m a part of him, now. Part of The Order. We’re as one.”
“So this Order,” I asked, folding my hands on the table. “Can you tell me a little about it?”
“Ah, it’s wonderful,” she beamed like a lovesick teenager mooning over her new beau. “It’s like a family, Tony. You’d love it. No judgment, no hatred…we simply work together for the greater good.”
“That girl who washed up on the shore of the Desolation Islands, she seemed like she’d been judged pretty severely. And someone carried out the execution.”
“Oh, you misunderstand,” Maisie replied, sounding genuinely concerned. “That girl was a non-believer, yes, but you can’t blame the entire Order for the act of one person. We don’t even know who took that poor girl’s life.”
“But you’re not exactly condemning it,” I added.
“Well, no, I didn’t want her to die. That’s barbaric. But you can’t blame the others for being upset with her. After all, she’d been taken into The Order, allowed to bask in The Living Eye’s presence, and then decided to throw it all away? She had to expect some backlash, didn’t she? Besides, we’re not about revenge. We’re about togetherness, and making the world a better place.”
“And how are you doing this?” Gavin asked nervously, edging his chair away from Maisie’s. “How exactly are you improving it?”
She shrugged. “That part of the plan has not yet been revealed. The Order of the Eye must first build its numbers. My job is to share the love that’s in my heart, and implore others to follow me. Nothing more.”
Gavin rubbed his clean-shaven jaw. “What are you pulling in for this ambassador gig? After taxes?”
“It’s not about money,” she said with a boisterous laugh. “It’s about being with The Living Eye, with my new family, at our home. When I’ve brought more believers into the Order, I’ll be granted my sacred place on The Island.” She spoke as if the cold, dreary Desolation Islands were tantamount to a
celestial paradise, when in reality, a lifetime trapped on that remote dusty rock seemed more like a prison sentence. To each their own, I suppose.
“And once there are enough believers,” I persisted, “what does Ken…er, The Living Eye plan on doing?”
“Ah, Tony, even If I knew I couldn’t tell you,” she smiled. “And it’s not my place to question his plan. Valeriya assures me that very soon, all shall be revealed to myself and the rest of the ambassadors. The Order are the tools which will forge the new world, and The Living Eye will be the architect.”
I wasn’t sure how much additional information I could mine from this space cadet, but from the sounds of it she’d been kept in the dark; it seemed that all of The Order had been, at least for the time being. Whatever Kenneth had planned for his grand finale would be a closely guarded secret, but from his aggressive recruiting strategy I had a fairly good idea about his endgame.
I forced the most enthusiastic smile I could manage, and sat a little straighter in my chair. “Well, I’m sold. Where do I sign up?”
Her dreamy eyes and broad smile vanished from her face, and were replaced with a hard, quizzical stare. “I’m a little surprised that you’re interested in joining our family…Matthew. All things considered.”
At that point I shifted my hand below the table as casually as possible, my fingertips slowing inching my jeans up my calf.
“You knew who I was all along?” I asked.
“Of course,” she said plainly. “Valeriya knew that you’d try to reach out to The Order sooner than later.”
I dug into my boot, curling my fingers around the grip of my handgun. “Yup, good old Valeriya. Sharp as a tack, that girl.”
“I didn’t think I’d be the one, though. The one you’d be foolish enough to meet up with.” Her bright green eyes flashed towards Gavin, and then back to me. “Funny story: I actually spotted you both ten minutes before I approached the table.”
“Is that so?”
“It is,” she nodded earnestly. “I saw you sitting here and thought about how easy it would be: find a steak knife, walk up behind you and slit your throat from ear to ear, draining you into your pint.” She brought a finger to her neck and pulled it across in a slashing motion. “One cut, no more God Slayer.”
I shook my head and let out a frustrated groan. “Still with that nickname? Really?”
Her emerald eyes blazed with fire. “People like you and your detective friend clearly want to stand in the way of the new world. And if that’s the case, you’ll burn in the ashes of the old one.”
I cocked the hammer and tilted the barrel up towards her chest. One squeeze and the projectile would barrel through the oak table, shatter her breastplate and explode out her spinal column. Gavin and I would have to run for it, but Karin was hovering just a quarter mile above the pub. She could scoop us up in the jet and blink us back to the South China Sea within sixty seconds, long before police could arrive.
For all I knew this lunatic had a gun of her own, or was strapped down with a vest full of explosives, concealed beneath her thick wool sweater. I had no way of knowing. If I squeezed the trigger now I could be saving both my life and Gavin’s (and potentially hundreds of people here in the bar). Although if she was unarmed I’d be murdering a defenseless woman; a delusional maniac, without question, but not someone who deserved to die.
“So why didn’t you kill me then?” I asked, staring into her wild, unblinking eyes.
“Because if The Living Eye wanted you dead, you would be. I am not going to presume to know what he wishes and what he does not. His is the final word, the final say.”
“And because you’re all about love and family,” I added.
“Families need to be protected,” Maisie said matter-of-factly, and with a steely resolve. “At all costs.”
My eyes darted towards Gavin, who was frozen with fear.
“You put a lot of faith in this man,” I said. I could feel the sweat forming in my palm, slicking the rubber grip of my pistol.
“He’s not just a man,” she snapped. “He survived the ultimate betrayal: your betrayal, when you abandoned him and left him to die in Arena Mode. The Living Eye overcame, ascended, and has returned to this Earthly plane to guide The Order. He is unstoppable.”
“Kenneth might have some crazy powers and some even crazier followers, but he’s no god. His powers disappear when he’s near a cerebral dampening unit, same as every other superhuman. He can’t scare me, and neither can you.”
“Oh you will be scared,” she promised. “Poor Matthew Moxon. For someone so brilliant you know so little. Everyone fears something…your detective friend learned that lesson, and you will too.”
When Maisie rose from her seat my finger twitched on the trigger. After just a heartbeat of hesitation I flicked my thumb, latching the safety back into place.
Without another word she snatched her coat, turned and disappeared into the crowd.
Gavin let out a breath as if he’d been holding it for the last five minutes, eyes wide, skin flushed. “Well she was a barrel of laughs.”
“I’m sorry, Gav. I needed to meet with one of Kenneth’s followers – see what these people were being told, and what they were up to.”
“Did you learn anything?” he asked, head swiveling around in panic.
“Yeah,” I said, signaling a waitress for another drink. “That it’s worse than I thought. This round is on me.”
As the waitress took our order, everything that Maisie had said tumbled through my mind. She knew something, I thought. She had to. My thoughts wandered to the funeral I’d attended that morning; the weeping children, his widow screaming to the heavens, begging for her husband back. That sound she made…that piercing, gut-wrenching wail as—
“Sir,” the tiny kilted Scottish woman asked, “you were saying…?” Ginger eyebrows raised, her pen was poised above a notepad, awaiting my response.
I rose, letting the wooden chair fall behind me, clacking to the floor. “I feel sick. I need to use the bathroom.”
Shoving my way through the dense crowd I located the back exit, which lead to a small cobblestone street dusted in snow. Standing at the edge of the road was Maisie, hailing a cab.
I pulled the gun from my pocket, lunged forward several paces and pressed the barrel to the back of her head, pushing through the thicket of flaming curls. I cocked the hammer.
“What the—” she spun to face me, staring into the steel cylinder. “What are you doing?”
“You said you spoke with Valeriya. She warned you I might try to seek out one of The Order, looking for answers.”
“S-she did,” Maisie stuttered. “She said you’d try to question one of us, but that you were harmless.”
“She was wrong,” I whispered.
Just then a fire-engine red sedan pulled up to the curb with a crisp white taxi logo stenciled on the door. The frost-covered window descended. “Need a lift?” a thickly-bearded man asked cheerfully, doffing his charcoal flat cap. His smile vanished when he caught a glimpse of my weapon.
“No, we’re good here,” I replied.
His hands were glued to the steering wheel, eyes focused on my gun in a trance. His expression was a freeze-frame of a video that had been paused at the most awkward possible moment.
“I don’t know if ‘we’re good here’ means something different in Scotland,” I said, now pointing the gun at his forehead, “but in America it’s a polite way of saying ‘fuck off.’”
He remained on pause.
I groaned and aimed my gun overhead, squeezing off a single round. The sound triggered a scream from Maisie and the man slammed his foot down on the accelerator, disappearing down the narrow road.
Dragging her by the arm I circled behind the bar, affording us a measure of privacy. I stepped into the shadows and shoved her against the building’s brick exterior. “Now,” I continued, “how did you know?”
“Know what?” she asked, eyes flooded with horror and confusio
n.
“That the detective – Todd Dzobiak, who died in New York the other day – was my friend?”
“E-everyone knows that.”
“No,” I corrected her, jamming the barrel of my gun into the soft tissue of her throat, causing her to gurgle. “My name was never mentioned alongside his in the news. And Todd and I almost never met in public. Someone told you I was his friend, and that I’d be investigating his murder.”
She turned away, wincing. “It…it was…Valeriya.”
“How does she contact you?” I snapped.
She dug into her coat pocket.
“Whoa, slow down, hands where I can see them.” She jerked her open palms overhead and I reached into her pocket, retrieving a small device that looked like a vintage pocket watch.
“I-It’s untraceable,” she stammered. “It’s how I…I mean, how the ambassadors from The Order get in touch with—”
“Call her.” I insisted. “Right now.”
“It’s only for emergencies,” she said in a panic. “She calls us if we’re needed, but we’re not to call her unless it’s absolutely necessary.”
With my free hand I snapped open the face of the pocket watch, revealing a touchpad. “I’m feeling a sudden sense of urgency.”
She nodded in agreement and pressed her thumb into the pad. I took the device and placed it on the cobblestone, projecting a holo-screen into the alley.
After a few blips, Valeriya’s face appeared.
“Sister Calderwood,” the young girl said with a yawn, brushing the platinum locks from her face. “It’s late. I told you that…” Her words drifted away when she spotted The God Slayer, pressing a gun into her ambassador’s face. “You,” she hissed.
“Sorry to interrupt your beauty sleep, but I have a quick question for you. Who killed Todd Dzobiak?”
Her tiny pink lips twitched. “Who do you think?” She asked playfully.
“Put Kenneth on the com right now.” I grabbed a fistful of Maisie’s collar and shoved her towards the holo-screen. “And if you don’t I’ll put a bullet in one of your recruiters.”
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