by Julian Folk
“It’s the doctor’s diagnosis!” Jeff says.
“Dr. Noon delivers babies,” Vincent says. “A Starbucks barista knows more about psychiatric illness than he does.”
“Nikki confirmed it,” Val says.
“Nikki’s an assassin, you stupid bitch! Jasper runs her!”
Val and Jeff fidget, shake their heads and appeal to Vincent with kind looks.
Bud says, “Bottom line, you folks sold out your daughter, your only child. You didn’t believe your flesh-and-blood when she told you the truth, you didn’t trust her when she needed you, and instead you believed the lies and abided by the manipulations of a psychopathic killer who was a stranger to you. Because you’re so blinded by hatred of your only child!”
Just hearing Bud lay down the indictment reinvigorates Vincent’s rage against these bad parents.
Val holds up her hand, as if to hail a cab. The gesture says, Let me please explain. “All her life, our daughter has sabotaged herself. She quit her job as a lawyer and married that loser just to screw with us.”
Jeff holds up both hands to explain. “You see, Vincent, it’s a tug of war between Ayelet and us. Trust me. Unless you talk sense into her, she’ll raise our grandson wrong, just to tick us off—”
“Bullshit,” Bud says.
“Ayelet’s a big fat baby,” Val says.
“No she’s not,” Vincent says.
What a peculiar thrill it is to defend that cow from these assholes!
“Trust me, Vincent,” Jeff says. “Our daughter is vain, selfish, egotistical, narcissistic, manipulative—”
Val nods her head compulsively.
“We’ve all got our shit,” Vincent says. “You failed to support, nurture and stand in solidarity with your daughter. My mom and dad would never take some asshole’s side over mine. If one of us goes down, we all go down. That’s how family should be. Your daughter is a piece I need to take off the board. Nikki injected her. She’ll succumb to a fatal infection. Still, that fat pig deserves justice, like anyone else.”
“Well, Ayelet’s brought a terrible situation on her family,” Val says.
“The sperm met the egg and something bad happened,” Jeff says. “That’s the story of Ayelet.”
Courtesy of Bud, the silenced weapon lands in Vincent’s open palm.
“FAMILY FIRST.” Vincent shouts, becoming someone else, or, for the first time, himself. He beats the table. “FUCKIN’ FAMILY.” He beats the table again. “FAMILY. That’s all there is. BEGINNING MIDDLE AND END. Family’s what it’s about. Fuckin’ blood, man!” He stomps the floor. “Blood is SACRED—”
CRACK CRACK CRACK.
Vincent shoots Val in the mouth.
CRACK CRACK CRACK.
He shoots Jeff in the mouth.
Bullets shred brain stems. The grandparents’ spasm, twist and fall. They piss, fart and crap.
“What filth,” Bud says.
Vincent passes back the gun:
“No, filth would reject these people. They’re lower than filth. Un-nameable.”
“I secured stretchers and body bags.”
“Perfect.”
Vincent hadn’t thought of disposal. He’s off his game. Fifteen years later, being so close to Connor still fucks him royally.
Vincent practically goosesteps back to the recovery wing.
Ayelet’s yellower than urine. Nikki wheels her out of the room. “We think it’s bacterial,” she tells Vincent.
Maisie worries for her favorite author.
Nikki tasks Lucy, who’s jumpy, to take Ayelet past the double-doors marked “No Non-Medical Personal Permitted Beyond this Point.”
Nikki pulls her mask down to her neck and walks right up to Vincent and Maisie:
“May I speak to Vincent alone, please?”
“Maze, go read a short story on your Kindle and write 1,500 words of critical analysis,” Vincent says.
Maisie obeys.
“What is it?” he asks Nikki.
“This is severe sepsis,” she says. “Ordinarily treatable… Today it could go either way.”
Nikki’s so smart, so competent. She’s a Get it Done-type. He’s pissed at Jasper for not giving her to him…but the geriatric has his reasons.
“It would be best for all,” Vincent says, “if it went a bad way soon.”
Nikki nods. No emotion. No moral qualms. Just duty.
“Thirty minutes,” she says and disappears through the double-doors.
Maisie jumps to his side.
“What is it?” she asks.
“Severe sepsis,” Vincent says. “But Nikki’s the best. She’ll have it taken care of in thirty minutes.”
“Great,” Maisie says. “I think Ayelet’s coming around.”
“I told you to write 1,500 words,” he says.
Damn shame Maisie will blame Nikki for Ayelet’s death, and likely kill her.
Chapter 29
Engineering No Touch Kill was rad.
In her job interview, Jasper confessed his guiding vision to Maisie. A vision of a world in which terrorists suffer elimination cleanly and neatly. By a precise, humane method. Harming none but the intended target. The way a surgeon excises a tumor. Zero collateral damage, political kerfuffle.
“If only manifesting this vision here and now could be my legacy,” Jasper said. “Our legacy.”
The National Security elder grieved for the scores of innocents who died along with the targets:
“These heartbreaking tragedies hinder peaceful resolution of political grievances.”
Civilian deaths tempered Maisie’s own support for U.S. policies.
Jasper’s soft prompt caused the idea to coalesce.
“Wanna hear something crazy?” she asked
“I’m usually the one asking that question, Maisie, but…”
“Wouldn’t it be so wild if we used those people, like, the ones who would normally be killed as collateral damage, to, like, kill the bad guys, or, better yet, drive the bad guys to kill themselves?”
“It would be fantastic, but how?”
His gaze fell upon the cell phone on the table.
“We’ll call them,” she said. “Spread rumors. Create evidence. Hound the terrorists.”
Jasper introduced Maisie to Vincent, who laughed at her and told her she was weak and ugly. Taking pity on Maisie, Vincent shared The Way of Transformation. A faith, a spiritual practice, a self-improvement program. She asked him to dinner. Vincent accepted on the condition Maisie got her boobs ass and nose surgically-enhanced and agreed to become a student of the Way.
She said yes.
Jasper established the Joint Cyber Ops/Psy Ops Annex in D.C.
Bud and Arun enlisted in Program Development.
Vincent and Maisie married.
In no time, they observed Yemeni villagers rise up and tear a terrorist’s body limb-from-limb as incest rumors spread via fake texts and photos. The village was under militia control. The people were dirt poor. But everybody who was anybody had a phone.
That night, at the Annex, corks popped. Blunts went up in smoke. The celebration climaxed in an orgy. With Maisie at the center.
One-by-one, in dozens of countries, targets self-eliminated, or suffered elimination by those closest to them.
The Program was perfect. It still is. Vincent stumbled here, but only because of his trauma. Connor’s gone. From here on out, it’s—
What the?
The T.V. in the waiting room shows the local news. Maisie sees her face. Her face as it used to be. In the bad old days, before she knew the Way.
Is she hallucinating?
Split Screen: left, Vincent; right, Maisie. BREAKING NEWS banner at the bottom: “Rogue Government Contractors Facilitated Honolulu Terrorist Bombing.” The picture of Maisie was taken prior to her brow lift. She had half-closed insomniac eyes then. Not the bright vivid eyes she has now.
She tugs on Vincent’s forearm muscles.
“I told you to read a short story a
nd write 1,500 words,” he says.
“But Vincent…”
Maisie points.
Vincent sees his former face. The face of Eric Rice. A kid who failed.
Rage supplants his irritation.
“FUCK!” he shouts.
Maisie spins around. “Bud’s not here, is he?”
She dials Jasper.
The disconnection message plays.
“Jasper threw us under the bus,” Vincent says. “He sent Nikki to…”
The dots connect and form a middle finger: “Jasper told that bitch Nikki to evacuate Ayelet and the baby. The infection was bullshit.”
“Go rescue Vincent Jr.,” Maisie says. “I’ll rescue Ayelet.”
Vincent escapes maternity.
Automatic doors lock, colorful emergency lights flicker, and a robot voice speaks: “Lockdown in progress. For your own safety, seek a secure room and lock the door. Do not open the door unless…”
Maisie charges at the “Medical Personal Only” double doors. They repel her. Her attention turns to the security guard in the booth. This guy she paid no mind to. He didn’t lock the doors, but he may be able to open them.
She pulls her piece from her ankle holster.
Vincent loves when Maisie wears it there because it doesn’t distort her figure.
“Open the fucking doors,” Maisie says.
She’s aiming right for his third eye.
The guard shakes his bald head and mouths the words, “I can’t ma’am.” What a lie. The jerk smirks. He’s not sorry.
The glass box shielding the guard reads as chintzy. Only idiots believe there’s such a thing as bulletproof glass. She fires. The guard’s smirk worsens. One, two, four shots go nowhere. The fifth tears a hole in his forehead. His smirk persists until his head and torso slump forward.
Maisie hopes his fat head slams the controls and his dumb nose pushes the button to part the doors.
But no. She spins 180 degrees. Empty floor. No one stirs.
Maisie knew Nikki was too good to be true.
This situation appears hopeless. But Vincent prepared her for apparently hopeless situations. She was broken when they met. Vincent repaired her by forcing her to overcome self-limiting beliefs. He tested her again and again. She passed the tests. Her performance showed Maisie she always had what it took to succeed. Vincent taught her how to build a fortress of confidence out of a black hole of self-loathing.
One time, he stripped Maisie naked, stranded her on Spruce Mountain with a backpack and told her to get to D.C. in one piece.
I did it.
He injected her with heroin for a month and then forced her to break the addiction.
I did it.
He forced her to sell pills for a summer and not get caught.
I did it.
He put her to work in a Nevada brothel another summer and told her not to cry.
I did it.
He told her to steal a car, get caught and serve jail time.
I did it.
He told her to gather her friends and family, denounce them for their flaws and hold them to account by disconnecting herself.
I did it.
Vincent’s Way of Transformation prepared Maisie to conquer the impossible.
Bud is disposing the bodies on the lower floors. The man kills for kicks. He would mow Ayelet down if they evacuated her to the street.
But this is the biggest hospital in the area. It has a helicopter pad on the roof. That’s it.
They’re on the roof.
She dashes to the elevator bank. Barges into the stairwell. Vincent’s boots trample the stairs above her. He has the same idea. They lock eyes. She chases.
The door to the roof.
Vincent turns the handle. He pushes. Cinder blocks stand their ground. Vincent holds the handle down. Maisie’s body bombs the door. The cinder blocks topple. Nikki’s chopper hovers fifteen feet above the roof.
The cyclonic wind and whop-whop-whop of the blades disorients.
Maisie sees Ayelet’s face. She fires, unsure where on the bird to shoot, emptying her clip. She starts on her second clip.
“Shoot the pilot or the engine,” Vincent says.
What about the risk to Vincent Jr.?
Vincent empties his clip in the rear underside.
Maisie empties her clip on the cockpit. The pilot keels over. The bird smokes. It spirals. Crashes on its skids and rocks side-to-side. The blades cut low. Vincent and Maisie hug the ground.
The blades cut her hair.
The rotation of the blades slows. Billowing smoke obscures the goings-on in the chopper. Maisie hears sirens below.
“Do we have a plan to get out of here, Vincent?” she asks.
She waits a couple beats for his answer. Afraid to look to her right. Don’t tell her the blades cut his head off? She waits another couple beats and looks.
Nobody. Her savior’s gone. He left a clip. She faces Nikki and God knows who else. Alone.
This is Maisie’s toughest test yet.
She grabs the clip. It jams. Nikki’s shape emerges from the smoke. The bitch is bent over coughing. Maisie fills her lungs with air and leaps into the smoke to attack.
She knees Nikki’s face. She hears and feels the woman’s nose break. She chokes Nikki as the bitch coughs. Vincent warned Maisie numerous times to strengthen her grip. She performed so many pull-ups and deadlifts in the gym. She squeezed her barbells and dumbbells so hard.
Maisie will kill Nikki in one squeeze; no rest or adjustment necessary.
Nikki’s eyes well up. They roll back in her head. Maisie gathers spit in her mouth and drips it on the whites of Nikki’s eyeballs.
“Fucking wannabe,” Maisie snarls.
And then she can’t see Nikki’s face. Dark red spurts accumulate on it. A thick coat of red. Gobs of red. More blood than you would see if you slaughtered a hog. Blood pools on Nikki’s eyes, gets sucked into her nose and mouth.
Maisie’s grip weakens. The pressure she applies to Nikki’s neck dissipates. Belatedly, Maisie feels the sharp object—a pen?—puncture her neck. She lets go and falls to her side. The last face she sees is yellow, puffy, ugly, sickly and mean. The face of her favorite author. The woman Maisie once wanted to be. A woman who made terrible choices, whose brain was broken by an evil man. A woman who cannot be fixed.
The injustice of it…
Maisie worked so hard on herself, and it wasn’t enough.
She’s sorry, Vincent.
So sorry.
Chapter 30
Williams, a woman detective, interviews Connor. She embodies a new generation of law enforcement: thirties, muscular arms, shaved sides and braids. Part of the same police force that declared him dead.
Detectives solve puzzles, he thinks. He remembers his three nephews constantly checking the picture on the box as they assembled the pieces on the cabin floor. He must convince Williams the pieces here don’t add up to a puzzle.
“You survived a severe beating, sir,” she says.
“Oh, this? Popped twice,” Connor says. “Once in each eye. Looks worse than it feels.”
“Who popped you?”
“First day on the job. Panhandling, you know. I said the wrong thing. I promise you it won’t happen again.”
“The city passed an ordinance against panhandling at busy intersections.”
“I was unaware, Detective. I’ll gladly pay a fine if you set me free. Like I said, I promise you it won’t happen again.”
“You had no ID on your person.”
“I’m a failure. I lived the dream and lost it. ID reminds me of who I once was.”
“You told the arresting officer a firefighter gave you assistance.”
“Yeah, Joey, at the firehouse. I’m a bum. I did a favor for another bum. Joey took care of me. He said he and his mom were on the street once. People took care of them.”
“Joey verified your story.”
“I hit rock bottom, Detective. Now I need to pick myself
up. I promise to never work a busy intersection again.”
“Joey said you were soaking wet. You were freezing. Your skin was blue.”
“I got chased by a bully, fell into the water. I’m so grateful to Joey.”
“You look exactly like the sociology professor, Connor Yard, who drowned in Boston Harbor.”
Williams shows Connor a glossy picture of himself on her phone. The picture from the dust jacket of his memoir. Brilliant white smile. Immaculate teeth. His blue eyes are floodlights of happiness.
“That prettyboy’s not me. Connor Yard hadn’t lived. He had no life experience. I’m living, man. I’m getting my life experience.”
Her phone vibrates.
“One minute,” she says and exits the room.
The closed door muffles the content of the call. But it conveys tone of voice. Offense surfaces on Williams’s end. The detective’s engagement with the case touches Connor.
Or does it?
He drinks his coffee. A stoic moment takes him. After so much effort…
He’s powerless here. The cops took away his freedom, which was his power. Williams holds it hostage to the duties of her job.
Where he’s powerless, he’s not responsible.
Whatever happens to Ayelet and Connor Jr., right now, no part of it is up to him, and he must accept this fact.
When his freedom is returned, then his power is restored, and responsibility kicks in again.
So Connor sits in abeyance.
Williams slams the door.
Were you overruled, Detective?
“Law enforcement is in pursuit of a rogue government contractor, Vincent DeSantis, a k a Marcello Pace, a k a Eric Rice.” She swipes her phone and displays an article. Vincent’s old face serves as the background. The humorlessness of his countenance spooks Connor. Despite its familiarity. “They say he’s responsible for the Honolulu bombing. For the death of Connor Yard. For the SWAT killings of four people at Mr. Yard’s home. For the deaths of four people when Mr. Yard’s wife’s vehicle was hacked. For the murder of FBI agent, Robert Yard, Connor Yard’s brother—”
So, Maisie’s dead or captured.
He wagers Ayelet got fed up and killed her.