by Taylor Kole
The opening credits finished, and when Inside Today returned from commercial, the on-screen Rebecca sat inside the cockpit of a Maersk cargo liner—an expansive triple-decked ship—packed with cargo containers stacked eight high. In front of her waited the silhouette of a man sitting atop a stool, a well-placed shadow protected his identity. The horizontal-patterned, tan shirt that covered the man’s bloated belly looked outdated by twenty years.
“Good evening,” on-screen Rebecca said. “I’m here with a ship captain who wishes to remain anonymous. We are on a cargo liner we will not name, that started its journey in one of the numerous ports along the west coast of North America. For reasons that will soon become frighteningly obvious, all identifying images will be edited.
“Sir, tell me, how long have you been a captain, and what do those responsibilities consist of?”
The man’s voice sounded deep and off-pitch, as if played through an old-style tape recorder set on too slow of a speed. “I’ve been on these waters for over thirty years. Been fortunate enough to stay alive, gain the notice of my employers, and have had the pleasure of piloting this same vessel for the better part of two decades.
“The job description varies, but mainly we pick up products from countries ’cross the Pacific, often China, but there’re others. We ferry ’em back, unload, get paid. Some shore leave, and then hope to resupply with American products.” He leaned forward. “Though I can tell ya, for a long time, we were forced to leave with empty bellies. In a nutshell, that’s my job.”
“Thank you. And I understand there have been recent changes in outbound cargo. Can you explain?”
“Oh, we’re not empty no longer.” He shifted on his stool.
“So you’ve found a shippable product from America?”
“Yes. People mainly.”
A few viewers around Rebecca hitched their breaths. She pictured tens of millions of gasps around the world and had to squeeze her thighs together to control her excitement.
“Are you saying human beings are the outbound cargo?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“American citizens are paying you to smuggle them out of the United States?”
“Sure. Tho’ some’re Canadians, Mexicans… paying big bucks too.”
“Wow,” the on-camera Rebecca adjusted her sitting position. “I can tell you, that is quite a shock.”
“Ain’t no shock. Maybe to some rich gal like yourself. But people been talkin’. When you’re down here with ’em, ya hear.”
“Yes…well, can you tell us how this came about? How you located these passengers?”
“Now they find me. I gotta call from a skipper a few days back. He says he’s already to sea, but he’s got people he couldn’t fit on his ship, lookin’ to hitch a ride. Says the number of people and the amount they’re willin’ to pay would knock my socks clean off.” The captain’s shadowed form nodded as if in deep reflection. “That it did.”
The camera panned around for a panoramic view of the surrounding ocean, while Rebecca posed a question. “How far out to sea are we now, Captain?”
“Hmmm… Lemme see. We’re almost through day two. That’d be ’bout halfway. ’Bout eight hundred miles outta port, I reckon.”
“And you have people onboard now?”
“Yes, ma’am,” he said with pride. “Full hold.”
“Do you have an estimate of how many travelers you have on this vessel, and what their reasons are for boarding?”
“Their reasons’re for them Death Trips,” he said matter-of-factly. “Open to anyone with a wad-o-cash and a desire to leave this pit-o-(censored word) called life.” He scratched his face, and paused. “Well, that ain’t ’tirely true. I s’pose some’re travelin’ to see that monk fella preachin’ ’bout salvation, harmony, and all that nonsense.” He fidgeted. “Wait a minute, let me take that back, too. It’d been nonsense a month ago, but when a man preaches ’bout somethin’ specific, sayin’ he had visions and whatnot, and those visions come true to the letter, there ain’t no more second guessin’ him, now is there? But still, most’re here for that final ride. The Death Trip.”
Rebecca watched herself cross her legs. To viewers it seemed inconsequential, but that two-second break created pacing and set her apart from her peers. “You said you had an idea as to how many people you have onboard?”
“Sure, sure. I can do ya one better. We got exactly fourteen hundred and ninety-two souls onboard this vessel.”
More gasps from the audience around her. Rebecca knew this dialogue word for word, yet a bomb going off in the next room couldn’t break her attention from the screen. Knowing that degree of rapture must be amplified in others tenfold was the truest testament to the power of information in the real world.
“So you’re saying, right now, below us are hundreds of people, riding with full intention of killing themselves?”
“Nah. They won’t be dead, ya see? I’d call it freein’ themselves. Free from pain, torment, bein’ judged. I’m sure a pretty thang like yourself knows the deal. Betcha can’t walk to the market without a hundred eyes checkin’ ya out. The Lobby’s a great option. ’Less ya think there’s some old guy in the sky waitin’ to pamper ya. If so, I won’t say you’re wrong, but that ain’t nothin’ I can sink my teeth into.”
“Well, sir, I’m not sure if you’re aware of this, but almost ninety percent of the world believes in a higher power. Are you saying you don’t?”
“I’m not sayin’ that, but most people’re brain-dead sheep. Don’t know what they believe, juss say what they think ya wanna hear. That much I know. And I do believe in a higher power. It’s ’lectronic. I can touch it, feel it, hold proof of it.”
“I see.” On screen, Rebecca checked a pad of paper in her lap. “Can you tell me how difficult it was to reach that number?”
He snickered. “Wasn’t. I coulda turned people away after few hours. I had some rules too. No kids under eight. Tho’ I fear some mighta smudged the ages on me. I had one couple wanted to bring their newborn.” He shook his head. “I wasn’t sure if they was to see the monk or… ya know. But I can’t see how loadin’ up an infant is right. Shoot, I didn’t even need this many people. Guess it shows I got a kind heart.”
“Need? Can you elaborate?”
“They payin’ whatever ya ask. Five thousand, fifty, a hundred per head out there. I had more than enough after the first two dozen, to be honest. “
“‘More than enough’ for what, Captain?”
“For my own Death Trip, ‘a course.” The shadowed figure checked his watch. “I’ll be out of this bag a’ fat and (censored word) in less than three days. I ain’t never been so ’cited. If I was you, lady, I’d leave that ’copter parked on my deck, call that deep bank a’ yers, and join the rest of us ’fore they find a way to lock us out.” He added, “One thing I know: it’s a great time to die.”
The program faded to commercial.
The room stayed so quiet, a hair dropping would have sounded like a cannonade.
Coming into this, she’d anticipated applause, pats on the back. This shocked silence meant so much more.
Following the commercial, Inside Today panned a flowing shot below deck. People of all ages and sizes filled narrow hallways and every hold. Families huddled close, suspiciously watching the cameras pass. A New Year’s Eve-type of party raged in one of the larger areas.
In voice-over commentary, Rebecca reinforced the thoughts of a nation. “All of these people have chosen to abandon faith, hope, and humanity for a one-way ticket to cyber prison.” Rebecca didn’t necessarily agree with that, but in modern journalism, it’s not what you report—it’s how portentous you make it. Fear sold ads, ads created revenue, and revenue led to recognition in the form of millions of fans tuning in to watch the greatest journalists cover the biggest stories.
Her lead segment did just that. It showed doomed people preparing for the inevitable. The misgivings on that cargo ship occurred five days ago, but they continu
ed today, would expand tomorrow.
Her next segment focused on religions and their gurus, covering Buddhism conversion rates around the globe. Before this theory of life to death to everlasting existence on a machine hit the population, roughly twenty-four percent of the world had been Islamic, slightly more were Christian, twelve percent were Buddhists, and members of the other thirty-three thousand registered religions added up to another twelve percent. Agnostics and atheists claimed what remained.
Since Sung Yi’s preaching became widespread, a full one-third of the world now considered themselves students of Buddhism—a more than three hundred percent spike in thirteen days.
Those same people now thanked Gaea, Creator of the World, for gifting the Lobby to her children. Sung Yi’s YouTube videos had been translated into ninety-one languages. They converted people by the second.
For supporters of monotheism, the most frightening statistic came from the chart that showed the projected conversion from the two major religions to Buddhism. Even with a drop in the current rate, in twenty years, Christianity would be all but extinct and Islam nothing more than backwoods voodoo.
Another commercial. This time chatter erupted, but no one spoke to her. You can’t run from facts. This was their new world, and her report would ignite a controversy and spark a struggle for the ages. Controversy, strife, death—the ingredients of good media.
Although Rebecca would never be knighted or anointed to sainthood, she was saving lives by creating conflict. Millions of people would forego an eternity inside the Lobby simply to catch that day’s news.
Outrage would follow this program. Faith in Jesus and Allah strummed in billions of hearts. This would be like paddles jolting that passion to life. Her research didn’t lie. Society strolled the path to a new world religion. The only way to avert its destination would be to derail the engine. People would try, and she’d report all the gory details.
The final segment touched on Tara Capaldi, Brad Finder, and Roy Guillen, presented a four-minute exposé on Alex Cutler, and ended with a six-minute finale on Adisah Boomul, the reclusive mastermind hiding in his futuristic fort.
What an amazing interview that would be. Maybe she’d reach out. The world had a right to know what was happening in those Montana mountains.
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Tim rode in a 1989 MD helicopter. Not a single cloud, created by man or God, populated that morning’s expansive blue sky. Yet a roving shadow of rotating blades and visually amorphous shapes blanketed the land.
His particular ship spent almost twenty years in Hawaii, flying tourists over a specific, uninhabited island known for its lush vegetation, heavy boar population, and rumors of cannibals.
Somewhere along the way, the craft had lost its doors. Wind blasted through the interior. The noise was deafening, and the sight awe inspiring. The nearest helicopter was six feet longer than his and painted in faded yellow. A lime-green stripe ran along the side, as if its past life involved promoting Mellow Yellow soda.
Tim’s helicopter soared on the armada’s left, northern edge, close to the middle of the pack. The MD would touch down twenty-one minutes after the old steel tankers that led the fleet. Each would hit the ground, offload their troops, and return to the sky.
Standing in an aged helicopter, the craft’s steady vibrations kept his body pulsing in time with his anxiety. Shooting people was in his immediate future. Landing twenty-one minutes after the first wave could spoil his chance for glory. Knowing hours of fighting awaited them, possibly days of random skirmishes, brought comfort.
Seven men—the full load under his command as a sergeant—along with a rookie pilot, caused the MD to be four passengers over capacity. A lenient figure. Other crafts of comparable size held ten men, crammed in like clowns in a circus car. However, his team transported two M107, fifty-caliber rifles. Four feet ten inches in length, the guns weighed twenty-eight and a half pounds when empty and had enormous ammunition, each bullet as big as a cigar. These weapons more than compensated for the lack of warm bodies.
Though they adhered to a near-silent radio status, a headset connected him with the pilots and other team leaders. Their tight flight formation allowed for eye contact with passengers of nearby helicopters, linking the army on a more personal front. He read the emotions on others’ faces: nerves, anticipation, fear.
The rotating blades created a deep thwumping that blotted out other sounds and whipped every strand of prairie grass below and head of hair above.
At one point, they crossed over a herd of deer. The dark, encroaching shadow and heavenly roar made the animals bolt as one, but as the crafts centered over them, and the tumultuous cacophony worked into their bones, they abandoned ranks and scattered.
Tim imagined the men at Eridu would first hear a slight buzz, alerting them to something amiss, then mounting caution as the rumble reached a thunder. When the sky blackened with metal carriages, terror would set in. These metal carriages carried the end of life as those men knew it or, if Tim got his way, the end of their wickedness, period.
“Twenty miles to visual,” a voice informed him through his headset. They traveled at sixty miles an hour—a little over half the MD’s top speed. He estimated fifteen minutes until a true combat mission unfolded. Holding a strap with one hand and a loaded rifle in the other, Tim concentrated on slowing his heart rate.
Leaning out the side, he bathed in fresh air. After the ablution, he pulled himself back in and surveyed the men under his command.
Three sat shoulder to shoulder in the rear seat. One prayed, one chewed gum, another rocked to his headphones, and a crouched pair across from them tried to converse with shouts.
“Contact approaching, west end. Assume spread pattern,” the voice in Tim’s headset spoke with control, but confusion layered his tone.
Tim’s helicopter yawed left, stumbling him and the two without seats. Securing his footing, he watched out the opposite opening, as over a hundred craft tilted in synchronization. He couldn’t help but appreciate the sight. Thirty feet of distance had separated each. The recent command tripled that space. Even if equipped with binoculars and unobstructed vision, identifying the model of the farthest craft, from corner to corner, might be impossible. The memory of the words that started this shift interrupted his marveling. Contact approaching? What type of contact?
Their government source informed them that Eridu had a sophisticated airport. In the unlikely event someone manned the tower, and the pilots flew high enough to be detected, Eridu’s radars would identify the inbound helicopter as far away as twenty miles out. Regardless, their ally assured them they’d sever Eridu’s communications to stop them from calling for help.
With the pack flying over the only road in or out for the last few miles, the biggest worry involved the enemy ferrying Boomul to safety in a private plane. Again, the government man guaranteed them that Boomul would remain at his compound, and that his men would fight.
“Enemy bogey, eleven o’clock, stagger pattern.” The voice in his ear held its command, but something else had crept into the pitch. Fear? Tim peered out of the main windshield for signs of danger.
The MD dropped fifty feet in altitude, taking his stomach with it. After the aircraft settled, he noticed the Mellow Yellow representative had risen out of sight, as if the rows alternated between climbing and dropping. Though spawned by a complication, the aerial acrobatics invigorated Tim. He hoped, decades from now, when he met his maker, he could revisit this event, live it from an omnipresent point of view, because he was participating in a glorious action.
“Oh, shit. Contact. Fire.” A new voice piped across the headset, and ended the radio silence. Dozens of voices yelled and cursed.
A pilot screamed for another to watch his three o’clock, followed by the crunch of an in-air collision in the distance, and the flash of an explosion.
Another, more portentous sound overtook the headphone chatter and rotor wash. A familiar sound. A noise similar to the sp
at of a buzz saw, a squeeze and release of a chainsaw: automatic gunfire. Distant, but of a large caliber, rapid, like no weapon Tim had ever fired. And he’d fired hundreds.
The men in the rear of the MD jockeyed and jostled in their attempt to view the outside commotion. The shifting weight rocked the overburdened aircraft. Using urgent hand signals, Tim commanded his men to stay seated. Their first-time pilot didn’t need extra distractions. Sweat rimmed the pilot’s scalp. His hands held the control stick so tight, Tim feared it would snap off. And then, from out of the main windshield, Tim witnessed the unimaginable.
Loud reports, and then a Lord’s Thorn helicopter skipped backward in a series of jabs, and, like a stone loosened from a clasped hand, plummeted to earth. The burning fuselage dropped out of sight. Seconds later, he heard the boom of steel impacting earth.
Another rattle of the massive caliber gun in the distance. Another explosion so intense, he imagined a thousand men shuddered in unison.
Did the bastards at Eridu have an attack chopper? If so, what a grievous oversight. The Lord’s Thorn had no defense against an attack chopper? Their plans involved a ground assault, using small arms.
The radio chatter reached pandemonium. A man ordered everyone to “break off,” “use evasive maneuvers.”
Wouldn’t help. They’d be torn to shreds.
The silence between each rhythmic spat of gunfire, although never more than a few seconds, seemed an eternity. Buzz saw, break; buzz saw, break. A lifetime in between. Birth, aging, and slaughter. Buzz saw, break. Each silence brought a mourning for a downed helicopter, each brought his craft closer to the crosshairs.
The pilot climbed to a desired height, pitched the craft forward, and increased their speed. Tim bent into the cockpit. The pilot leaned toward him, and while keeping his eyes forward, shouted, “We’re in one of the fastest machines. Someone’s got to ram that mother. By my count, he’s brought down nine of us. If we can’t stop him…”