“It worked out just as you planned,” said the Burnt Man. “The mob arose spontaneously, which gave us the opportunity to launch the real attack. The Swiss were there, but none of the pope’s inner circle was seen. How did you know he would be vulnerable?”
“I have my intelligence resources,” Icar said.
The Burnt Man wondered about this. His boss seemed to have amazing, inside intel.
“You mean your spies,” asserted the Burnt Man.
“Were you seen?” Icar asked, turning the question aside.
“The whole thing was likely taped or filmed,” he responded. “That could not be helped. Still, there was a great deal of confusion, and we were dressed to blend in with the people.”
“And you set the explosives?”
“Yes, we mined the entire place. No one could have survived when they detonated,” responded the Burnt Man.
“Did you actually see his body?”
“No,” he replied. “The destruction was total. The debris was too much to search. The local citizens and reporters began to converge on the site. I had to get my people out.”
“Yes, of course,” said Icar.
He then pivoted and walked over to him and reached out. The Burnt Man thought he was to have his scars smoothed as before, but his master seized his face with different hands, and the pain was excruciating. He screamed in agony and fell to his knees.
“Is the pope dead?” cried the man in a bestial scream.
“Yes, yes!” croaked the Burnt Man, shocked and wracked with pain. “He could not have survived.”
“Indeed, I do not feel his presence,” said Icar, pausing to sniff the air.
His hands changed in an instant. They released the Burnt Man and traced his scars, caressing the pain away.
“He is gone, but surely another will follow quickly,” said the Burnt Man when he had recovered.
“No, the Vatican has been destroyed. Only the cardinals can appoint a successor,” said the dark man. “And many of them are dead. Their traditional meeting place, the Sistine Chapel, has been destroyed. Even if they could agree on a new meeting place, the survivors will be weeks and more likely months getting there. By then it will be over.”
“The Church is resilient,” observed the Burnt Man. “Nothing can be taken for granted.”
“True, my friend,” said Icar, looking directly at him with eyes like arrows. “But for now, pray for yourself that the pope is indeed dead.”
CHAPTER
56
In the conference room of the airport at Tel Aviv, the satellite phone crackled with static. The late-afternoon sun streamed through the windows.
“Albert, are you there?” came the tinny voice.
“Yes, I can hear you but just barely,” said the monsignor. “Who is this?”
“Albert, it’s Tony,” said the voice.
The monsignor squeezed the handset, and Cloe thought tears might again bloom in his eyes. He looked at them and said, “It’s Father Anton. I don’t know how.”
“Albert, talk to him,” said Cloe. “What has happened?”
“Tony, what can you tell me?” said the monsignor into the phone. He hit the speaker button so all could hear.
“Albert, the pope is not dead,” yelled the priest into the phone. “Don’t believe what the news media are saying.”
“Oh my God!” cried the monsignor. “His Holiness is alive!”
Cloe looked around and saw everyone had tears of joy.
“But how?” asked J.E. “How could he have survived the explosions?”
The monsignor turned back to the phone and said, “Tony, tell me how this all happened.”
“The supposed mob was just the cover for a very well-orchestrated, professional attack. As soon as we realized that, we decided to evacuate the pope. When the blasts went off, we were in the underground redoubt of the monks who handle our intel.”
“Yes. And then what happened?” asked the monsignor.
“The blasts were devastating, but we were a step removed,” said Father Anton. “The pope was slammed against one of the stone walls and is now in a coma. But he lives.”
“A coma?” said J.E. “Who leads the Church?”
“Albert, there must be some provision for continuing the governance of the Church in this situation,” Cloe said. “I hate to ask a stupid question, but is there a vice pope who carries on if the pope is disabled? I can’t remember any discussion about this as I was growing up.”
“There is no vice pope or assistant pope. There is only the pope,” said Father Anton. “Even if there were, we cannot announce the pope is in a coma because the evil one will try to finish the job. So the world, including what’s left of the College of Cardinals, must think the pope is dead. It’s the only way.”
“I can’t believe there’s no provision for papal succession when the pope becomes unable to carry on,” said Cloe.
“It’s true,” said the curator. “There is the one and only pope. Otherwise, there would be a line of succession as with kings of various empires. The possibility of succeeding to a throne has been enough to cause many pretenders to plot murder. This cannot be the case with the papacy. Once elected, there are only two ways out of the office: death or, as recently demonstrated, retirement. In either situation, only the College of Cardinals can appoint the new pope.”
“Where is he?” queried the monsignor.
“I cannot say,” said Tony. “He is getting the best medical care in a secret facility. For the time being, he must remain dead as far as the world is concerned. His safety depends on it.”
“But who will carry on for him?” asked Cloe. “If he is supposed to be dead, will not the cardinals convene to elect a new pope?”
“Yes,” said Father Anton. “The cardinals will convene. At least those who are left. Word on this will be made public soon.”
“But where will they go?” asked J.E. “The Vatican has been destroyed. Their tradition has been ruined.”
“I do not know,” said Father Anton. “Where would be safe in these times?”
“Suppose the pope does not survive his condition?” said J.E.
“Then whomever the cardinals appoint will wear the ring of St. Peter,” responded Father Anton.
“This is bizarre,” said Cloe. “Everyone must be deceived as to the pope’s death, including the cardinals who have to appoint his successor. Whomever they appoint—if they can get together—will have legitimacy depending on whether the pope lives or dies. This at a time when the world’s Christian religions need leadership that only the pope can give.”
“Albert, while you and your friends know the truth, I must impose upon you the strict duty to keep silent as this plays out and we see what is God’s will as to His Holiness,” said Father Anton. “You must keep this confidence no matter what.”
Cloe looked at the grim faces of her companions and said, “Tony, we understand what’s at stake. Still, we must act to put an end to this evil.”
She relayed what they had learned at Uruk.
“Seven and seal,” mused Father Anton. “I’ll ask the monks to look into it. “By the way, you must have heard, the scientists at the Uruk dig were executed by ISIS agents.”
“Noooo!” cried Cloe. “We only left them yesterday.”
“Yes. The German press said that they were accused of plotting against the government and that they were shot at the dig site,” said Father Anton. “There was no trial and no time for diplomacy. All their notes, writings, and work were burned or destroyed.”
“The bastards! Those men were scientists, not spies!” said J.E.
“All those lives and lifetimes of scholarly work have been lost,” decried Cloe, throwing her arms up and wringing her hands. “Is there no end to this barbarism?”
“It seems not,” said the monsignor. “Tony, we’re in go
od hands here. We haven’t worn out our welcome with the Israelis yet, so we may stay for the time being and work on the clues.”
“That’s a good idea,” said the priest on the phone. “With the destruction of both the Vatican and Gandolfo, we can’t really secure you here, and I can’t tell you where we are even if we could provide a safe place. I’ll keep the monks focused on the project … it’s the best I can do.”
“Until we meet again, Tony, God’s blessings on the pope and all of you,” the monsignor said.
“And you,” came the tinny reply just as the line went dead.
CHAPTER
57
The small group looked at one another around the table in the Israeli conference room. Some were seated, but Cloe stood at the end of the table. It was just Cloe, J.E., the monsignor, and the father curator. They also had Boogie, the sole survivor of the Uruk massacre. Boogie sat in the father curator’s lap as he scratched the dog’s ears. Captain Jacob had left earlier on other business, and the Israeli sentries were picketed outside. They could not go back to where they had come from, as the Vatican and Castel Gandolfo, along with much of Rome, had been destroyed. The Israelis had also said Europe was in the midst of the worst plague since the Middle Ages. There was nowhere to go.
No one had used the cuneiform from Uruk in six thousand years. The German had given them two clues off the top of his head. They might mean something or nothing. Cloe could not remember feeling so alone and so isolated and … so useless. She looked at the team around the table and had the impression of a locker room after a losing season.
She stamped her foot and cried, “Enough! This will not do!”
“Enough what?” asked J.E.
“Enough of this down-in-the-mouth attitude,” she said. “We’ve taken some blows, but we’ve been in tough places before. We’ll just have to figure it out.”
The monsignor smiled and said, “Amen.”
“J.E., get on the computer and start working your magic,” Cloe said. “Check with your intel buddies and see what’s happening in the US.”
“Roger that, ma’am,” said her son, rising from his chair.
“Father Curator, try the sat-phone to see if the monks in the Opts Center need anything we can give them,” she instructed. “Also, if we can get some of the oldest translated samples of Uruk cuneiform from them, maybe we can add something to what Dr. Klein told us. I’m going to call New Orleans to see if my staff there can help.”
Twenty minutes later, Cloe felt very lucky. She reached her second-in-command in New Orleans in spite of the disturbance in global communications. The jars sent by the Sicarii were being methodically opened and carefully catalogued. There would be no real analysis of the individual manuscripts until all had been opened and accounted for. This was good progress.
The plan had been for Cloe to work on the journal, and, at some point, she and her colleagues would all converge and compare what they had learned. Everything was up in the air now, and the journal was the center of importance. Cloe told her assistant, Jeanne Richard, about what she had learned from the cuneiform passage and the trip to Uruk.
“My goodness!” said Jeanne. “Seven and seal. My first instinct is that it is reminiscent of Revelation, but otherwise it’s a mystery.”
“Yes,” replied Cloe. “It’s one we must solve and as soon as possible.”
“We’ll talk about it here, Dr. Lejeune, but I don’t think we’ve seen anything from the jars we have opened that might help.”
“I understand,” Cloe replied. “Don’t limit yourselves to the jars. If there’s anything in your experience that might be brought to bear, no matter how remote, please let me know.”
“Well, Dr. Lejeune, now that you mention it, a strange thing happened a couple of days ago,” the scientist replied.
“Yes?”
“We were working in the far end of the second-floor library, and we looked up to find ourselves almost surrounded by strangers,” said her assistant. “At first we were a little afraid, but on second glance, even though they were in a restricted area, they did not seem threatening. Their apparent leader, a young man named Zack, said he needed to talk to you.”
“Zack?” asked Cloe. “Did he give a last name?”
“Yes, it was Landry,” she replied. “He said he was from Des Moines, Iowa, but he had some connection to Louisiana.”
“I don’t think I know the name,” mused Cloe. “He said he needed to talk to me?”
“That’s right. It wasn’t that he wanted to or anything social like that,” she replied. “He needed to. He was very insistent.”
“What of the others?” asked Cloe.
“Well, it was a real menagerie,” the woman responded. “They were young and old. At least a couple of them were from other countries. Two of them did not seem to be a part of the core group. One was a large dog … at least a hundred-pound English bulldog.”
“A large dog?” laughed Cloe. “My goodness.”
“All I can tell you is the dog seemed to be part of the extended group. He was well behaved, listening to everything. He and the little boy.”
“A child?” asked Cloe.
“He was seven or eight years old, but his eyes seemed older,” replied the woman. “His parents weren’t there, but the dog appeared to be looking after him. It was all very odd.”
Cloe wondered what this could all be about.
“Did this Zack say why he needed to talk to me?”
“Not specifically, but he said it had to do with your work on the journal, which he had read about on our website,” she said. “He said he had information for you.”
“Jeanne, this could be important. I need to know what you can remember. Tell me a little more about the relationships between them, anything you can remember. How did they behave toward each other?” asked Cloe.
“Well, there was a young woman, Doris, if I remember correctly. She was from New Orleans, and they were staying somewhere in the area,” said the scientist. “The rest seemed to have no relationship to each other whatsoever. Zack said he was from Iowa, and the young woman who accompanied him was from somewhere in the Pacific. One of the islands. There was a man from the Philippines and one from New York. There were a couple of other women from other parts of the world I did not get.”
“You’ve done a very good job remembering these things,” said Cloe. “Of the people who did not appear related or local, how many were there?” She held her breath as her colleague mentally counted the visitors.
“With or without the dog?” the woman finally said.
“Without,” replied Cloe.
“Seven.”
CHAPTER
58
On the 160th floor of the tower overlooking the Persian Sea, Icar stood in the frame of the floor-to-ceiling window, watching, once again. It was as if he were a king observing his many subjects. Of course, the Burnt Man knew that individual people looked like mere insects from this great height. What was he always watching?
Suddenly, Icar turned and caught him staring. He smiled slightly and advanced on him. As Icar strode in his direction, the Burnt Man began to feel somehow … assaulted. There was a strange aggression in the approach. His mouth fell open in shock, and he began to experience fear—something he had felt only a few times in his life.
“The pope lives,” said Icar. His eyes, burning, fixed upon him and held him fast.
“Impossible!” he replied.
“Yet he lives,” said Icar.
“How can you know this?”
“Do you seek to question me?” asked Icar. “Your existence is already forfeited because of your failure. I can make your death feel like a thousand deaths.”
“Master, there’s just no way he could have survived the explosions,” replied the Burnt Man. “There must be some mistake.”
“And yet you survi
ved an explosion—really, two explosions,” his boss reminded him.
“The explosives my team used destroyed the entire building. Somehow your intelligence is wrong.”
“There is no mistake,” replied Icar. “My sources are impeccable.”
“But what can be his condition? He cannot be whole.”
“He is in a coma. While I’m not happy that you did not kill him, I find that luck sometimes exceeds skill in result. The pope in a coma may be better than dead for my purposes.”
The Burnt Man relaxed slightly, hoping that events had somehow turned in his favor.
“Master, where is he? This time my men and I will see him dead,” he said.
“He has been hidden somewhere even my sources haven’t been able to find … yet,” said Icar. “Even so, we will let this scenario play out for a while. This will create great confusion among my enemies.”
“Well, someone will simply fill in for him,” suggested the Burnt Man.
Icar laughed. “There is no mechanism for that. The Catholics have certainly boxed themselves in on that. No, if the pope is incapacitated, they are dead in the water. They will be little more than mute witnesses to my final triumph.”
“Are you saying this takes the Catholics off the board?” asked the Burnt Man incredulously.
“There will always be isolated resistance, but as an organized force they are finished. I have won,” Icar declared.
It hurt the Burnt Man to smile, but he beamed at this news. He would reign in glory with the new order. His revenge for insults to his father and to himself would be complete.
“Master, this is wonderful news,” he said.
“Yes, but there is one remaining significant threat, and I want you to go and personally deal with this one as well—terminally.”
Another threat? What could possibly threaten his master now that the Catholic church was paralyzed? Still, his master had many enemies.
“What is it?” he asked humbly.
“The woman you failed to shoot in Rome has an ancient writing in her hands,” said Icar. “I did not believe it could be useful until now. You will go and eliminate her. You are not to fail me this time. Luck will not again be your ally.”
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