Mercury Falls

by Robert Kroese

  “I’m the Michelle.”

  Christine regarded the girl, trying to make sense of this remark.

  “Archangel,” she said. “Commander of the Heavenly army.”

  “But he’s… You’re…”

  “Mistranslation,” said the girl. “You know how male-dominated cultures are. I’d like to think it was an honest mistake, but Gabrielle isn’t so charitable. I allow the misunderstanding to persist for security reasons.”

  “So you… you’re the highest ranking angel there is.”

  “Well, I command the army. Technically I answer to the Seraphic Senate. They tend to follow my lead on military matters, though.”

  “Why are you here?”

  “This is where it ends,” said Michelle. “This is Megiddo, the site of the final battle between good and evil.”

  “I know. I’ve been here before.”

  “Really? Did you get a t-shirt? There’s an excellent selection in the gift shop.”

  “So I suppose you’re here to do some final reconnaissance or something? Make sure everything is in order for the big Apocalypse.”

  “Actually,” said Michelle, “I’m here to talk to you. I’ve been watching you with some interest. It’s difficult not to empathize with your situation.”

  “You’ve been watching me this whole time? Through everything?”

  “Not the whole time, but long enough. I was there when Isaakson died.”

  Christine’s eyes widened. “You... you were the one who helped me escape from that house!”

  “I was.”

  “So you’re behind all this?” said Christine. “You understand how I got sucked into this whole mess?”

  “Actually, no,” replied Michelle. “Your involvement is still a bit of a mystery. None of the factions planned on you playing much of a role. Somehow events conspired to place you in the middle of all the action.”

  “But if I wasn’t expected to play some important role in the Apocalypse, why did you save me?”

  Michelle smiled grimly. “I felt somewhat responsible for your circumstances.”

  “Why? Did you have something to do with that rocket?”

  Michelle nodded. She said, “Isaakson was supposed to be a known quantity. It had come to our attention that his heart was no longer in the fight. I spoke with him not long before you arrived, under the guise of a Syrian informant. I got the impression that he was on the verge of consolidating his gains and calling off any further offensive action. We needed him to continue escalating the situation.”

  “So you killed him? Because he had the gall to hesitate on the path to Armageddon? And nearly killed me in the process, I might add.”

  “I redirected a rocket that was going to hit a civilian dwelling. Rather than seven civilians dying, one elderly general died. A military officer who, I might add, was scheduled to be killed in a few days anyway. All I did was hasten his death to ensure that the conflict would escalate as expected.”

  “Yeah, well, you could just as easily have turned the rocket into a bowl of petunias,” said Christine. “Nobody had to die.”

  “At the time, I was of the opinion that someone did. I’m reassessing that opinion at present.”

  “So you left me at the hospital with the spelunking note? And the Attaché Case of War?”

  “I did. As I was technically not supposed to have any contact with Isaakson, I couldn’t risk holding onto the Case. I figured it was as safe in your hands as anywhere.”

  “Then you’ve been watching me since that rocket strike?”

  “No, but I have enough intelligence sources to piece together most of your adventures over the past few days. I have a sense of what you’ve been through.”

  “I doubt that.”

  The girl peered curiously at her. “Can I ask you a question?”

  “Sure,” said Christine wearily. “Why not.”

  “What would you do if you were in my position?”

  “Hmmm,” said Christine. “I’d avoid making any big decisions at this point. I thought I wanted to be a veterinarian when I was your age.”

  “Lucifer has given me an opening,” explained Michelle, “and I’m tempted to take it. To give him the ass-kicking he’s been asking for since he first started screwing with the plan down here. He’s off-balance and unprepared for the battle. On the other hand, an operation like this inevitably creates a great deal of collateral damage, and by withdrawing from the Apocalypse Accord, Lucifer has given me a fair amount of flexibility. I could call the whole thing off and just hope for the best. Lucifer’s organization would remain intact, but his influence on this plane would be mitigated to some degree.”

  “Well,” said Christine. “The way I see it, God gave us this planet. This plane, whatever. To humanity, I mean. Not the angels. I understand that He’s evidently given the angels some authority over certain things, and I won’t pretend to understand how all that works. But your organization is clearly too vast and complicated for even you to fully understand or control. And the bigger and more powerful an organization is, the more bureaucratic hoops its members have to go through to get anything done. What I’m trying to say, I guess, is that while I’m sure you run a bang-up organization, it doesn’t frankly seem to do us a whole lot of good down here on the ground. You folks are so far removed from the actual events that when you finally do something, it’s usually too little too late. Or far too much, too early. To us down here, your involvement is just another terrifying unknown. Terrifying unknowns tend to create fear, and fear tends to bring out the worst in people.”

  “So you’d prefer that we pull out of this plane entirely and just leave you to fend for yourselves?”

  “I suppose not,” admitted Christine. “Granted, if Lucifer is going to keep scheming away, then I suppose some involvement from your side is a necessary evil, if you’ll pardon the expression. But maybe you could limit yourselves to preventing Lucifer from wreaking too much havoc down here, so at least humanity has a chance.”

  “You would have me call off the attack then. Put off the Apocalypse.”

  “Look, the way I see it, there are plenty of battles between good and evil on this plane already. You might have noticed that we’ve got a fair amount of war, death, famine and the other one...”

  “Pestilence.”

  “Right, and pestilence without any help from you. I don’t think you need to go out of your way to ratchet up the stakes. Just give us a chance to work things out down here.”

  “Hmmm,” said Michelle. “You understand what you are asking for? You are asking, essentially, that the Apocalypse be left in your hands.”

  “In the hands of humanity, correct. Don’t misunderstand me, I’m not saying you can’t help out. All I’m asking is that you don’t blindly follow this SPAM, or whatever guidelines you are using. Don’t just mechanically follow rules that were written up thousands of years ago, for reasons that you don’t understand, in a language nobody speaks any more. Ask yourself, before you act on the basis of one of these rules, whether you’re helping our cause or hurting it.”

  “A reasonable request. The SPAM is a very powerful document, but between you and me, I find certain parts of it nearly impossible to understand. There is, even among my wisest advisors, a good deal of disagreement regarding the meaning of some sections. Trying to use it to plan a military operation is hopeless.”

  “This is really all up to you then? Whether the Apocalypse goes forward or not, I mean? You get to make the decision.”

  “Oh my, no,” said Michelle. “I have tactical authority, of course, but all I can do about a decision like this is report to the Senate Committee on Strategic Interplanar Intervention. I do, however, have some pull, and at this point my recommendation could very well make the difference.”

  “And what are you going to tell them?”

  “Well,” said Michelle, “as inclined as I am to leap off this precipice, I do find your case compelling. I’m in a difficult position, you see. On one hand
, your actions allowed the Apocalypse to proceed according to plan. I could take that as a sign that it is part of the Divine Will that the Apocalypse go forward. On the other hand, you’re only involved in the first place because I violated the SPAM to kill General Isaakson and to spare you.”

  “So,” said Christine, “if you hadn’t violated the SPAM, then your plan – the so-called Divine Plan – would have failed. Your failure to follow the plan was a critical element in the plan’s success.”

  “At least as far as I can tell,” said Michelle. “That is, perhaps the Divine Plan would have found another way to work itself out, even if I hadn’t acted the way I did. Maybe in the end it makes no difference what I do.”

  “But you’re the Archangel Mi – er, Michelle!” Christine sputtered. “If your actions don’t matter, then whose do? I have to believe that it makes a difference. I mean, I wouldn’t be alive if you hadn’t saved me.”

  “On the other hand, your life wouldn’t have been in danger if I hadn’t redirected that rocket to kill Isaakson.”

  Christine groaned in exasperation. “We could play this game forever,” she said. “You can’t live your life according to far-off consequences you can’t possibly foresee. Ultimately, you just have to make the best decision you can.”

  Michelle sighed. “It’s a paradox, to be sure. By violating the plan, I made it possible for the plan to succeed. Do I take that to mean that the plan is meant to succeed, or that I am meant to circumvent it?”

  “I’m not sure it means anything,” said Christine. “To quote one of the minor prophets: ‘You can choose a ready guide in some celestial voice; if you choose not to decide, you still have made a choice.’”

  “That’s quite profound,” Michelle said. “Is that Habakkuk?”

  “Rush,” said Christine.

  “Of course,” said Michelle. “I remember when Lucifer lost that bet to Neil Peart.”

  “So what is your decision?”

  Michelle stared over the edge of the valley for a time before answering. “The matter requires further study,” she said. “I believe I’ll recommend that the Senate appoint an investigative committee and put off taking any further action until the committee has made its findings. Then there will be the interminable hearings regarding the report that the committee generates, the inevitable scapegoating and bureaucratic reshuffling, culminating in a lengthy debate about what course of action, if any, to take.”

  “How long do you expect this process to take?”

  “I wouldn’t expect anything this century.”

  “Wonderful. So humanity gets a second chance.”

  “Yet again,” said Michelle. “I hope you appreciate what this means.”

  “I do,” said Christine. “I will. Absolutely.” The Universe, she thought, might not be such a jerk after all. One thought still nagged at her though. “Perhaps it’s too much to ask, but I was wondering... Do you think I could be reimbursed for new linoleum in my breakfast nook?”

  “Hmmm,” said the angelic general. “I’ll see what I can do. That’s not really my department.”

  FORTY-SEVEN

  In a dingy gray pub on a dingy gray Tuesday afternoon in Cork, Ireland, a demon called Eddie sat, forgotten by the Universe, nursing a pint of Guinness. It had been nearly a year since he had last talked to Gamaliel, and he could only assume that his supposed savior had gotten too busy with his scheming to make the call to the higher-ups at the M.O.C.

  “Figures,” he muttered to no one in particular.

  The worst part was, he had actually begun to enjoy the visits from Gamaliel. And now, not only had Gamaliel disappeared; he had lost contact with Harry Giddings as well. Eddie was more desperately lonely and bored than he had ever been before. Gamaliel’s presence had given him some hope that there was some reason for him being here; now he was once again faced with the prospect that his exile on the Mundane Plane was just a cosmic accident. It was almost too much to bear.

  The pub door swung open to let in a blast of cold, damp air, and along with it a pudgy, bespectacled man who appeared to be in his mid-forties. The man carried against his chest a large brown accordion-style folder wrapped in a rubber band. He let the folder hit the bar with a thud.

  “Bloody paperwork,” said the man. He signaled the bartender for a drink.

  Eddie grunted his assent. One thing Eddie did not miss about working for the M.O.C. was the interminable paperwork.

  The man accepted a pint of beer from the bartender and, after taking a few sips, sighed heavily and removed the rubber band from the folder. Out of the folder slid a massive stack of papers, perhaps seven or eight hundred pages thick.

  “Bloody paperwork indeed,” said Eddie, with renewed sympathy. “What on earth is all that?”

  “Report,” said the man, who was now thumbing through the pages, evidently in search of something.

  “Did you write it?”

  “Did I… goodness, no. It’s bad enough I have to read the damned thing.”

  “And have you?”

  “Have I what?”

  “Read it.”

  “Oh. Well, you know, it’s not something that you read, start to finish. A lot of it is reference, you know, and footnotes. A ghastly number of footnotes. And appendices. Something like thirty-seven appendices. It’s not something one, you know, reads.”

  “Why was it written, if nobody is going to read it?”

  “Well, as I say, it’s a sort of reference with, you know, an annotated chronology, cross-referenced glossary and several hundred pages of recommendations.”

  “Recommendations for what?”

  The man sighed. “The organization I work with has become aware of certain irregularities. Violations of protocol, that sort of thing.”

  “I see,” said Eddie, who didn’t.

  “Yes,” said the man. “Rather serious violations. Things not being done by the book. Not entirely on the up and up, as it were.”

  “Right,” said Eddie. “Irregularities, you might say.”

  “Precisely,” said the man. “Irregularities.”

  “And these irregularities,” Eddie went on. “They’re a serious problem.”

  “Well,” said the man. “Well. You’ve got to have, you know, procedures. Things have to be done in a certain way.”

  “Of course,” said Eddie. “Because if they’re not….”

  “Yes, exactly,” said the man. “If they’re not….”

  “Things wouldn’t be entirely above board.”

  “Absolutely,” said the man. “Not above board.”

  “So this is a report on how the appropriate procedures were not followed?”

  “Correct.”

  “With recommendations for additional procedures?”

  “Yes, exactly. And footnotes.”

  “I see. And you think the footnotes will make all the difference this time around?”

  The spectacled man’s eye moved slowly back and forth between the mountain of papers and the pint of beer several times before eventually settling on the beer. He drank deeply.

  “Here’s the problem as I see it,” said Eddie. “People don’t want to read some dry, long-winded report with thousands of footnotes. People hate footnotes.”

  “What’s wrong with footnotes?”

  “They’re Satanic.”

  “No!”

  “Yes. Footnotes were invented by Lucifer in 1598 to prevent anyone from reading the fine print in the Edict of Nantes.”[11]

  “Really?”

  “Really.”

  “So what do you suggest?”

  “What you need is a narrative.”

  “A narrative?”

  “You know, a story. Are you familiar with the Warren Commission?”

  “Should I be?”

  “They’re the group that investigated the Kennedy assassination.”

  “Oh, I saw that movie with Kevin Costner. That was the one with the magic bullet that changes course in mid-air.”

  “E
xactly. You remember the movie because it was a story. Even if it was a contrived and fantastically inaccurate story that completely glosses over Nixon’s apprenticeship with the demon Moloch.”

  “Er…”

  “The point is, if you want people to pay attention, you need to give them a compelling story, with likable characters and a satisfying resolution.”

  “So… no recommendations?”

  “No. At least nothing explicit. Everything has to arise organically from the story.”

  “Can I tack a moral on the end at least?”

  “Absolutely not. I mean, you can try to wrap things up a bit in the final chapter, and maybe hint at some overarching themes, but no moral.”

  “But how am I supposed to boil everything in this report down to a single story? There are hundreds of individuals involved. Each one of them has a story of his or her own.”

  Eddie reached over to the pile of papers, jamming his thumb into the stack about halfway down. He divided the stack in two and slapped the top stack upside down on the counter. Then he ran his finger down the exposed page until he hit a name.

  “Here,” he said. “This is your main character.”

  “Mercury?” said the man. “But he’s just a minor player. He had almost nothing to do with…”

  “Doesn’t matter,” said Eddie. “Wrap the story around him. He’s your hero.”

  Eddie split the text again, finding another name.

  “And this one. Christine. A woman, right? Perfect. Maybe start off with her, and introduce her and the reader to Mercury about eight chapters in.”

  “Wow,” said the man. “You’re really good at this. Are you a writer?”

  “Something like that,” said Eddie. “I’m in something of a lull right now, but I’ve done a fair bit on the Ottoman Empire.”

  “Ah, so you’re familiar with this sort of bureaucracy, then. What with the diwans and viziers and all.”

  “Oh, well, you know,” said Eddie, a bit sheepishly. “My work was mostly conjecture.”

  “Tell me,” the man said, “Considering, as you say, that you find yourself in a bit of a lull, would you be interested in helping me out with this report?”

  “Er, I’m afraid I’m actually on a sort of retainer... My employers have a very strict policy....”