by Sean Hoade
Doucette reached down into the tank to take the portable webcam from Sergeant Mitchum. “We ready to go?” Doucette said to him, and apparently got the thumbs-up because he then said, “Ex-Madam President, or President ex-Madam … anyway, we’re recording.”
Her hair was a shambles, the lighting was bad, shattered foot-long shards of black iron littered the grounds, and she was standing in a torn navy pantsuit and stocking feet on the lawn of a White House that was no longer hers. But every man there, including Mitchum and Horan Marmalado, watched on the forward tank monitors as Hampton assumed the mantle of the Presidency once more, seeming to grow in stature and gravity as she prepared to speak.
Holy hell, Martin thought, impressed and amused, she must have been a monster of a sixth-form schoolteacher. A spitball thrown in her class would send you up the river for the rest of your natural-born life.
President Hampton began her final address to anyone still alive to listen:
My fellow Americans and humans throughout the globe, I have resigned the United States Presidency. This was a decision made in the greatest haste, but I do not regret it in any way. Indeed, while the trust put in me by the American people allowed me to be more influential and beneficial than I ever could have dreamed, any President’s power to move the world forward is constitutionally limited, as the Founding Fathers intended.
However, the entire planet—the entire human race—is now in the greatest crisis in its history. The entity known as Cthulhu has sent out a series of psionic—that is, from its giant brain and mind—waves that at first killed half a billion people around the world. Sooner after His emergence from the Pacific Ocean, Cthulhu began moving toward the planet’s South Pole. This has sent out, and indeed is still sending out, these highly destructive psionic waves.
For those still able to hear my message, you are alive due to differences in your brain chemistry from the majority of humankind. If you are intoxicated or under the influence of drugs at the time a psionic wave passes over you, you will be unaffected. If you have a mental illness due to brain chemistry, you will be unaffected as long as those chemicals maintain that imbalance. But there is only one way to escape the psionic destruction permanently, and that is to put your faith in our new God, in the Old One, Great Cthulhu.
Yahweh and Allah, Buddha and Brahma, the ten prophets of the Sikhs, the animist spirits of the jungle, none of these will protect you. Only Great Cthulhu can protect you, as he has protected me. His herald form, once it reaches the South Pole, will open the gate between His dimension and ours. Those who believe will witness the return of our planet’s true masters: Great Dagon under the sea, the Elder Things and their shoggoth slaves, and of course the glorious Cthulhu.
I know these things first because of the prophecies of the writer Howard Phillips Lovecraft, and second because once I believed, I could see everything. Once you believe in the power of Great Cthulhu and the other masters, you will see it all, too.
My fellow Americans, my fellow surviving humans, now is the time to place your fate in the hands of those so much more powerful than ourselves. Trust in Cthulhu, make yourself sensitive to the Lord Dagon’s love, and learn from the wisdom of the Elder Things.
[She motions to Percy to come join her in front of the camera. He steps up beside her.]
This man has staved off the psionic waves by injudicious consumption of alcohol. Is that correct, Percy?
[He nods, and Hampton reaches to the ground to pick up a large iron shard from the White House gate.]
People of this great planet, this man does not believe in any of the Old Ones and their complete dominion of what we call “Earth.” Is that also correct, Percy?
[Eyeing the iron spear in the ex-President’s hand, Percy seems to both nod and shake his head simultaneously, which makes him simply look like a doddering drunk.]
To remain in the realm of our new masters, we must perform a sacrifice. Once we believe, we must end the life of a nonbeliever in the name of Great Cthulhu.
[Before Percy can even back up or Martin can stay her hand, Hampton shoves the iron spear directly through Percy’s chest, right through his heart. He falls to the ground immediately, already dead.]
I am the prophet of Cthulhu! Now sing it with me, my children:
Ïa! Ïa! Cthulhu m’glhal! Ph'nglui Mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh m’glhal!
Praise! Praise! Cthulhu is awake! Cthulhu is free from R’lyeh, alive and awake!
Ïa! Ïa! Cthulhu m’glhal! Ph'nglui Mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh m’glhal!
YES! CALL TO HIM! ÏA! ÏA! CTHULHU M’GLHAL! PH’NGLUI MGLW’NAFH CTHULHU R’LYEH M’GLHAL!
Show the others the Way! But first, SACRIFICE an unenlightened one! Do it NOW! And may the Old Ones bless America!
Her speech concluded, former President of United States Judith Hampton ran out onto Pennsylvania Avenue, turning south and screaming in religious ecstasy until the men gathered on the White House lawn could no longer hear the sound of her voice.
Martin knelt next to the body of his longtime assistant and friend. He didn’t cry at funerals. He didn’t cry when he had been diagnosed with early-stage throat cancer a few weeks earlier. He didn’t cry on 9/11. But now he sobbed and then cried, his tears dropping onto Percy’s face. A baptism of sorts, he supposed later, but one that made sense in a world without the God he had never believed in, a God he already missed.
“What now?” Doucette, as shocked as the rest of them, asked no one in particular.
“Why did you come here?” Martin said.
“To protect the White House and the President.”
“Then stay here and do that. I’m off to kill Judith Hampton.”
“Whoa, Mister Storch, I can’t let you do that. I’m sworn to protect the President, ex-President or whatever you got.” He carefully unholstered his Beretta 9mm sidearm and brought it up out of the hatch, pointing it at Martin very slowly so that the writer would not notice it hadn’t been there the whole time. “So why don’t we calm down for a minute?”
“She’s getting away!”
“She won’t get far, Mister Storch. Tell you what—we got spades in the tank here. Why don’t I help you bury your friend and we can discuss what we should do next?”
Doucette called down into the tank, “Mitch, hand me one of them spades, would ya?”
***
Within the bowels of the M1 tank, Horan Marmalado pondered the words of Judith Hampton. She was the prophet of Cthulhu? But he was called by the Old One! The open door at the hospital, the guards unable to stop him because of Cthulhu’s attack, the Army tank picking him up and bringing him to the White House, where he could get his powerful followers together? She didn’t even have any acolytes, and she was the President!
No, this would not do. This would not do at all. The Great One’s emanations had removed the schizophrenic jumble from Horan’s mind so he could lead the new Church! He was the prophet of the Great Cthulhu!
Agitated, Horan tried to work himself through the narrow confines of the tank to get to Mitchum and Doucette, his friends. They had been spared the destruction of their brains as well—yes, they had needed alcohol, but that’s why they were acolytes, disciples (if he could be so bold, all glory to Great Cthulhu) instead of a prophet like himself.
And unlike the murderous pretender, Judith Hampton.
Killing was Cthulhu’s job. What she advocated was unforgivably presumptuous! (Oh, these words I can make now, Horan thoughts, how long it has been since I could put them together to mean anything! Thank you, Great One!) It wasn’t just presumptuous, it was blasphemous for anyone to assume for himself the right of Cthulhu, the right to kill!
“Sergeant Mitchum,” Horan said to his friend who was handing a folded shovel up to Doucette.
“Just ‘Mitch,’ man. I told you that.”
“Right, sorry. Mitch.”
They looked at each other in silence for a moment.
“Yes?” Mitchum said.
“Do you believe? In the
One who has come?”
“You mean Cthulhu, the one the President was talking about?”
“Yes! Cthulhu!” Horan yelped in delight. “Do you believe?”
“We’re talking about the “Great Cthulhu,” the thing—I mean God, not “thing”—that Hampton said that believers are supposed kill nonbelievers about?”
“Yes! Exactly!”
“Well …” Mitchum said as he remembered the ex-President’s call for sacrifice of Cthulhu’s infidels. “HELL yes, I believe! The Master Sergeant and me are both big believers in, um, the Old One. In Cthulhu. Heya, heya! like she said. Right, Master Sergeant?”
Doucette, who had heard every word of the conversation below even as he was trying to talk Martin Storch out of murdering Judith Hampton, ducked his head down into the cramped quarters and said, “You bet I do! Heya, heya!”
“Heya? Oh, you mean Ïa? Like Ïa! Ïa! Praise! Praise!”
“That is exactly what we mean,” Doucette said, getting his footing to climb out of the tank and help the writer bury his friend on the front lawn of the White House. “We’re believers, all right. Down to the core.”
Mitchum turned back to Horan with a calming smile. “See? We’re all friends here, all big supporters of Cthulhu. No conversion necessary.”
“Cthulhu be praised!”
“Yes! Right! Cthulhu be praised!”
“So we will go further south to answer His call?”
Mitchum scratched at his stubble. “We don’t have exact orders to stay at the White House, I guess. It just seemed like the thing to do when the shit started hitting the fan …” he said. “Really, though, that’s up to the Staff Sergeant. How far south you talking about?”
“The antipodes.”
“The what now?”
“The South Pole, Mitch. It is where Great Cthulhu calls His prophet.”
“Ohhhh. So that’s why President Hampton ran off? She’s going to the South Pole?” On foot? Mitchum thought, but kept anything sounding even remotely skeptical to himself.
Horan’s features clouded. “She is a false prophet. Great Cthulhu chose me and paved the way for me to come to him. I am His prophet.”
The inside of the tank had never seemed so small to Mitchum. “Uh, yeah, of course. That’s why me and Deuce stopped to pick you up in the first place! We’re believers, and you’re the prophet! It just makes sense.”
Horan beamed now. “We will drive south in your tank until we can go no further, until we reach the water.”
“Sure, defs,” Mitchum said, sliding as inconspicuously as possible toward the hatch, which he planned to climb up out of and lock from the outside. “Listen, I better check on—”
A sack of potatoes was pushed through the hatch, followed by Doucette. Only Mitchum could see after a second that it wasn’t a sack of taters—it was an unconscious Martin Storch. With a nasty-looking bloody patch on the back of his head, one that matched the smear on the underside of the spade the master sergeant carried back inside. “Gentlemen, we have ourselves a new passenger.”
Mitchum trusted his commander completely, so he asked him with a bit of irony, “What, we got too much space in here?”
Doucette laughed. “Just keep your Beretta on him if he wakes up and seems ornery. We’re not letting anybody kill any Presidents on our watch.”
That in turn made Mitchum laugh. He reached behind him for the holster he kept hung on the bulkhead—
—and it was not there.
“What the f—?” Mitchum swore to himself, then turned to look and saw Horan Marmalado slipping on the holster and pulling out the 9mm. His blood froze. “Heyyyyy, whatcha doing there, Horan? I kinda need that. We got a prisoner and all now, as you can see.”
“Don’t worry, Mitch,” he said, and held the pistol at different angles, as if he’d never seen one before, and nodded at Martin’s unmoving shape. “He wants to kill people he thinks are prophets. If he makes a move, I’ll shoot him in the face.”
Mitchum and Doucette shared a look: Was it worth it to try to get the gun away from him right that second? As only longtime soldiers sharing a very small space can do, they silently agreed that it was not, not at the moment.
“We’re believers,” Mitchum said. “You are definitely the prophet.”
“That is exactly what I was going to say,” Doucette added. “We’re believers.”
Horan had never felt so calm, so in charge, so sane. “Then let us go, my friends. Let us go south until we run out of land.”
“And then what? Key West is still pretty far from the South Pole.”
Horan smiled. “Did I ever tell you what I did for a living before they locked me away for killing a demon disguised as a Bronx shoe salesman?”
Mitchum’s opened his mouth to speak, but thought better of saying anything and shut it again quickly.
Doucette said very calmly, “I don’t believe we knew you had been locked away.”
“Oh, yes, at Manhattan Psych. For paranoid schizophrenia. But I’m better now. Cthulhu’s psionic powers have made me sane again.”
Mitchum and Doucette nodded and nodded. Sure, yes, you bet. Doucette wished he hadn’t clocked Martin Storch so hard with the shovel. Three against one in the confines of the tank would have made for better odds.
“Yes, so it won’t be any trouble when we run out of land. From everything that’s been happening, I don’t think a lot of planes are leaving any airports. And what I did before I got committed?” He gave them both a little salute. “I was an airline pilot.”
Mitchum quietly groaned. Doucette closed his eyes.
“So let’s get going! It’s bad form to leave Great Cthulhu waiting.”
“We’re believers,” Mitchum said, eyes on his own 9mm in the crazy man’s hands.
“Definitely, we are total believers,” Doucette echoed.
Horan Marmalado laughed. “Why do you guys keep saying that?”
Deep Underground Command Center
1.2 km under the White House
Event + 38 hours
President Algernon Steele and the surviving members of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, surviving members of Congress, their families, and whatever support staff who had not abandoned their posts or died had been relocated to the “superbunker.” The facility had only recently been completed even though planning for it began in the mid-1960s. There were quarters for all members and their designated relations, and in fact was room for many more people, but most of those who would have qualified were missing or dead.
Steele sat with his top advisors in the Situation Room recreated in the DUCC. One of the few surviving aides put a satellite image on the main screen. The bulk of Cthulhu was clearly visible, His round third eye seeming to stare right into the lens orbiting 500 miles above the ice. “The thing is obviously going for the South Pole, and the command has been given based on these pictures to send every nuke we have right at it,” Steele said, and his own determination felt damned good to him. He thanked God that he had stepped in when he did, saving the world from that hippie bitch’s peacenik routine when it was time to destroy the biggest threat they had ever faced.
Zhikin in Moscow had survived along with most of his staff, Steele knew, because they drank like goddamn fish any minute they were awake. The other leaders on the Security Council , the interim—or maybe permanent, who the hell knew with these people?—Chinese Communist Party Chairman, French President, and British Prime Minister—all agreed to send their missiles, everything they had, at the same target: the South Pole. The birds were in the air as Steele sipped his whiskey.
Of course, he had put aside just a couple of missiles, one for Moscow and one for Beijing. The fucking Communists had to go. Decades and decades of Cold War and then Glasnost and all that shit, but finally Putin made it all like the old days before being replaced by Zhikin, only this time it would be a hot war. That had been the last thing Steele had conferred on with Jack Patterson before the general disappeared, apparently slipping out right before
they all were to go down to the DUCC, and also apparently taking Kevin Berry with him. Stupid move, Steele thought, but at least you did right by your country before you went all chickenshit.
Steele didn’t know but might have been informed by Patterson, were he in the bunker, that President Zhikin and the new Chinese leader probably would each have several nukes put aside as well. However, the NSA chief was gone, so he couldn’t predict for the President that the Communist countries likely had in reserve one each for Washington, one each for New York, one each for Paris, one each for London. (Also one from Russia to Beijing, and one from China to Moscow.) The rest, however—those hundreds, if not thousands, of warheads—had truly been committed to destroying the psionic monster. Some 6,400 megatons of nuclear destruction was headed for Antarctica, so what did it matter if each superpower sent one or two to his enemies’ capitals? It was just good strategy.
The President told his assembled chiefs, “Just before midnight, the nuclear attack on Cthulhu was launched. Thank you for making this unprecedented response to an unprecedented attack possible. The South Pole will be losing a bit of ice, but it’ll be worth it to kill this monster from the deep.”
There were smiles around the table, even though free-flowing alcohol was the only thing keeping anxiety from getting the best of them. The DUCC was for a doomsday scenario.
“But I have a little surprise for you. Taking advantage of my new executive privilege, soon fire will be engulfing Moscow and Beijing to a twenty-mile radius, if I have my figures right. The United States of America will be the only power left standing, let alone superpower. We can rebuild this planet as we want it, as a haven for our values. Thank you for making this possible, ladies and gentlemen.”
Jaws dropped around the table. No one spoke. Steele raised a glass and said, “Here’s to Cthulhu, who's about to get his green ass fried, and the beginning of our New World Order.”