Rapture: Where are our Children (A Serial Novel) Episode 3 of 9

by Gary Sapp

That’s probably why she always had such an attitude with her mother before the older woman left for church. Traffic flowing through the neighborhood was the slowest all week on Sunday mornings. And if she did manage to get some guy off and pocket some money, then trying to find one of her dealers took some doing as well. Even the most religious drug pusher had to sleep some time or the other, especially with Friday and Saturday nights being so prosperous and all. And the weather was warming up too which was great for the drug and the skin trade.

  Louis knew that Tracy was running low on cash with the days approaching the middle of the month. It didn’t take rocket science to figure that between her mother’s social security and Tracy’s welfare, that money was tight under the most ideal circumstances.

  These weren’t ideal circumstances.

  Louis abandoned his usual routine of following Felicia and the kids and stayed after Tracy this morning. She had walked down one of the alleys and behind the dumpster. The neighborhood was circular by design with rows upon rows of shotgun houses all in some need of work or paint needed on them. Louis had seen men of his color drive down here every so often. Most of these men were legitimate business types: Salesmen, Insurance Brokers, Bails Bondsmen, and even some undercover police. And it amazed Louis that no matter how dangerous the neighborhood was the drug pusher code was the same during the day: Hands off Whitey unless he backs you into a situation where you have no other choice.

  Yet, all bets were off when the lights came on. It is the twilight and shadow syndrome. The voice inside him said. Four Pandora agents had to sprint down and rescue him when he got cornered by a group of gang members a week ago. Those young men never knew what hit them when the bullets tore through the soft tissue in the back of their heads. We weren’t afraid though. We would have handled ourselves…defended ourselves even if the cavalry hadn’t arrived. Louis told himself that the other voice was a liar. He had been scared. He still had the trembling hands, the cotton mouth and the piss on his pants to prove it.

  Still, Danielle Rohm offered him a pretty smile…and more importantly a change of clothes as the other Pandora agents dragged the fresh corpses away. Shooter had taken the young men out from at least 200 feet away. Louis was thankful that Serena had put together men and women with such a variance of skills and talents within Pandora. But no one had the lethal range and the means to spout off kills like the little girl dressed in black.

  The neighborhoods of downtown Atlanta hadn’t changed much since his first round of raptures 30 years earlier. He saw the same trash low income housing areas, the same potholes in the roads, and worst of all the exact same hopelessness imbedded in the faces of the people who lived down here.

  One thing had changed though.

  He saw young men and several women as well, dressed in khaki suits and sneakers running pockets of drug dealers off of the corners. The confrontations often were no match. The Peacekeepers were always victorious. Some of the residents would actually walk out into the streets and cheer them. One night, several weeks back before 411, he saw a group surround three Peacekeepers and started hopping up and down while they chanted we have a vision, we have a vision…

  Louis drove away as fast as the F150 would take him that night.

  Yet, he had always come back. He had been given a job to do by Serena Tennyson and it was very unwise to displease the head of Pandora too often. So he got to the business at hand.

  He came close to grabbing Moses two days ago as he walked home from middle school. The opportunity was there, but he had blown it. Moses had run straight home as his grandmother had instructed him to. Since Serena’s announcement on Thomas Pepper’s blog, Felicia Jackson would often leave her home and begin walking towards the school where each child came home from. The walking was difficult for her considering her arthritic hip and other ailments. Also the younger kids got out of school an hour before Moses did and she barely got back home, caught her breath, before it was time to venture out again.

  But that day, two days ago, had presented the best opportunity that Louis had yet to grab the boy. Moses best friend had stayed home with a bug. He would be walking alone and even if the old woman started walking to meet him, she would not get to him in time. What did save him is that some neighborhood kids were playing kickball on a side street about four blocks from his home. And no matter how disciplined a 12 year old may be, he was still just 12 years old and the game was too much of a good time to pass up.

  The temptation earned Louis a spanking from Felicia that day, arthritis and all.

  And it saved you from us…for now.

  Tracy Jackson had been waiting all evening for a regular John to show up at the house so she sent Moses, as she often did, to meet her dealer for a rock. Moses had met the young man, who was probably four years older than he was, countless times before and knew right where to go. He had tears in his eyes and hated this task. He knew his grandmother wouldn’t allow it, but she had already left for her bible study meeting at the church, and wouldn’t be returning until it was late. Tracy knew this as well and that’s why she always scheduled these rendezvous at her house through the week on Wednesdays and Fridays. And Tracy could put it on them too. She could satisfy three of four men in the two to two in half hours his grandmother would be out of the house.

  The John was driving up now, so Tracy slapped her oldest child upside his head and gave him another slap on his rump, cursed at him to get on his way.

  When the screen door closed behind him, Louis vowed that he would at least never have to return to this specific hell again.

  If Serena Tennyson and Pandora were going to exploit his talents the way she was exploiting Danielle Rohm and all the others then so be it. He would be happy to use their money and resources so he could engage in the pleasure that he had been born to engage in.

  This was no different than when the Caretaker had commanded him to do the same thing 30 years earlier. In both cases, the political and social ideologies were well past his ability to completely understand them all. He did understand what to do with these boys after he had picked them from the streets.

  And just as before, Louis Keaton had six of them already of his scope of vision. He had their routines and habits and their family’s routines and habits rounded into memory. He had the locations, the point of rapture mapped out and his necessary escape routes available to him whenever he needed to fetch them from thought.

  Louis knew, just like years earlier, that he wanted…no, we needed…to capture his General first. He wanted a boy of outstanding character and discipline who would watch over the other boys once he had captured them all. The general would help keep them quiet, calm and safe.

  Moses Jackson would be his general for this generation of abducted boys…just as Christopher Prince had been his first general when his first rapture began all those years ago.

  When the boy had cleared the first street Louis Keaton made his move.

  He waited patiently until Moses made his buy from the drug dealer. Louis needed him to advance quickly out of this little sector of hell and start walking down the block. This street, with its low lighting and narrow streets, actually would have served Louis better to grab the boy unseen but anywhere that significant narcotic activity took place, there was an increased opportunity of Peacekeeper interference. Louis didn’t need that kind of headache. He was running low on chances to get this thing started. Serena Tennyson had insisted on the operation beginning now.

  Louis knew that snatching the other boys would be a breeze by comparison. It had been three decades since he had tried to hold a group of boys together. He had the pleasure of a single boy here and two brothers there, but not a collection as was needed to satisfy the Dragon Woman and her brood.

  Suddenly all of the brief sessions that he had with Dr. Angel Hicks Dupree came back to him. She had asked him how he felt when these urges washed over him. She had instructed him on how he should fight back against them. She had smiled at him with her fake lips and told him tha
t he was no less human for having these feelings, what dehumanized him was his inability to overcome them once he recognized they were on him in full.

  Serena, on the other hand, balled up her fist the last time he saw her and told him to embrace his urges. She told the truth about us, Louis. We are a magnificent creature. We are a blunt instrument. But mostly we have been kept at bay for far too long. We need to feed. Dupree-Hicks would bury us forever. She is a fool. We will feed again. Dinner’s on.

  The good doctor’s influence hadn’t waned however. In his mind’s eyes he could see her pleading with him to return to his F150 and drive away. She yelled at him to remember the dead and the dying that happened because of his miscues last time. She reminded him that he was a molester, a pedophile…a butt fucker, but he was not a killer. And if he took Moses Jackson here and now, he would get his pleasure but he would eventually have to kill them as he had been instructed to kill the other boys before.

  Don’t listen to Dupree- Hicks. We won’t allow the situation to erode like it did the last time. Moses is stronger than Christopher had been. And what saved him…and started the ball of death rolling for the other boys was dumb luck anyway. That ain’t happening this time; it just ain’t.

  Moses Jackson dropped his mother’s bag of rock on the ground, gave his dark surroundings a once over and stooped down to scoop it up—

  And Louis Keaton was away from his F150 like a blur of light with his phony badge in his hand. He was yelling…but not too loudly about how much trouble the boy was in. Moses tried to drop the baggie again but it was too late for that. The police had seen you with it in your possession. And everyone knew what the police did with 12 year old Black boys who were in possession of rock cocaine. Moses cried and nodded his head. He probably didn’t know, but he surely had been taught to always agree with an officer of the law, especially when he caught you with the goods on you.

  Moses Jackson was a smart kid; in fact the 12 year old was brilliant. Although he attended a failing school that was short of resources, funds, teachers who gave a damn and mostly illiterate kids he was excelling. And even though he’d been assigned to high school equivalent classes and arguably was the smartest kid in the whole school he allowed himself to get caught doing this.

  But after Moses let the moment and his bad situation sink in…some of that intelligence seeped through. He asked Louis if he were a cop where was his gun? He asked why he wasn’t calling his back up in. And then he said respectfully, but firmly, why they would put a man as old as he was on such a dangerous beat in a neighborhood like this one.

  Louis Keaton found the strength, quickness and resolve that he thought he left behind years earlier to snatch Moses and throw his ass into the passenger side of the truck. He worked quickly but steadily, he gagged Moses and roped his feet and hands together and stuffed him down on the floor board all without drawing any attention.

  Louis got himself over to the driver side, closed the heavy door, latched his seat belt on and drove off without speeding. He turned onto one main road, then to another and then another at a moderate rate of acceleration. He checked his rear view mirrors and saw that no one was following him including Pandora agents. Serena had explained to him that they would no longer be sent out with him since the scouting phase had concluded and the rapture phase had begun.

  Louis pushed the F150 harder when he drove the truck up on the entrance ramp and eventually onto I 20 heading parallel out of the main part of the city, towards the sanctuary that he had created for Moses and the other children. And He has built many rooms in this mansion. And after the rapture of his flock, they will spend an eternity together.

  We’ve done so well.

  Much later, hours after the Pandora agents helped pull a crying Moses Jackson from his truck, Louis Keaton allowed himself a deep exhale of a breath he hadn’t known he was holding and threw up. He walked inside the sanctuary. Serena had promised him that her hand full of agents would allow him adequate space to do what needed to be done. And we have held up our end of the bargain and we will make sure the witch of a dragon woman does the same. Serena Tennyson was proving to be as efficient as and even far more ruthless than the Caretaker had been.

  And although no one would trade Serena’s cold passionless persona for Caretaker’s compassion and love of humanity, Louis had to believe that between the two of them that somehow they would be able to pull all of this off without the senseless deaths that occurred the first time around.

  Yes, the voice inside said as the first stir of his manhood inside of pants this evening occurred. There would be plenty of time for that soon enough. You are stronger than Chris ever was, Moses. You won’t force Serena too command us to kill the other boys who will soon be joining us here.

  We’ve chosen well.

  We’re sure of it.

  Roxanne

  The liberation of Carver had begun.

  And while it wasn’t her war per say it would be affecting her if she didn’t move out of one its many apartments soon.

  At first all she had heard were a few bangs and pops of scattered gunfire. Those sounds were more common around here than the sound of children laughing and playing. This was Carver after all. But then there was the screeching of tires followed by another round of bangs, pops, and cries of men dying. It some odd way it had reminded Roxanne Sanchez of her childhood growing up with Maria and her parents in the old broken down shack that had once been her beloved home a few blocks from here. This evening was like New Year’s Eve all over again. The closer to midnight the hour got the louder and more frequent the sounds of New Year’s Day drew closer. And that gunfire and the killing is getting closer minute by freaking minute, where is he—

  So far Councilwoman’s prognosis of the offensive had been on target. The Peacekeepers had engaged in a full-fledged assault that senior militias across the world would have been challenged to mimic. The problem was that she’d been caught behind enemy lines when the campaign had been engaged and it had slowed her investigation to a near stall ever since.

  And I was getting closer to some answers. Roxanne slid over to the window of the otherwise empty apartment for a quick look down the street. The usual early evening activities of drug sales, pimping out the younger hoes and maybe even a quick game of craps while you could still see the numbers had ceased to exist. She’d seen a lot of running back and forth. Mothers were grabbing their children and making a break for cover. The dealers were on the phone trying to find out what in the hell was going on up in the front.

  And I’m stuck in here, waiting. The Prince family had paid well and on time but they both had been a pain in her ass. First, there was Denise Prince, who had originally hired her. The lady was a head case at best with her moodiness and downright hostility at times, especially around Chris. Her ex-husband was loyal maybe even to a fault to his former family, but it was clear that both of them were hiding a secret that might have been the final nail in the coffin of their marriage. And its and ugly secret too, Roxanne thought and pulled the curtain back further for a larger look see down the street. It was something that nearly destroyed you, Chris, not just your marriage.

  And now Xavier Prince, Chris younger brother had deployed this offensive today…right now that made an already difficult search even more dangerous.

  She heard the bolt on the lock unlatch on the front door. She brought her Nine up to greet in unwelcome visitor.

  Andre Knight opened the door and slid inside. He locked the bottom lock, bolted the middle one and even swung the chain over into place. He was out of breath and looked as if he’d seen the mountain top for himself.

  “They’re dudes dying out there,” He told her between bits of heavy breathing.

  Andre Knight:

  He was a scrawny dark skinned Black man who had graduated high school a year after she did. He was so long and so lean in fact, that Roxanne would have sworn on a pile of bibles that if he were any skinner she would be able to see behind him. He wore too much grease in
his hair and a well-manicured goatee surrounded a mouth full of beaver teeth. He’d acted like a spoiled punk in high school and age hadn’t improved his standing with her one bit.

  “They’ll be one dying in here if you’ve lied to me.” She had ‘Dre pinned to that same front door with all of the locks in place with the back of her forearm. She hadn’t pointed her gun at him…yet. “Where is this contact you promised me? You said that someone in him saw Erica Prince after the day that most people think she went missing.”

  “Calm your nerves, Girlfriend.” Andre said and pushed himself away from the door and out of her grip in a single motion. “There is a shooting war going down in the hood in case you ain’t keeping up with current events. Things like that can add to a man’s travel time. I wasn’t nowhere near up front and struggled to get here. My man had further to go.” He closed the curtains. “He’ll be here.

  Roxanne rolled her eyes at her old schoolmate and sighed in exasperation. She did not do waiting well. Patience is not a normal human virtue, Senorita. Victor had once told her after he’d made her body tremble with pleasure. You are good at what you do. Yet, you must make patience an ally if you truly want to excel. And her own inner voice countered: And I suspect that you are using that patience right now…in an attempt to find me, Victor.

  And so his words that he had text her echoed in her soul;

  Someday, when the time is right, Gonzales and I will stop what we are doing here…and find you.

  I will see you suffer for what you have done here down below.

  Roxanne Sanchez knew she would rather face a thousand Peacekeeper liberations than one Victor Castillo.

  That was at least until ‘Dre had told her what he’d seen so far.

  The Peacekeepers had used two old vans to ram through the check in point at the front gate. Everyone knew that ‘security’ was bought and paid for by Bishop and his Choir boys. Dre said that one of the fools even had the nerve to go for his pistol but one of the Peacekeepers’ riding shot gun in the opposite van shot just above his earlobe killing him on the spot. The other played it smart—at least at first, by hitting a silent alarm that notified the Ushers that they had company.

  Dre stopped his tale long enough to pull a brew from his fridge and chugged half of it down in one gulp. Roxanne frowned at him when he dared offer her one. Men and their vices, still she urged him to continue. They might as well do something constructive while they waited on this contact to arrive.

  He said that the ‘Boys followed procedure…but it didn’t