CANNIBAL KINGDOM

by John L. Campbell

  Over the secure radio channel Agent LaBeau’s vaguely slurred voice said, “Stagecoach is diverting to route three. We are fully defensive and heading to Angel, but Angel gives no response. All agents, collapse onto the airfield.” The transmission was followed by the man’s deep voice letting out a short giggle.

  David King acknowledged and ran for the rooftop door, pulling his pistol. What he had already seen reminded him that everyone was now a potential hostile, even other agents. He elbowed through the door and launched down the stairs.

  He did not see what happened in the plaza. Among all those fallen bodies, those who had been wounded by their fellow man but not killed outright began rising to their feet. They moved off in every direction, slowly at first, eyes cloudy and grayish drool slipping past their lips, then moving faster.

  They joined in the killing at once.

  -14-

  DANCER and DESIGN

  Twenty thousand feet – October 28

  Patricia Fox sat in the rear of the large, private jet facing her daughter in the seat across from her. The First Lady was dressed in a smart, red suit, a classy-looking middle-aged woman with shoulder-length chestnut hair and good skin. Considered lovely by any standards, she knew she could not begin to match her daughter’s beauty. At twenty-two, Kylie Fox could easily have been a highly successful, professional fashion model. The Secret Service had given her the codename Dancer because she had been a cheerleader at UVA, and had the physique to prove it (and the brains to contradict the stereotype.) Not only did she have an enviable figure and her mother’s perfect skin, she also had the most captivating blue eyes her mother had ever seen, and that was an objective observation, not simply because she was her daughter. Kylie’s hair was the same color as her mother’s, thick and glossy, hanging about her shoulders in natural curls. She wore designer boots and jeans, a top cut a little too low (in her mother’s opinion, certainly her father’s) and a short, brown leather jacket.

  Attitude influences beauty, though, her mother thought. Not so pretty at the moment.

  Kylie’s arms were crossed and she was glaring at Patricia. “You heard me. I said bullshit.”

  Patricia sighed. “What part’s bullshit? That you’re being made to go to Ohio, or what your father and I think about Trey?” That was the nickname Terrence Weaver used, Kylie’s boyfriend. Patricia even disliked using his name.

  “Both,” said Kylie. “I’m not part of all this.” She waved a hand, indicating the plane full of staffers and Secret Service agents. “Daddy doesn’t need to parade me around to win this election.”

  “Whether you like it or not, you’re part of this family. And besides, you know it’s not like that. You’re not doing any press. He just wants to see you.”

  “Yeah, right. And the photo op with his smiling, perfect family will just accidentally happen. I’ve been through this before. And why isn’t Devon coming?”

  “Your brother has been to the last two of your father’s events. You took a pass both times. Now it’s your turn, and your dad misses you.” Patricia resisted the urge to cross her arms to match her daughter’s defiance.

  “You don’t have any idea how busy I am,” said Kylie. “It’s grad school, and it’s Harvard. The pace is faster. I don’t have time for this.”

  Patricia did appreciate how packed Kylie’s schedule was, and that Harvard was a high-pressure, unforgiving environment. But they were a family first, and in this bizarre world of the presidency she was doing everything she could to maintain at least a measure of normalcy. Seeing his daughter was important to Garrison, who suffered from the same parental guilt as his wife. He adored the girl, who, despite all he said and did, couldn’t seem to grasp how much he loved her, the pride he felt for his first-born. Frankly, Patricia was surprised she’d gotten the girl onto the plane.

  “It’s just for the day. We’ll have dinner with him in Cleveland, and you can fly back to Boston tomorrow. Or even late tonight if you like.”

  Kylie looked away, glowering out the window.

  “I think you need to be a little more understanding,” said Patricia.

  Kylie’s head snapped back, and she turned that glower on her mother. “Like you and daddy are about Trey?”

  Patricia wanted to snap back that Kylie was acting like a spoiled child, a petulant teenager who wasn’t getting her way and so lashed out at everyone around her, no matter who she hurt. She didn’t, was able to control her temper – barely – and resisted an immediate comeback. Still her brow creased as she frowned. Terrence Weaver had been seeing their daughter for only a couple of months now, but already he’d had a serious (and in Patricia’s opinion negative) effect on her. Patricia doubted it was love, didn’t know if it was the sex but was almost certain that the relationship was some childish screw-you to get back at her parents in retaliation for whatever millennial angst they had inflicted on the poor child. It made her ill, and it frustrated her that this young woman, a grown woman, was behaving like an obnoxious thirteen-year-old. Kylie was too old, and too smart for this nonsense. Although Kylie had never concealed the fact that she was resentful and unhappy about how her father’s role had impacted her life, she’d always been either calmly articulate about her objections or simply quiet and distant, throwing herself into her studies and doing her best to ignore the many restrictions circumstances placed upon her. This regression in maturity was a new development. Patricia didn’t wonder at its source.

  Also a grad student, Trey was an angry young man who was vocal about his opinions and politics and completely at odds with everything for which her husband stood. Not just vocal; toxic. Trey used words like fascist, tyrant and warmonger, right-wing elitist and racist, all the trendy, inflammatory favorites the Left liked when referring to the opposing party. He was also a blogger, spewing his radical views to anyone who would read them and – also in Patricia’s opinion – using his relationship with the First Daughter as legitimacy in promoting his agenda.

  The Secret Service was digging into his background and monitoring him closely. Patricia had no objections.

  “Your father and I respect your choices, Kylie. We know you’re an adult. But we also want you to make up your own mind about things, not simply parrot what someone else is saying.”

  Kylie smirked. “Do you know how hypocritical that sounded? Especially in this family? Besides, it comes down to the fact that Trey doesn’t like daddy’s politics, and that makes him unacceptable to you both.”

  “He doesn’t treat you well,” Patricia said. “He’s all about himself, and he talks at you, not to you. I’ve seen it. That’s what’s unacceptable.”

  “You don’t know anything about us.”

  Patricia tried not to roll her eyes. It was like the trite script to a melodramatic teenager movie. And in fact Patricia knew Trey quite well, or at least his type. Terrence Weaver wanted everyone to agree with his rage so he would feel validated. Every conversation was shouted and bitter, and anyone who didn’t share his righteous indignation was either a sympathizer with the opposition or one of its crafters. There was no attempt to see another point of view. She believed in his right to an opinion, to give voice to unpopular ideas – that was America, and she supported that right as strongly as her husband – but she was still a mother and a person. The first and only time Patricia Fox had met the boy, Trey had offered his condolences that she was married to a man who intentionally hurt minorities and the poor. She’d wanted to slap him at the time, and remembered the smug look on his face. Her own expression must not have been well-concealed, because he followed up with, “What, are you going to pull a Clinton and make me disappear?”

  Patricia had steamed, an ugly part of her thinking that Trey was probably lucky he wasn’t speaking this way to Bill or Hillary.

  “And I do make my own decisions,” Kylie was saying. “You’ve just never given him a chance.”

  “Never? He’s only been around for a few weeks.”

  Again Kylie looked away. “You don’t k
now,” she said to the window.

  The First Lady crossed her legs and now her arms as well. Her daughter hadn’t used the word bitch, but she’d have no trouble with it when she was out of her mother’s presence. Patricia couldn’t argue. It was the word she wanted to use as well.

  In the cockpit of the First Lady’s jet, both the pilot and co-pilot were having trouble focusing. During the forty-five minutes since lifting off from Boston, both had developed headaches and chills, and now their faces glistened with sweat.

  “I feel like shit,” said the co-pilot, looking over. He was pale with darkening circles around his eyes.

  The pilot nodded. “Me, too.” An Air Force lieutenant colonel, he was the regular pilot for FLOTUS, the First Lady of the United States, and the responsibility of safely transporting her, or any member of the First Family, was something he took seriously. Protocol demanded that if either pilot (especially both) were feeling unwell, the aircraft was to land immediately.

  But the pilot was having trouble remembering any procedures, and the multitude of controls, switches and gauges were starting to lose their significance.

  He strained against the disconnected feeling, bearing down in an attempt to think straight. It helped a little. “I’m declaring an emergency,” he told his co-pilot. “I’ll call it in, you let the Detail know and then get back here.”

  The co-pilot sat there blinking, palming away sweat and shuddering. After a moment he rose with a dull expression and headed for the cockpit door.

  Special Agent Alexander, a woman with eleven years in the Secret Service and the senior agent in the First Lady’s Detail, pressed a finger against her earpiece and asked for the radio transmission to be repeated. She would have paled, but she already was, her body shaking with chills and a headache pounding behind her eyes and at the back of her skull.

  “Copy that,” she said when the information came again, then switched to the Detail frequency so all the agents aboard, Design and Dancer’s both, would hear her. “Alexander. We have an AOP on Devil Dog, and we’re initiating Bank Vault.” Then she rose from her seat and headed back to the First Lady and her daughter, supporting herself with seat backs as she went, not due to any movement from the plane but because of how she was feeling; dizzy, weak, disoriented and sick to her stomach. The First Lady looked up when the female agent stopped at her seat.

  “Mrs. Fox,” the agent said softly, “there’s been an attack on POTUS in Cleveland. He’s being…evacuated now. The White House…has ordered that… we initiate Bank Vault.”

  Patricia Fox had heard the term before, vaguely remembered it from a briefing, but at the moment it meant nothing. Only her husband mattered. Her complexion suddenly matched her bodyguard’s pallor. “Is he alive? Has he been wounded?”

  Agent Alexander just stared at her. Past her. Through her.

  “Alexander!” Patricia said sharply. “Is he hurt?”

  The other woman shook her head slowly. “We…don’t know… We’re going to be…diverting.” Her eyes swam out of focus, and she shook her head again, blinking, wiping at the sweat beading on her forehead. Alexander moved back up the aisle. She should be talking to headquarters for instructions. She should have been able to remember all their alternate landing locations along their route across Massachusetts, New York State and Pennsylvania. She should be talking to the agents on Design and Dancer’s Details.

  None of that was happening, because she was suddenly struggling to remember where she was. And none of the other agents on board were asking questions or even responding to the fact that she had announced an AOP. They were all either staring at nothing or holding their heads in their hands.

  The cockpit door opened, the co-pilot standing in the doorway, blinking. Then he snarled and rushed Agent Alexander with his fingers hooked into claws, just as the aircraft banked hard to the right, throwing everyone against their seatbelts and the starboard bulkhead.

  Don’t crash, don’t crash… The pilot repeated the words in his head like a mantra, squinting and forcing himself to pay attention to yoke and rudder, altitude and airspeed. He gripped the yoke so hard his knuckles cracked, while his body shook violently with the chills and sweat streamed down his neck, into his collar. His vision blurred in and out. Don’t crash, please, God, don’t crash…

  Somewhere within cloudy thoughts that wanted to fog over completely, he knew he was supposed to be using the radio. Had he done so already? What was it he needed to say? He couldn’t remember, only knew that he needed to put this plane on the ground. Hanging onto bits of lucid thought that were tattering by the moment – a battle he knew he was about to lose, and wouldn’t that be a relief? – he continued his steep descent. Cut airspeed. Decrease altitude. Landing gear down. His right hand worked the controls by muscle memory alone, and there followed a loud bump and a hydraulic whine from below.

  Screaming and savage growls came from the main cabin beyond the open cockpit door, the terrified cries of penned animals during a thunderstorm. The noises had no meaning for the pilot, who leaned forward in his seat, still squinting. A body thudded to the floor in the doorway. The pilot didn’t notice.

  The Gulfstream’s wings dipped left and then right, the aircraft drifting side to side as the green and brown earth reached up for it.

  The pilot began making a high, keening sound as he fought for control, not only of the jet but of his own body and awareness. He cut back on the throttle, barely noticing the ripping sound of treetops scraping the lowered wheels and white belly of the screaming plane as it came in too fast. A large green square appeared beyond the windshield.

  Field. Too short. Trees.

  He cut speed further, leveling the wings, feeling the bottom drop away from him as gravity took hold of an aircraft no longer moving fast enough to maintain flight. Then like the flick of a switch, the only things the pilot understood were the needs to kill and feed.

  First Lady Patricia Fox had a bloody nose and was trying to tuck herself into a protective ball on the carpeted floor between the seats. There were splashes of red everywhere, bodies thrashing in the tight cabin and ungodly screams and snarls making her ears hurt. She was sure she heard her Chief of Staff Maria screaming, thought she heard Kylie doing the same, but didn’t know where they were. All she did know was that she was about to die.

  An agent from her own Detail was on her, clawing and snapping his teeth. His eyes were glazed and distant, seeing not his protective charge, only prey.

  Patricia felt the plane shudder, the nauseating way it sagged left and right, heard the engines screaming outside and the sickening plunge of what could only be a freefall. She uncoiled from her ball and tried to fight off the agent, knowing a crash was coming at any second. Impact and fire. She knew she’d never feel it, not because it would be so sudden but because she would be torn apart before it happened. The agent was bigger and stronger, and now he had her by the shoulders, pulling her toward him even as his drooling, snapping mouth rushed in.

  She let out a scream as she tried to push him away, her hands trying unsuccessfully to force his bulk away, and then one hand slipped off his chest and went into his jacket. Patricia felt that hand now touching the grip of a holstered pistol, and her eyes widened.

  Being a Marine family, there had always been guns in the house, and Garrison Fox had insisted they all learn to shoot, both handguns and rifles. Even at an early age both kids had been taught gun safety, care and cleaning and proper shooting stances. Before their busy lives and the turmoil of Garrison’s first term as President made getting together so difficult, they had often gone to the range as a family.

  In all her plunking at paper targets, Patricia Fox had never expected to turn her skills on another human being. Although she was a fair marksman, at this range she didn’t need to be. Just as her attacker’s teeth came in at her face, close enough for her to smell his sour breath, she ripped the handgun from its holster, rammed the muzzle against the madman’s chest and pulled the trigger three times in quick
succession.

  The agent’s heart exploded out his back in pieces.

  And the Gulfstream went down.

  -15-

  DARK HORSE

  The Harrison School, Vermont – October 28

  He’s going to use his bishop, Devon thought. Threaten my queen. He doesn’t see it coming. He looked at the chessboard, one of ten lined up in a row in the event hall. Groups of teachers, parents and students both from here and the competing Winston Scott Academy stood back and watched quietly as pairs of boys in their school uniforms faced off across ten small tables.

  Devon, playing black, stared at the pieces, seeing how it would all unfold. Normally he thought seven moves ahead, but at this point he only needed to think about four. Checkmate and victory was that close.

  You’re not paying attention to the knights. Too focused on your own attack. Too aggressive. You’re not protecting the flanks. The kid could have his queen, and Devon had moved her intentionally to be attractive bait. It was his knights that would prove to be the kid’s downfall.

  “Devon Fox employs his knights with surgical precision,” the school newspaper recently said in an article that Devon was certain had been read by only a handful of geeks like himself. This talent was the source of his Secret Service code name. His chess coach, however, frequently warned him that he was overly dependent upon his knights, making his strength also his weakness. He didn’t care. Not today, anyway. It was good enough to finish off this kid.