by Han, George
In his mental radar, he picked up an approaching darkness. Jin murmured prayers to hold it bay and barely managed.
A voice, cold and strong like steel, broadcasted in his mind. “My old friend. My old foe!”
Jin knew that voice. He opened his eyes to see a familiar figure. Clad in flowing dark robes and protected by a ring of dark energy, rimmed with gold, he was formidability at its purest.
“Darius. Barbatos.”
As Jin searched for words, Barbatos lunged at him. Jin reached for his sword but the figure had locked his hand onto Jin’s. A punch landed on his chest and Jin felt thunder rumbled through his veins, and involuntarily fell to his knees. He felt blood on his lips. Angel seldom shed blood and only a powerful foe could inflict such a misery.
Around him, the repercussion of Barbatos’s punch sent tremors that tore into the façade of the nearby buildings, including the bell at the clock tower which swung wildly. Windows of nearby vehicles were shattered and shards of glass flew through the air.
Jin shook himself off Barbatos’s grip. He somersaulted over and landed on his his feet. Jin then threw his hands in exertion of his powers. Instantly the glasses stopped in their projectiles and in another twist of Jin’s palms, the sharps felled harmlessly to the ground.
Jin turned to his foe and remarked “You have grown stronger.”
“So have you Jin.”
Jin’s jaws squared with defiance “Explain your presence.”
“A loser does not have the right to ask that question, Jin.”
“Good Lord. What is in your mind?” Jin mulled.
“You will find out. I am not going to destroy you today. I shall save that for another day.”
Barbatos delivered another bolt of dark force that pinned Jin to the ground. The Angel rolled over and struggled to shake off the impact of the hit.
When Jin regained his equilibrium, Barbatos was no longer in sight. As he staggered to check his surroundings, another explosion occurred. Soon, the campus was a scene of disarray.
The Demons had shown their hand. Finally.
Chapter 15
Battle Begins
Being alone in the woods does not make him lonely. Maganus sauntered through the woods like it was his garden, with familiar friends and cosy corners. He dispatched Pologus as a scout and trekked alone.
Then free from the nags of Gwyneth, he lit his smoking pipe. It was one of the indulgences that mitigate the stresses of a war with the Demons.
As Maganus moved deeper into the forests, he noticed a thin mist. He smelled something unusual – a light stench of unpleasantness. He did not walk very far to discover the cause of it.
The sight of hundreds of dead animals that laid strewn over a clearing spoke of a massacre. The sight roused the anger in him. The Demons had already covered the plains and they were obviously in pursuit of something, so single-minded that they were ready to crush all that fall in their place.
Maganus snubbed his smoking pipe and kept it.
The Guardian Angel dropped onto one knee and lowered his head in prayers.
“ Mercy on friends, mercy on living beings .”
A ring of light descended on the dead and soon their bodies meshed into the terrain, disappearing like mist into water.
Then he crossed his heart and stood. Maganus heard a commotion and turned his head to find a little furry thing.
“Jan?”
“Lord Maganus.” The squirrel whispered.
“You knew what happened?”
“Not here. I came from across the valley. Similar clashes. Many dead.”
Jan sniffed.
Maganus noticed bruises on Jan’s body.
“You fought.”
“Could I? Lucky to escape unscathed.”
Maganus took out a vial from his belt pockets and poured a drop over the wounded animal. He murmured a prayer which brought a ring of light travelling down the squirrel’s body.
“Now you will be fine.”
Jan looked at his body and nodded with glee.
“We wished you came earlier.”
“I am deeply sorry. I had to meet my fellow angels. Tell me what happened.”
.Jan sniffed, his eyes wet with melancholy
“Tell me my friend.”
“An army of demons. They were in pursuit of some people. A pair of kids.”
“A pair of children? Are you sure?”
“Of course, one male, the older holding the hand of a younger girl. One of yours was with them.”
Maganus’s caterpillar-hairy eyebrows wriggled.
“One of us? The Bellators?”
Jan nodded “He was injured with a limp.”
Maganus swallowed hard. The Bellators are tough warriors, trained in every art of combat and gifted with resilience and endurance. A limp can only denotes a tough foe.
“Which way did they go?” Maganus asked stoically.
Jan peeked around and then pointed into the woods.
Jan blinked “Into the west.”
“I must hurry.”
“You want me to come along.”
Maganus shook his head “No. Return to your kind and warn them to go into hiding. The Demons have struck.”
Jan nodded with teary eyes. “I bear that in mind. And you be careful too, Lord Maganus.”
“I will.” As Maganus turned, Jan suddenly exclaimed “Why are they so important? The kinglings.”
“Secret.” Maganus put a fat index finger to his lips.
Chapter 16
A King in the Making.
2018, New Hampshire, United States
Walter Johnson, the Republican governor of New Hampshire, was a homely character. Despite the frills of the gubernatorial office, he preferred the simplicity of home. The friendly vibes of his family Mansion at Manchester, where he grew up, were the perfect nourishment for a spirit rent by incessant politicking and parochial bargaining.
The Johnson family House did not contain the opulence that one expected in a building that served as the home of a governor but it occupied a special place in his heart. It was here Walter welcomed his first grandchild. It was here he wrote the speech for the anti-drug bill, and scored a major victory against the powerful pharmaceutical lobbies.
Walter was not a man of urban environs. He loves the countryside, the rural greenery, and the simplicity of that lifestyle. God-fearing and fiercely conservative, he was known for his high regard for the family and education.
He was a New Hampshire boy, studied in the state, and received his first degree from the University of New Hampshire. Economics was in his blood, and he aspired to fill his father’s shoes as an authority on the same subject. When Johnson senior took up the deanship at Brown University, Walter was asked to undertake his postgraduate studies at the same university.
However, as he courted his future wife, who hailed from San Marino, California, he chose the sunshine state over the Providence. He spent the next decade in California, raised a family, climbed the hierarchy at the local university, and was eventually appointed head of the economic advisory team of the Republican governor.
When he was thirty-five, Walter was asked by his father to run for the congressional division, Fourth District. The incumbent, Paul Fermont, had decided to retire at the age of seventy-four and Johnson senior had been the chairman of the Fermont’s fundraising committee.
After a tough campaign, Walter won with 51.3 percent of the votes and stayed on for five terms, each successive win achieved with growing majorities.
Then Walter took a gamble and decided not to seek a sixth term. He took a respite and headed back to teaching at the University. The boys were growing up, and he wanted time to take stock of his life. However he was thrown onto the crossroads again when the party asked him to join the gubernatorial race for the state.
He was fifty, healthy and eager beaver. It was a gamble because the state had had a strong democratic incumbent for four years. Walter could have chosen to do something easier, and m
ore rewarding, without braving the hustling.
However, audacity outweighed caution, and Walter decided to throw the hat in the ring. It was his calling. It was vintage Walter Johnson—always reaching for the impossible. As the voting commenced, exits polls predicted that Walter Johnson would lose by six percentage points. The incumbent governor, Sheila Canning, had a strong track record in health and social pension reform and was a favourite amongst woman rights groups and the minorities. It looked impossible to unseat her.
But the dogged Walter Johnson created a political miracle and won by a four-point margin on the promises of jobs security and economic growth. His personal charisma, down-to-earth persona and moderate intellectualism won him support from both parties. His tough stand on abortion and crime-fighting secured the undecideds.
Walter was reelected with clear majority despite his tough reforms in state government. He increased healthcare spending, cut wasteful welfare payments, and got half of the state employees on healthcare insurance. Walter Johnson became synonymous with optimism, possibility and real change for the better.
After eight years of leading the state, he came to crossroads again. He was hungry and lost—hungry because he needed fresh inspiration and lost because he felt he could no longer do better in the coming year than he had in the previous eight years.
Back at home, he had a good dinner and, after coffee with his wife, Walter Johnson rose to retire to his study. Before he entered the room, his aide, Ken Parker, informed him that, Robin Ballard, had arrived.
Walter cringed. Robin has been his confidant and political comrade for his entire public life. The man has engineered all his electoral successes and quite a help with fund-raising.
When Walter entered the study, the man was on the couch by the fireplace. “Robin.”
“Walter,” Robin remained seated so Walter took the opposite seat. He found Robin tired, face wrinkled and eye puffed. Robin was eight years younger but looked older, and Walter knew why. He had shouldered his worries, and everybody else’s, when they were on the campaign trail.
“You want something to eat?” Walter asked.
“Guv’nor—” Robin said, but before he could continue, Walter snapped. He knew the implication behind the word guv’nor. Robin was leaning on him to make a big decision.
“You can just call me Walter. No need for guv’nor. You have been doing that every day since last week!”
“You are thinking of it, aren’t you?”
Walter chuckled like a child. “Robin, you are such an asshole.”
“Will you consider running?”
“I don’t know.”
“If you haven’t been thinking of it, why are we having this conversation?”
"You have gate-crashed.”
“You knew I would be here tonight. If you aren’t happy, you can have me arrested, guv’nor!” Robin held his hands up in feigned surrender.
“No crap, Walter. I’m serious.” Robin turned grave “Give me an answer.”
Walter shook his head. “I am tired. It has been one hell of week, meetings, conventions, and a trip to Congress.”
“No excuses, Walter. It’s a dog’s life since the day you decided to run for public office.”
“Yes, I know but Robin, I was only thirty-five then and after five terms, I was only forty-five! I am coming on to sixty now.”
“Come on, Walter!” Robin jumped to his feet. “Age is not an excuse. It is a badge for the dead or dying, and you don’t belong to either group.”
“On my way to one of them…”
“Shut up.”
“I should remind you that I have a heart condition since I was fifty-two.”
“We all will die, but it’s how we die that matters. You want to run again as governor and then retire in five or six years down the road or do those corporate advisory things?”
“I am going back to teaching, Robin,” Walter said.
“I hope you die while marking assignments if you go back to teaching.”
“Wicked bastard. Teaching is a noble vocation; my father did that for forty years,” the governor said.
“Politics is just as noble, only much dirtier.”
Walter kept quiet. Serving his country and community had been the best years of his life. Despite the acidic grind of bipartisan politics, which sometimes grew too much to stomach, the sweetness of achievement outweighed all else. The thought that he had made a difference provided the motivation that kept him soldiering on.
“Run for president, Guv’nor Johnson!” Robin forthright comments made him cringed.
Walter stood and folded his arms and before Robin shot before he could speak
“Don’t use age again. McCain? Ronald Reagan? You are still a young man, Walter.”
“McCain lost.”
“Look across America now. A wavering Democratic White House administration, festering terrorism in Middle East and South Asia, ballooning deficit, we need a strong president to hold this nation together. There is despair and uncertainty everywhere.” Robin continued, deaf to Walter’s cynicism.
Walter searched deep within for a reason to overturn his arguments. Robin Ballard had such persuasive powers that rendered him speechless. A senator who was his classmate at Princeton once joked that if Robin was made Secretary of State, he could make the North and South Koreans best of pals, and the Pakistanis and Indian troops would kiss and make up in Kashmir. All jokes meant as compliments, but the point about the man’s qualities had been made.
Walter strolled over to the fireplace and looked at framed photographs. He saw the one he took of his parents. He was only fifteen, and they had gone to Maine to fish. It was a memorable trip and maybe that’s the reason why he and Robin were such good friends. Robin was just like his father.
Walter’s silence nibbled at Robin and his tone strengthened. Storming over to the governor, he said, “Walter!”
Walter turned to find a face of grit. He had not seen that much energy in his friend since he first met him on the congressional election campaign trail.
“The White House is not an office that you choose to run for in a whimsical swing, or at the turn of a dime, or whether it’s Sunday or not!” Robin waved his arms. “It is an office for a special man, an office fit for a unique man of destiny.”
Walter paused “It is not just about brains, it is about the heart. It is about that rendezvous with destiny. It is about having someone special in that office. That someone will be you, Walter.”
Walter Johnson turned to the photographs again. “Maybe you should run instead? I can be your campaign manager.”
“Only that I would lose.” Robin protested.
“Ease up!” Walter retorted.
“Stop looking at your father. He is dead. He had already told you what to do.”
“Did he?”
“He asked you to serve this country.”
Walter was silent.
*
Republican Senator Victor Palmer, senior senator of Florida, had every reason to feel good. He had just won reelection to the Senate with an increased majority and then quickly added another feather to his cap with his election to the chair of the Senate Subcommittee on Appropriations.
With the chairmanship, he was effectively one of the most powerful men on the Hill and had considerable leverage over spending allocations vis-à-vis relationships with foreign countries.
Victor earned that position of power without really having to fight for it. In fact, he was embarrassed that it landed on his table by the merit of an unexpected death. The former chairman, Republican Robby Pegasus, had been found dead from a massive heart attack, sprawled on his work desk, by his secretary.
With the Republicans holding a wafer-thin majority of two, a senior senator, who did not have too ‘controversial’ of a voting record, was preferred. Victor, who had been strong on the gun-control issue, staunchly antiabortion and a budget hawk, was seen as one of the candidates. He had co-sponsored four bills with Democrats and
was seen as an acceptable candidate to both parties. His seniority, four terms in the Senate, sealed his appointment.
It seemed as if rays of nourishing sunlight fell on every step that he took in his life and career. In no time, Victor had turned into a focal point for the key relationships on Capitol Hill. He coordinated the policy-making meetings and decision-making processes on billions of dollars of spending. In the age of instability in the Middle East and central Asia, escalating threats from Islamic terrorists and rogue states, Victor Palmer was a sought-after man.
His schedule had been packed with meetings, from lobbyists from defence industry to every important ally of the United States. Fellow senators, junior congressmen, and key members of the Democratic and Republican parties wanted a piece of him.
His wife, Dorothy, had complained that she had lost her husband to another competitor. It was a joke made partly in praise but mostly in sarcasm.
Victor had every reason to believe his career can only get better, and bigger; there sun is beaming but there is threat of storm though. On his horizon of clear blue skies, there was one growing grey cloud.
Ironically, the problem was nonpolitical and very personal. It had to do with an investment decision Victor made five years earlier. He had taken a stake in an oil company, Maxi Oil, with a few of his long-time associates. The founder of the company, Chris Bates, his classmate at Princeton, had thought he could do much more with his savings, and with oil prices buoyant again, at $90 per barrel, the industry seemed like a good investment.
Chris Bates lived up to his word and Maxi Oil was listed inside three years and Victor’s investments almost doubled. The winds were taken out its sail in an unexpected event that happened last year. Off the coast of Mexico, Maxi Oil moved a drilling platform to a location that was miles away from its original spot. It would have caused little fuss to relocate it, but it was set up in a protected region. The relocation was messy and various environmental groups protested the mistake. An environment-minded White House was forced to take a position and the federal agency took Maxi Oil to court.