GodBomb!

by Kit Power

  She can’t shake the feeling that she missed her shot. That’s basically the thing. He was right there, and pretty distracted, but the blade and the blood had her nervous. Then her point man backed out on her, and she nearly went anyway, but in the end she couldn’t, and now she seethes and tries not to be afraid. It was a good shot, and she doubts like hell she’s going to get a better one. Especially now the blade is out. That thing doesn’t look like it’s just for sticking, she’s sure it could slice and dice pretty good if needed, and that is bad news for anyone planning a palace coup.

  And she is still planning it. Visualising it, most seconds. Trying to judge the distance to the stage and how quickly she can cover it. Trying to figure out if anyone will get in her way. Most of all, trying to judge if her point man has relocated his testicles. Because whatever shitty odds she’s looking at, she knows that they go from anorexic to fucking dysenteric if Mr Sax Player chooses to sit the party out. So she’s trying to will him to open his eyes, and he’s cheerfully and blissfully ignoring her, face relaxed, almost smiling. The fucker. Like he’s in on some really excellent joke, or the good weed. She promises herself that she’s going to slap that smug face at least once, just to see what’ll happen.

  If they make it out.

  So she tries to ignore her full and straining bladder, the smells of fear from the bodies of the worshippers turned cattle around her, tries to tune out the whispering voices of doubt in her own mind. Tries to ignore the apparent emotional instability of the dickhead (what a shocker there, right?) and the uncomfortable implications that fragility exposes for the rest of them. Evaluating his slumped form, she tries to think only of physical vulnerabilities, lines of attack, the size and shape of his left hand and wrist, the area she will need to isolate and control with all the speed she can muster. She tries to ignore the wretched sobbing that even now continues to shake his frame.

  Open your fucking eyes, Saxman. It’s time to get this show rolling.

  But Mike has no intention at all of opening his eyes. Not yet. God has asked Mike to wait, so Mike waits. God has asked Mike to listen, so Mike listens. He feels the calming light of God’s love within him, filling him with light. He doesn’t understand why God saw fit to call the preacher to him so soon, but he questions it no more than you would question whether one and one make two. His plan is manifest, that’s all Mike knows and all he needs to know, and Mike does as he is instructed. He waits, and he listens.

  Mainly what he hears is crying from the stage. The boy. He sobs and snuffles. From the front row, he hears the occasional low moan from the woman who has gone into labour. There’s the odd shuffle, sniffle, even a cough or two from the congregation - because it seems that even the threat of imminent annihilation is not enough to prevent some people from coughing in church. Minutes pass, the sounds continue, static on the radio, the murmuring before the orchestra seats, noise without signal. Mike listens.

  The sounds of crying from the stage dry up eventually. He hears shuffling and a ripple of reaction from the crowd. The boy has regained his feet, apparently. Good. A throat is cleared, loudly. Mike can hear the snot rattling in the boy’s throat.

  “Has anyone heard from Him?” Mike hears the click in the boy’s throat as he swallows.

  Mike prepares to open his mouth, his eyes, but

  No Mike. Not yet. Wait. Listen.

  Again he hears the collective shuffle and movement of the congregation. The fear is like a stifling blanket, choking out life and hope, trapping in suffocating heat. Mike can smell the terror of the congregation, it seems to roll towards him as they move, shrinking away from the boy and his blade and his question. They remember the preacher, thinks Mike, and the warning against false witness – even if any of them had thought they’d heard something, they’re not going to say anything now.

  “Anyone?”

  There’s an awful pleading tone in the boy’s voice. A desperate longing, thinks Mike.

  “Seriously? A church full of people praying for three hours, and no one of you has had a reply? Nothing?” The last comes out in a roar, rage and fear blended with blood.

  There’s a long silence. Mike waits. Mike listens. He listens to the boy's breathing become ragged, start to hitch again. He realises the boy is crying again.

  “Look! Look! This woman is in labour. She’s giving birth to her child right here, a woman of faith, her loving husband in attendance, and I stand here with this fucking bomb ready to rip her and her child and all of the rest of you to bloody chunks...” - there’s a few shrieks and yells from the congregation at this last, and Mike feels them flinching back - “...and no-one’s heard anything?”

  There’s a thump that causes a few more frightened yells. Mike hears sobbing from somewhere in the pews and gets the first sense of something deeper and earthier along with the smell of sweat. For a moment, he’s transported to a urinal in London and the sound of a flick-knife opening behind him...

  “Why are you fucking doing this?”

  The boy's yelling is louder, as though he had turned in Mike's direction.

  “You think I won’t do it, is that it? You sadistic fuck, you think you can put her in the way, and I’ll just do the right thing? Is that the measure of you? That you cower behind pregnant women and let them take all your shit? The Great and All-Powerful... You really think that I’m going to fall for that? You can see into my heart! Take a good look! I mean it! You’re mistaking regret for weakness, and that means you’re nowhere near as good as you need to be, because I WILL DO THIS! I sent you the preacher, and I WILL send the rest of these people in pieces, do YOU FUCKING HEAR ME? I WILL DO THIS! So what have you got to say? To them, to me? To this woman and her husband and this innocent child? Anything? Nothing? DO YOU HEAR ME?!?!”

  The last feels like it hangs over everything, not echoing exactly, but like it has a weight, a density, that causes it to continue to have presence long after the air molecules have stopped vibrating with the physical passing of the sound itself.

  It’s time, Mike. Will you be my vessel?

  Always, Lord. Always.

  Mike opens his eyes.

  “I hear you.”

  The words ring out rich and deep – deeper than Mike’s usual speaking voice. At the same time, his eyes open and take in the boy. He’s on his knees; head thrown up to the ceiling. Tears cutting tracks across his cheeks and down his neck, blade in one fist and switch in the other.

  His head snaps around at the sound of Mike’s voice, and their eyes lock. The boy’s are watery, bloodshot, but piercing, intense.

  There’s a long silence. The boy breathes deep; nostrils flaring, almost panting. He’s in a state of animal rage, fury driven to the point of distraction, hanging on to the ragged edge of what passes for his reason. Mike’s face remains still, hands resting on his sax, eyes not blinking.

  It’s clearly for the boy to speak. He seems to know it, too. Much of what has happened appears to have been planned for, rehearsed, but it’s clear that this moment had not been part of the calculation. Mike remains silent and unmoving.

  Eventually. The boy does. “What did you say?”

  “I said, I hear you.”

  The boy nods, taking it in. His eyes flick from side to side, unfocussed, mind trying to process. “You... I’m...” He shakes his head, as if to clear it. Droplets of sweat fly from his damp fringe, leaving a pattern of dark circles on the wooden stage. “You hear me?”

  “I hear you.”

  The boy laughs now, a single bark, a violent exhalation of breath. “What are you saying?”

  “I’m saying I hear you.”

  The boy leaps to his feet, staggers backwards, almost falls, recovers, regains Mike’s face with his eyes. His voice drops, just above a whisper, and there’s still anger but also a tremble of something else. “You... is that you?”

  “What do you think? What do you feel?”

  “I...” The hand with the switch comes up to his brow, presses into the flesh there, rubbin
g hard, eyes screwed shut. “No, you fucking don’t. No. No. It’s not about what I feel; it’s...”

  “What do you feel?”

  The boy covers the ground to Mike in three steps, bringing them close enough to kiss. The blade comes up as he walks, coming to rest against Mike’s throat. The cold steel causes the hairs on Mike’s neck to stand up. “I don’t know what this is, but you need to remember what I did to the preacher, friend, you need to...”

  “Shall I tell them all your name?”

  The boy flinches, visibly recoils, and the blade leaves the surface of Mike’s skin for a second. Then he lurches forward again, nose just shy of touching Mike’s, hot breath coating his face. “That’s a fucking bluff! You’re just trying to fuck with me; that’s...”

  “How about your mother’s name? Your father’s? How about...”

  “Fuck you! You’re not Him; you’re just some fucking second rate sax player that’s about to get...”

  Mike’s voice deepens further, gains volume. To the boy, it seems to gain a booming echo that rolls out across the building. “Do you doubt that the power of God could fill this room right now and bring you to your knees?”

  Mike’s face, his eyes, do not change – yet somehow they do. Somehow, to the boy, he appears taller, somehow those same placid eyes now appear to have a power and a light and a purpose. The boy blinks rapidly, colour rising in his face, flushing the shade of brick, and he takes a hesitant step back, a second, a third. Still facing Mike, back to the congregation, one more step will send him tumbling over the edge of the stage, but he does not take that step. Instead, he drops his head, mumbles something.

  “What?”

  The boy lifts his head, and there’s something defiant about the way he does it, about the way he holds himself, as he says “No. I don’t.”

  “So then.”

  “So.”

  The silence lasts a long time. Then Mike speaks, and it’s with his own voice. “May I tell my story?”

  The boy seems to relax at this – his shoulders slump a little, and his jaw lowers, no longer clenching in unconscious tension. “Has He gone?”

  Mike smiles, hoping the smile does not betray his fear. This young man means to kill them all, he is quite certain, and many, probably most, are not yet ready to die. God is merciful, yes. But this is now Mike’s show, not God’s.

  I am always with you, Mike. Never doubt it.

  “He is always with us, he...”

  The boy exhales in amusement, and Mike observes he’s smiling. He waves his blade hand dismissively. “Yeah, yeah. But I’m not talking to Him now, am I?”

  “He hears all. But no, I’m no longer his vessel.”

  The boy nods several times, the smile fading from his face, eyes narrowed, considering. Mike takes this in and wonders if God will take control again, or if this is going to be the hour that Mike is called to the kingdom. Mike waits. Mike listens.

  “You didn’t flinch. When I put the blade to you, you didn’t flinch. Why not?”

  Mike’s made a deep and unbreakable commitment to truth, and this moment doesn’t feel like a serious test of that commitment. “Couldn’t. Wasn’t in control.”

  The boy's eyes narrow even more, face wrinkling, like he tasted something bitter. “Vessel, was it?”

  Mike nods.

  “Sounds more like puppet to me.”

  “If you say so. Either way, it was my honour.”

  The boy fully winces at this, like he’s been caused physical pain. When he talks, his voice is thicker, less stable. “So where is he now?”

  “Everywhere.”

  “Don’t take the piss. You’re no longer his meat puppet, right? Why not?”

  Mike shrugs. It’s all he can do. The boy laughs, an ugly jagged sound. Mike thinks of barbed wire dragged over skin, and his stomach turns over.

  “Mysterious fucking ways, huh? Perfect.” Head shaking, grin like an open wound. “And I suppose He thinks that’s it, right? I’ve spoken with Him, now it’s time to let everybody go, is that it? IS THAT WHAT YOU FUCKING THINK?”

  “Well, didn’t you?”

  The question stops the boy cold. His eyes, which have been darting about like they were chasing the deranged path of a flying insect, snap back to Mike’s face, seek out and devour. Mike sees so much blackness there, but he does not look away, and he does not flinch. “Do you doubt that your life is on the line here?”

  “I do not. I give it willingly, should that be His will.”

  Mike feels the impasse, allows it to spin out.

  “What about my will? What about that?”

  “Your will is free – His gift, to do with as you will.”

  “Does that make any sense to you?”

  Another shrug. “He spoke through me. You heard it. He has fulfilled what you asked.”

  “Like FUCK! He...”

  “You felt it, you...”

  “...what the FUCK does that prove?!?”

  “You felt it. You felt Him.”

  “Felt? Fucking FELT?!? Shall I tell you something about feelings, SHALL I?” The boy is yelling now; face contorted with anger, spit spraying from his mouth, unheeded. Panting like a dog. Barking like a scared dog, too, thinks Mike, but he says nothing. If the boy wants to talk, he will. Bad idea to try and push. Dangerous, Mike thinks.

  Mike waits. Mike listens.

  Little by little, breath by breath, the boy brings himself under control. The dam does not burst. He swallows several times before attempting to speak again, and when he does, his voice is smoother – closer to that performer tone he first took to the stage with. “It’s not enough to feel. It’s never enough. If you take nothing else from this room, I beg you, please take that. It’s not enough to feel. It proves nothing.”

  Pause. The room breathes as one, every eye - apart from Deborah, whose gaze is still turned inward, unaware of what is unfolding - on the back of the boy. The young man, the killer, the bomber, the shithead, the lunatic, the man with the sword and the bomb.

  “I need to know. I need to know. He knows that. He understands perfectly. He can make that happen...” here he slams the point of his blade to the stage. The resulting bang is not loud, but it elicits some cries from the congregation just the same “...like that. This...“ waving the blade at Mike. “...This puppet show achieves nothing. He knows that too. If you’re happy to be his puppet, that’s fine. But you need to understand that He’s leaving you twisting with this shit, because it isn’t enough. And He knows it.”

  Mike nods, believing. Nevertheless... “I understand what you’re saying. I do. I’d still like to tell my story. With your permission.”

  “Why?”

  Mike sighs. But he has no choice. “Because I feel that He wants me to.”

  The boy throws his arms up in exasperation, sending another wave of fear through the congregation. “What did I just say, man?”

  “I know.”

  “And fucking yet.”

  “Yeah.”

  The boy nods again, then shakes his head, feigning sadness, Mike thinks. Perhaps to hide the real thing.

  A sigh. “May I have your name?”

  “Mike. My name is Mike.”

  “And do you wish to talk to the congregation, Mike? Do you have testimony? Do you wish to witness us?”

  “I do. I wish to give witness to all who can hear me.” Never taking his eyes off the boy’s. Because, yes, witness to all who can hear, surely. But there’s only one person he’s actually talking to here. Only one person he wants - needs - to reach.

  The boy nods like he understands. Perhaps he does.

  “Okay Mike, it’s your own time you’re wasting. You have the floor.” He gestures this last, inviting Mike to step forward. Mike walks slowly to the edge of the stage, looking out for the first time into the faces of all the scared people. Feeling their collective fear. Their collective desire to survive, to live, to not die. He sees and hears and feels and he walks to the edge of the stage and then turns back
to the boy, who has also turned to face him.

  They stand on the edge of the stage, facing each other, five paces apart, like duellists in Renaissance England, missing only the flintlocks and ridiculous wigs. The boy nods, once, like a bow. Mike takes him in, drawing breath to speak, offering a prayer in his mind as he does: Lord, be my protector. Lord, be my guide. Lord, give me the words. Lord, I open my mouth, and you speak. Lord, guide my tongue.

  Mike has witnessed before, many times, in churches, on doorsteps, in living rooms and pubs and on the street. He knows the story well, it’s always the same and it’s always different, and as that breath comes in and the prayer goes up, Mike slips into that place, the place where the story will come and move mountains. In Jesus' name.

  At six minutes past one, on the afternoon of the twenty- third of July, in the year of our lord nineteen ninety-five, Mike speaks.

  “I was a good child, mostly. I didn’t shout a lot; I wasn’t angry very much or very often. My parents were not religious, but I went to a Church of England school, and we sang hymns and said prayers in assembly. I believed in God. Because the teachers told me so. Because it made sense, that the world was made. That our creator was good, and loved us, and wanted us to be happy. Gave us rules to follow that would keep us all happy. I never prayed at home. My parents, as far as I know, never prayed at home either. But I prayed at school, and I thought they prayed at work.”

  Mike shrugs.

  “It had a logic to it, I suppose. It didn’t even occur to me that they... Well, that anyone wouldn’t believe. Made no sense to me.”