GodBomb!

by Kit Power

  Andrew hesitates for a fraction, but can see no angle in lying.

  “Responding to a Missing Persons. The parents called it in. This is her last known location.”

  Even as he’s saying this last, Andrew is wincing inside. Too much information, idiot! Don’t need to lie, okay, but have some fucking restraint.

  “I see. Chris?”

  Andrew sees the kid's focus shift behind him, then shift back.

  “So, Officer...?”

  Play dumb? But what’s the point? The question is clear.

  “Officer Jackson. Andrew Jackson.”

  “Officer Jackson. Would you mind telling us all who it is you’ve come here looking for?”

  Yeah, that’s the problem with honesty, reflects Andrew, you just can’t see how it’s going to bite you in the balls until it’s too fucking late. Making up a name is out of the question, and Andrew intuits that ‘need-to-know’ is likely to lead to bloodshed sharpish. Anyway, it’s not exactly a state secret, just protocol. Still, it pains him to have to say “Katie Jennings.”

  Especially when he sees the huddled over figure in the aisle snap to in scared recognition. Andrew’s eyes are drawn to the movement, so he sees with unasked for clarity the look of hurt and confusion in the girl’s face. Sees too the limp arm fall out from under her shirt, back to the prone figure on the floor. The one down there might just be unconscious, but Andrew thinks more likely deceased. The pain in poor Katie’s so-blue eyes is all the confirmation he could ask for.

  Shit.

  “So, you’re Katie?” The blade is pointing down at her, and she stiffens up further, eyes locked on Andrew’s, pleading, desperate. Don’t make me, please don’t make me.

  “She fits the description, yes.” It feels like the right move. Minimum buys her some time. Maybe more. She’s still scared, but he sees relief, gratitude. Good call, Andrew.

  “And you said her parents called it in.”

  “That’s right. She’s sixteen. Should have been home by twelve thirty, so they called it in at three.” Telling it feels right too. Buy time with meaningless detail. It helps Andrew feel more in control too, talking like an officer. Doing his job. Humanise the hostages. Make him see them as people.

  The kid cocks an eyebrow, and Andrew realises he’s looking back at his accomplice. He clearly likes what he sees there, because the smile that comes is smaller but more real.

  “Apologies, Officer. You find us in the middle of an experiment, and much has not gone according to plan.”

  He laughs at this, and to Andrew it’s a terrible sound, broken glass grinding in concrete.

  “Or maybe it has, after all.” The eyes seem blank to Andrew suddenly, opaque, and that dark feeling comes back with a vengeance.

  “My friend and I are relieved to see you, let’s just leave it at that.”

  Andrew is desperate to respond, but his mind scrabbles for purchase, unable to find anything to grip onto, and he feels his eyes pulled back to Katie, who is crying, he sees, big blue eyes running freely, silently, her lower lip shaking badly. It twists in Andrew’s gut, every protective instinct screaming to do something, but he can’t think of a fucking thing to do or say. He looks back at the stage and sees the killer is now staring down at her. He comes within an ace of taking a step forward until he remembers the loaded gun, just out of sight, pointed at the back of his skull. He winces in frustration but holds his place. He watches the kid sit on the edge of the stage; blade pointed at Katie’s back. Sees her face again, a mask of misery, but Andrew realises with a start that he sees no fear there at all, only loss. He feels his breath catch in his throat at the realisation, because it’s not what he would have expected in a million years. The immediate impact is for him to feel something he hasn’t felt since he took that step into the building, lo those many aeons ago.

  Still, the darkness is stronger.

  The girl holds his eyes, even through the tears. He hopes his face is giving comfort, and decides to stay with her, ignoring the kid. She’s beautiful, he thinks, even in her grief she is beautiful, and he thinks about that hand falling out from under her shirt, what it probably means, and he marvels at what civilians are capable of, for good and ill.

  Then he sees the kid’s hand appear over her shoulder, come to rest there, and he sees her go still, her eyes darkening. He flicks back to the kid, sees the blade now resting across his thighs as he squats, his face a mixture of eagerness and hunger that turns Andrew’s stomach. His eyes flick back to Katie but he’s just too slow to hide his own reaction, and she sees it, and he sees despair flood her grief, and Andrew is ashamed of himself.

  “Katie.” The voice is quieter, softer, but it still carries.

  “Yes.”

  There’s a dull quality to her voice that Andrew does not like at all. Resigned. Already half dead.

  No good.

  The hand rests on her shoulder, leaving blood on her white vest. She does not flinch or try to move away.

  “Is he telling the truth, Katie?”

  “Yes. I am Katie Jennings. I’m sure Dad is...”

  But she can’t finish the sentence, lowers her head and sobs instead, and Andrew feels terrible, but he’s also glad, because she’s reconnecting with her feelings, back to herself. Away, he hopes, from resignation.

  The kid nods as though she can see. He even pats her back, in a gesture of comfort that strikes Andrew as obscene. His eyes are still blank, and Andrew imagines the smell of burning.

  “That’s good. It’s good to have people that care for you.”

  Katie sobs again, an awful high sound, wrenching. Andrew sees her gaze drop down to the body, hold there.

  “Katie. I need to ask you something, okay?”

  There’s something really shitty about the way he asks for permission, thinks Andrew, and the taste is bitter in his mind. He hates the kid, at this moment.

  Katie nods, tears spilling down her cheeks as her head moves.

  “Why did you help this person, and not...”

  “Alex!”

  There’s an anger, no, fury in her voice. Andrew likes it a great deal.

  “Her name is Alex.”

  Was, thinks Andrew, but the semantics are not as important as the defiance. A warrior, or just with her blood up? Either way, Andrew reckons he’s got an ally in this one.

  If he can somehow keep her alive.

  “I’m sorry,” says the kid. Andrew thinks he may mean it. Doesn’t help with the hate.

  “My question is, why did you help Alex, and not the young man who collapsed earlier? I asked for help, a doctor, and you didn’t...”

  “I’m not a doctor. I’m not anyone!”

  The hell you aren’t, thinks Andrew.

  “But, you...”

  “I WAS SCARED! And then... when she was shot... I couldn’t stand it, just being scared. I had to do something.”

  The kid is soaking it up, and Andrew again sees an awful hunger. The kind that is normally only fed, never satisfied. He’s seen it on the face of many of the drunks that grace the cells so often on a Friday and Saturday night in this town. Seen it on a couple of bodies too. The ones who never beat it.

  “Katie, are you a believer?”

  “Oh, what does it matter?” Andrew sees her forehead wrinkle with frustration.

  “Are you?”

  “YES! Yes, okay, yes I am.”

  “And has He.. have you...” The hesitancy is fascinating, awful. Such hunger.

  “No. It, I only get a feeling sometimes. That’s all. Never words. Just a feeling. When I pray. Sometimes.”

  “Today?”

  “No. Not today.”

  The kid seems torn by this. Andrew sees a dark satisfaction warring with hope, with that driving need. The kid doesn’t seem to know whether to gloat or cry.

  “What about when you helped Alex? Then?”

  Andrew sees Katie’s eyes flash as the name is spoken. And Andrew again thinks this girl has a rage he could really use, if only they get
the chance, and he’s well satisfied with that.

  “No. I felt... No. Not that.”

  Does the kid understand what’s going on here? Andrew thinks not. Andrew thinks the kid does not understand what Katie has been feeling in the last few hours, and Andrew has an insane intuition that that lack of knowledge may just be very costly indeed.

  “Thank you, Katie.” Patting her back again, distractedly, turning his attention back to Andrew. Andrew feels it like a weight, and he thinks again of his duty, doing the job. It centres him. He realises he’s drawing strength from the example Katie has just given him. He’s grateful to her.

  “Officer Jackson?”

  “Yes.”

  “How long until your silence becomes suspicious?”

  “Not long. A few minutes, maybe less.” Unless John decides to break the habit of a lifetime and get off his ass, come knocking. Then there’s apt to be shooting.

  The kid nods, appraising. Then he stands, steps past Katie into the aisle, raising his blade to point once more at Andrew.

  “Officer, we’re seeing signs and portents here. Significant ones. All may yet be well.”

  Andrew thinks about the bodies at his feet, the one on the stage, Katie’s angry grief. He makes no comment.

  “Will you allow us to continue? Uninterrupted?”

  Andrew has a pretty good idea about what he’s being asked, but if he’s right, he needs to play for time, prepare himself.

  “What do you want?”

  The kid smiles, bloodless and without humour.

  “I want a revelation. A miracle. A conversation. But from you, what I mainly want is to radio your friends at the station and tell them that there’s nothing going on here, and you’re going back out on patrol. I want you to use the radio to... actually, when does your shift end?”

  Ten. I’m on the twelve to ten.”

  The kid takes another step. He’s now seven paces away? Six?

  “And could you keep sending them messages saying all is well, between now and then?”

  Andrew takes his time answering. Partly it’s because he’s trying to weigh up the honest answer, even though he has no intention of doing as the kid asks - he’s learned through his Friday night poker sessions that the best way to deceive someone is to run your mind through the thoughts you would have if you had what you want them to think you have. So he honestly tries to figure out if, hypothetically, he could give control the run-around until he goes off shift at ten, and finally says “I think so, yes. Unless something major kicks off.”

  It’s the truth, and it has the ring. The kid takes three deliberate steps. The blade is fully extended, and the point is now two paces from Andrew’s body. Andrew sweats under his stab vest.

  The kid’s eyes slip away from him, and Andrew hears feet shifting on the floor, and suddenly the gun has moved back into view too big and too close, and Andrew feels that dark feeling erupt in his stomach, blooming, spreading, and his mouth is dry and his mind is suddenly weary.

  “Now officer, it’s time for the important question. I have a reasonable nose for bullshit, and in my experience people lie worse under stress than normally, so I encourage you to tell the truth. Do you hear me?”

  Andrew does not trust himself to speak. He nods. His eyes are now captive to the kid’s gaze. It makes him feel light-headed and sick.

  “Good. Because if I hear you say anything that I don’t like, or that sounds like a code that you no doubt have in place for situations like this...”

  You fucking idiot. If you had a clue, you’d be dangerous. Andrew’s played enough poker that his face moves not at all as this flashes through his mind, and the kid ploughs on, regardless.

  “...Chris here will end you. So my question is – are you going to say anything to give us away?”

  It’s a gift, the purest grace. Andrew does not smile as he says “no,” but it’s an effort. Because, no, he’s not going to say one word out of place.

  You don’t need to do that when you press the red button to send the message.

  You can say anything, or nothing at all, and every single cop on duty will converge like flies on shit. The location information he’ll be giving is the icing on the cake, but even without that, this building will be swarming in ten minutes, tops.

  Thank you, God, Andrew thinks, without really thinking at all.

  The kid reads Andrew’s nervous sincerity just right, apparently, because his arm relaxes and the blade points loosely towards the bodies between them. Andrew holds the kid's eyes steady.

  “Good, then. Please, proceed.”

  Andrew reaches his hand towards his radio, finger already curling to reach behind the main receiver button, in his mind already hitting the red button concealed there. Feeling a swell of simple gratitude so strong it probably looks like fear – gratitude to whatever little nerd genius figured out the perfect place to hide a panic button. He does not try and catch Katie’s eye, or move focus away from the kid, but he does send her a last thought, a positive message, don’t be scared, help is coming, his hand touches the cold black plastic of his radio, and it feels amazingly good in his hand, comforting, the shape of the thing that gets you home safe, and that’s when a piercing scream bursts from the front row, incredibly loud and sudden, and it’s the last thing Andrew hears.

  The last thing he sees is a bright flash to his left, followed immediately by a fierce punch in the side of the head.

  Then nothing.

  “...I’m going to put a bullet through my own skull, right? Then we’ll know, yeah? No more fucking about, no more..."

  “...Chris it won’t work, you know it won’t, it needs...”

  “FUCK YOU! Fuck you! I don’t give a shit if it works, I just..."

  “Officer Jackson, please state your current location. Over.”

  “Yes you do, Chris. You do. Everything has built to this, don’t...”

  Chris presses the barrel of the gun to his cheek. The pain is immediate and intense, and he pulls it away with a hiss. The eye above the burned cheek fills with water. He blinks furiously, trying to focus on the bomber.

  Chris wants him to see this.

  “One!”

  “Repeat: Officer Jackson, please.” Click.

  “You know it won’t work, Chris. A man of faith cannot tempt Him, it won’t...”

  The same bullshit, thinks Chris.

  “Two!”

  “...work. You will go straight to hell, and none of us will be any the..."

  The same arguments they'd had, night after night, trying to design the perfect test. The way to test without testing. A way to prove God, once and for all.

  The same bullshit.

  “Three!”

  “...wiser. Don’t forget what this is about. Don’t forget...”

  The stench – burning, blood, piss and shit. There's no God here. Maybe there never was.

  “Four!”

  “... what we’re trying to achieve. It’s cost too much, Chris. Too much..."

  Chris thinks about cost. About what the bomber has lost. About his will. About his willingness to give up his own place in heaven, just for the chance to know.

  Chris thinks about what this has cost him.

  “Five!” Voice almost a sob now. Too much. All too much. It should have worked by now, if it was going to. Surely, God knows. Surely, God sees. Surely...

  “...for me. Too much for you. You have to see this through. We’re so close, can’t you feel it?”

  Can you feel it? The words the bomber had spoken when he'd shown Chris the vest. Explained how he'd gotten it. Divine provenance. How could it be other? The means to deliver everything they'd discussed, all those other times. The safely hypothetical suddenly brought within their grasp. Real.

  Can you feel it?

  “Six.”

  “You can, can’t you? I know you can. I can feel it too.”

  Chris hitches in a breath at this last, the words following with his thoughts, like the bomber had plucked them o
ut of his mind whole. The gun feels heavy in his hand, suddenly. He feels something spark in his stomach.

  “I can feel it. I can. This...” blade pointing to the body heaped at Chris’ feet, “...is a critical part. I feel it. We’re getting close.”

  “Seven.” He says the word hesitantly. Remembering the two of them standing over another body, the night before. The crucified, gutted body of the bomber's father. Hearing the story of how it had happened. Considering the awful symbolism, the grotesque coincidence, and then seeing the look in his friend’s eyes.

  Believing. Believing in the reality of the test. Understanding there was finally the means to prove to his friend what he needed so badly to know. Believing that Chris could be a part of it. The crucial part.

  “Can you still get your father's gun? Do you know how to use it?”

  Back in the present, that same voice:

  “We’re so close now. This is the desert. Don’t you think? This is forty days. This is temptation. This is Gethsemane. We’re close, Chris. We’re going to see something. I think before nine o’clock, we’re going to see miracles.”

  That conversation, the memory of it realer than all that has passed since.

  “I feel it Chris. I do.”

  “R... Really? You feel it?”

  “I do, Chris. I don’t know it, but I feel it. I feel like I’m going to get my conversation. And... I feel like you’re going to get to see some shit, Chris. And I think you feel it too, don’t you?”

  Deborah looks at the fallen policeman. She allows herself a moment of frustration. He'd seemed like a useful person, potentially – a missing link, someone who could give her the space she needed to do what she planned to do. Looking at the small hole in his temple, skin blackened around the edge of the wound, she wonders who will replace him.

  “I... Yes. I do.”

  “I know. That’s why... this. It’s the temptation. We knew it would come. We thought it would be me, but...”

  “Yeah. Yes. We did.”

  “It was you, brother. But you’re stronger, aren’t you?”

  Deborah looks back up at Chris, sees with no surprise that he’s crying again, wiping his cheek with his empty hand.