by Sam Herrera
“You really think you can get us all in there?” David asked.
“Yes I do.” I pointed to a print of the outside of the statue’s head. “This is the one contingency they have not thought of: a ship that doesn’t exist yet except on a blueprint.” Caleb shook his head, thinking, just as I had when I had first heard this insane plan, that this was too easy. Just flying up and storming the place?
“It must be guarded in some way or another,” he said. “Karden’s protective detail is the best. Secret service. How can we hope to surprise them?”
“That is where our insider comes in. Someone we can rely on one hundred percent.”
“Who?” David asked.
“Chloe. She is currently inside Karden’s protective detail. Our goal is to land here,” I pointed to the statue’s head, right on the balcony at the crown,“out of sight of the bodyguards but in full view of the podium. Chloe has assured me she will be there, standing beside Karden. The moment she sees the shimmering in the air, she will hold him hostage while we disarm the bodyguards.” It did seem a lot to put on the shoulders of one girl, even a smart, independent one like Chloe. Plus we only had her word to go on. I gave a shiver as I thought back to the last time I had ever seen her. It had been after the argument in the cavern. She vanished right in front of my eyes; just literally disappeared into thin air, leaving only her shoes behind. Last night, out of the blue, she’d called the Winter’s intercom with this crazy scheme. If it worked, yes, we could win the war. If it failed we could all be killed. I watched Caleb chew his lip anxiously as he, no doubt, thought along the same lines.
“Caleb.” They both looked up at me. “You know your role?”
“Yes, sir,” Caleb nodded.
“Good.”
“No,” Mara protested.
“We need him,” I argued.
“He’s my husband; you can’t risk his life like that.”
“It’s my life,” Caleb broke in indignantly, hating being spoken of as though he wasn’t there. “I want to go,” he insisted.
“And I need you to go,” I nodded. “I need everyone I’ve hand-picked; no one else will do.” She sighed in defeat, but still tried, one more time, for Caleb’s sake.
“Don’t do this,” she said to him quietly. An entreaty. He shook his head stubbornly.
“Come, it’s time.”
MARA
Now here we were, onboard the Winter, heading straight for the Statue of Victory. I got the feeling there was more to this than met the eye. There were ten of us: Caleb, me, Dave, Kyle, Snow, Sam, Father, Andy, Richard, whom I had been very surprised to see, and Ethan in the pilot’s seat. It was a curious bunch for a stealth mission, I thought. I was also getting sick of Snow’s disgusting ogling. Why was I here? I was physically fit, sure, and I was okay on the firing range, but full-on combat was a new experience for me. Richard was a priest as well; he had never held a gun in his life, had refused to. I looked to the left at my husband. Husband. Whenever I thought of him that way, a warm smile spread all across my face. I had a husband, a gorgeous one. I was a married woman. I slid my hand into his and held tight. Kyle had insisted that he come, that he was important to the mission. And what was that box at his feet? I looked down at the identical large box between my own feet. We all had one and, from the puzzled looks they were getting, it was clear no one had any more idea what they were than I did apart from Caleb who had this odd, secretive smile on his face. I knew whatever was ahead of us would be dangerous, that we might never come back. My grip on his hand tightened and I leaned my head on his shoulder. I love you. If you die, I die with you. The fear in the air was suffocating me.
“Screw this,” Caleb snapped, getting up and moving to the cockpit.
“What are you doing?” I asked.
“I don’t like uncomfortable silences,” he told me, bending over Chloe’s laptop. A tune began filling the air: O.A.R, ‘Love is Worth the Fall’.
Soon we were all singing our lungs out. Even Ethan, in a fine bass tenor.
“Shhh,” Kyle hissed suddenly. We looked up as our target, Karden’s icon, the Statue of Victory, suddenly filled the cockpit window, its emerald eyes seeming to home in on us like two searchlights.
KYLE
“Chloe?” I asked, holding the intercom to my mouth.
“In position,” she whispered back. I gave a low whistle, seeing all the security around the island. The OWO, looking like black metal robots from an Asimov novel, were all over the place. Searchlights were scanning the crowd gathered at the statue’s base to attend the speech and, as I watched, they were all singled out, one by one, to go through the metal detectors. This, in my opinion, was overkill: they were all here by invitation only and had arrived by motorboats from the mainland, steered by more robots just as heavily armed. I smiled as I watched the ring of gunships circle the statue’s head. We were, as I had said, in the one contingency no one had thought of: a ship that, in this day and age, was still in blueprint form.
Mara joined Ethan and I in the cockpit and together we looked down at the head of the statue. On the crown, the very top, I saw a podium, a wooden walkway and platform set up in front of a stairway, leading down into the statue, with mikes and speakers. A phalanx of bodyguards, marching in perfect unison, came up the steps, rifles at the ready. I swallowed nervously. I had pushed my recruits and pushed them hard. But they were the Elites, the best Karden had, hardened combat veterans each and every one. One of the bodyguards caught my eye, suddenly. There was no real difference between any of their uniforms and I couldn’t see their faces under the helmets, but this one was shorter and slighter than the others. As they neared the podium, I was sure. Chloe had always had an air of supreme, nonchalant indifference, acting as though nothing could touch her. The same thing was apparent here. C’mon, Chloe, don’t let us down now. I had heard a lot of strange stories about why this was, from Mara, Dave, Caleb – many people. In fact, I could recall several coming from the horse’s mouth, stories of time travel and shit. It was rumored that if anyone or anything threatened her life, she would simply vanish into thin air. Caleb had seen her many times apparently, up to when he was twelve: she had been his babysitter. At the time, I had scoffed at this. But after seeing her vanish into thin air myself and end up here, I wasn’t so sure. We watched as a tall figure in a long, black overcoat, over an immaculately pressed three-piece suit, came forward out of the sea of black body armor, its dark hair tossed back from its shoulders by the forceful wind blowing at this height. The statue was a good likeness; the man had exactly the same features and emerald-green eyes, glowing just as bright. They shone brighter as he began his speech, a mad, fanatical glow. He spread his arms wide and began the usual self-serving bullshit. David joined us, his face grim as he looked down at the man who had once been his benefactor and friend and was now a self-appointed god, a king on the throne of his own imagination. I shut my ears. We were here to take him down, not kiss his ass. I nodded to Mara and she passed the word along to the others: get ready. As one we rose and moved to the back of the jet, weapons up and ready for action. As soon as the gun was on Karden we would pounce. Chloe wouldn’t last long on her own out there. There it was: a single, fluid movement and Karden, wide-eyed with astonishment, cut off mid-speech, was a hostage.
MARA
We pounced, taking the bodyguards completely by surprise. Chloe, throwing off her OWO helmet, kept her gun under Karden’s chin and yelled at the bodyguards to drop their weapons. They didn’t even react as Kyle and Caleb, ahead of the rest of us, jumped out of thin air and went around them, grabbing the rifles and side arms and shoving them out of the way. Once we were inside, half our squad sealed the doors, aiming at the guards outside in case they tried to come in. The other half surrounded the ten suit-and-dress sporting OWO state officials and their families, covering them from an elevated position on the balcony. I scoffed at all the flash tuxes and glittering ball
gowns. Welcome to the party. A sudden loud explosion nearly deafened me and lit up the entire statue. I spun on my heel to see an OWO Nighthawk go down in flames. I went to the window to see it hit the lawn at the statue’s feet and vanish in a ball of flame.
“Cool, huh?” Kyle smiled at me, coming through the door, around the metal shaft of the handheld rocket launcher resting on his shoulder. Where the fuck did he get that? He suddenly looked up at the sky, through the glass. All the other gunships were converging on us. Dropping the rocket, he grabbed me by the shoulder and dragged me away from the window.
“Ladies and gentlemen,” Kyle began, addressing the cowering, clearly terrified suits, “we are the Outcasts you’ve heard so much about and, as you can see, we are in fact taking you hostage. None of you will be harmed if you cooperate. Ask yourselves if this so-called god,” he added with a sneer as he backhanded the cuffed and glowering Karden viciously in the mouth, “is really worth dying for. You, in the office. Chloe, with me.” She grabbed Karden by the arm and led him into the corner room, shutting the door behind her.
*
After a short while, a single gunshot suddenly rang out of the office. I walked along the golden hallways, needing time away from this. It would seem this statue really was gold. The hallways were gold, even the guardrails were gold. I put my hand in front of my face, seeing the yellow glow reflected on it.
“Are you okay?” I looked over my shoulder and smiled to see Richard come up behind me. I shook my head as I leaned my forearms on the rails, my hands clasped. “I hate this. I hate what this war is doing to us. We’ve just killed a man and we’re threatening whole families for Christ’s sake.”
“I know,” he nodded, raising his brows. “I hate it too, but I believe we are doing what we have to do. It was written that this would happen.”
“What?” I frowned.
“The Beast. The fatal wound that the whole world marveled at.”
“Ah, c’mon. You heard it. Karden’s dead.”
“He’ll be back,” Richard nodded, his face grave. I respected his beliefs, I was grateful that he’d married Caleb and I and I had to admit so many baffling and truly terrifying things had happened, but still…
KYLE
I gave a smile as I watched a genius at work. As pressed for time as we were and as big a self-confessed ball-buster as I was, I had to stop and admire this guy’s skills. It was like someone had turned on the “go” switch in Caleb. He sat at the desk and went at the mounds of wax, in the ten boxes, before him, hammer and tongs. The mysterious waxwork artist, Joe Cussler, who I had heard so much about from Mara and the news, was revealed here. I shook my head, awed, as the faces of people whom we’d called in and seated in front of the desk one by one were soon formed. And still he went at it, spurred on by the music pounding through his headphones and the inspiration from his own genius. As soon as the faces themselves were complete, he went onto painting them. Freckles, tone, wrinkles, crow’s feet, sagging skin; no detail escaped his keen artist’s eye. I called Simon Cale on the desk phone when he was done. To the world at large he was known as President of the United States and Special Advisor to the OWO. To us he was known as Karden’s puppet. To Richard he was known as some kind of False Prophet or whatever.
“Good morning, Mr. Cale, how was your flight over?” I smirked, knowing he was out there somewhere, either on the mainland or en route.
“Who are you and why do you not address me by my title?”
“I’ll address you however I like, you arrogant bastard,” I snapped, getting some satisfaction from hearing the pompous old fart gasp in outrage. “Here are my instructions.” I took out a handwritten list from my overall pocket. “You will have these dropped to us by chopper: ten rifles. Empty, I don’t want to see a single bullet anywhere, and ten overalls of varying sizes, all gray color. Your chopper will fly over, drop ‘em and fly off. I don’t want it anywhere near the statue for a second longer than necessary. Or I shit you not, I will shoot it down. I also want boats to the mainland and two choppers waiting for us on the roof of the Great Hall. Again, they will be empty and they will be fully fuelled. You, and the whole world, have seen what I did to your gunship. Don’t. Fuck. With. Me,” I growled, hanging up.
“You dropped that rocket launcher and you can’t go back for it now,” Caleb reminded me.
“But he doesn’t know that,” I grinned.
*
“Here,” I said, coming out of the office and handing David Grey a mask. A mask modelled on the face of Ule Okamodo, the Prime Minister of Uganda.
“Good, innit?” the exhausted, clay-and-wax-covered Caleb asked, following me out. David stared down at his son’s creation, shaking his head in wonder. I grinned as I watched each of my team don a mask each. The great army, gathered outside, would be clueless as to who to shoot at.
MARA
I raised my rifle to my shoulder as I opened the trapdoor a crack, peering down the scope at the chopper flying closer and closer, hanging a metal crate from its stomach by rope. I was a pretty decent shot, yes, but could I take a life? I wasn’t like Chloe and Kyle: born soldiers. I noticed Karden’s bodyguards weren’t here. They must have been evacuated. The box fell in front of the doorway with a metallic clink but I didn’t come out until the chopper was gone and I was sure the sky was clear of any other aircraft. Even then I covered Snow all the way as he dashed out, grabbed the rope and, with a grunting and tugging, pulled the box in. I helped some though it left us vulnerable for a few seconds. Together we dragged it back along the hallway.
I was confused here. In fact I had never been more so in my life. I’d come back from hauling in the mysterious box to find twenty OWO officials, not ten, and one set seemed to be wearing what our team had been wearing, not so long ago.
“Here,” Caleb smiled, coming up, covered in paint and some kind of gray shit.
“What?” I asked, frowning at what he was offering me: a mask modelled on the face of the Prime Minister of China, Something Wu. “What is this?” In answer, Kyle blasted the box open with a short burst from his rifle, scaring the shit out of all of us and spilling the contents on the floor: another set of ten overalls and ten pairs of heavy boots with a bunch of rifles and handguns. Looping his rifle over his shoulder, he took one of the guns, aimed it at the ceiling and squeezed the trigger. Click.
“Cool,” he nodded. What?
“This is our escape plan.” I looked from the mask to Wu himself as he came forward, as instructed, and was given an overall and a pair of boots.
“This won’t work,” I stated flatly. “He doesn’t have my red eyes. If they look closer—”
“I realize that,” Kyle said. “I’ve ordered Cale to give us boats. They’re waiting outside right now.”
“Do they know Karden’s dead?” Chloe/Prime Minister Morgan asked as her double dressed in a similar coverall.
“Afternoon, Secret Weapon,” I smirked.
“Blow me, Albino,” she sniffed and smirked back. “So?”
“Oh, yeah, I told them.”
“Was that wise? We could have bluffed.”
“Yeah, well. Get them changed and on their feet,” Kyle ordered. The hostages were yanked up and given their new clothes. I watched my teammates playing Guess Who with their masks. Some of the captives joined me in staring. I grinned and the face of my mask stretched, moulded to my face muscles. This explained everything: Caleb, the uniforms, identical to ours, that the hostages now wore, the empty guns Kyle had demanded and that had been dropped off by helicopter. It also explained the strange team that we’d assembled: Kyle had needed people of the same height and build. He went around the hostages shoving the useless guns into their hands.
“You two are geniuses,” Chloe beamed under her own mask, the mouth moving in rhythm with her own exactly. If I didn’t know better, and couldn’t see the real man, standing a few feet away, I would have swor
n it was actually him talking in a girly voice. My husband was always a genius. My grin widened as I imagined the baffled fury the army outside would feel. In yer face.
“Ahem, Chloe,” Kyle barked, scowling at them, “if yer done socializing…” I followed his gaze to where Chloe and some tall, dark-haired, somewhat familiar hostage were chatting. She took the hint and snapped instantly back into armed guard mode. I would say this for her: she had lightning instincts.
“Hello, Mara. Nice mask.” I stared in dawning surprise and hurt at my old school friend, Scout, sitting on the floor wearing a smug smile and an OWO uniform with the Mark on her forehead. I didn’t reply. Some friend. Kyle began talking to the hostages, his own mask working just as well for him. I saw the guy he was impersonating staring wide-eyed and, I suspected, not really paying attention.
“Any of ya says a word, or does anything to give us away, we will kill as many of you as we can until we’re stopped. Can I possibly make myself any clearer than that? Good. Follow us, all of ya.”
KYLE
We raced out as fast as our legs would carry us down the interior of the spiral staircase. Our hostages ran just as fast, my words, no doubt, still ringing in their ears. We ran out into the bright sunshine, having no time to let our eyes adjust. The boats were there, waiting for us, just as I had ordered them to be; two of them, moored alongside the dock. We all piled in, five of us and five of them to each, and sped off, the engines kicking up twin jets of water. I smiled to see Mara standing beside me at the wheel and she smiled back. Behind us were five officials with Snow, Caleb, Richard and Abby covering them. It felt right to have her up here beside me; ever since she was a child she and I had been together.
“Please, let us go,” some guy in a suit begged.
“Sit back,” Snow, his double, snapped. I ignored the suit. He was the enemy. I looked around me at the empty sea and clear sky, my instincts giving me a ton of grief and I agreed with them. This was too easy. I watched as Ellis Island came into view.