by David Wong
“Sooner or later. Not right now, I don’t think.”
“How do you know?”
“If I understand Molech, he knows the collapse of Livingston Tower is the headline and he’ll want to let that play. Level the Casa now and it’ll be back-page news. But Molech is coming. He’ll come for you. He’ll come for me. He’ll come to make a statement. If you’re going to go, go now.”
Zoey forced herself to stand. She picked up Stench Machine and dragged herself up the stairs, feeling like she was trying to summit Everest, figuring that at least packing wouldn’t take long. She made it to her room and started stuffing dirty clothes into her suitcase. Soft steps approached in the hall, and she turned to see Wu standing there. He had a new katana on his back, exactly like the previous two.
Zoey said, “Sorry, but your employment won’t last long. By tonight, I intend to be somewhere far away from this nightmare.”
“I am sorry about what happened. I know you had a relationship with Armando.”
“I only knew him for a few days, but yeah. Were you friends?”
“We worked together for three years, off and on.”
“Oh. I’m sorry. I should have said sorry first, in fact. This is my fault, I sent him and I should have known.”
“No. When you were around Armando, you felt what you felt because he was a man who lived as one willing to die. If he had wished to get fat in front of a desk and then rot in a nursing home, he would have done that instead. Ultimately, Zoey, you’ll find that we all get what we want. Regardless of whether or not we like it when we get it.”
“Did you get any of the gadgets, like Armando had? Are there any super powers you’re hiding from me?”
He smiled. “I am afraid not. I do not trust myself with more power than what the universe has seen fit to grant me. Does your cat travel in the suitcase?”
“What? No. Stench Machine, get out of there. You’re getting hair all over everything.”
She zipped up the suitcase, hoisted the cat, and turned to see Carlton in the hall behind Wu.
“All right,” she said, thinking. “Let’s see. The lady who’s car I stole to get here, I need you to give her five million dollars.” She turned to Wu. “I need a driver, to get me someplace safe, someplace far away. Do you do that?”
“Mr. Billingsley is actually making arrangements for you and your mother both. Will told him the situation.”
“I’m sure he did.”
She pushed past Wu, wheeling her suitcase into the hall. She found Will on the stairs and said, “What now?”
“Livingston’s cars are all identifiable. Budd is going to bring a new vehicle. And I mean literally a new one, one we’re buying, as we speak. That will get you to Salt Lake. Arthur’s private jet will take off from there, but it will be empty. A decoy. At the same time you’ll get on a charter flight to another city where you’ll meet your mother. The two of you will go through a … process, with Budd’s people, to erase your trail. Once he’s satisfied, you and your mother can fly out together.”
As he talked, he was already on his way down the hall toward the library, and its secret garage entrance. She followed, and Wu followed her.
Zoey said, “Fly out? To where?”
Will glanced back. “You’re asking me? Go someplace where they have a beach, I don’t know. Figure out what you want to do with the rest of your life.”
He pulled the not-so-secret book on the shelf and the four of them—Will, Wu, Zoey, and Stench Machine—descended to the garage. A moment later they strode out among Arthur’s collection of obscenely expensive cars, and made it a point to say nothing to each other until they heard the hum of the two doors in the garage’s airlock security system. Zoey tensed up, ready to be ambushed by some mechanical monstrosity, but it was the black panel truck she’d seen parked in the garage earlier, backing in. It stopped, the rear door scrolled up and twin ramps slid to the floor. A small, deep blue BMW rolled out.
Budd emerged from the driver’s seat of the truck and said, “Don’t reckon I got you much of a deal, didn’t have time to haggle and the salesman could smell it.”
“It’s a cute car.” That was important, Zoey thought, since there was a significant chance it would also serve as her coffin.
“Now, it’s a convertible, which normally is a big no-no security-wise but, honestly, if these guys catch you I don’t think it’s gonna matter what you’re drivin’. San Marino Blue, reckoned it matched the streaks in your hair.”
“Oh. Ha. I’m dying that out the first chance I get but still, I like it. Thank you.”
“Well, I paid for it with your money, so don’t thank me too much.”
Wu sat in the BMW, and appeared to be familiarizing himself with the controls.
Budd said, “I don’t know if Will told you, but I’m going along, make sure you and your momma get to safety.”
“You have to do that yourself?”
“It’s better. You got to understand, making people disappear ain’t so easy when you’ve got millions of cameras attached to millions of Team Molech rodents, all eager to report back to him. I got a network of folks who do this kind of thing and we’ll get her done, don’t you worry. Lot of stops and changeovers, you might have to hide inside a barrel or two. Then once we’re at the safehouse, we’ll go to work on you. Blink works on facial recognition, so my boys will have to make some … changes. But soon enough you’ll put all this nonsense in your rearview.”
“What, like plastic surgery?”
“Plus voice alterations, got an acting coach to give you some new mannerisms—sometimes we’ll even swap out the race of the target, if we can get them to agree. But you got to understand, even if we get you to a country where they don’t have Blink yet, it won’t stay that way for long. The only way to keep you safe—”
“Is to turn me into a completely different person?”
“You’re only twenty-two. Trust me, in ten years you’d be a completely different person anyway.”
While Zoey let that sink in, Budd hurried off toward the elevator. Zoey and Will were left alone.
Zoey considered for a moment. “Wait a second. Why were you in the building?”
“What building?”
“You know what I’m asking. Why were you in Livingston Tower when it started collapsing? You and Echo were both waiting outside, that was the plan. Why’d you come in after me?”
“You heard Arthur’s will. You die, the estate gets donated to the Mormons or, whatever it was.”
“Wow. That’s the first really bad lie I’ve heard you tell. You want me to believe it was easier to race to the top of a skyscraper and attempt an escape from a collapsing building in a helicopter you don’t know how to fly, than to hire some lawyers to hash out Arthur’s assets?”
“Have you ever dealt with the Mormons, Zoey?”
She sighed in exasperation. “Anyway. Thank you. For coming back for me. That’s what I’m trying to say.”
He shrugged. “It was Echo’s idea.”
“Stop it.
They waited in awkward silence for a moment, then Zoey said, “So … what happens to you guys? After I’m gone?”
“What does it matter?”
Wu walked up and asked if she was ready to go. Zoey turned to Will and stuck out her hand, offering to shake. He didn’t raise his in return.
She said, “Come on. There’s no reason to be a dick now. I’m leaving. You’re getting what you wanted.”
He looked at her, finally shaking her hand, his eyes never leaving hers. He worked his jaw, something grinding away inside his brain. The last time she had seen that expression, a game-show contestant was trying to work out a puzzle clue with the clock ticking down.
Will lowered his hand, seemed to consider for a moment longer, then reached into his pocket.
“There is one last piece of business, I suppose.” From his pocket, Will produced the lucky coin. “This trick is really three tricks, done in succession. The first trick has five s
teps. If you mess any one of them up, it’s over, you understand?”
“I … am totally okay with forgoing the coin trick provision of Arthur’s will. I was just joking about that before.”
“This was his final wish. At least let me have the peace of knowing I showed it to you once.”
She shrugged. “It’s … whatever. Okay.”
“All magic is just misdirection. The mark’s eyes will be focused on the hand that appears to snatch the coin, while the coin is secretly stashed in the other. So to start, we’re going to do what magicians call a French Drop. You hold the coin like this, so your audience can see it, between thumb and forefinger. Don’t start the next part until their eyes are focused on the coin. Now, step one—and I’m going to do it real slow, so you can watch it—is you appear to be closing the coin in your other palm, but instead you’re going to drop the coin out of sight, and squeeze it between your knuckles and palm. But you can’t close your hand, or else that gives it away—you have to let the coin hand fall to your side, like it’s not involved in the trick anymore. That’s what sells it. Like this. You see?”
He waited, demanding an answer.
Impatiently, Zoey said, “Yes, I see.”
“If that coin falls out of your hand, the trick is ruined. Now, what you have to do next—and this is the key to the whole trick, so listen carefully—is to take that coin and practice the French Drop over and over and over. And over, and over. Thousands and thousands of times, over hours and hours and weeks and months. Just sitting at home, dropping and catching, a little bit faster with each week and month that goes by, hearing the coin hit the floor, again and again. The improvement will be so incremental that you won’t feel like you’re accomplishing anything. But you’ll keep doing it. And while your friends are all out drinking, or playing video games, or doing whatever you people do for fun these days, you’ll be at home, practicing that coin trick. Over and over. In silence. Until one day, months or years from now, you’ll be able to do that move so fast that the eye can’t perceive it, even if the mark is looking right at your hand. The coin will never hit the floor. Then, after you’ve mastered that step, you’ll be ready for step two, the Back Palm. Now—”
“No, that’s enough. It already sounds awful.”
“And that,” said Will, “is what Arthur wanted me to show you.”
“That your cool magic trick is really just a bunch of tedious repetition?”
“Yes. That, right there, is the difference between the heroes and the nobodies. The difference between people like you and people like me. People like me know that there is no magic. There is only the grind. Work looks like magic to those unwilling to do it.”
He slipped the coin in his pocket and tugged down his sleeves.
“I get it, I’m lazy, I’m stupid, I’m—”
“You didn’t hear a goddamned word I said. You say you’re not a hero? Well, I’m going to tell you the best and the worst thing you’ve ever heard. Heroes aren’t born. You just go out there and grind it out. You fail and you look foolish and you just keep grinding. There is nothing else. There is no ‘chosen one,’ there is no destiny, nobody wakes up one day and finds out they’re amazing at something. There’s just slamming your head into the wall, refusing to take no for an answer. Being relentless, until either the wall or your head breaks. You want to be a hero? You don’t have to make some grand decision. There’s no inspirational music, there’s no montage. You just don’t quit.”
“What, like Armando? Charging in and winding up with his blood splattered all over the floor?”
“Yes. You take risks. You get hurt. And you put your head down and plow forward anyway and if you die, you die. That’s the game. But don’t tell me you’re not a hero. You walk away, you’re choosing to walk away. Whatever bad things happens as a result, you’re choosing to let them happen. You can lie to yourself, say that you never had a choice, that you weren’t cut out for this. But deep down you’ll know. You’ll know that humans aren’t cut out for anything. We cut ourselves out. Slowly, with a rusty knife. Because otherwise, here’s what’s going to happen: you’re going to die and you’re going to stand at the gates of judgment and you’re going to ask God what was the meaning of it all, and God will say, ‘I created the universe, you little shit. It was up to you to give it meaning.’”
“You really think God uses that kind of language?”
“Yes.”
“So was that little speech for me? Or you?”
“I don’t know. Goddamnit.”
“I don’t get you. I’m giving you what you wanted from the beginning. Just let me go.”
“You’re giving me what I wanted. You’re not giving Arthur what he wanted. He wanted you to have this. I don’t know why. I’ll never know why. But damn it, he was like a father to me and now the same deranged fool who took his life gets to piss all over his final wish?”
“So what, you’re telling me to stay?”
“I can’t tell you to do anything. But if it matters, I think Arthur would want you to stay, and see this through.”
“To do what? Kill Molech?”
“No, that’s what he’s expecting. That’s what he wants.”
“He wants us to kill him?”
“He wants us to try. No, what we need to do is much, much harder.”
Zoey met Will’s eyes.
“Here. We’ll let my cat decide. I’m going to put him down. If he walks toward the car, I go. If he heads back toward the elevator, I stay.”
She set Stench Machine on the floor. He flopped down onto the concrete and started licking himself.
After another long awkward silence in which all three of them watched the white cat noisily lick his own crotch, Will said, “Well, I assume you’re not going to do that.”
“If I could do that, I’d have been famous long before all this started.”
Will’s phone rang. It was Andre.
“Get up to the salon. Molech’s about to make another announcement.”
Will said, “We’re on our way.” He strode off toward the elevator and, after a moment, Zoey followed.
FORTY-FIVE
The Suits were gathered under the buffalo head, watching two feeds on a split screen—one was black with the words “AWAITING MOLECH” in stark white letters, the placeholder for the Molech announcement that was to start at any moment. The other was drone video of the massive crowds gathering downtown, in the aftermath of the tower collapse. Zoey noted a half dozen street vendors and food trucks had rolled up to serve snacks to the onlookers. At that moment, the synchronized skyline feed switched away from the ad it had been playing (for the film James Bond Infiltrates a Space Station Full of Ninjas and Has Sex with Four Women) and replaced it with a single gigantic face, looming over the city.
Molech’s face was bathed in a menacing shadow. When he spoke, his voice was modulated to sound like a god calling down from the heavens, the bass vibrating the streets below. The crowd went nuts, reacting like it was a concert and the headliner had just taken the stage.
“My name is Molech,” boomed the voice. “I am a man the likes of which you have never seen before. You could say that, in fact, I am no longer a man, but something more. I mean, am still a man, in terms of gender, that’s not what I meant when I said I wasn’t a man. I’m all man. More man than you can possibly comprehend. I am well endowed. I am male on a level that you … just won’t even believe it when you see it.”
Molech paused and glanced off to the right, as if someone off-screen was reminding him of something.
“Right. As you saw, I destroyed Livingston Tower, with the power from my right hand. And this is just a small preview of what is coming, as I reveal my true strength to this city, and to the world. The dirty money that built Livingston’s skyscrapers and slums is collected by scheming men who hide behind gated walls and grow fat on your paychecks. Men with false power, built on weasel lies buried in fine print. Well, for them the sun has set, and now the long night has begun
. And thus, their reckoning comes at noon on December 21, the day before the longest night of the year.
“In forty-eight hours I will reach out with my mighty hand and destroy seven targets, seven symbols of the false powers in this city, to demonstrate real power, in full view of Tabula Rasa and all of mankind. The false powers are guns, money, and superstition—the smoke and mirrors that keeps beta cowards in mansions and limousines. So first will be the home office of the Tabula Rasa Security Co-Op—big, bad guns hired by fat cats, as if they deserve police but we don’t. Then, in no particular order I’m going to smash the Tabula Rasa mosque, and the Catholic church the next block over, so you can watch as neither of your gods strike me with lightning even while I take a messy burrito shit on the smoking ruins of your precious faith. Then I’m going to execute a foreclosure of the Bank One tower. And guess what—you rebuild it, I’m just gonna knock it down again.
“There’ll be a couple of surprises thrown in, before my tour of destruction will culminate with the estate of Arthur Livingston, which I will reduce to rubble while on the spikes of the front gate I will impale the bodies of his piglet daughter and shitwind crew, who’ve controlled this city behind the scenes since before it was a city. You have forty-eight hours. To do what, you ask? Nothing. I am making no demands, I will carry out my attack regardless of what action you take. See you then.”
Molech stared in silence from across the skyline, then turned and said, “Did you cut the feed? The light is still on. No. Push the—”
Molech disappeared from the buildings, and across every surface the feed was replaced by a countdown, in digits thirty stories high.
Zoey said, “I don’t get it. What does he gain by warning everybody? Why not just start blowing stuff up?”
Will said, “Back up, and walk through it. What do all of his targets have in common?”
“They’re all, uh, prominent?”
“And?”
“And … their owners aren’t gonna sit back and let him do it. They’re going to stand up to him.”
“More than you know—he’s going after Co-Op’s main office—that place is a fortress, and they have some military-grade hardware they can put on the street. But—”