Messenger's Dawn

by Lior Akerman

  She went to the door and locked it. Then she returned to him, took his hand and led him to the sofa in the corner of her room.

  “Where were you, love? What have you been doing all this time? I waited for you and I was going mad with all the thoughts I had going through my mind,”

  He answered quietly:

  “I will tell you everything, Alice, in good time. Now I just want to sit here and hold you.”

  They sat quietly on the sofa holding each other. An hour later he said:

  “I have been through an amazing and surprising time. I have experienced unbelievable things. At one point, I was afraid I would never see you again, but I knew we had to meet and that it would happen. I don’t even know how to start telling you what has happened, but you have to know.”

  “I don’t want to part from you again,” she said in concern.

  He looked it her with love and said:

  “We will not part. Even if I leave, I will always return.”

  He kissed her lovingly and she kissed him back. He never thought he would feel this way, when he finally was with her again. Her touch was gentle and loving and her skin was smooth as velvet, her smell intoxicating. They were together all night, loving each other every possible way. Years of expectation and tension were relieved that night in Alice’s bed. They remained quiet, so that Alice’s parents would not hear them but they made love passionately. They had been waiting for so long and they finally fulfilled their love. She moved beneath him in uncontrollable lust and he enjoyed pleasuring her. After hours of love making, they lay together sweating and exhausted, looking each other in the eye affectionately and that was how they fell asleep. For the first time in months, he managed to fall asleep in a real bed and in a pleasant atmosphere.

  The night however ended sooner than expected. Mike opened his eyes and listened. He did not hear a sound but felt something was happening. He saw that it was 04:00. He had slept for just 2 hours. Mike got dressed quickly and silently went over to the window. His senses had not misled him. The house was surrounded by tens of policemen, approaching it with flashlights. He turned and bent down to kiss Alice. That was when the special unit entered the house in a loud explosion. Glass shattered and armed special unit forces dressed in black searched the house with flashlights. They went straight up to Alice’s room, blocking all the other rooms and exits. Alice woke in panic and looked around her. She heard the noise but before she could get out of bed, the force stormed the room and took control of it. She reacted with terror and covered herself with a blanket. The commander asked her to stay where she was and not to move. After searching the room and the rooms next to it, he came to her and asked:

  “Where is he?”

  She looked at him naively and said:

  “Who?”

  Then one of the agents called him.

  “Sergeant.”

  When the Sergeant turned to him, he indicated the open window and the sergeant mumbled in disappointment:

  “Damn it, he knew we were coming.”

  The police questioned Alice’s parents who knew nothing and the police believed them. They treated Alice differently. She was detained in her room for a long time, until Captain Jacobs, who was in charge of the investigation, arrived. Jacobs had left for the house several hours earlier when the cameras outside the house identified Mike entering. When he received the notification from the surveillance unit, he called for a police helicopter and was on his way. He notified his commander of the surprising development, hoping to return to New York with Mike Messenger and to close one of the cases, if not both.

  Even before he entered the house, he knew Messenger was not there. The police did not understand how he disappeared, despite being surrounded. Jacobs didn’t care. All he wanted was a few minutes alone with Alice and that is what he got. When he walked in, he asked the policewoman guarding her to wait outside. She left, he closed the door and sat down next to her.

  “Many unusual things have happened here in the last few months, Alice,” he began.

  Then he remained silent for a while and after taking a deep breath, he continued:

  “Something does not make sense to me. On one hand, I have been conducting a manhunt for Mike Messenger for over a month, considered by the authorities all over the world to be a mega-terrorist, responsible for the terrible attacks at the Rockefeller Center and Trump Towers.”

  She looked at him and asked:

  “And? Is there a ‘but’ here?”

  He smiled at her and said:

  “But on the other hand, everything I know about him does not fit the profile of a terrorist. Even more than that, I don’t understand how he was exactly at the location where there was a struggle between the figures in black and the figure in white, the one called the messenger.”

  Alice continued to look at him but did not say anything. Jacobs continued:

  “I located his phone exactly at the same places and times that the incidents at Alice Island, Battery Park and Chelsea Waterside Park took place and calling you from the synagogue in Chelsea. Then he vanished and you suddenly receive a call from his house in Jerusalem, right before the huge clash between the messenger and the black figures,” he added in a quiet but confident tone. “And then,” “when things settle down over there, he appears here and spends the night with you. We arrive and he somehow discovers that the police are here, even before the dogs sensed it and he vanishes in thin air.”

  Jacobs closed his eyes, as if trying hard to understand or accept what he just said.

  “Why is he running from me, if he hasn’t done anything?” Jacobs asked her.

  “I know he has not done anything wrong,” she said decisively. “I just know it. He is a good person.”

  He looked into her eyes, examining her and he knew she spoke the truth. After a few seconds he said:

  “I have a feeling that Mike is the Messenger. Besides circumstantial evidence, I can’t prove it, but I know it is him.”

  Alice stared at him in shock.

  “What? How? Where did you come up with that? Mike couldn’t hurt a fly and he certainly does not have the power to fight forces that are stronger than him,” she said in anger. “That is nonsense.”

  He smiled at her and stood up.

  “I assume you won’t tell me he was here with you tonight, right?” he did not wait for an answer, opened the door and left. The large police force left the house and it returned to its usual peace at the cold hour of sunrise in Portland, in this season.

  Alice did not know when she would see him again but her heart was full of joy and love and she could not get the smile off her face.

  27.

  The World, October 15th

  It did not stay quiet for very long. Samael and Charnbog had no intention of letting things go back to normal. They were frustrated with their failure to overcome the messenger. They never imagined he would succeed in standing in their way and prevent them from carrying out their plan. They had no intention of giving up or changing their plan. They could not fail in their next task. They had to get to the messenger before he got to them. They had to get rid of him once and for all, so they could complete their mission. This time, they were not going to fail.

  The third week of October began with terrible reports. In the south of the Atlantic Ocean, an enormous earthquake occurred, measuring 8 on the Richter Scale. The earthquake led to huge tsunami waves heading towards Brazil and Argentine from the west and towards the shores of western Africa. Millions of people were under direct threat of being flooded. A few hours later, there were reports of another catastrophe. A sharp rise in temperatures as a result of an extreme change in climate, leading to the rapid and dangerous melting of mega icebergs in Norway, Ireland, North Canada and Greenland. Experts were saying that within hours Scandinavia, Canada, Ireland, Holland, Belgium and parts of England would be flooded. Amid these reports
, there were new reports streaming in of huge fires in America, South America, Southeast Asia and Australia. Entire cities, towns and villages were in danger of being burnt to the ground. The fires were spreading at terrifying speed in Colorado, California and Oregon, with major cities in the U.S. at risk. The area of Tasmania and New South Wales was in danger of being completely destroyed. The huge fire spread in the jungles along the Amazon river, endangering hundreds of villages. In southeast China, the flames burned houses, fields and temples, mainly in the area of the city of Guangzhou, where the firefighters took position, hopelessly trying to stop the fire from spreading.

  It would be impossible to save all the people who were in danger. The disasters spread across the globe simultaneously and in a well-planned manner. The first waves were expected to hit the shores of South America at 18:00, flying through the ocean at over 150 kilometers an hour. Millions on the shores of Argentine and Brazil left their homes, fleeing for the hills. The millions of residents of Buenos Aires got stuck in massive traffic jams in their attempt to flee towards the mountains. Millions did the same in Rio De Janeiro. They used any means of transportation available. Thousands ran on foot towards the hills. On the cliff around the statue of Christ, masses crowded together. Those living in the villages and towns along the thousands of kilometers of shores in Argentine and Brazil were luckier. They did not have traffic jams and the villages emptied quickly. The only ones left behind were the brave news photographers, taking position in high strategic places, in order to film the huge wave that was going to hit the shore in less than an hour.

  At 17:55, the cameras covering the Rio La Plata bay, south of Buenos Aires, focused on a white figure appearing on the shore and standing facing east. The figure appeared north of La Plata, on the breakwater built into the bay. The cameras zoomed in, filming him walking across the long breakwater to its edge, into the water.

  “Este es el mensajero It is the messenger,” the photographers exclaimed and so did the correspondents covering the story on the media all over the world.

  They identified the messenger. He was seen clearly, descending from the breakwater, entering the water, until his entire body was under water. There was applause in the studios and a sense of relief in the air but still nothing happened. The silence was suddenly broken with the rolling thunder of the huge wave, heading towards the shore. The cameras focused on the wave that kept rising and gaining speed. The wave was just one kilometer from the shore and everyone held their breath in anticipation. The ocean turned into waves of white foam approaching the shore, threatening to erase all the houses, factories, fields and forests that humanity had created for hundreds of years.

  Then something unexpected happened. A huge wave rose from within the ocean along the shore, falling from an enormous height towards the tsunami wave. A few seconds later there was a huge explosion, as the two waves collided. A huge whirlwind was created in the water that rose and covered the shore but the tsunami was blocked. The flood did not reach the city and villages and ten minutes later the sea was calm again. The millions of people watching on television or from the hills around the shores were ecstatic with joy and applauded. This danger had passed but the world was still facing many dangers.

  Ten minutes after the tsunami hit South America, it reached the shores of South Africa. The cameras along the shore of South Africa and Namibia, about to suffer the worst damage, showed similar footage of the huge wave approaching the shores. The roar of the huge wave approaching them was deafening and the sight of the wall of water threatening to wash over the shores of Southern Africa was terrifying. Minutes before the wave hit the shore, a sound rose from the water and the cameras filmed a huge wall of water rising to face the tsunami. It was identical to the wall that appeared just minutes earlier on the shores of South America. The wave was heading towards Cape Town at terrifying speed, seen clearly on cameras on the cliffs of Cape Peninsula. The planes hovering above the shores of Namibia filmed the huge wave approaching, sending terrifying footage to the millions of viewers. The cameras showed a similar occurrence as had taken place minutes before in South America. The huge wave crashed into a wall of water, scattering into millions of shards of water in the ocean, without reaching the shore. The viewers were stunned and jumped up and down in enthusiasm to see the danger pass.

  When the messenger appeared in Shilling, China, the fires had already burned many villages and forests, thousands had died. From the place he was standing, on the hill north of the Yangtze river, he saw the catastrophe. The fire was heading towards the large city of Yichang, on both sides of the big river. Over 4 million people were trapped in the city. The Chinese authorities sent in hundreds of ships to transport the terrified residents, leading them southward down the river, out of the danger area. The people left behind, climbed up the hills around the city that had not caught fire yet waiting to see what their fate would be. The only solution he saw as possible was to blow up the dam up the mountains. The Three Gorges dam was the largest of its kind in the world and took over a decade to build. The dam was over two kilometers long, 180 meters high. This massive structure blocked a huge amount of water. He considered having the huge amount of water to put out the fire but blowing up the entire dam would be a catastrophe for the city, destroying it. The fire continued to surround the city from the north and kept getting closer. Masses of residents continued to flee through the southern hills and on the boats that remained in the harbor.

  When the flames caught the first houses on the northern slopes of the hills of Yangtze, with the red and orange flames of the huge fire blending with the green of the forests, he acted. Huge waves of water rose above the dam and flowed down the river towards the city. The waves continued to flow at a set pace over the dam, washing everything in its way. The flow of water increased as it reached the final turn, crossing the 20 kilometers from the dam to the city. The water flowed powerfully in many different streams from the river into the hills and reaching the city, it flooded the fire that was threatening to destroy it. The water continued to flow, putting out the fire.

  The incident was filmed by the planes hovering above the city. In the footage sent all over the world, the figure of the man in white was clear above the city and then above the dam. Two hours later, the footage showed small pillars of smoke coming from the northern houses of the city and part of the port warehouses scattered along the river. At night, the residents returned to their homes and the city started to get back to its regular routine.

  When the water settled, it became clear that all these natural disasters that he had been fighting successfully were just bait, just the first stage. He had the support of the entire world but that was temporary.

  28.

  Washington, October 22nd

  At 16:00, the world leader’s convention opened with a short statement made by U.S. President Gerald Lindon. This convention was a successful result of his efforts in the past month. Weeks of coordinating and drafting compromise agreements led to all the world power leaders agreeing to meet at the White House as the President’s guests. The Security Council, initiating the meeting, was calling it “The President’s Convention for World Peace.” In the end, everyone agreed to participate. Dimitry Magrayev, the Russian President was there, with John Brown, the British Prime Minister; Jackson De-Mill, the Canadian Prime Minister; Chang Li, the VP of the Chinese Communist Party and the Chinese Leader’s personal aid. Dikey Maduro, the Japanese Prime Minister also attended, along with German Chancellor Anastasia Dimeler and Nicolette Gerard, the French President.

  President Lindon started by thanking all those present for their willingness to attend the important convention and for their contribution to world security.

  “On this day, we are all one people and nation. After months of a global war and chaos, we understand that the enemy is elsewhere and that we need to unite in our battle against it. We have also learned that the enemy is stronger and bolder than anything we have faced b
efore,” Lindon declared. He continued: “In this period, we discovered unexplainable forces acting within us. We had difficulty understanding who was on our side and who wasn’t. The messenger in white used his unexplainable power to prevent tragedy in South America and Africa. He prevented another catastrophe in China. Whoever he is, we are grateful to him but we do not know who he is and how he is related to the dark forces attacking and destroying our world. I assume we will find out soon enough but until then, we need to be cautious of him as well. We need to understand who he is and what his intentions are. With assistance from the U.N., we have managed to begin rehabilitation in our countries,” Lindon said with satisfaction.

  After completing his opening words, the leaders gathered at the tables set for dinner in the diplomatic hosting hall, on the first floor of the White House. None of them realized they were in a death trap, never expecting what was about to happen. The hall had four entrance and exit doors, leading to the Maps room, to the main corridor, the Ceramics room and the corridor leading to the south lawn. All of the entrances were guarded by secret service agents. The walls were decorated with wallpaper with landscape of famous sites in America - Virginia, Niagara Falls, the Upstate NY Bay, West Point and the Boston Port.

  The hall had a Federal design. In the center there was a Regency style chandelier. The tables were laid out on a carpet with the symbols of the 50 states.

  This hall was supposed to be the most secured in the world but, nonetheless, two tall figures walked in through the main doors leading to the main corridor. They were wearing black, their heads covered in black. The leaders present identified them immediately and began to flee from the room, only to find locked doors on all sides. A huge wall of fire surrounded the entire building, making it impossible for the security and rescue forces to get inside. Everyone in the hall was completely hysterical. They stood and stared at the black figures in terror and shock. Samael and Charnbog stood there calm and peaceful, looking at the world leaders. Then the U.S. President emerged from the group.