Where are our Children: A Novel: Complete and Uncut
Chapter Nineteen
First, hate blinds us to exercising common sense.
Secondly, hate causes you to seek out the wrong in the right and the right in the wrong.
Finally, hate is sustained directly as a consequence of ignorance and fear.
I fear it because of these three things that Blacks will always hate Whites and Whites will always hate Blacks.
-Simon Woodward, author of Race and the 2000’s
Roxanne
Marta (nearing MLK Memorial), 25th Day
She watched Dr. Angel Hicks Dupree awake from her slumber at last. The other woman rubbed at the corners of her big brown eyes, shook the cobwebs out and then turned her attention to what should have been a tremendous know on the back of her head.
So this is the woman who Chris called his best friend?
The doctor noted Roxanne’s presence and she tell that the memories of what had transpired over the past few minutes and hours were pouring back into her. Angel went to stand, but Roxanne pulled her and gun and the doctor slid back into the Marta’s uncomfortable seat where Roxanne had directed her.
“Roxanne, listen, I’m only going to say this once so listen up,” Angel said. “I don’t have the time to do—whatever in the hell it is you’re hoping that we can do right now.”
Roxanne waved the barrel of the gun at her again.
“Oh, you have more time…and less time than you’ll ever believe, Doctor. I’ve waited so many years for this moment right here. And I promise you that I won’t be disappointed.”
Angel cocked a brow. “This…all of this is about Marie isn’t it?” She dared to mention Roxanne’s dead sister’s name and began to rise from her seat once more without permission.”
“Sit down, Doctor. Please don’t have me tell you that again.”
Angel flashed her sad smile on her processed lips. Was there anything about this woman that wasn’t fake or enhanced or some shape or form? “You blame me for what the FBI did to your sister.”
Angel got to her feet over Roxanne’s objections…just long enough to seat herself next to her—violating all pretenses of etiquette and space. She then leaned on the gun’s barrel causing her to gasp for breath. Roxanne saw two or three Marta patrons glance over their shoulders, curious at what was going on in the farthest seat in the back of the car.
“Don’t insult either one of our intelligences, Doctor.” Roxanne held her gun steady, even with Angel brushing her side up against it repeatedly. “Don’t deny your full involvement in the FBI’s blatant murder of my sister.”
“I can’t speak to your version of past events, Roxanne.” Angel pushed her hair out of her eyes. “I was just as in the dark about your sister’s ambush as you were.”
Roxanne can feel the Marta’s brakes engage seconds before she hear the whine of them engaging with this car finally grinding to a halt. The doors a few feet from them slide open and three patrons disappear through the hatch while none replace them. Roxanne knew the rout well and waited until they were less than two minutes from the next stop before she surprised Angel by standing herself—with her gun raised for all to see.
“Alright,” Roxanne announced aloud. “Unfortunately, through no fault of your won, you people have been involved in a private affair that is far from your concern. I would appreciate if the remainder of you exits the Marta at the next stop.”
A couple of riders protest. One older gentleman laughs heartily, tells Roxanne to kiss his ass and returns to the act of reading his newspaper. Another man, who smelled like an old gym shoe, comments ever slyly that this isn’t his stop.
When the Marta slowed to stop no one moved.
Roxanne Sanchez fired a single shot into the ceiling.
“I said everyone out, right now.” She then sneered something in Spanish. “I won’t ask nearly as nicely next time.
The passengers exit, some running, others stumbling over themselves to get away from the crazy woman with the gun. The man with the newspaper was the last to leave. He folded his paper neatly, grabbed his hat and cursed ever so quietly and leaped off a second before the doors closed once again and the female automated voice announced the Marta’s next stop.
Roxanne found and turned the lock that would allow no further passengers to enter this car. She then plopped into the seat that Angel had first vacated when she came to. She took a deep breath and got a full measure of the woman she’d wanted to confront for so very long.
I’ll give you credit, if you are afraid, Doctor, you are doing a good job of masking your fear. Or maybe you are just as cold hearted a bitch as I’ve always believed you to be.
“Roxanne, I don’t understand why didn’t you ever take the time to contact me?” Angel asked her. “We should have talked. We could have discussed this matter rationally instead of you allowing the years to pass and the bitterness to grow. I can understand what your sister meant to you—“
“Don’t,” Roxanne spat out the word. “Don’t you patronize me, Doctor. I won’t have you treating me like one of your sheep. She waved the gun at Angel again in case the other forgot she possessed it. “And back up off of me. I’m not playing games with you. I intend for you to hear what I have to say, know my pain and then I’m going to kill you, Angel.”
Angel latches her palms to the seat and uses them to methodically slide her torso that soon after she is nearly on top of Roxanne. Roxanne cocks her gun in a reactionary manner, but Angel only unleashes a sneer and gives her full contact.
“Back off of me, Doctor,”
“You’re not very good at this are you, Roxanne. Allowing all of the other passengers to get off this thing was the worst possible mistake you could have made—little girl.”
Roxanne pointed the gun in her face.
“You must have a death wish, lady?”
“Do you think that I am afraid to die? Do you, really?” Angel wrinkled her nose but her big brown eyes went glossy. Roxanne imagined that the other woman, like herself, did not let tears flow very often. “I had one of those resting in my gums by my own hand earlier tonight. So if you think that you’re so very tough and I’m shitting in my panties because you are pointing it at me now—“
“Make one more move towards me and I’ll kill you, Angel. I swear that I will.”
Angel lowered her head so that the barrel rested firmly against the backside of her skull. “Let me help you, dear. I wouldn’t want you to miss. You have helped me miss my stop already. Probably my last chances in helping the FBI avert this Zero Hour deadline catastrophe from dropping on us all has passed. I have nothing to lose by you pulling that trigger. But I do want you to stop wasting our time. I don’t want to hear you whine and bitch about your long lost sister. I want you to do what you say you will do. Put both of us out of our misery by pulling that trigger right now.”
“Oh, my God,” Roxanne shoved Angel away from her and stood with her back against one of the Marta’s sliding doors. “You’re even crazier than your reputation says that you are.”
“Maybe,” Angel answered with a blank stare on her face. And then Angel surprised her yet again by letting the tears flow. After a moment of silence, the doctor said, “Yes, I quite think that I might be a little crazy, but I have enough professional experience in my field to recognize a cold hearted killer when I cross one, Roxanne. Your sister qualified as one. Marie excelled in soliciting innocent patrons, getting them into various compromising positions—and then killing them.”
“They weren’t innocent,” Roxanne said. “Don’t talk to me about innocent. Those men were pigs…all of them. They cheated on their wives and girlfriends with whores—just like my sister Marie. I’m sure their rendezvous with her weren’t any of their first. How could you call these bastards innocent?”
Angel stood with her.
“True enough, those men had sinned.” Angel nodded long and hard. “But the judgement belonged to a higher power. They didn’t deserve to be murdered in cold blood and mutilated. She cut their throats
when they least expected it, Roxanne. She sliced off their genitals and left their naked remains for the dogs and other scavengers to feast on.”
“And what about the FBI’s sins,” Roxanne asked her. “Marie was guilty enough to be sure. She should have been brought to justice. She should have been tried by a jury of her peers, sentenced—and perhaps even given a sentence of death for what she’d done.” Roxanne rubbed the sweat from her brow with the gun. “She didn’t deserve to be cut down and carved up like some animal.”
Angel nodded slowly again.
“I agree. She did not. I know that she did not. And I wept for her. But I swear to you that the agents that I was working with never fully informed me on what their ultimate end game was for Marie. My job was to aid in finding her sister. Once that task was completed, I was to help in convincing her to come in.”
“I guess you did your job very well, Doctor.” Roxanne said sardonically.
“And I guess you did yours as well.”
“Shut up,”
“Well, you did, didn’t you?” Angel asked her. “Maybe these entire episodes, this Marta ride from hell that takes us full circle is about your role in that fiasco, not mine.”
“I said, shut up.”
Angle circled her.
“Maybe, you killed her after all.”
Roxanne fired a round—intentionally behind Angel that shattered the Plexiglas casing. She fired an identical warning shot on the opposite side of the car that netted the same result.”
“I’ve told you before, Roxanne, don’t waste time or shots—kill me if that’s what you brought me here to do. Let’s do the dance.”
“Go to Hell, Angel.”
“Do it,”
Roxanne pulls the trigger…but her piece only clicks with an empty chamber.
A teary eyed Angel said, “A part of me wishes that you would have saved a bullet. At least our little conversation—this girl talk would have accomplished something worthwhile.”
Roxanne caught her breath.
“What in the hell are you babbling about now?”
“Like I said before, I missed my stop. Apparently you’ve been following me for some time. You were there when those women outside the Marta Station reacted the way they did towards me. Why do you think that I would risk showing my face anywhere near Downtown Atlanta right now unless I was trying to reach someone important.”
Angel told Roxanne the short version about one of Atlanta’s missing children showing up alive and reasonably well at his home. She also told her how the country seeing this child before the Zero Hour arrived could have aided in avoiding casualties that were surely to occur even in a limited racial standoff in the streets.
And then Angel punched Roxanne.
“You’ve denied me my last chance to make this right.” Angel spat out as she swung wildly again, Roxanne barely able to dodge a series of windmill rights and lefts. “It’s over now, Roxanne. The life in this country as we knew it is over.”
A few tired minutes later, Roxanne Sanchez couldn’t recall how many more of the other woman’s blows she’d fended off.
She also couldn’t remember how many tumbles down the platform…and down the stairs they both made after the door opened when the Marta reached its latest stop.
She sure as hell couldn’t remember when or where the throbbing pain of shattered bones in her ankle first struck her senses.
And finally, Roxanne Sanchez couldn’t vividly recall the instance where she’d successfully stabbed Doctor Angel Hicks Dupree in her side with a knife.
Louis
Stone Mountain, Eastern Zone, 25th Day
It was finally his time.
The man who had once been known as Louis Keaton unbuttoned his shirt in a slow and deliberate motion. Moses watched him with eyes as bright and large as flashlights. Hugh—that is what he thought of himself now—Hugh seemed to be only using the tips of his fingers, each stroke of movement calculated, and every tug on the shirt’s fabric measured. He’d come a long way physically, mentally and emotionally. Why would it be necessary to rush through this now?
Out of the corner of his eye he could see Serena’s two guards she’s left behind to watch him. And we needed to be watched did we not?
What? Who?
They watched each other conspicuously. They wanted no part in seeing what was sure to come next. Their reports and all the other official documentation they’d been presented reminded them that he was capable of such savagery. But who wanted to see a child violated—a child’s innocence ripped away in an instant by a madman with a hard on.
They don’t have to see anything of the sort. We could walk away from this. We still have time.
What? Who?
And yet, the guards looked on. Hugh knew that in part it was the call of duty. Serena had left them a task to complete and they played the good solider carrying out a mission.
And yet, they also looked on because it was partly human nature that allowed men not to look away from disaster and tragedy when it surfaced for all eyes to see.
The man who now knew himself as Hugh started to unbuckle his pants. The steel felt cold in his hands. He could smell his own funk building underneath his neck, in the walls of his armpits and especially around the black hole of a groin. He ran his tongue behind the lining of his teeth. He felt his pulse pounding in his ears.
He could hear the howl of insanity and reason calling out to him in the back of his mind.
And in the front—
You are looking for an avenue of escape. We are giving it to you—take it—take it and be gone from this place. We release you.
Who? What?
How much longer would he be able to fend his natural instincts off? How much longer could he deny what he actually was?
Everything went cold now. Hugh began to shiver. It was the other…Louis who had always been so uptight, so insecure. Hugh always took what he wanted—consequences be damned.
Hugh was a study in power and stability.
And by God in Heaven—or the long damned ruler of the other realm, Hugh wanted that feeling of ecstasy and fulfillment one last time.
He wanted it so very badly.
When Moses failed to move, paralyzed with fear, Hugh commanded Serena’s men to bring the boy to him. They reluctantly obeyed.
Xavier Prince’s stalling tactics—and that’s all they really were—had proven to be folly. A House in Chains or the authorities would never find these children before the Zero Hour came and passed. Moses Jackson and the other boys were pawns in a game nearing its long completion.
And he had won the game.
And these boys would serve as his just reward for all of the self- control, discipline and obedience that he’s exhibited over the past days, weeks and months.
They were his to do with as he had pleased.
“Take your clothes off,” Hugh had offered the boy as if it were truly a suggestion. “You should take them off for me. Let me see you. Let me see all of you.”
The first of what Hugh suspected would be many tears dropped from the boy’s eyes. “No, please don’t hurt me.” He shook his head violently. “You promised that you wouldn’t harm me if I did everything you asked. I watched over the other boys. I didn’t let anything happen to them like I said that I would.” Moses let out a wail. “You promised.”
“I want you out of those clothes right now.”
“But—“
“Now,”
Hugh could see one of the guard’s Adam’s apple moving and he swallowed audibly. The second man looked as if he wished he were anywhere in the world but here. He even dared to part his lips as if anyone had asked his opinion of this situation.
“You gentleman may excuse yourselves.” Louis dropped his pants for effect. “Young Moses and I have our business to attend to. And he is but the first.”
They look from one to another, back to Hugh, to Moses and repeat the cycle once again.
“Respectfully, sir, Mistress Serena left s
trict orders not to allow you out of our sites again.” One of the two managed to say.
“Her reasoning is completely understandable considering the fact that the children nearly were lost—and more importantly I was under the control of a far less stable influence in the guise of Louis Keaton.” He finally removed his shirt as well. “But as I’m sure you two gentleman can attest, I, Hugh Keaton am in total control of mind and body.”
They still failed to leave him in peace.
“Alright, okay, why don’t you two hang around then? I do enjoy a little child porn myself from time to time. It does get the heart pumping. Well, it does start with the heart…”
And the man known as Hugh Keaton removed his boxers as well.
The second guard swallowed hard again.
“It’s…it’s not like…it’s not like that at all, sir.”
Hugh whips behind Moses with cat like quickness and takes his tongue and licks the length of Moses Jackson’s neck from hairline to the top of his spine, never taking his ocean blue eyes off of the two guards while he enjoyed the boy’s taste.
Moses releases another wail of anguish and disgust.
The first guard gulps one final time…and nearly tramples his partner with his retreat out of the room. The second one looks as if his knees could buckle at any moment and joins the other man on the other side of the door.
“We’ll be right outside the door, sir, if you need anything at all.”
“Thank you.”
Moses shakes himself free of Hugh’s grip—at least momentarily. He scatters to the other side of the room, scraping his knees in the process. He was breathing heavily by now, his already large eyes, stretched to their limits with terror. Hugh tries to calm him in vain.
Both man and child look to see that Hugh’s manhood has extended into a fine erection.
We won’t do this, Hugh.
Who? What?
We won’t.
Who? What? Who or what was the voice that was so very loud in his head?
Hugh covered his ears in an empty attempt to chase the voice away but nothing seemed to work. In fact, the other’s tone seemed to have grown louder.
We’re okay, for now, Hugh. The voice inside of him said; a voice far too familiar for his liking. A voice that he’d hoped that he would never to hear again.
We take care of our own.
We are here for us, Hugh.
We won’t let anyone hurt us…we won’t let anyone use us again.
And we will kill anyone who tries.
And I do mean anyone.
And after a moment and many tears, he stooped down to the floor and gathered his clothes—and put them back on his body.
He then tossed Moses Jackson his shirt back to him as well.
“You’ll need this.”
But Moses could only aimlessly watch as his shirt fell back to the floor. He is paralyzed with fear and can’t allow himself to move.
“Most…most of what you’ve witnessed from my behavior over the past few minutes was an act for the guards.” It was the only way to explain it in a quick and precise way to a child who had no earthly idea how to understand it any other way. He inched closer. “I’m not going to hurt you.“
Moses wasn’t buying his explanation and refused to move from his spot.
Louis…yes, for better or for worse, the boy who had watched his home and parents burn at Hugh’s hand, the Louis persona had returned to him for good.
Louis ran his hand through his thinning hair. The stress was building. Time was short.
His own personal Zero Hour was here.
“Moses, listen” He offered the child his hand. “Please, I need us to get the other boys and get going. I’m okay now. I’m not going to hurt you. I kept my promise to you.”
Moses cried out as Louis approached him.
“Listen,”
Louis heard the two guards back further away from the door. He guessed they were well out of earshot now.
“Pay attention to me, solider.” Louis said in a gruff voice. “Do I need to remind you that you took an oath to these other boys in here? You gave your word that when the moment arrived, that I could depend on you that you would be there for them. That moment is upon us. I need you to move your feet. I need you to march yourself out of this room and this place right now. Do I make myself clear, Mr. Jackson?”
Moses’s feet seemed to unscramble themselves and unlock from being embedded into the floor. He wiped his red eyes and runny nose with the back of his sleeve.
“Yes, I do, sir. I understand. What would you have me do?”
“Gather up the troops on my command. We are leaving this theatre of operations immediately.”
“I…I like the sound of that, sir.” Moses said but then the flashlights returned. “But how are we to do that sir? How do we get past Serena’s guards?”
Louis only glared at the child with those brilliant blue eyes of his—and flashed him the most wicked smile that he could manage.
“How else,” Louis asked gently. “We are leaving through the front door like any other guest would.”
Moses nearly grinned.
“Yes, sir, right away sir.”
“Would you mind if I asked you something kind of personal first?”
Moses took an involuntarily step backwards, but eventually straightened his stance once again. In this case his curiosity conquered any fear that might have been feeling.
“What?”
“When is the last time that you had a bite to eat?”
Moses raised his eyebrows, the merits of the question lost on his adolescent mind.
Five minutes later the twin guards burst into the room when they heard Louis fake the loudest scream that he could muster. Undressed again, he is squatted over by the door as if Moses had bitten down of him in an unforgiving spot. When one of the guards reaches to tend to his injuries Louis grabs his sidearm and shoots him in the face.
In the split second that the other guard’s mind has to comprehend and process what he originally thought he witnessed, Louis take’s his partner’s gun and fires a single shot between the man’s eyes just as he went for his own weapon.
Louis could hear the other children screaming from their secured location in the compound a few feet from here. Moses is himself in a squatted position in the far corner of this room. He is still covering his ears from the explosion of gunfire.
He mutely asks him to be still until he returns.
He knows that there is one guard that remains.
He could hear him charging from the outside. If Louis understood anything about Pandora procedures and protocols, this man had already radioed for backup.
Louis had used a weapon like this today and even before, but lacked the hours of training and competence to outwit his adversary now that his element of surprise was now gone. He knew that he may only get a single opportunity to kill this last remaining man or all was lost.
He did understand that with all of that training and experience the other man had, that there was at least a slim chance that he could be over confident and even arrogant when he finally faced Louis. In the other man’s mind there was no way in hell that a freak like Louis Keaton could have single handily taken out two of his Pandora comrades.
But Louis knew he couldn’t fail.
If he were to fall…if his enemy found and killed him…Louis knew that shortly thereafter Serena would order these children slaughtered—just as the Caretaker had done all of those years ago.
Louis couldn’t afford to fail.
And he does not.
Just as the man bent the last corner to this room, Louis planted a bullet in the man’s temple. He unloaded more rounds in his chest; torso and thigh for good measure even after the solider had fallen on his back.
Louis turned away from the carnage of his creation and his weaponless left hand out to Moses Jackson.
And the boy reluctantly took his hand in return.
They found the other boys cryin
g and huddled together nearby.
“It’s okay,” Louis said to them. “It’s alright now. Everything is going to be fine.”
The boys look from Moses to Louis and back again. None of them take a move forward even after Louis uses one of the dead guard’s keys to unlock the bars that head them caged in like some type of animals. The Zero Hour has passed for him and the city but the clock on a new deadline was ticking. He could guess that at least a dozen vehicles and at least a chopper or two had been dispatched to this location—even in the unlikely event, that a freak like him had overcome three experienced and well-armed agents.
“I know that all of you are afraid. And frankly, so am I. I’ve done some terrible things tonight.” He looked back at the men he’d massacred to the weapon warm in his hand. “And I’ve done far worse without even a gun in my hand in my past. I know that I’ve given you boys no reason to like me and very little reason to trust me. But I need you all to put your personal feelings aside for now—“
Some of the boys cry out louder.
“Please, stop it.” Louis heard the pleading tone in his voice take center stage. “Pandora will be sending someone here soon to hurt us. I need you all to follow me out of here.”
All of his gestures of goodwill seem to be laid to waste. None of the other boys look to be making any strides towards leaving this place. Louis falls to his knees in frustration. He was ever so close to making this right.
And could he hear the other’s voice beginning to whisper in the back of his mind.
He could feel all of the training that Dr. Hicks Dupree was melting away.
Perhaps he hadn’t vanquished Hugh like he so wanted to believe so easily?
Perhaps he was destined—
He heard Moses bark out a command.
The crying stopped.
“I said on your feet, solders.”
The other boys look at Moses as if he is even more crazed than the only adult still left alive in this room…but they slowly begin to rise to their feet. Chills race through Louis shoulder blades.
In a strange way he can understand the pride a father feels for his own son’s accomplishments as he watches his boy grow into a man.
“This man kidnapped us from our homes and families.” Moses said. He looked different somehow to Louis, he looked older, especially the skin around his eyes and mouth. He was Moses from the old Bible stories. He was going to lead his people out of Egypt. He was the general that Christopher Prince had been. He was that special child that everyone in his life knew that he could be. Moses Jackson was the hero that Louis Keaton could never be. “This man put us in considerable danger. He almost did something unspeakable to us. But I am not asking you to trust him. I am begging you to trust me while I follow him out of this place. Let’s saddle up, gentlemen. We are going home.”
Thomas
Radisson Inn, Downtown, 26th Day
It has been often said that fortune favored the bold.
So which way would the scales of justice weigh for an audacious act of betrayal?
For the third time in many minutes Thomas Pepper picked up Lucy Burgess’ hotel key and examined it with a keen interest.
He spun the key around his thick fingers. He tossed it in the air and then rolled it around and through his fingers again. Are you safe Lucy? Have the Peacekeepers left you in peace…or in pieces?
Thomas dialed 9 from the bed of his own hotel room’s phone here at the Radisson Inn and keyed in the appropriate numbers of her cell phone that had burned in his memory by now.
Again she’d failed to answer.
He’d left her yet another message on her answering service. He then got to his feet, his footsteps heavy in his own ears and scooped up his cell phone. He texted her again—but this latest message of are you there, would simply exist in line with the dozen or so text that he’d previously sent.
Thomas Pepper knew that she never was far away from her cell. Even if she had taken on a lover for the evening—which was a distinct possibility—she would check her phone between sessions.
She would want to be on top of current events especially with the evening growing late and the Zero Hour fast approaching.
A scratchy but familiar voice on the television uttered something that had finally broken his concentration. Tammy Fields, a woman reporter from local Channel 6 was interviewing common, everyday citizens about the impending passing of A House in Chain’s self-imposed deadline for Atlanta’s missing children to be found by the FBI. Most of the interviewees acted with nervousness if not outright anxiety about would happen in the city over the next few hours. Tammy smiled an honest but futile assurance and a couple of them. Thomas noted that one of his former lovers had grown a small mustache on her upper lip and tried to mask the defect with too much red lip lipstick.
Thomas turned away and walked to his room’s oversized window and peeked out at Midtown from his 8th floor vantage point. He compared this unease that Atlanta’s citizens were feeling to a city that was lined up in the direct path of a major hurricane. You did what you had to in the attempt to protect what was yours. You bordered up the windows of your home. You moved yard furniture that the heavy gust of wind would use as projectiles inside. You checked on your neighbors.
And then you grabbed everyone you loved and got the hell out of the hurricane’s path while there was still time.
Tammy had found more residents to speak on the air. One or two spoke to the camera in far angrier terms. One black woman who wore ponytails blamed the Rooster and his arrogance for the impending confrontation. Thomas was unsure how her blatant cursing got through the time delay but it had. A frame or two later the camera showed a couple of skinheads showing off sawed off shotguns on live television. They whooped and hurled obscenities and racial slurs at any person of color they could find and fired off several rounds into the air.
For a moment, Channel 6 went black.
When it returned four men who’d taken the mark were standing next to Tammy. She looked uncomfortable…if not a little scared in their wake. They vowed to honor Xavier Prince’s instructions not to act until the Zero Hour officially passed. And then the largest of the men leaned into the microphone and wished the viewers a good night and blew a kiss at the camera.
Channel 6 went to another feed to show a far more panoramic view of Atlanta. Parts of the city were a blur of activity while other neighborhoods looked abandoned altogether. Independent school bus companies were offering charter service to people of color who were desperate to flee—to what most authorities believed—were safer areas of the metropolis in the suburbs. History had taught the country that what was perceived at predominantly Black neighborhoods would take the heaviest brunt of the coming act of civil disobedience as they did in Los Angeles during the Rodney King Riots and the assignation of the country’s first Black president.
Thomas turned the station with the remote looking for a narrative with a more national perspective to it. He found one within a few clicks. Reports and video coming in from Harlem to Washington, DC to New Orleans to Chicago to Los Angeles and countless other municipalities mirrored one another.
America was sitting on a time bomb of racial discord that the world had never witnessed.
And that bomb was set to go off in two hours.
The talking heads were having a field day. They’d hyper analyzed all of the events of the past few weeks—and of American history itself—that had let us to the brink…of this. One man, who was the color of vanilla ice cream, argued that this day had been inevitable since Lincoln had freed the slaves. A woman wearing a black blazer over a dark colored blouse—which only made her appear larger—offered a comment that each generation had its signature point of racial unrest and that this was our time. And yet, another man wearing wrinkled khakis pleaded for cooler heads to prevail in what he repeatedly referred to as a fiasco. He demanded that Serena Tennyson and Xavier Prince pull their people back from this impending catastrophe. And before Thomas switched the TV of
f he saw one last woman whose odd figure proved that God indeed has a sense of humor, ask the question that he himself wanted to know: What would become of the missing boys when this conflict began in earnest?
He paced the floor pondering that question for a very long time.
He sat down. He got to his feet again. He peered over his shoulder at the clock resting on the nightstand. He compared the time to the one that he had synced to his laptop and his cell phone.
There were only five minutes remaining until the Zero Hour.
He ignored the remote to the TV and raced back to the hotel’s window for another look. It became painfully obvious early on that dozens of people had obviously not waited for the deadline to pass to make their hostile mark. In the distance, probably about two miles away, he could see groups of people wielding baseball bats involved in a confrontation.
He looked in another direction and saw National Guard troops putting their people in place. Several helicopters filled the skyline with their presence.
With nervous hands Thomas fumbled with his cell. It took him a minute or so to control them shaking and finally governing control of his thick fingers again. He dialed Lucy Burgess once more, but and automated feminine voice informed him that all circuits were busy. He fumed. He tried her number again a second…and then a third time…netting the same results each time.
He resumed his frantic pacing.
He steadied his hand long enough to use the remote to bring the TV back to life choosing to concentrate on local coverage of events. Tammy and her camera crew were struggling to continue their duties. She did announce that a heavy estimate of casualty reports from across the city was already coming in.
The pundits, he thought, had been wrong after all.
Atlanta was a city that had found the time to hate.
On the national feed the talking heads had gone eerily silent as video feeds from across the nation had uttered its violent message all too well. The funny shaped woman finally broke the silence and asked a question that Thomas Pepper was sure to take to his grave:
She asked the panel and all the viewers who watched tonight where was he at this evening? What was he doing? She said that he had been proven a prophet after all? She reminded the world that he’d seen the inevitable clash between Pandora and a House in Chains on the horizon for many years.
She also reminded him of something that he himself had forgotten that he now remembered uttering a single time five years ago on his vlog when he was feeling particularly dramatic:
A conflict between the two social powers could quickly escalate and get out control easily…and lead this country into a second Civil War.
Unable to idly stay in this room one second more, Thomas Pepper finally stepped towards the door. Atlanta’s missing children hadn’t been found. The extension that he had bargained with Xavier Prince in exchange for the whereabouts of Lucy Burgess had been for nothing. Now, the thought of the price that she might have payed—might still be paying was consuming him. In a few steps he had reached the elevator, but it had a sign displayed in front of the entrance saying that it was out of service.
Damn.
He was winded by the time he trudged down the eight flights of stairs. He stopped and bent over to catch his breath and to garner his thoughts to come up with some type…any type of makeshift game plan. Lucy’s hotel room couldn’t be farther than two miles from where he was standing here gasping for breath right now. He made his way to the parking area where he could see his Jaguar sitting on the third aisle. He fumbled for his keys as he reached the car…and saw something that was beyond belief: He had a flat tire.
Oh no, oh no, not now. I can’t believe that this is happening now.
He rolled Lucy’s hotel key card around his fingers again and again. He could change the tire, of course. But how much time will I loose in the mean time? He spun the key card around his finger one last time and secured it in his pocket. His mind was made up. He could reach her on foot. He could do this. He leaned back and inhaled deeply—and then Thomas Pepper did something before he set off that he couldn’t remember doing in years:
He prayed.
Four blocks away he saw his first act of violence as three white men drug another man of Latino descent into an alley and began pounding him to a pulp. He could only venture a guess as to what had gone on between the two parties before his arrival on the scene. This wasn’t his business. His only business right now was getting himself to where Lucy Burgess was. Getting himself involved in this or any other fracas along the way hampered his chances of doing that in one piece.
Thomas Pepper was done trying to be the voice of reason in a chorus of others singing madness.
And then he jumped when he heard a woman screaming.
And then he heard round after round of gunfire that sounded as if it were close by.
Thomas Pepper lowered his head as much as his large frame would allow and got his feet moving.
Around the next corner he saw dozens of youthful black men breaking into rows of downtown shops, robbing each of the buildings of everything that a man could carry. One of the store owners, who looked to be an Asian descent wrestled with one of the thieves over his merchandise—only to be expectantly be shot in the be shot in the head by another gun carrying robber.
It didn’t take keen intellect to predict that the worse elements of society would feast on the rest of us, especially during the initial moments after the Zero Hour passed. Regardless of race or color, these heathens and lowlifes were little else but opportunist. There would never be a better time for them to exploit the anarchy in the streets and an undermanned police force to their personal gain.
Thomas was so very tired carrying around all of his extra bulk. He hadn’t needed to run like this on any continuous basis since his college days when he boxed. And the windy smoky conditions around him weren’t aiding his cause either. He honestly didn’t know if he had enough energy stored in his reserves to venture another three or four blocks to reach Lucy.
To his immediate left Thomas saw a middle aged woman of Indian descent fall to her knees as gang of teenaged white boys descended on her clothing store. She begged them to leave her and her possessions in peace. She told them that her husband had died a year ago and this store was all she had left of him in this world. Thomas tried to look away but as he glanced back he saw the woman grab one of the boy’s hands…and kiss his knuckles. She told them that she knew that they were good boys—all of them—and she knew that grant her wish and leave her be.
The boy squeezed her hand with enough force to cause the woman to wince. One of his buddies moved past them both and wielded two handfuls of cash in a blink of an eye when he returned. Three others took their turns inside each exiting the store with hundreds of dollars of stolen merchandise.
And then the leader, who had been locked in physical contact with the store’s owner, back slapped her with that same hand…
…and then he pulled his pistol out as if to finish her off—
And by all that is and was holy, Thomas Pepper had seen enough.
“Stop this now,” Thomas yelled at them before he had realized what he had done.
The one with the gun fired a shot just past Thomas’ ear as a single warning shot for him to mind his own goddamn business.
Thomas cursed back at him.
The boy trained his pistol on him. Thomas thought that he surely was a dead man…and a damned stupid one at that.
But just as quickly the boy begin to smile…he put the pistol away for now and instructed his boys to cause him to suffer a wee bit before they made the final kill.
And so they began to chase after him instead.
And yet, despite Thomas’ advanced age and weight, he had a decent head start and rounded the next corner, but was already beginning to breathe heavily.
They were already gaining.
Well, at least the store owner would be able to escape while they are chasing me.
He could go
to his grave knowing that he at least saved someone’s life tonight, even if he had failed to save Lucy—and himself in the process.
After he cleared a jewelry store that was being ransacked with the gang closing the distance ever rapidly he knew he was down to two very difficult options: He could take his chances and run out into the open street and risk the boys tiring of the chase and giving it up or them firing their guns at him.
Or he could hope…he could pray by God and Jesus that they had a thread of decency in their bones and wouldn’t follow him into a cathedral that was just close enough for him to use his very last ounce of strength and courage to reach.
And he had to make his decision right now.
Thomas Pepper ran for his life towards the church.
He could nearly feel a couple of errand shots that whizzed by him, striking two other pedestrians who were running from the heist at the jewelry store.
Thankfully, the huge French doors slid open without issue and Thomas dove inside the entrance, slowed his momentum in an instant and slammed the door and bolted it behind him.
He slid down to his knees in total exhaustion.
He listened…he waited for either their gunshots piercing or themselves trying to break the door down in an attempt to reach him and finish what he had started.
But either instance ever came.
After another minute, Thomas composed himself long enough to turn around…
And he saw hundreds of people who only had eyes for him.
Perhaps out of reflex, perhaps in part because of respect for a House of God, Thomas staggered to his feet.
He felt as if he made personal eye contact with each and every one of those hundred or so people.
They were all people of color. They were of all ages and sizes. Children were crying. He could see a young mother holding her infant to her breast. Families were huddling together. Some of the elderly looked at him with an air of sourness in their gaze. He even heard two or three people openly curse at him even though they were in this holy house. Another questioned why in the hell would he seek shelter here?
One balding man whose body had once been a temple but no more stepped out of the mob and asked in a gentle but firm voice for all to remain calm; He said that everything would be alright. He told them that the God he knew never had made a mistake.
The man’s tone and inflection reminded Thomas so much of his old friend and Editor Bernard Lott. And where are you…and how are you right now, my old friend? Thomas could imagine the man’s sermons booming over his congregation on Sundays.
Thomas slumped down into one of the bench seats that separated him from everyone else who was inside of the church. He was exhausted. He was spent. He looked behind at the French doors one last time and decided that his pursuers had truly given up the chase. He mouthed a word of thanks to the heavens for that when yet another thought caused him to shudder in his short sleeves: He had truly put every man, woman and child in this Cathedral in danger if that gang had decided that he was worth killing no matter the cost.
The minister of the church, at least that’s what Thomas had deciphered from the man’s clothing and leadership, cast a rather large shadow on him when he finally stood next to him. Thomas stole one final lungful of air and prepared himself to return from the way he came if and when this man asked him to leave his flock.
And his banishment would be poetic justice. Outside of a friend’s wedding here and there Thomas hadn’t stepped foot inside of a church since his father’s funeral. He shouldn’t be here…but he should. He needed to be here, especially now.
Several others joined those who voiced opposition to his presence. Before long those who wanted his vanquished became loud and nearly unruly.
The minister laid one giant hand on Thomas’ shoulder—and raised the other high so that all who were inside would see it.
“This is the house of our lord.” He said in that same booming voice that Thomas had found intimidating, that Thomas had found so very comforting. He then turned away from those who had come for God’s protection through him and turned all of his attention to the one who had done the same. “Let your heart not be troubled, son. Everyone here had come for forgiveness, for comfort and for protection during this trying time. The truth teller is not beyond our God’s love. He is covered by the blood as well. ”
And then the minister embraced Thomas Pepper with every ounce of strength that he had in him. After the larger man released Thomas, he gave him his full measure.
“I hope that you may find some comfort here, my son; may you find comfort here.”
Thomas Pepper found the comfort that he sought.
And then he found tears.
Seth
Fulton County-Cobb County Border, 26th Day
Atlanta was a hell on Earth and ciaos was the devil that reigned supreme over it.
Dr. Seth Dupree watched partly in horror, partly in awe as his “comrades” in a House in Chains methodically rounded up more of they termed as “Roosters” and executed them in viciously efficient ways over the past few hours.
Their travels had taken them to the borders of Cobb and Gwinnett counties and back to the home turf in Fulton again. The Zero Hour had long past now. But Seth would never forget what Quincy Morgan and his Peacekeepers when the midnight had arrived: The men and women halted the convoy’s trek through the street and avenues and roads long enough to kill the engines, climb to the rooftops of each car or SUV and fire semi-automatic weapon fire into the already smoky air.
And then Quincy Morgan said at the top of his voice, “Brothers and sisters, what do you see when you visualize our people’s future?”
Seth heard the other’s reply in a mediocre attempt at voices trying to sound off as one.
“We see days filled with misery and pain.”
He remembered them breaking into a Victorian styled house when they had crossed into Cobb County an hour ago. The initial, independent phase of his operation was completed and he had admitted as much to Seth. The Gray Man had somehow somewhere along the way morphed into what amounted to the role of an embedded reporter traveling with the troops witnessed the war on the ground as it happened.
And now he the doctor/journalist could report that his units were picking homes at random. Number Four, the man Seth thought Quincy refer to as Percy—at least once respectfully reminded their field leader that they needed to wrap this up and return to the Fulton County Theatre of Operations sooner than later.
Percy said something about Scar being enacted; and soon.
Quincy acknowledged with a silent but meaningful nod. He told the slightly darker skinned man with the clean shaven head that he had one last household on his hit list before they turned back. Percy winced a little…but reluctantly agreed. Again, he reminded his leader of their limited time available to get it done.
When the Peacekeepers charged inside the residence they found five white adults sitting in the living area.
Thankfully, Seth thought to himself, at least there are no children here.
Seth said for the fourth time in as many trips.
“Stop this madness now, Quincy. Order your Peacekeepers to leave this place and leave this people in peace. You don’t have to do this.”
But Quincy Morgan had chosen to ignore him as he the other three times.
Three of the people present were women and they started to scream as if they had been cued to while one of the two men shouted racial insults and profanities at the invaders. The other man saved his small talk for another time, grabbed a loaded shotgun but Percy proved too fast and equally efficient when he blew a large whole in the homeowner’s temple.
Just as in the other incursions, the raid didn’t last overtly long.
A handful of very large unnamed Peacekeepers drug the survivors unceremoniously into the middle of the street kicking and screaming. One of the snipers who had been guarding their perimeter from the far corner picked off an old man who was loaded for bear off of his roo
ftop. Seth was four more neighbors take to cover behind cars and trees taking shots at the Peacekeepers. Seth ducked for cover. A female Peacekeeper who had been with them since the beginning went down first with a gunshot to her neck. She was bleeding profusely and by the time Seth got to her side she was drowning in her own blood.
Percy cursed aloud. Quincy Morgan barked out commands with his last one leaving no room for misinterpretation from those who had chosen to follow his path: We will stand or fall, but we will not let these prizes of ours escape our judgement.
And then Quincy fired two quick shots and killed two men defending their neighbors as best they could. Two Peacekeepers caught the third white man in crossfire and their combatant’s torso exploded in a spectrum of blood and bones. And Percy finished tonight’s latest skirmish by capping the final man in the kneecap as failed to find adequate cover in time. The man’s gun fell out his immediate reach. Desperate and dying he tried to crawl to where the weapon was resting but Percy easily beat him to it. Percy stomped on his back and fired a single round into the base of the fallen man’s skull.
Percy cursed aloud again soon after his shot was through echoing down the street. He pointed at the dying female Peacekeeper and screamed at Quincy that they should vacate the area now. He said that they didn’t need to lose any more people to these aimless attacks. Scar was on the horizon. There was still much work to do.
Quincy was unshaken and unmoved. He commanded his troops to bring the four people from the Victorian house to where he was again standing in the middle of the street. Seth tried to put two fingers and pressure on the woman’s wound…but she was already gone.
Seth heard himself inhale.
And then he heard Quincy Morgan as he said to the first of the two women who had been shoved down near his loafers. “Do you seek forgiveness for the indiscretions your ancestors have perpetrated against people of color?”
“What?” She said between wails of agony at the direness of her situation.
Quincy Morgan stooped down so that she could hear his words better—and put his gun to her temple.
“Do you seek forgiveness for the indiscretions your ancestors have perpetrated against people of color?”
“My ancestors,” She sounded baffled. “What do my ancestors have to do with who I am? I’ve done nothing to you people—“
Quincy pulled the trigger killing her instantly.
A teary eyed Peacekeeper couldn’t strike his gaze from his fallen comrade. Seth recognized the look in his eye even though most of his face was covered by a mask. He must have loved the girl the way that Seth had loved his wife. He rudely threw the first man down to where Quincy stood tall and athletic once again.
“Do you seek forgiveness for the indiscretions by your ancestors have perpetrated against people of color?”
The little man slowly looked up and Quincy a look as cold as ice…a look as hot as fire.
And then he spit in the face of the man who was standing in judgement over him.
Quincy snarled, grabbed the man, spun him around and placed two shot in separate sections of the other man’s spine. Seth heard parts of the man’s vertebra shatter, even over his screams of horrid agony. Blood gushed out…but the Gray Man’s long surgical background reminds him that this man will die—but not for hours to come.
Quincy wears s tight smile on his twitching lip, but his eyes are stretched to a vexing level of size and intensity. He knows all too well the damning end that he has brought to this man’s life.
And Quincy looks oblivious to the spit dangling from his chin as he does not wipe it away.
The final man had seated himself in Quincy’s shadow.
After a moment, The Sargent at arms found his focus and his voice again. He is unable to finish as the man launches an unintelligible monologue of cries and begging. He grasped for Quincy’s lower pants and kisses his loafers.
“I’m sure women of color did exactly as you are doing right now when your brood sold her husband or her children while she was powerless.” He said his voice nearly a whisper. “It would have been a mercy for her master to kill her then.”
Quincy placed his gun between the man’s eyes—and blew a gaping hole between them.
“Who would deny that I have not been merciful tonight?”
At the last, it took two beefy Peacekeepers to drag the last victim forward. She was kicking and screaming and crying. The snipers checked the perimeter one last time to make sure the group would not come under a counter or new offensive while they finished up here.
“Silence,” Quincy commanded her as if she were one of his.
She quieted as best as her trembling lip and sniveling would allow her.
“Do you seek forgiveness for the indiscretions that your people have perpetrated against people of color?”
“Oh yes,” The woman put her hands up defensively. “Oh, God, yes, I seek your forgiveness. Please forgive me. Please don’t kill me.”
And then Quincy Morgan smiled.
He ejected the gun’s magazine clip and tossed it and then the gun in the street.
He took less than a handful of steps towards Seth.
“You see, Doctor,” He said as a matter of fact. “Not only am I merciful, I am reasonable as well. This woman has given me what I want.”
“And by doing so, you will let her live?” Seth wanted to know.
“She is worthy of survival.”
And then Quincy Morgan backhanded the large woman with all of his power and strength.
He stomped on her stomach and side again and again until The Gray Man can take it no longer—“
Seth dove at Quincy’s waist. Quincy throws him off as if was a light as a feather. The two Peacekeepers who were closest to where the activity was began stomping and kicking the doctor in his ribs side and chest—
“Enough,”
Dr. Seth Dupree curls up like an embryo, the pain in his ribs and side nearly unbearable as he spits up blood. And yet, he finds his final bit of strength and courage to…he grasp at one of Peacekeeper whose boots had assaulted him so duly just seconds ago.
He raised his face up to feel the dirt of the man’s boot on his face with force.
“No,” Seth spat out. “Don’t tell them to stop now, Quincy. Command them to kill me the way that you’ve killed all the others. I demand that you kill me right now before you force me to endure one more minute of this nightmare.”
Quincy looked to be a study in tranquility.
And then he extended his hand as if to aid him to his feet once again.
Seth looked at the other man wearily.
Is this another of your ruses, Quincy? What fate awaits me when I stand at your side?
Quincy pulled him to his feet as if he weighed no more than a rag doll.
“This,” Quincy addressed with the same guarded respect that he had exhibited when Seth first came to and found himself in the company of the Peacekeepers earlier this evening.
In what seemed a lifetime ago.
“Doctor, your people have been systemically killing innocent black men and women since the day you stole my people from our lands in Mother Africa.”
“I don’t need a history lesson, especially from you, Quincy.”
Quincy laughed. He looked around and couple of Peacekeepers let out a nervous grin.
“Look how the good doctor speaks to me. He knows that I have the power to kill him for it.”
Seth purposely relaxed his tone.
“What I am saying is this: Let’s say that every word you’ve spoken tonight is correct. You have influencer. You certainly have influence. You have the Peacekeepers. You won’t be able to match soul for soul, life for life.”
“You’re right, Doctor. Ultimately this is a hopeless exercise. History has shown us that minorities can never hope to rise up and overthrow the rule of a superior majority.”
Seth frowned; he was truly at a lost.
“Then educate me, Quincy, what is all of this murder
and mutilation really about?” Seth pointed at the large woman who was still rolling on the pavement, trying to recover from her near death experience. “You orchestrated the execution of the leader of your House, Xavier Prince in cold blood. You told him that he was a leader for peace times only. This was now a time of war. What did you mean that?”
Percy looks away, ashamed of his role in Xavier’s betrayal. The Peacekeepers look on as if Quincy’s answer would interest them as well. Even the beaten down white woman lifts her head in anticipation of this man’s response.
“When I was a little boy I was raised by my maternal grandmother. My own mother left for work one day when I was two and never returned.” Quincy looked away, the memory stabbing at a tender area of his heart. “Anyway, I remember the day that she set of those Gansu knives she had ordered had finally arrived. To this day, I don’t know, I don’t fully understand why those knives fascinated me.”
Seth felt his own face soften.
If Quincy was about to spring another trap then he had been hook line and sinker.
“I know the ones you are speaking of. I remember the infomercials than ran endlessly about them.”
Quincy nodded.
“She warned me to stay away from them. She told me to let them be.”
“But you didn’t heed her advice did you,” Seth added to the other’s monologue. “How bad did you cut yourself?”
Quincy lifted his left arm up so Seth could view an old gash that was nearly four inches long and at least an inch deep.
It was a very deep scar.
“The knife was so sharp that I barely felt it. It was only a tingle of pain when it happened. All the blood scared my grandmother real bad though.”
Seth nodded—and laughed nervously in spite of himself.
“It was a very deep scar.” The Gray Man muttered.
Quincy pointed a long index finger at him as if the doctor had hit on a very important point.
“Yes, that is it exactly, Doctor. And even to this day, to this very moment, I’m cautious around knives. I am an efficient killer. I can kill you with a gun; I can end your life with my bare hands. But I never let a knife do my killing, even considering all of my professional experience; even considering all of the people that I have had to kill.” He took a deep smoky breath and glared up at the stars. “That scar is always there to remind me of that. It is there to remind me of everything that I have lost…of all that I could still loose.”
Seth nodded slowly...and then shook his head.
“I want to understand, Quincy. I do. You don’t think you can win this conflict with Pandora.” Seth nodded once more. “All of this…all of what is coming is your attempt to…you are going to leave your own scar for the world to see. What has a House in Chains done, Quincy? What are your people going to do?”
The other man stole one last peaceful, silent breath. He smoothed out his bloody shirt and straightened out his pants.
And then he turned his full attention to the area just south of their position right now, back into the suburbs of Fulton County.
“A House in Chains has spent a considerable amount of time and capital hacking into the local telephone assistance database.” He looked at his watch. “Twenty minutes ago thousands of bogus 911 calls are remotely being dialed out to the Atlanta Police Department. As scattered as the cops are surely to be now after the Zero Hour, we’re counting on them to respond quickly to any and all calls originating from predominantly white neighborhoods.”
“What kind of emergencies are these calls—“
“They’re reporting the standard emergencies that would arise during an event like a great civil unrest rising out of the streets of a major American metropolitan city.”
“And what happens when the police respond to these bogus calls?”
“Our snipers, like the ones you’ve seen in action here tonight, will feast upon them. It will be like target practice.”
“Tell me it ends there,” Seth took a dangerous step forward. “I’m begging you, Quincy to please tell me that it ends there.”
Percy chimed in.
“We learned much from what we’ve learned from the riots in Miami, Los Angeles, Baltimore and countless other cities in this country over the years. The authorities expect black folks to do what they’ve always done in the past. They expect us to torch our neighborhoods. And though there is an element of ignorant motherfuckers who embrace such stupidity, our people have a much broader agenda on the table. We have shipped buses and buses of our people to strategic places all over the city. They are armed, angry and focused just like our cell that you’ve ridden with tonight.”
“Oh my, God, please no.”
Quincy said, “It should already be underway.”
“And you had Xavier Prince killed for this?” Seth asked with some gruff in his voice. “You murdering son of a bitch—“
“Shut up, Doctor.” Quincy gave his voice some base. “I meant what I said when I spoke to him last. I loved Xavier Prince like a brother. Do you think it was easy for me to snub his life out the way I did after all he and his family has done for people of color? Who is the insane one now?”
“You’re a smart man, Quincy. You’re also very bold. A House in Chains has vast resources but I refuse to believe that you pulled this off alone. You must have had help.” And Seth paused to weigh the gravity of what putting his theory to voice. “And by my God in Heaven…I believe that I know where.”
And then, from almost nowhere, Dr. Seth Dupree, Quincy Morgan, Percy, the Peacekeepers—all of them found themselves surrounded by what easily had to be an armed brigade of 50 or so white men.
The Peacekeepers pointed their weapons in a vain attempt to intimidate such a large force. Percy pleaded with his own troops to hold their fire.
After a tense moment of silence, one man who looked the part of a raptor in a forest full of T-Rexes stepped to the forefront.
“I’ve waited a hell of a long time for this moment, Quincy Morgan.” The man who announced himself as James Carter said. “And I know that I won’t leave here disappointed.”
D r. Seth Dupree didn’t know whether to mourn his previous captor’s imitate demise or embrace it.
The Gray Man only knew that the question was soon to be raised and answered if any of them were worthy of survival.
Episode 7 Scar