Children Of Fate

  The door soon followed.

  Tony gave a final push and knocked the door over like a sad lonely domino. The heavy door fell way. Hot black suffocating smoke filled their cold lungs and scratched at their eyes. They pushed through the thick smoke and made it to the seating area. Before them, bulimic columns of flames and ghostly shadows waltzed around the restaurant over tables and across the walls.

  Nadia coughed.

  Joel swore.

  “Cover your mouths,” Richard shouted over the sound of hells song. He lifted his shirt up over his mouth and nose, “link up. Hold hands and follow me.”

  They held hands tight creating a snake. The hand in front held on in hope and trust, the other in a promise to never leave the other behind.

  The snake weaved through the restaurant. The roof to the right gave way and a pile of burning ruble rained down.

  The cocoon of heat closed in tighter.

  Roy tripped but never fell; he was immediately lifted back up to his feet by Joel and Nadia’s hand. There was another crash behind them but none turned to see what it was.

  They finally reached the closed glass doors. Richard never bothered to check if the doors were unlocked, in one sweeping motion he lifted a potted pot plant and heaved it through the glass panel which exploded in hundreds of pieces. They all had to turn sideways to avoid the pointed glass teeth left behind around the door frame; one by one they all carefully stepped into the gapping bright mouth and out into the world. The clean air rushed up to their aid and soothed their burning tired lungs.

  A small crowd gathered across the street. The sight of them exiting drew gasps of disbelief and praises to their gods.

  The building’s wooden floors on level one and two finally released its grip and it all came crashing down in a puff of burning ambers and black ash.

  Richard coughed out the last remaining black soot from his throat then herded the group together, “We have to move away.” He led them towards a narrow pedestrian ally that ran down between a bookstore and a bakery.

  “Sir! Where are you going?” a concerned voice came from the crowd.

  “The hospital,” Richard lied over his shoulder not stopping. “It's not far, we are ok, we can walk.”

  They formed a line and passed through the ally before spreading back out as they reached a fenced off open area behind the bookstore.

  “We have to get the disk back,” Joel said to his feet refusing to stay still.

  “We almost died. Do you understand that? We’re being put through this crap because of that stupid thing,” Alicia cried. “This is it, the end of the line. That curse is not our problem anymore. This is our chance to leave.”

  “You owe it to the disk.”

  “Owe what?”

  “That million year old thing made by god knows who, holding the voice of an alien was the only thing in this world that has ever offered us the one thing that no man, woman, parent, brother, sister, friend or teacher has ever offered us.”

  “And what’s that?”

  “An unquestionable, incorruptible belief in who we really are inside, that no one else can see. A belief that gives us hope and power to change the world we are growing up to hate.”

  Alicia crossed her arms.

  “Ok what do you desire above all else?”

  Alicia did not answer but stood firm, arms crossed and head down.

  “Alright, I’ll go. Believe it all not I can’t resist the urge to help people. Roy how about you?”

  Roy blushed or was burnt mildly on his cheeks, “to find an alternate clean energy source so we can stop polluting the world.”

  Joel nodded and smiled then turned to Nadia.

  “To never forget the hardships and courage our ancestors endued.”

  “Good,” Joel more animated now. “Alicia?”

  “Alicia unwrapped her arms, “to create the perfect society where people don’t have to live in sadness anymore.”

  “Tony?”

  Tony hesitated then said softly but very clear. “I wanted to find a cure for Alzheimer’s so I could help my grandfather. To help others sick just like him. But I didn’t understand the image.” A tear nearly escaped but Tony held it with a tightly clenched blink.

  “I want to get the disk,” Joel said sternly.

  Richard stepped away from the dumpster he was leaning on, “Joel your urge to protect the disk. It was asked of you and your desire granted it. It is how my group had started in the fourteen hundreds.” Richard plucked a small object out from his collar, dropped it then crushed the electronic bug with the heel of his boot. He took out his phone, dialed then spoke a few words in a foreign language. He closed the phone and returned it to his pocket. “My colleague with the key will be here soon. Make your choice.”

  No one stirred but they watched one another closely. Alicia finally adjusted her bag on her back then simply walked towards the gate cut into the fence behind them. She tried to apologize with an unspoken word to Joel as she passed him but he lowered his head in sadness. Before she pulled the whining gate open Roy was close behind.

  Together they walked away.

  Roy and Alicia shrunk away and finally vanished amongst the bustle of the street beyond.

  Suddenly there was an explosion of glass.

  Just beyond the fence a man crashed to the ground accompanied by cubes of glass that skidded and bounced across the concrete. A once shimmering window overlooking the boring alleyway was now a mat black square.

  “Yosef?” Richard yelled recognizing his friend.

  Two men hopped out the black square. Their jackets flapped as they hit the ground running.

  “Richard,” Yosef yelled. “They have the key.”

  Richard knelt down beside his friend.

  Yosef slowly lifted himself up off the ground. “I thought I lost them. The bastards followed me. I was unsure at first if I was being followed but when I spoke to you on the phone it must have gave me away.”

  “Yosef you get to the disk. I’ll meet you there with the key.” Richard then waved a hand at the three remaining kids, “stay with Yosef.” He turned and took off at full flight in chase of the two men.

  A siren shrieked and wailed. It was quickly joined by others as the sirens echoed from all directions. Fire engines swarmed the burning building.

  **

  Alicia and Roy stood at the edge of the road on the carefully manicured curb and waited for the traffic to clear so they could cross the street. Cars, trucks and buses streamed past on the four lane road. On the opposite side three taxies awaited at the taxi rank the first one in line was Alicia’s target.

  “All this stuff won’t assure me a passing grade into Uni,” she said, her head flicked left and right looking for an opening to cross. “And that’s what a true future in this life relies on, not arcane ghost stories.”

  “That’s right Alicia, were just decent individuals trying to do the right thing, going to school, study, not soldiers fighting over myths and conspiracies,” added Roy.

  Alicia turned to Roy and nodded once, hard and true.

  “Alicia you got a smudge of soot on your cheek.”

  Alicia wiped at her cheek with her palm.

  “No you missed it's still there.” Roy raised his trembling hand, his face began to burn. Alicia leaned in closer. Through the charcoal smell Roy could still smell the scent of peach in her hair. Just as Roy’s nervous thumb touched Alicia’s soft cheek his left leg felt as if it vanished. His foot stumbled into a small pothole as he shifted his weight. Arms and legs flailed everywhere as Roy tried desperately to stay upright but it only postponed the inevitable. Roy fell onto a meter high A-frame board advertising managers special of chicken wings; four for two dollars a kilo. The A-frame board folded neat and flat then tipped over. Roy landed on his ass and the board landed onto the bike of a punk who looked like the direct spawn of the devil. The punk boy was being a wise ass weaving in and out through the pedestrians on the foot path, with no helmet and an invis
ible smug grin on his face. The punk squealed in shock. Pushed off balance he careened into a green canvas blind partially shielding the last shop window before the alleyway.

  Alicia and Roy watched like an audience watching an entrant into Australia’s funny video show. The blind ripped and the punks momentum swung the heavy wooden pole weighing the blind down out past the building and across the alleyway like a pendulum on a Grandfather clock. As the end of the wooden pole hit its apex it also hit the side of a man’s head who suddenly appeared from the ally. The man stumbled, knocked out cold where he stood and tripped up another man who also appeared from nowhere. One fell to the floor the other running at high speed stumbled straight onto the road. A truck’s wheels howled and then cried white smoke as it bore down on the stunned man. The truck shuddered as it slowed and the trailer jackknifed sending other cars jumping and darting out of the way to safety. The man with the oversized jacket standing in the middle of the road shut his eyes tight and waited for the impact. The truck hopped to a stop, a breath away from the man. The truck hissed and the stunned man slowly opened his eyes. He let out a smile of relief but it was short lived, another giant of a man came plowing in from nowhere and tackled him to the ground.

  The two men rolled and wrestled in the middle of the road. They fought like rabid dogs.

  Roy, Alicia and the rest of the people down the street watched but none intervened. Finally the man with the big jacket laid still and the other slowly stood up.

  “RICHARD!” Alicia yelled in disbelief.

  Roy picked himself off the ground and dusted his hands. The motionless picture was broken as a group of four strangers piled out of a parked car across the street and charged at Richard. Richard spun around and spotted Roy and Alicia. He reached them in two steps, “here please take this.” Richard dropped a metal object into Alicia’s palm.

  The object was a brown metal with a tinge of rust thrown through it. It had a handle that was in a simple T-shape and the other end looked like a spark plug but with a small coil of thin wire protruding out from it.

  “It’s a key,” Richard said then pleaded. “Please you must take it to the others. I cannot overpower all four of them but I can hopefully give you enough time to get away.”

  Alicia paused, frozen. Not believing she turned her back on all this and now it was placed straight back into her hand.

  The four men bore down.

  Alicia closed her fingers tight around the key.

  “Richard smiled, “they will be at Mauritius’s house.”

  “I really hate you, you know that,” Alicia said. “Be careful.”

  “You too. Run, go,” Richard turned to face the men.

  Alicia and Roy ran. They ran without breaking stride until they were several blocks away and out of breath.

  “We need a lift out of here,” puffed Alicia.

  “I know someone who will give us a lift,” Roy said then pointed to a payphone a short distance away.

  CHAPTER 26

  A small white Nissan darted and weaved through the thin traffic. The car sped along, not fast enough to draw any unwanted attention but quick enough for the three fifteen year olds in the back seat to clasp the door handles to stop them sliding about.

  Tony, Joel and Nadia sat surprisingly calm. The experiences of the past few days had played a part in loosening the strings that controlled their nerves. Joel glanced at the stranger in the driver’s seat in particularly his left hand that rested on the gear stick. His little finger also bore the mark but not as predominate as Richard’s.

  “So you three used the disk, no,” the man said then dabbed at a trickle of blood dripping from his nose with the sleeve to his shirt.

  “Yeah,” Tony said exhaling all his breath to drag the heavy word out.

  The man dabbed at his nose again, made a quick turn to the back then returned his eyes to the road, “And you there the one with no eyebrows. Richard told me the maker appeared to you.”

  In the quick glance back Joel noticed the man’s features for the first time. He had a bulbous nose; no doubt the result of many a beating, large eyes that absorbed everything under a wave of blond hair, a small mouth and a straight angled jaw line. “I just saw his hands.”

  “So did my grandfather.”

  This got Joel full attention and he sat forward in his seat. “He did. What happened? When?”

  “At the start of World War Two,” the man said watching Joel in the rear view mirror.

  “World war two? Your German right?”

  “Yes.”

  Joel’s eyes awoke from a knowing that came from deep within his unconscious mind, “Your grandfather was one of the German scientists taken to America.”

  “My grandfather saw many things but the image of the makers hands were the first. After that he was drawn to the object as a guardian. To protect it from mans desire to use it for destruction. So he helped get the others away from the fuhrer.”

  Nadia cut in, “Away from evil, ha! He went to America and built a bomb.”

  “No, no. he did not go to America straight away he feared for his family’s safety. Just as he was drafted into working for the Nazis with threats to his life, he was kept there by threats to his family. He went to America a little later in nineteen forty five in something that was called Operation Paperclip. That was yet another operation to bring engineers and scientists into America.”

  The driver checked his mirrors, changed lane then made a right turn.

  “He did not go to build weapons, he went to chase the one true dream of his. To stretch man's hand up and touch the stars. He went on to work for N.A.S.A and lead the Saturn five Project.”

  Yoseph took a quick glance back to soak in the kids amazed expressions but was only greeted by blank stares.

  “Saturn Five, the rocket that landed man on the moon.”

  The blank expressions were gone, replaced by only a hint of excitement.

  Yoseph threw his hands up, “Ahh. You kids take too much for granted.”

  Joel sat back in his seat, “how do we protect the disk from misuse? How do we hide from it when it’s all of us?”

  With the car idle at a set of red lights the stranger turned back to the three. A fresh drop of blood bubbled below his right nostril. “Now that answer is up to you three. Please don’t make the wrong choice. I would hate to kill any of you.” The man erupted into a fit of laughter but before the three in the back seat thought the threat was a joke from the man’s sick sense of humor, he tightened his face into an expression that spoke only one meaning, he was serious.

  “Why do you think you are in this car?”

  “To help save the day?” Joel said.

  The man laughed, “You are just kids. You’re here so I can keep an eye on youz.”

  Tony, Nadia and Joel cowered into their seats and the man turned back to the front and drove the car through the green light.

  “Oh. And you again,” the man said cheerfully to Joel. “Did Richard tell you the other myth, No? It was passed down to me by my father. Just like the training and responsibility of the oaf we took to protect the disk. He goes, the one bearer of the disk to see the maker’s face is the one who one day would be the bearer of the final clue that will lead to the last disk.”

  “So what’s the big deal about the last disk?” Tony asked.

  “My friends, the last disk is said to have the one thing that shall save us all from extinction.”

  “Like immortality,” Nadia pondered.

  “No, sorry. It has been named many things, Armageddon, judgment day, the end of the human race.”

  Tony rolled his eyes, “isn’t all that end of the world thing getting old.”

  “It’s the one fear that runs deep into all of our existence.”

  “Yeah right. Maybe in the middle ages where a person’s social intellect peeked at figuring out regular bathing and washing reduced the risk of disease.”

  A short time later of silence the driver sat up in his seat, awoke
all of his senses and slowed the car. “Mauritius Cushly’s house is around the corner. I park here then we walk.” The driver pulled the car over to the side of the road, ushered them out and motioned for them to follow him quietly and slowly.

  They passed a mismatched group of houses. From the delicately manicured front lawns with sculptured bushes and colour splashed flowerbeds, to houses with a collection of rusty cars parked on the front lawns with the letter P pasted on their back windows and four foot high blades of grass and weeds big enough to have trunks and branches; no guessing they’re rental properties.

  The driver now acting scout leader slowed the group down as they reached the house on the corner of Adam Street; the street Mauritius’s house is on. They all peered around the corner of a green leafy hedge fence. Further down and across the street Tony, Nadia and Joel recognized the spot where a few days before they parked with Dave and watched Richard spying badly on the house. They stepped out further and looked down the footpath. There was a collection of cars parked up Mauritius’s driveway and out in front of the house.

  The scout leader swore and pushed them all back behind the hedge.

  “What’s wrong now?” Nadia sighed.

  “They’re there. The others are here already.”

  “Who?” Joel asked on reflex.

  “How did they get here so quick?” Scout leader said to himself then fumbled for his phone in his pocket. “Mauritius is not the only one behind all this. He’s in charge of the retrieval. There’s a collection of equally sinister men who wish to summon the knowledge of the disk.” He dialed with a shaky hand, “military men, scientist, and corrupt members of governments.” He put the phone to his ear. “All with one purpose, to wield a power that they will use to build their own kingdom, if you will.” He waited for the connection to open but got one of the most herd phrase of our modern time, your call could not connected please check number and try again.

  The scout leader swore again, linking profanities together that even surprised the teenagers ears, not knowing some of the words that came out of his mouth could have ever been hyphenated together to make such thought provoking words. He’s not a scout leader, more like a pissed off drill sergeant in a Quinten Taratino film.