Mercury Revolts: (Book Four of the Mercury Series) Read online

  The demons nodded, having been persuaded of the wisdom of Izbazel’s plan.

  Once he was satisfied the rope was securely tied, Izbazel tied the other end around Nisroc’s waist. The rest of the rope lay coiled on the ground near the boulder. Izbazel had Konrath and Scalzi hold the rope, instructing them to slowly let it out as Nisroc made his way down the slope. “Once you’re in place,” he said to Nisroc, “I’ll pull the rope up and then lower the explosives down and swing them over to you.”

  Nisroc nodded uncertainly, taking the rope in his hands. He began to slowly back down the sheer rock face. “I don’t think I like this very much,” he said.

  Izbazel shrugged. “At least you can see where you’re going.” he said. “Imagine climbing down Washington’s big dome. With Jefferson, it’s a straight shot from his widow’s peak to the tip of his nose. Now get moving.”

  Nisroc grumbled but continued down the granite slope. Soon he had crossed Jefferson’s brow and was making his way down his long, straight nose. When he got to the tip, he stopped, flattening himself against the rock. Down below, he could hear tourists shouting.

  “Don’t stop!” cried Izbazel. “They’ve seen you. We don’t have much time. We’ll lower you another thirty feet or so, and then you need to swing over to Washington.”

  “I don’t think I’ll be able to reach!” yelled Nisroc. “Can’t I just fly?”

  “No!” shouted Izbazel. “No miracles.”

  Nisroc grumbled to himself but allowed them to lower him so that he dangled thirty feet under Jefferson’s nose. He could hear shouting far below.

  “Now what?” he yelled.

  “Swing over to Washington’s shoulder!” shouted Izbazel.

  Nisroc remained hanging from the nose, the rope digging painfully into his midsection. Izbazel had tied it with a slipknot, and every time Nisroc moved, it tightened a little more. He thought he knew what a balloon animal felt like. He worked one of his hands into the loop of the rope to try to widen it, but only succeeded in getting his hand hopelessly stuck.

  “I can’t move!” he gasped. His vision was starting to blur at the edges. “I don’t feel right!”

  “Ugh,” said Izbazel in disgust. “All right, we’re going to have to swing him. Konrath, climb down the nose and see if you can get him going.”

  Konrath clambered down the nearly vertical rock face. When he reached the edge, he lay down, with his left hand clutching the rope and his head hanging over the edge. He reached down with his right arm and began to pull sideways on the rope. Soon Nisroc had begun a slow, back and forth swing.

  “I don’t think I can do this,” groaned Nisroc, whose face had turned a bright shade of purple.

  “Keep quiet and swing!” Konrath yelled at Nisroc, who didn’t have much choice in the matter.

  Soon Nisroc was swinging in great arcs back and forth, like a gnat buzzing across Jefferson’s chin. He was on the verge of losing consciousness.

  “Almost there!” shouted Konrath.

  “Hyeergh,” Nisroc replied. The arc was now bringing him within a few yards of Washington’s shoulder, but there was no way he was going to be able to grab hold of the rock and halt his motion. His fingers had gone numb and he could barely move his one free arm. As he swung over the shoulder, he managed to grab hold of enough interplanar energy to weaken the rope around his waist. It snapped and he fell to the rock. He rolled uncontrollably for several yards, finally managing to get enough control over his appendages to stop before he tumbled off the edge of Washington’s shoulder.

  “No miracles!” shouted Izbazel disapprovingly from atop Jefferson’s scalp.

  Down below, a huge crowd of spectators had gathered, and were watching the exploits of Chaos Faction with great interest. A large black Humvee pulled up and men in heavy tactical gear jumped out. They began working their way up the trail to Lincoln’s left.

  “Hurry!” yelled Izbazel. “Get the rope back up!”

  They pulled the rope up and Izbazel threaded it through the handles of the duffel bags and the loops at the top of the backpacks. He tied the end of the rope to itself, making a loop, and he and Scalzi began to slide the several hundred pounds of explosives down Jefferson’s forehead. Konrath helped the package over the brink of the nose and they lowered it another thirty feet so they could swing it to Nisroc.

  Nisroc, for his part, was sitting with his back against Washington’s lapel, trying not to vomit.

  The load of explosives was considerably heavier than Nisroc, and Konrath had a hard time getting any momentum going. The bags were lazily swinging back and forth in an arc of about three feet.

  “Hurry!” yelled Izbazel, who was watching over his shoulder for the arrival of the cops.

  “I can’t get it going!” Konrath shouted back.

  “Try harder!” yelled Izbazel. “The cops are here!” It was true: the SWAT team had reached the plateau and were cutting across the field right toward them. It was pretty rough going, particularly for guys in combat gear, but it wouldn’t take them more than two minutes to close the distance. Izbazel fingered the radio detonator nervously.

  Konrath had managed to get the load of explosives to swing a bit farther, but he was having trouble keeping the trajectory straight, and the pendulum was still several yards out of Nisroc’s reach. The cops were almost on them.

  Now none of the four assembled demons was particularly bright, but they did each possess some basic mental faculties and a fairly robust sense of self-preservation. And so it occurred to each of them, simultaneously but independently, that what they needed right now was a miracle. Nisroc, Scalzi and Konrath were convinced that Izbazel wouldn’t go along with the idea, and Izbazel didn’t want to admit his plan wasn’t working out. So what happened is that each demon simultaneously harnessed a bit of interplanar energy and gave the pendulum just enough of a push to get it to Washington’s shoulder. These four small pushes combined to form one big push, causing the load of explosives to jerk violently toward Washington’s head. Before Konrath could let go, he was jerked off his feet. He slid off Jefferson’s nose, plummeting to the rocks below. The explosives smacked against Washington’s wig and then fell directly on Nisroc, knocking him flat. The combined mass of Nisroc and the bags then began to slide down Washington’s shoulder. Nisroc, dazed, was unable to do anything but marvel at the sensation of granite sliding under his backside.

  The SWAT team was now within fifty yards of Izbazel, and they were yelling at Izbazel to get on the ground and drop the detonator. Izbazel, realizing that his carefully thought out plan had gone awry, did what leaders generally do under such circumstances: he panicked. Izbazel pushed the button on the detonator.

  A deafening explosion sounded below, accompanied by a shock wave that knocked Izbazel and Scalzi against Jefferson’s hairline. Dazed, the two demons stumbled, lost their balance, and fell forward onto the great statesman’s brow. They rolled head over heels down the forehead, slowed momentarily when they reached the gentler slope of the left eyebrow, and then pitched into the open air, plummeting to join Konrath and what was left of Nisroc.

  Up above, the SWAT team had reached Jefferson’s coif. At the head of the group was a stocky young sergeant named Daniel McCann, who was as well-known in Rapid City, South Dakota for his impressive marksmanship as for his ridiculous handlebar moustache. Daniel stepped to the edge of Jefferson’s hair and peered into the gravelly hillside that led away from the monument. At the bottom of the hill lay the body of one of the terrorists, and two others were rolling down the slope toward him, their limbs flailing crazily. Finally they came to rest as well, and the three lay motionless on the rocky valley floor. Behind a wooden fence a hundred yards or so away, tourists gawked and gasped at the horrifying scene.

  Then something unexpected happened.

  The first of the terrorists to fall slowly sat up and began rubbing his head. The other two were soon moving as well, and after a moment the three of them were on their feet, rubbing bruises and dusti
ng themselves off as if they had just fallen off a hayride. One of the terrorists walked a few feet away and picked up something that Daniel at first took to be a rock about the size of a human head. When the man held it in front of his face and began talking to it, Daniel realized it was, in fact, a human head.

  “Well,” said Daniel, observing the strange scene unfolding below, “that’s not normal.”

  Another man came up from behind and stood next to him. “No,” he replied. “It isn’t.”

  The other man was taller than Daniel, close to six foot two, and had the build of a heavyweight boxer. His skin was a dark chestnut brown and his short-cropped hair was black flecked with gray. Rather than the loose-fitting combat gear of the SWAT team, he wore a precisely tailored dark gray pinstriped suit and aviator-style sunglasses. He wore no badge or nametag, but he didn’t need to. Those who didn’t know his name called him sir. Those who did called him Zion Johnson. Or sometimes Mr. Johnson. Or occasionally sir. Nobody on the mountain knew who Zion Johnson was exactly, or who he worked for, but they all knew he was in charge.

  Daniel brought his radio to his mouth. “Hey, Jim,” he said. “You got these guys?”

  After a moment a voice crackled over the radio. “Say the word and we’ll take ’em out.”

  Daniel glanced at Zion Johnson, who tilted his head half a degree to the left.

  “Stand down,” said Daniel.

  “Seriously?” said the voice over the radio. “We’re going to let these assholes go?”

  “Out of my hands,” said Daniel.

  Daniel and Zion Johnson watched as the three figures fled the scene. One of the men had the fourth’s head under his arm.

  “I hope you know what you’re doing,” said Daniel to Zion Johnson.

  “This is just a distraction,” said Zion Johnson. “Chaos Faction is up to something much bigger.”

  Daniel frowned. “The intel I have says there are only four members of Chaos Faction unaccounted for. And we just let them go.”

  Zion Johnson shook his head. “We didn’t let them go. I’ve got eyes on them.”

  “Oh yeah?” said Daniel. “Funny how your ‘eyes’ didn’t keep them from almost giving George Washington some unnecessary rhinoplasty.”

  “It was a calculated risk,” said Zion Johnson. “Chaos Faction is more dangerous than you think.”

  Down below one of the men lost his footing and stumbled into the man carrying his compatriot’s head. The head slipped from under his arm and tumbled into a ravine below, causing the two men to erupt into loud recriminations while the third man clambered down to retrieve what was left of the fourth.

  Daniel McCann cleared his throat.

  “You’ll see,” said Zion Johnson.

  “Uh huh,” replied Daniel.

  Zion Johnson turned to leave.

  “Your work is done here, huh, Johnson?” said Daniel. “Back to Washington for you?”

  Zion Johnson stopped and looked back at Daniel. “That’s Mister Johnson, Sergeant.”

  “Back to Washington, Mister Johnson?”

  Zion Johnson sighed. “Let me introduce you to a phrase that’s going to come in very handy over the next few days, when the press starts asking questions about what happened here today.”

  “Oh yeah?” said Daniel. “What’s that?”

  “No comment,” said Zion Johnson, and walked away.

  Chapter Three

  Milhaus, Texas; August 2016

  Mercury walked out onto the street, blinking in the bright Texas sunlight. It seemed like a long time since he had seen the sun. How long had he been away from the Mundane Plane? Days? Years?

  He stopped a young man on the street and asked him what the date was.

  “August nine,” said the man.

  “The year!” cried Mercury, gripping the man’s lapel. “What year is it?”

  “Twenty-sixteen!” yelped the man, tearing himself away from Mercury’s grip. He ran off down the street.

  “OK, thanks!” yelled Mercury after him.

  2016, he thought. He’d been gone for almost four years. He wondered how much had changed in that time. He hadn’t seen any flying cars or teleportation pods yet, but this looked like kind of a backwater town. There was some kind of crowd gathered up ahead; he hoped they were handing out Soylent Green. Mercury could go for some Soylent Green, and maybe a Guinness.

  But as he approached, his hopes faded. The people in the crowd were chanting something, and many of them were holding signs and waving them at passing cars. Some of the messages had strange, cryptic phrases on them, like

  RFID IS NOT OK!

  and

  KEEP YOUR CHIPS OUT OF MY BODY

  and

  WE DON’T TRUST MENTALDYNE

  There was a red circle with a line through it superimposed on “MENTALDYNE”, so whatever MENTALDYNE was, it was hard to say whether the protester was against MENTALDYNE or against not MENTALDYNE, making him pro-MENTALDYNE.

  Others had Bible verses. Revelation 13:16 seemed to be particularly popular:

  IT ALSO FORCED ALL PEOPLE, GREAT AND SMALL, RICH AND POOR, FREE AND SLAVE, TO RECEIVE A MARK ON THEIR RIGHT HANDS OR ON THEIR FOREHEADS, SO THAT THEY COULD NOT BUY OR SELL UNLESS THEY HAD THE MARK, WHICH IS THE NAME OF THE BEAST OR THE NUMBER OF ITS NAME. THAT NUMBER IS 666.

  “Oh, man,” groaned Mercury. “Not this again.” Mercury had been through so many Apocalypse scares that he had lost count of them. As he approached the rear of the crowd, he strained to understand what they were chanting. “Hey,” he said, tapping an elderly woman on the shoulder. “What are you guys saying?”

  “RFID is not OK!” the woman shouted in his face.

  “Gotcha,” replied Mercury. The woman turned back to face the street. After a moment Mercury tapped her on the shoulder again. “What’s RFID?” he asked.

  The woman turned around again, now a bit irritated. “Radio… something. Don’t you watch the news?”

  “I’m a bit behind on current events,” said Mercury. “You’re against radios?”

  “Not radios,” the woman spat. “The chips, you know. Mentaldyne.”

  “What’s a Mentaldyne?”

  “They’re the company that makes the chips.”

  “Right,” said Mercury. “The chips. Oh, I think I get it. These chips, they’re made of people, right?”

  The woman stared aghast at him. “What? No! They put them in people. There’s this whole secret government program. They’re already putting them in prisoners and mental patients. They’re going to make us all get them.”

  “Oh, chips!” Mercury cried. “Like tracking devices. But, um, what does the Mark of the Beast stuff have to do with anything?”

  “Wow, you really don’t know anything, do you?” the woman said, shaking her head. “It’s all in here.” She handed Mercury a tract. On the front was a cartoon of a man, woman and child bowing before a hideous horned creature, who seemed to be touching the child on the forehead.

  “What’s this?” Mercury asked, pointing at the picture. “Why is Mr. Gruesome Pants violating Timmy’s personal space?”

  “It’s the End Times!” the woman shouted in exasperation. “Just read it. It’s all in there. The government making us get chips implanted, the great winepress of God’s wrath… Just read it.”

  “OK,” said Mercury. “But just so you know, it isn’t actually the End Times. Trust me. I’ve been through all this. The whole Apocalypse thing, it was a bust. The more I think about it, the more I’m convinced that Apocalypse Bureau completely misread the prophecies. Between you and me, I’m pretty sure all that stuff in Revelation was meant to be metaphorical.”

  “Metaphorical!” the woman cried angrily. “The Bible means exactly what it says!”

  “Except for the part where the Mark of the Beast is actually an RFID chip,” replied Mercury.

  “Huh?”

  “Well, that’s a metaphor, right? It’s not literally a mark; it’s a computer chip. If the Bible was meant t
o be taken one hundred percent literally, it would just say, ‘The government is going to force everybody to get a computer chip implanted,’ not ‘the beast will force them to receive a mark.’”

  The woman stared at Mercury, momentarily dumfounded. “What are you, some kind of atheist?” she finally demanded.

  “Not at all,” said Mercury. “I just think God has a twisted sense of humor. Anyway, good luck stopping the Apocalypse.”

  The woman continued to glare at Mercury as he continued down the street. Man, Mercury thought. Not only are there no flying cars, but people haven’t learned a damn thing. They’re still obsessing over the End Times, just like they were four years ago. And four hundred years ago. Granted, there was some reason to think the world was ending four years ago—a third of the Moon had imploded, after all. That was some scary stuff. Mercury knew first hand just how scary, since he was the one who had imploded it. Only he and a few others knew that it had almost been Earth that had imploded instead.

  Where did people get this crap about RFID chips being the Mark of the Beast? He seriously doubted whether Lucifer had the technological savvy to pull something like that off, even before he was incarcerated. The idea of him masterminding such a scheme like that now was ridiculous. If there was any truth to the claim that the government was putting RFID chips in people, it was probably some completely sensible program to keep tabs on criminals or something. People always got all worked up about the silliest things.

  Less than half an hour on the Mundane plane and he’d already encountered a crazy mob. Was there something about him that caused this kind of crap to happen? Hadn’t he been through enough of that sort of idiocy? Why couldn’t those faux-Satanist knuckleheads have just left him alone? Mercury found himself nostalgic for his early days on this plane, back when everything seemed new and hiding two hundred sweaty Greeks inside a giant wooden horse seemed like a good idea. These days everything was just so… predictable.