Threat warning

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Brother Michael Copley asked, “Are you ready?”

Sister Colleen’s heart skipped in her chest and her stomach tumbled. “Yes” was such a simple word, yet somehow she couldn’t get her mouth to say it. She settled for a nod.

Brother Michael smiled, a dazzling display of perfectly aligned white teeth framed by perfect dimples. Colleen thought he was the most stunning man she had ever seen. From his green eyes to his spiked blond hair to his muscled physique, he was as fine as any movie star.

“Relax,” Brother Michael said. “You are here to be honored, not punished.” He turned to Brother Stephen. “What about you?”

Brother Stephen snapped to attention, his deep-set dark eyes locked on a spot on the opposite wall. With his broad, muscled shoulders and his narrow waist, he seemed to Sister Colleen to be the perfect image of a soldier.

“Couldn’t be readier, sir,” he said.

Brother Michael patted him on the arm. “You can settle down a little, too.”

Beyond the white paneled door that separated her from her destiny, the congregation had been assembling for the last ten minutes. Colleen couldn’t yet see them, but she knew who they were. She could see their faces in her mind, and even knew where each of them would sit. They were a young crowd-average age well under thirty-more male than female, but not by a lot.

They numbered around one hundred souls now, and one way or another, they all worked for the church, whether as factory workers, groundskeepers, doctors, or teachers in the school. They all would be dressed plainly, in blacks or whites or blues, because the compound store only stocked plain cloth. Together, they were the Army of God, servants to the Greater Good, united in their opposition to the evil spawned by the Users.

Until last night, Colleen had never witnessed the evil with her own eyes. She’d had no idea that the lights of vehicles could be so bright, or that the very air could smell rancid from the pollutants they pumped into Mother Nature’s lungs. It was as sickening as it was exhilarating.

Even now, eighteen hours after the assault had ended, it was difficult to believe that she had been a part in such a momentous victory. But for her efforts-and those of her brothers and sisters throughout the Army of God-the Users would continue their assaults without end. Her mission at the Woodrow Wilson Bridge-a span named for a warmonger and a money worshipper-combined with the brave efforts of her brothers and sisters in Kansas City and Detroit had made clear to the world that being a User meant being at war with the righteous. Within days, in a dozen other cities across the United States, the lesson would be taught again and again.

Those who had died at her hands had perished at the altar of the future, martyrs to a cause they did not yet understand, but would when they found their eternal rest. They died in service to the greater good.

She had not yet shared with anyone that horrible moment when the User on the parallel span of the bridge shot at her. She thanked God that Brother Michael had had the presence of mind to order them to wear body armor. Without that, Colleen was certain that she would have died.

“It’s time,” Brother Michael said. There was that smile again. “When you hear me introduce you by name, that will be your cue to enter onto the stage.” He looked each of them in the eye and offer them a kind smile. “Be sure to enjoy your moment, children. You have achieved greatness in the Army of God. No one can ever take that from you. Drink in the adulation. You may never feel so special again, so enjoy it for what it is.”

Brother Michael disappeared through the doors. The instant he was visible from the other side, all noise among the congregation stopped.

“Good afternoon, brothers and sisters,” he said, his voice booming along the twenty-foot-high rafters.

In perfect unison, the congregation replied, “Good afternoon, Brother Michael.”

Brother Stephen opened the door a crack to see what was happening.

Colleen pulled on his sleeve and hissed, “Brother Michael said to wait.”

Brother Stephen pulled his arm away. “He also said to drink in the adulation. I don’t like drinking what I can’t see.”

His words were rebellious, and therefore sinful, but Colleen was pleased to see him doing what she had been so tempted to do. She pressed in behind him.

Brother Michael stood at the edge of the stage, squarely in the beam of light that flowed from the tall windows above the double doors in the front. He held his hands out in a welcoming motion to all, and they similarly reached their hands out to receive his projected energy.

“I am pleased to say that we have achieved our second milestone in our quest to reeducate the Users,” he said.

The congregation erupted in applause and cheers.

Brother Michael gestured for silence, and the congregation quieted. “And I bring sadness from Kansas City. While the mission to the Users’ shopping mall was unquestionably successful, Brother Thomas Ezekiel and Sister Elizabeth Marie were both martyred to the cause.”

Colleen and Brother Stephen exchanged their silent shock. Neither had heard a word of this. A ripple of distress rumbled through the congregation.

“We will miss them both,” Brother Michael went on, “but while we mourn, we must also celebrate. I have heard reports this morning, via the Users’ television broadcasts, that our martyred saints killed ten people and wounded many more before their escape became blocked by the police. Brother Thomas Ezekiel and Sister Elizabeth Marie each fulfilled their destiny, and took their own lives.”

This time, the applause was spontaneous, loud, and sustained.

Brother Michael shouted above it. “No User’s hand touched them. They each remained pure to the end. They entered the kingdom of Heaven with full knowledge that their missions had been accomplished.”

More applause.

“Brothers and sisters, this war has finally begun. The age of sin-the age of lust and greed and idolatry and gluttony-will soon end. For many of you in this room, those under twenty-two, this is a moment for which you have trained your entire lives. The time has arrived to disrupt the flow of so-called commerce and to redirect the river of wealth that flows to the Users, and from them into the pockets of heathens and miscreants throughout the world.

“Brothers and sisters, through my eyes and through my soul, the Lord God has laid this awesome and terrible responsibility upon our shoulders. Yours and mine. Together, we will cleanse the world of the blasphemers. We will shake the Users down to their very bone marrow by bleeding them of their precious money. People will be afraid to visit their stores and to travel their roads. In New York City, the second home of the evil whose primary residence is Washington, D.C., the rich will become poor as their precious investments shrink and become worthless.”

The congregation erupted in applause again, sustained and rolling, until Brother Michael raised his hands.

“As in every war, ours will be fought with blood. The blood of our brothers and sisters will doubtless commingle on the field of battle with the filthy blood of the Users we kill, but remember that each of us is here on this earth for this reason, and this reason alone. When the time to fight comes, I know that you will each do your part. You will use your training, and you will shoot straight and you will show no mercy.”

Brother Michael paused as he let those words sink in. He walked all the way to the front end of the altar.

When he spoke again, his voice was barely a whisper, yet somehow every word resonated. “If it is God’s will that you die in this noble struggle, then so be it. But do not believe for a moment that ours is a suicidal struggle. Your duty, when at all possible, is to return here to the compound, to your home. To the Army of God.”

He paused again. “I care for you,” he said. “Each of you is my brother or my sister, just as you are brothers and sisters to each other. While we lost two of our family in Kansas City, we have two more who have more than fulfilled their mission, and they have returned safely to us. These two heroes, according to Users’ news reports, killed twelve gluttons and idolaters, and wounded many, many more.”

Brother Stephen looked back at Colleen. He was beaming-filled, she imagined with the same bursting pride that bloomed inside her own chest.

“I think he’s about to do it,” Brother Stephen said.

Brother Michael’s voice crescendoed. “Brothers and sisters, I present to you the first two heroes of the war. I present to you Brother Stephen John and Sister Colleen Erin.”

Brother Stephen pushed open the door, and then Colleen found herself somehow on the stage. Surely she had walked, but in the wash of the moment, she couldn’t remember doing it.

She had never heard such applause. To a person, the congregation was on its feet, and many of those feet were stamping against the floor. She heard whistles and cheers, and some of the congregants clapped with their hands over their heads.

The cheering was still shaking the walls when Brother Michael stepped behind them both and placed his hands on their shoulders. He leaned in until his lips were inches from their ears and he said, “Smile, give a big wave, and walk off the stage.”

There was a firmness to his order that Colleen found startling. Still, an order was an order. She smiled and waved, her hand high over her head, and something about the gesture ignited a new eruption of applause. The noise was still peaking when Brother Stephen led the way back out through the door they’d entered.

When they were alone together in the anteroom, Brother Stephen fell to his knees and threw his hands over his head, his fists balled in triumph. “Oh, my God!” he exclaimed. “Oh, my God, did you hear that? We’re heroes, Sister Colleen. Future generations will talk about us. We’ll be legendary.”

Colleen held up a cautionary hand. “Be careful. Pride is a sin.”

“This isn’t pride, Sister. This is fact. Here, let me show you something.” He reached into his back pocket and pulled out some folded papers. He started to open them, then hesitated.

“What?”

“I committed another sin to get these.”

“What are they?” Colleen knew that it was wrong, but Lord help her, she was intrigued.

“Promise you won’t tell.”

What could it be? Brother Stephen had always been one to skirt the rules, but not Colleen. She was Miss Straight and Narrow. And she had to know. “Okay, I promise.”

Brother Stephen shot a quick glance at the door, then unfolded the pages. “I got these off a computer at the factory.”

Colleen gasped. In the hierarchy of forbidden activities, accessing the computers was up there with fraternizing with Users. The punishment was flogging.

“Do you want to see them or not?” Brother Stephen growled.

Colleen nodded.

He unfolded the pages to reveal pictures of a familiar tableau of bloody mayhem. “The Internet is packed with photos of our work last night,” he explained. “They’re amazing.”

Colleen took the stack-there must have been ten pages, each with three pictures apiece, printed in color.

“Everything with bullet holes in the front of the cars is yours,” Brother Stephen explained. “Everything with the bullets in the back is mine.”

The photos were amazing. “Who took them?” They showed mangled cars, vans, and trucks, riddled with bullets, spattered with blood.

“Everybody,” Brother Stephen said. “Cell phones, cameras, everything. All the Users carry something to take pictures with. They just upload them to the Internet.”

The images were enthralling, unlike anything Colleen had ever seen before. The third page of the sheaf of papers showed the first picture of a corpse. Brother Michael had told them about the damage that would be inflicted by the. 223-caliber ammunition they were firing from their Bushmaster carbines, but until she actually saw the lifeless bodies that they leave behind, there had been no way to fully comprehend it. The bullets cut huge trenches through exposed flesh, and dislodged enormous wedges of skull and brain tissue. Brother Michael’s and Brother Kendig’s movies and the diagrams proved to be entirely inadequate to describe the carnage.

To her utter shock, Colleen found herself unnerved by the images. This was the mission she’d just been hailed for accomplishing, yet seeing the victory reflected in torn flesh and spattered blood made it feel more like a travesty than a victory. Brother Michael had lectured about the fog of war, and of the emotional trauma brought by taking a human life, but Colleen now realized that an enormous gap existed between the theory of killing and the actuality of it.

She felt emotion building in her throat, but she swallowed it down. She had asked to see these pictures, after all; Brother Stephen had given her the opportunity to say no, so whatever discomfort she felt was of her own making, and she therefore had no rational reason to object.

Then she turned to the sixth page of the photos, and everything changed. The images there showed two toddlers-they may have been twins-dead in their car seats, torn apart by bullets. Something inside of her caught, the way a fish bone catches in your throat. The bullets had entered from the front of their car.

“Now that’s disgusting,” Brother Stephen teased, but his tone was still triumphant. “That’s some wild shooting, Sister Colleen. This is the most famous scene out of the whole thing. It’s on the television news, in the newspapers, on the Internet, everywhere. Not these photos, exactly, because the bodies aren’t in them, but those car seats. Man, you’ve got them pissing in their shoes.”

Footsteps approached the door to the anteroom, and Brother Stephen struck like a snake to snatch the papers from Colleen and stuff them down the front of his trousers.

Brother Michael entered. He scowled. “What are you two doing?”

“Nothing, sir,” Brother Stephen said, a little too quickly, Colleen thought.

Brother Michael’s gaze shifted. “Sister Colleen, do you have something you want to tell me?”

Colleen fought the sudden, inexplicable urge to vomit. “No, Brother Michael,” she said.

His scowl deepened. He had an uncanny way of reading people. “You don’t look well, Sister Colleen.”

“No, sir, I’m fine. Thank you, sir.”

He looked back toward Brother Stephen, and then again at Colleen. “A boy and a girl alone in a room on the day they are recognized for valor,” he mused aloud. “Forgive me if my suspicious mind gets the better of me. Need I remind you of your celibacy vows?”

Colleen blushed, while Brother Stephen looked as if he’d been slapped. Then they both laughed. It felt good to laugh.

“No, sir,” Colleen said. “Not a problem.”

“I remember my vows well, Brother Michael,” Brother Stephen agreed. “No need to worry about that.”

Brother Michael folded his arms and scowled even more deeply. “Well, if not that, then what?”

Colleen caught herself shooting a glance to Brother Stephen, but when she broke it off, Brother Michael had already seen it.

“Interesting dilemma,” Brother Michael thought aloud. “If I press you for an answer, you’ll likely feel obliged to lie. Lying is a sin, of course, and if I put you in that position, then I will be partly responsible for your eternal torment in Hell.” He paused for dramatic effect. “How could I ever live with the guilt?” He winked at Brother Stephen and made a shooing motion with both his hands. “Carry on. Both of you get out of here.”

They donned their coats, and as they opened the door onto the bright sunshine, Brother Stephen patted her on the bottom. She whirled on him, but then he pushed past and headed off to join Brother Zebediah and the other boys he hung around with.

Outside, as the frigid air embraced her, Colleen felt herself trembling. A chill had invaded her, and it was not just from the twenty-degree air. It was as if the warmth that flowed through her veins during the rolling applause had turned to something frozen and ugly. Make no mistake: Brother Michael had just authorized carnal relations between her and Brother Stephen. That was the wink; and once authorized, they could not be denied. Certainly, not by her. She was nineteen now, after all, and she believed that Brother Stephen was twenty-both of them old enough to do their part to populate the Army for the future. And as the offspring of two such heroes, her children would be born into fame. They would be raised with the others in the communal dormitories, but the expectations upon them would be enormous.

Colleen should have felt honored to be coupled with Brother Stephen, but even as a small child, he had been cruel and violent. He preyed on other children under the guise of character-building competition, and the guardians had never interfered.

It had always seemed wrong to her, and while she would never say such a thing aloud lest she invite a flogging, the mother in her could not be denied. Children sometimes just needed to be held, especially when they were small, but after they turned two and they became part of the communal dormitory, such displays of affection were forbidden. To pamper was to encourage weakness, and given the mission at hand, weakness in any form could not be tolerated.

Still, when the younger children became overwhelmed by their schooling and their training, they knew that they could turn to her, and that she would be there for them, not to encourage weakness, but to help them find the pathway to strength when their resolve was sometimes shaken.

Marriage did not exist within the Army because marriage implied ownership of relations. Women between the ages of twenty and thirty were expected to bear children, per the designs of Brother Michael and the Elders, and once weaned, the children became the communal property of everyone. She would lie with Brother Stephen at a time of his choosing, and she would accept his seed, but she prayed that he would at least be gentle.

As Colleen wandered across campus among her fellow soldiers, she became aware that something had changed. She was a killer of innocent children whose crimes consisted of being born to parents who drove along the wrong bridge at the wrong moment of the wrong day. The images of the ravaged little boy and girl flooded her mind, bringing a rush of emotion. She gagged. That frigid block of ice that had formed in her gut seized and doubled in size.

She knew what was coming, and she didn’t think she could stop it. Desperate for some measure of privacy, Colleen dashed twenty yards to a small copse of pine trees, where she vomited into winter-dead scrub growth that was clustered at its base. Thankful for the cover provided by the thick pines, she sat heavily on the frigid mulch and gave in to the sobs that wracked her body.