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Page 15.
 "We are a brokerage, as Alecto already told you. We like to think of ourselves a mission, rather than a business."
Was that an Afrikaans accent?
"What is your name?" Louis demanded.
"I am Dr. Night." The name had a faint electric charge to it when spoken, breaking apart and drifting away like dread, icy ions in the gloomy ceiling light.
Cartouche sat stunned, digesting this bizarre information. Had he died and gone to hell?
"I am Dr. Night, supreme operating authority of Underworld. Or, as the world will come to know us, Black Umbrella. Blum, for short, which is coincidentally German for Flower. A very black flower, if I may say so.” The disembodied voice shivered with underwatery chuckles that rippled around Louis. “We are a force the world's ruling corponations cannot deny. We represent all of the world's dispossessed, the outsiders, the defeated, the outraged, the runners in cities at night, those who sleep in forests or desert tents, those who endure the elements in hope of being restored to what is historically theirs."
Cartouche recognized the voice now.
Blechstein! Can it be?
Could this be the man Blechstein from the conference screen at the Villa Caproni? It must be Blechstein. How could this be? Perhaps he was speaking in Palermo, and his voice emerged here in Agrigento on a one-way video hookup. He could see Louis, but Louis could not see him.
“Do you recognize my voice, Louis?”
“Yes. I think so. Mr. Blechstein.”
“Very good. That’s rich. Actually, Blechstein was just a useful little man who died long ago. I borrow names and personas as I see fit. You will never know who I really am, nor will you ever need to. You will simply think of me as Dr. Night.”
The disembodied voice paused to let that sink in, and then continued: “I see all sorts of thoughts and schemes flickering across your eyes. I have metrics all around you, to look into your soul through your eyes, your skin, your heart beating in your chest. Everything about you is being monitored.” Each of Dr. Night’s sentences trailed off in echoes, like ripples across chilly water at night. "I cannot be defeated, Mr. Cartouche. In case the world ever tries to rise against me—I am only one man. They can kill a thousand of me, and a new Dr. Night will always stand in the next day. The same goes for my chief of operations, Alecto."
"Erin?"
"Yes. She has many names. She is formidable in beauty and intelligence. Thou art beautiful, O my love, as Tirzah, comely as Jerusalem, terrible as an army with banners— Solomon 6:4 Song of Songs. She is terrifying and powerful like Virgil’s Alecto in the Aeneid. Yet she can be replaced by a woman of equally wonderful capabilities. We have already chosen her line of successors. Their names are inscribed in our books—Hanne, Elizabeth, Aoi, Aleksandra, Genet—our list of names and ultra-gifted candidates is not long, but illustrious."
At that moment, in a distant maze of hallways, another beautiful woman swept by. "Case in point," said Dr. Night. "Alex Nolenta, the next Alecto if something happens to Erin Yes." The woman was shorter, but wiry, dressed in a martial arts gi, and carrying Okinawan style bladed weapons. She disappeared into a distant corridor. Dr. Night continued: "My principal Furies are Alecto, Tisiphone, and Megaera. They avenge capital crimes against humans, while a fourth deity, Nemesis or Invidia, avenges insults to the gods. They have snakes for hair, and men turn to stone just looking at them."
"Like Medusa," Cartouche said. Medusa (her Latin name) was the best-known of these three sisters whose collective name meant 'horrid.' He raised a silvered cup to sip water. Little Tissy from Belgium had not had snakes for hair. If anything, she had turned him to jelly.
"Yes. As with the Gorgons—who are also Underworld or Chthonic daemons—you turn to stone just by looking at them. The bite of their serpents can kill just as swiftly."
That did it. "I already have a nice contract with Global Anaconda, and I am quite happy."
"I’m sure you are."
"You brought me here to negotiate?"
Dr. Night's tone was surprised. "Oh no, Mr. Cartouche, I never negotiate. I do not ask, or beg, or bargain, nor do I spend much time contemplating what my instinct dictates. I am a decider. I simply decide, and then I do. Very simple, and always effective."
"What do you want from me?"
"Nothing, Mr. Cartouche. I already took what I decided to take."
"Me?"
"No, Mr. Cartouche. Your OST technology. It is mine now."
"But Global Anaconda—."
Dr. Night emitted a little snort. "Global Anaconda was once my employer, Mr. Cartouche, but they are one-dimensional business people, as all corponations are by nature and definition. Their best people are motivated by greed, ambition, competitiveness, and selfishness. Their perfume is the sweat of greed and fear. They embody the single goal of any corponation. Every student of business learns this. It is to maximize the wealth of its shareholders, the people who hold common or preferred stock. Legally, just as the corporation is a person—without any heart—so the corponation is a state without a soul. The corporation is a heartless entity, piloted by amoral people, who have no connection with religion, patriotism, or virtue of any sort, which are the snake oils they peddle to the sincere and gullible millions. They own the media, and massage receptive minds with slick advertising and distorted news reports. They tranquilize the masses with entertaining dramas filled with repressed sex and violence. They are owned by a tiny minority, who control the masses through their vast wealth and ownership of the means of power. They manipulate facts so that their lies become truth itself. That is where I decided to go my own way, finally, for a life motivated by my personal idealism."
"You want to save the world, is that it?"
"No, Mr. Cartouche, I want to own the world."
Louis Cartouche's jaw dropped as he stared at the six foot logo overhead.
"The world cannot be saved, Mr. Cartouche. It is composed of idiots. Why else have we had all these wars, while tens of thousands of children die from preventable diseases every day? So many horrors and evils could be cured if amoral predators did not always rise to the top in human affairs. It is the Human Condition, Mr. Cartouche. It is a law of nature, and cannot be changed, any more than a zebra can change its stripes or a spider can run from its own web. Reality is the highest ideal, Mr. Cartouche. I can do a much better job of running the world than kings, presidents, or CEOs. There will be no more predators, no more ruling class, no more wars and oil barons and liars in the media. There will only be myself, Dr. Night, and a grateful humanity. I will distribute the wealth so that every human being will have food, and health care, and freedom from fear. They will be my power base, and nobody will be able to say no to Dr. Night."
The man's filtered voice seemed to emanate from all around, from thin air. Dr. Night continued: "Your excellent technology gives me a great leg-up on my quest. With a few adaptations and technical enhancements, Orbital Sniper Technology will help me become master of the earth."
Madness, thought Cartouche. There could be no debating with this crazy man. What had he said in Palermo? A great technology…in the right hands…but if it falls into wrong hands…
"History, Mr. Cartouche, is filled with vanished peoples, exiled dynasties, lost causes, toppled kings, forgotten emperors, and suppressed religions burning to rise again. The world is what we know, but its shadows are delineated with phantom provinces, sleeping kingdoms, shadowy realms awaiting rebirth. Our science books speak of extinct species, lost seas, sunken continents, deserted islands, forgotten valleys, Loch Ness monsters, ghost cities like Petra, last refuges like Machu Picchu that are haunted by dead kings and queens, by spirits of what might have been.
"My intention, when I left Global Anaconda, was to found a new organization such as the world has not seen since Grandmaster Hasan-i Sabbah founded the Assassins, a secret society in Syria and Persia, around the time of the First Crusade, about 1,000 years ago. Like the Jedi masters in the movies, they were perfect masters who vanished from an imperfect world, but their name is still a synonym for divine terror. You might call it shock and awe, without the ignorance, lies, and bungling. Without the stale, fetid stench of greed on unwashed skin."
Madness, Cartouche thought, but no surprise. He should have realized that a technology like OST would attract the craziest of people.
"Your OST fits our bill perfectly, Mr. Cartouche, which is why we shall harness it to our purposes. I offer you one of two choices for your future. You must make your decision before rising from that chair. Either you turn your back on Global Anaconda and join us as a comrade in arms, or you will die before you stand up. Do not rise until I know your choice, or you will die instantly."
As a warning, twin energy beams streaked down from the ceiling, one on each side of Louis. The beams sizzled visibly in the air, stirring up fine wires of light and dust at thirty or forty feet in the air. Within the same second, the empty armchairs on either side of Cartouche exploded in smoke and flames. Had anyone been sitting there, they would have been burned alive, as if spontaneously combusting.
"A little warning to prod your logical processes. Think carefully, Mr. Cartouche."
Cartouche weakly raised one hand in submission, while crouching to one side in his seat. With his free hand, he palmed his lower face in terror. Smoke roiled around him, and he coughed with the seats' choking plastic smoke.
Powerful air conditioners sucked wounded air from the hall.
Alecto strode back into view. She walked as erectly and gracefully as ever, while holding a small but deadly looking black automatic. She aimed the gun at Cartouche from close range, just ten feet away. "What's it going to be, Mr. Cartouche? On the count of ten, live or die. One."
"It will be a quick, painless, clean death," Dr. Night said consolingly.
"Two," Alecto said.
"Good choice, either way," Dr. Night said.
"Three," Alecto said. Her lovely face was impassive, and showed no hesitation.
Dr. Night said: "If you choose to live, we'll start with a nice dinner, and company for the night."
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Copyright © 2018 by Jean-Thomas Cullen, Clocktower Books. All Rights Reserved.
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