A Thousand Years of Darkness: a Thriller (32 page)

“Sure and he listening to you,” Big C said, even more sarcastically. “You won’t see Homies enforcing the No Protest law against
them
.”

Judy sat glued to her chair, eyes wide and mouth open in astonishment. “I feel like something done walked over my grave,” she murmured.

“A shadow has fallen across the nation’s grave,” Sharon said. “This is the beginning of the end of the United States of America if these people have their way. There are powerful forces in the world coordinating to take America down and destroy the Western way of life, planned and deliberately instigated—border problems, a sieve that is overwhelming our culture with illegal immigrants who have no motivation to become part of the melting pot, some of whom are terrorists biding their time; a national debt that cannot ever be repaid and which will soon destroy our economy; wide distrust of government and each other; energy problems that can be solved internally by drilling offshore and in our own coal and oil resources but won’t be; wars on two fronts; terrorist threats; political correctness; Islam extremism growing within our own country; a collapsing financial system, causing recession and unemployment; and, increasingly, enemies within. We could weather any of these things alone, but not all of them coming on us at the same time. The collapse of the dollar is the end game if the goal is to destroy America. Jerry Baer tried to warn people what was happening.”

“And people didn’t believe him—and they won’t believe you,” Nail said, grunting with pain as he shifted in bed. At least the IV had been removed.

Sharon touched his shoulder. “They don’t
want
to believe that a president of the United States would,
could
, do such a thing.”

Big C stood up in exasperation.

“Do any of us
want
to believe it?” Nail said.

Big C sat back down. Sharon resumed where she left off as though rehearsing for her next show.

“For the last several weeks,” she said, “Zenergy researchers, producers and I have been following up on reports of a series of secret international meetings and summits being held inside the United States. Socialists and Marxists from all around the world are attending to discuss the topic of how to bring about the final conversion of the United States to a Marxist nation. George Zuniga, we hear, is the major player behind the gatherings. People will have to wake up and believe if we can discover where these summits are being held and somehow get inside one of them to expose it.”

Nail reacted sharply. “It’s too dangerous.”

“It may be our last chance to stop them,” Sharon shot back.

The exchange left a long, strained silence in the cheap room, punctuated by a barely-audible gasp from Judy. Nail finally broke the hush. “Too bad we all couldn’t go John Galt.”

Sharon managed the ghost of a tired smile. “You
have
been reading.”

“I lost my
Atlas Shrugged
when I got shot. I didn’t finish it.”

“We’ll get you another copy. There’s nothing I’d like better than to find a John Galt sanctuary to disappear to and live a normal life. But there’s nowhere to go. Individual liberty will disappear off the face of the earth if we lose this fight. It’ll be the dark ages of
1984
forever. Big Brother will triumph.”

Food Prices Spark Riots

(Miami)—
Continuing high unemployment and a spike in food prices triggered deadly rioting overnight in Miami, Seattle, Kansas City, and other cities across the nation. Angry young people rampaged through Miami’s Liberty City district, throwing stones, looting shops and drawing police gunfire that killed at least nine people...

Chapter Fifty-Seven

Washington, D.C.

Senate Majority Leader Joe Wiedersham summoned his protégé, Dennis Trout, off the campaign trail to attend what he referred to as one of a crucial series of conferences and summits crafted to help prepare selected U.S. leaders for global governance. Trout felt flattered even while he had to double his intake of Maalox to quell the roil of his rebellious stomach. His father, were he still alive, would not be proud of him; his father
believed
in the special character of the American people, the Republic, and the Constitution.

His father had been old-fashioned and idealistic. Times for men like him had passed. It was a New World and anyone who didn’t want to end up in the slag piles had better compromise and latch onto the comet that was sweeping the world.

Dennis Trout tried to think about his father as little as possible.

Wiedersham instructed Trout to report to the Kellogg Conference Center at 9:00 a.m. on Monday. Trout took off from Chicago on Saturday to spend a night with Judy while informing Marilyn that he wouldn’t be home until late Sunday. The only thing Marilyn wanted out of him anyhow was a free ride to the top. Let her sleep with Reggie the pink poodle.

Judy told him nothing about why she had been in New York most of the past week other than that she was looking after a sick cousin. How many cousins did this bitch have? He supposed everyone from Bugfuck, Oklahoma, was cousins to everyone else—some of whom ended up hung in cemeteries.

She seemed more ditzy than before, not quite as puppy-wagging-the-tail as usual. She wasn’t even
that
enthusiastic in bed, which put him in a sour mood and set him to pondering the state of their rather odd relationship.

In Washington, it was accepted that Senators and Congressmen have their little pieces of tail discreetly stashed somewhere in cubby holes they paid for. Although Wiedersham was often critical of the custom on practical rather than moral grounds, Trout suspected his brother-in-law was as disturbed by his
choice
of Bimbos as by a “Bimbo Eruption” per se. Bimbos were more acceptable in Washington society these days after the Clinton Bimbo-on-her-knees-in-the-John era. Providing the Bimbo wasn’t a dimwit hillbilly who probably hadn’t worn shoes until she started school, if she even went to school.

The way things were going—his meteoric rise into the elite governing classes—Trout expected he was going to have to dump his goofy piece of trailer trash sooner rather than later. But not yet.

While he took a hot shower in her grubby little bathroom, drawing it out as long as possible to delay another meeting this morning with Wiedersham, after which he would have to go home to Marilyn, he heard Judy watching a soap or some infantile women’s gab show on TV. He finally forced himself to get out of the water and dry off. He put on a fresh suit, button down pale blue shirt that accented his eyes, a red power tie, and a new pair of Kenneth Cole shoes like the latest fashion display by Wiedersham and his new kiss-ass chief of staff, Justin Cobb. It did no harm to play up a little to his brother-in-law whose coattails he was riding to wealth and power.

Judy looked up from the sofa and smiled when he came out dressed and ready to go. “Don’t you look nice, Dennis.”

She was still in her nightie, a sheer little thing through which was visible the black triangle that had proved throughout the ages to be the bondage of many a man. He felt himself aroused. She had a body that more than made up for her lack of brain.

No time. He turned away and spotted his notebook open on the dinette table next to his briefcase. He had been making a few notes over coffee, but he was certain he shut the book on his way to the shower. He glanced at Judy. She seemed absorbed in her inane program. He noted the passages on open display in his bold, scrawled handwriting before he closed the notebook and stuffed it into his molded leather briefcase.

What I know is that Wiedersham is a ruthless son of a bitch and it pays to watch your back. He sees himself as a king of the world—or at least a prince underneath whoever the king is going to be when this all plays out. I’m not sure from where he receives his orders. I think they come from somebody like that creepy character George Zuniga who has more money and power than God. Joe says even President Anastos gets his orders from higher up.

Things are happening real fast. Joe says the summits will prepare all of us to govern when the time comes...

Judy smiled at him and stretched like a cat, one boob struggling to escape. He shrugged off his suspicions; he must have left the notebook open himself. She hadn’t any more inclination to treachery or deceit than a cow or a sheep. She even lacked normal curiosity.

Marxists Look To Future

(New York)—
Revolutionaries and radicals gather daily at the Brecht Forum Community Center on West Street to pontificate and plan for a future free of capitalism. Activists, agitators and community organizers join together for classes on “Josef Stalin: The Vision;” “The Principles of Mao;” and “Freedom after Capitalism is Gone.” On game nights, regulars put aside their copies of Marx and play a Marxist version of Monopoly called “Class Struggle.” In a nation grown increasingly cynical, the New York Times reports, the Brecht Community Center is a “surprisingly open and idealistic place...”

Chapter Fifty-Eight

Washington, D.C.

Armed AmeriCorps guards manned all entrances to the large Kellogg Center where The International Summit on Social Justice was being held. Flags of socialist and Marxist governments blazed on the stage, as well as the flags of nations bent on going that direction. China, Russia, North Korea, Cuba, Venezuela, Iran... Greece, Nicaragua, Jordan, Britain, the United States... Delegates arrived solemn and reserved and spoke in low tones in various languages, as though to prevent being overheard by spies. Interpreters at banks of microphones to one side of the stage stood ready to translate conference speakers.

An AmeriCorps officer properly vetted for inside duty ushered Majority Leader Joe Wiedersham and future Congressman Dennis Trout to front row seats reserved for international spokesmen, organizers and other VIPs, an indication of Wiedersham’s status. Wiedersham had been selected to open the summit and introduce President Anastos, who would speak via remote from the White House. It was considered too risky for him to appear in person and chance being linked to the gathering by Zenergy News or some crafty rightwing blogger. The U.S. flag flying next to those of China and North Korea seemed to Trout to be a
fait accompli
that America was next to fall in line.

As the two politicians took their seats, Wiedersham said, “My sister called this morning. She said you left before she was awake.”

Fuck Marilyn.

The guy knew how to irritate Trout’s ass off. That fucked-up little bark that served as laughter but was not quite laughter. His expensive duds that always looked as though he had slept in them. The narrow, mocking eyes and blubbery jowls... Part of Trout’s irritation today rose from Wiedersham’s refusal to tell him in advance what the summits were about, other than in general terms of “preparing to govern.” Everything about the conferences was classified
Top Secret:
who attended them, where they were held, even that they
were
being held, topics discussed... If word leaked out prematurely, Wiedersham said, it could be explosive enough to set back the movement for months.

Trout looked around for the spooky dude with the spooky East European accent and located him sitting on-stage in the center of a mixed-nation delegation. Even though George Zuniga was backing Trout’s campaign, the guy still gave him the creeps. Zuniga was the man known for having broke the Bank of England and, Wiedersham said, would do the same to the U.S. Federal Reserve to open the way for the collapse of the United States and the ascent of a New World Order. Like so many of the Progressives Trout had met through his well-connected brother-in-law, Zuniga was a narcissistic sonofabitch who pretended to know better than God how the world should be run. Trout recalled a Zuniga quote from a Progressive publication:

“It is sort of a disease when you consider yourself some kind of a god, the creator of everything, but I feel comfortable about it now since I began to live it out.”

Wiedersham rose and stepped to the podium on-stage and lifted both hands as though to part the waters.

“We are in a fight for the minds of men,” he was saying when Trout’s wandering mind finally focused, “for the conquest of their convictions and hearts, to open the eyes of the intelligent few to the possibilities of regimenting the public mind that all the planet may be able to thrive. In order to get things like universal health care and free education and decent standards of living for people in Bangladesh as well as in the United States, we are going to have to redistribute the pie so that everyone can have social justice...”

Trout doubted Wiedersham gave a flying fuck about “social justice” unless it was defined in terms of political power. Wiedersham continued.

“The governing classes must rise to lead and make the tough decisions that can save the world from disaster and that will lead to peace and prosperity for those most deserving. Global governance is the answer to the social, climate, economic and population challenges this generation faces. An international order is within our reach for the first time in the history of mankind...”

Trout had to admit that his brother-in-law was a gifted orator. One could almost overlook his rumpled appearance and abrasive character.

“It is therefore with great honor that I introduce Patrick Wayne Anastos, President of the United States. President Anastos can do more than speak the truth. President Anastos knows how to
be
the truth. He is an evolved leader who will bring evolved leadership to the United States and to the world...”

The President’s image flashed onto a huge screen in a bigger-than-life telecast from the White House. The familiar Presidential Seal on his podium had been replaced with Anastos’ campaign shield featuring its iconic “A” logo emblazoned against a field of stars and stripes, under which appeared:
Vero Possumus.