CHAPTER 34
~T-minus 0:49~
The time of judgment was drawing near - one hour to midnight, one tick of the cosmic clock until that grand event. The campus of Jameson Labs was putting its best foot forward as it rolled out the carpet for the gala to precede Joshua Jameson's moment of truest glory. A row of searchlights illuminated the road leading to the laboratory, a stretch dotted at regular intervals by checkpoints. The abandoned shops and run-down apartments that lined the road (the ones that were meant to be reinvigorated by the money the lab would attract) had been given a hasty makeover to conceal the blight that marred the otherwise pristine thoroughfare. The parking lot was filled with news vehicles and luxury cars, the reporters and VIPs waiting for their admission into the facility. Then there were the guards - stone-faced men in green body armor, armed with shotguns and automatic weapons, positioned through the crowd in such lopsided numbers that a casual observer might mistake them for the honored guests. It was a curious atmosphere, less a scientific milestone than a happening somewhere between an exclusive film premiere and a military procession in a failing state.
Meanwhile, a short distance away, Kiyama Hill was decked out in its own party best, ready to greet the final conflagration. What was normally an inconspicuous incline covered in buffalo grass was shining in the dark, wrapped over many times with lights, its own overpowered floodlights carving an unmissable path through the night sky. Beneath the lights was a fifteen-foot banquet table bearing food enough to last a solid week and flanked by a sizable charcoal grill and a pair of large coolers. Opposite the lab, a pair of speaker towers - supported by a ring of smaller soundboxes - belted out a steady mix of radio-friendly music, loud enough to be audible down on the street and beyond. At the edge of the lights in the deepest part of the shadows a collection of blankets and mismatched lawn furniture encircled a ring of stones and ash, the surrounding brush cleared in preparation for a bonfire.
Everything was set for a party, lacking for nothing except the people. There was no crowd here - not a hundred-fifty people or a hundred, or fifty, or twenty, or even ten. There was but a single figure on the hill, the lone man who had planned the entire event - the Prophet of Patmos, the loser crowned a hero, now nearing the moment of his own triumph. He sat in the midst of it all, surrounded by the fruit of his labors, a bag of potato chips in one hand and an ever-growing pile of crumpled beer cans by the other. His eyes drifted to his watch, then around the empty hill, then to the town, and with a heavy sigh he reached for another beer.
Will seethed whenever he looked at the town, those rows of lights completely overwhelmed by the brilliance of Jameson's folly. For the first hour and a half, he convinced himself that people would still come, that they were biding their time, putting their own houses in order, following through on their plans to arrive fashionably late. Now, with the zero hour so close and the streets devoid of life, there were no doubts left. No one was coming. So he sat, attended to by his sound system and unused fire pit and mountains of food, and cursed at the town - silently at first, but growing ever louder with each drink, with each tick of the clock.
"Yeah, they'll show up. Just give 'em a little longer. It'll be a blast. They'll show up just to spit in the old man's eye, just like before." Will turned his eyes to the heavens and screamed. "Cowards! Hey, isn't the town supposed to back its hero? Isn't that how this movie always ends, you flock out in support? Oh, what's that? I'm supposed to swoop in and save you all? The loser? The moron? Your last hope? Well, that ain't me! But at least I have the goddamn nerve to come up and look death in the eyeball! You assholes just want to watch it on TV, but I'm here, just like I promised!"
Stumbling to his feet, Will pulled the last beer from a six-pack and tossed the plastic rings aside. "Did you see that everyone? I just threw that away! I'm shitting all over nature! Don't you care? It's your world I'm trashing! Don't you care? Don't you care about anything?"
Will leaned heavily against the table, the lightweight plastic shifting from his weight, and watched the road below. A single car appeared on that road, effortlessly clearing each checkpoint in the blink of an eye. There was no doubt who this was - Joshua Jameson, the emperor himself, arriving to inaugurate his latest world-disrupting project.
"Oh, look at that. Look at all the peasants stepping out of the great Josh Jameson's way. Bet you're real proud of browbeating everyone, huh? You got your way, just like you did every time you had one of your super-good billionaire ideas." Will opened the beer can, pouring half the liquid down his throat and swallowing in one loud froggy gulp. "Well, I'm winning too, you know. I'm getting my way. What did I say? I said, I'm gonna have a party and watch the world blow up, and you made fun of me, but I'm here, and I'm watching this thing. I'm watching it all go boom. And it's gonna be great! You'll see! You'll..."
The can slipped from Will's slackening grasp and he buried his face in his hands. The solitude, the enormity of the situation - they had settled upon him at last. The spectacle, no matter how tremendous it might be in the moment, was hollow in light of what was transpiring at that very moment - life, in all its varied and vivid forms. It would be gone in an hour, nothing left to take its place but ash and ghosts and memory.
A mad laugh tore out from Will's mouth. "This is why you did it, right, Derek? Oh God, this is why you took all that time. It took that much time to find what was pretty here, but you did it, right? You did it. Goddamn, it was a glorious thing. A glorious thing."
Will lurched to the sound system console. "Goddamn it, where's the radio tuner on this thing?" After a few seconds of fumbling, the music faded, replaced by a reporter's steady, even voice:
"...forty-seven minutes from now, the promises of Project Rudra will be put to the test. Five minutes ago, the project technicians announced that they had formally finished the last round of safety checks and the activation awaits only Joshua Jameson's order. It is unusual for a businessman to have such a personal level of involvement in a scientific test, even one of this magnitude, but Mr. Jameson has taken a personal hand in guiding this project since the beginning. He has described it as his legacy, what he hopes to be his great contribution to civilization. Some of the lab personnel, speaking off the record, told me that they hope that Mr. Jameson's presence will help calm the controversy that has haunted this project for the past week. Certainly, the security here suggests that lab personnel are prepared for an act of violence, although I am assured that no specific risks have been identified."
"Mr. Jameson has just passed through the outer perimeter and met with Dr. John Bellamy, the administrator of this facility. In a few minutes, he will deliver a short address, and..."
Will flicked off the sound system. "All of this over a generator, huh? My ass. Yeah, I know you news parasites. Probably hoping for a riot, get some nice footage of a bunch of hicks getting shot to bits. That'd be perfect, right? Just what you want, huh? You can carry it live. Death and mayhem, right to your home, right to your pocket. Next best thing to the end of the world. A nice little appetizer." He reached for one of the whiskey bottles, twisting the cap free. "Yeah, death and mayhem. Always makes things nice and exciting."
"William Scarborough?"
At the sound of the voice, Will spun around, thinking for a second that the crowd had finally arrived. Instead, he found himself face to face with a four-man Jameson Labs team, all of them toting high-powered firearms. "Yeah?" he said, eyeing the men closely. "What did I do this time, huh? I was just standing here."
"Mr. Scarborough, please-"
"Seriously, why can't you guys leave me alone?" Will turned from guard to guard, wagging his finger at each one. "I never tried to stop you. I didn't leak anything. Why can't you just keep out of my life and knock off the harassment, huh?"
"Mr. Scarborough!"
"Sorry, I was being a jerk there. Just the booze talking, you know how it is. Sure, you can join the party. You want something to eat? I didn't bother with the meat, but we got pretzels and cupcakes and liquor...well, let's start with the liquor." Will waved the whiskey bottle at the armed men. "How do you boys want it? Straight or with cola? And how much ice? I've got a ton."
One of the guards took a cautious step forward. "Mr. Scarborough, we aren't playing around. You need to come with us."
"Or what, you'll shoot me?" Will slapped his open palm over his heart. "One shot, one kill? What, you got a gun you're gonna shove in my hand afterward?"
"Mr. Scarborough, we've got your confederate. He's talking to us already."
"What confederate? What are you talking about?" said Will. "I just wanted to have a party, you assholes started this."
"We're talking about Dr. Yang Yizhen."
"I don't know who that is!"
"Don't play dumb. We already knew that he was leaking information to you, plus you're using his devices to circumvent our security protocols. Now, we're done negotiating." The guard pulled a pair of handcuffs from his belt. "Mr. Scarborough, you're to come with us. Now will you come voluntarily or do we have to subdue you?"
"Take me where?" said Will.
"To the laboratory," said the guard. "Dr. Bellamy's orders."
"Are you kidding?" screamed Will, so lost in outrage that he barely noticed the weapons trained on him. "You're no cops! You can't arrest me! And you damn sure can't lock me up. I have rights."
"Mr. Scarborough, we have police powers. In ten seconds, you're going to find out just what we're allowed to do. Now, you are to be brought to the laboratory to be detained and debriefed. Dr. Bellamy is taking this very seriously, as is Dr. Richter."
Will staggered back, the whiskey bottle slipping free from his hand. "Dr. Richter is here?"
"Yes, he is. Now..." The guard nodded to the others, who quickly moved to flank Will. "...are you going to come willingly, or do we have to subdue you?"
"No, I'll go," said Will. "But if I'm not back to watch the show in forty-five minutes, I'm going to be very mad."
"Extend your hands."
"You're going to handcuff me anyway?"
The guard stared coolly back at Will. "Your hands."
Will sighed and dutifully extended his arms, wrists together. "You're not going to put a bag over my head, are you?"
"Shut up." The guard slapped the handcuffs on Will. "You make a scene, we'll shoot you. That's a promise."
Will let out a morbid laugh. "Won't that look funny with the cuffs on?"
"You want to find out?"
"Hey, it's your game," said Will. "You wanna drag me past the cameras with a gun in my back, knock yourself out."
"We're not going in the front."
"There's a back route?"
"Shut up." The guard signaled to the rest of the team. "All right everyone, quickly and quietly. They gave us eight minutes to get him in."
The guards led Will to the perimeter wall, cloaked in the gloom cast by the hill. One guard lifted his hand to an unseen panel - there were a few muted electronic beeps and a hidden door opened. Out front, just within earshot, Mr. Jameson was beginning his address.
"Ladies and gentlemen, natives of the Midwest, from the coasts, and from around the world, we stand now at the gate to a better world..."