Sean Col found the envelope on the hotel room’s dresser when he woke. In it, a lovely hand-drawn calligraphic design crissed and crossed on good stiff paper. He took his picture of it with his phone, then held it up to the mirror and took a picture of the reflection.
He emailed it to Emily. Military Liaison Enterprises, MLE.
He received a number from them at once and entered it into the decoding algorithm. The pattern and its mirror image yielded the clear phrase: I SEE LIGHT ETERNAL.
The ISLE protocol. No man is an island. John Donne.
It was a hit, then. A kill. Wet work.
Again.
Col burned the paper and envelope. His phone cleared itself, part of the algorithm. A quick shit, shower, and shave set him up for the day. He dressed in local casual, which he found in the satchel he found in the closet.
Invisible maid service.
Reeboks, Hanes socks and underwear, Levi jeans, and a Nike wicking polo shirt under a Brooks Brothers windbreaker. All shades of blue. Matched his eyes, currently.
He left the satchel in the room with yesterday’s clothes. Emily would collect them, or destroy them. Abandoned equipment didn’t matter. Sean Col existed in a bubble of now. Expedience gave him momentum.
He rode the elevator down. In the lobby his phone buzzed.
An address appeared on it for three seconds, went black.
He stepped outside. His phone buzzed three times. West. He started walking. He moved briskly, a man with an appointment perhaps.
His phone would vibrate when he got near the target. He’d see an image on the phone, which would allow three seconds study before disappearing. For now, the address was his target.
Emily would refine things for him. Zero him in.
Sunny, light breeze, windbreaker weather, a lovely June day in Omaha, Nebraska, North America. Sean Col felt his phone buzz once and turned north. Professional people in nice clothes clumped at corners, waiting to cross with the light. Tall buildings surrounded them.
He crossed and the phone buzzed three times again. West it was. He turned left and walked along under trees. To his right, behind a waist-high wall, children slid down slides in a park. Water held regal geese as sun glittered from wavelets. Shade gave way for a few yards, making Col squint. A man passing the other way nodded, mistaking the squint for a smile.
Col tensed, then relaxed. Just a man.
He saw a woman in a sun hat watching him from the middle of a wooden bridge over the park’s canal. Her hands were visible so he put her down as a gawker. Maybe he reminded her of a lover.
Another buzz from his phone turned him north at the end of that block. He walked with a four-lane street to his left. To his right the park’s water gleamed like polished metal.
From there he had a commanding view of the park. Gene Leahy Mall, it was called. Families sat on sloping grass. Kids fed geese bread. Old men leaned on the wall, people watching.
Great sniper spot, he thought, but he saw others that would hide a sniper better. For that matter, too many high buildings offered countless lines of sight. The back of his neck wasn’t tingling so he kept walking.
At the corner, two buzzes. He turned eastward, walking past a fountain into shade. The park’s water was now to his right. To his left, two lanes, across which, the Holland Center for Performing Arts. Beyond that, down the block, older buildings stood proudly in various states of refurbishment. Far down, the street became a highway and arched high, headed toward the Missouri River, longest in North America.
Beyond that, Iowa sprawled.
In the middle of the block, to Col’s right, a paved path veered from the sidewalk, sloping upward to a gazing area. His phone buzzed four times; head south. He turned onto the path, mounting the low hill.
He got to the top and his phone buzzed longer. He looked at it, saw a face for three seconds.
It was an image of the man sitting on a park bench at look-out point. The bench sat well back from the low wall enclosing a small square area paved with square tiles.
Col walked away from the man, went to the wall, and looked down at the water, at the people by it, at the people across the water. An archway he’d passed on the opposite side had an ice-cream vendor setting up his trailer, with kids already gathering.
Col turned to lean his rump against the wall. As if resting.
He faced his target.
The man was heavyset, older. Grey hair, expensive glasses with minimal frames. He wore a suit with a vest. He looked into Col’s gaze and smiled, nodding. “Thought so.”
No weapon had been presented. Col waited, trusting MLE.
The target patted the bench beside him. “Have a seat. I won’t struggle.”
Col stayed put. “Fatalistic?”
The man shrugged. “Had a good run. Knew how it’d end.”
“Measured life.” Col’s hand went to his phone. It remained inert. Conversation was never part of such work. He wondered what was going on. His hackles weren’t tingling yet, so he remained leaning on the wall. “We don’t mean it personally.”
“I know. I don’t take it personally. It’s necessary.”
“Philosophical view.”
The older man chuckled. “It’s all connected. We know that. No man’s an island unto himself. We are all involved with actuaries.”
Sean Col didn’t say anything. Let him vent.
“It’s a matter of accumulated information. There’s a threshold. One datum too many and wham.” He slapped his hands together, hard. The sharp sound caused a bird to fly from a nearby shadow.
Col saw that the bird was a hawk. It dipped toward the ground between two pine trees, plucking up a mouse in its talons. He watched the hawk glide gracefully across the road just over the traffic and bank toward an empty lot, bushes. The mouse hadn’t been thinking about actuarial charts or the tolerated limits of knowledge.
“It’ll happen to you, too. Happens to all of us. Well, all on this plane.”
Col thought about airliners. Where would he fly next?
The man reached into his jacket.
Col tensed, ready to dodge.
Out came a flask. The man took a swig, held it up. “Want some? Forty year-old scotch. Kept the barrel in my cellars. White oak. Vanillin. Phenolic aldehyde. C8H8O3.” He took another swig. “It’s not poisoned.” He held it up again, then lowered it. “No?” He shrugged, took a third swig, smacked his lips, then closed the flask, put it back into his pocket.
“Remember to grab it, once we’ve done our final business. It’s remarkably layered; delicious.”
“I don’t drink.”
The man pursed his lips, altering his fleshy face toward the avuncular. “Flask’s silver, chased with gold. Gold dram cap. Worth a plane ticket, at least. Maybe a week of fine dining.”
Col thought of Satan tempting Jesus and wondered how people bought into such nonsense.
“I can see you’re all business.” Pity glittered in the jaded gaze.
Col wondered if that described him. He tended to think of himself as a weapon. A tool. An extension of Emily’s will. Her reach. In magick, knowledge focused through will informed action that conjured change. Physical change, not wishful delusions. Was this his business? Emily’s?
His phone buzzed.
A picture of a rock, which he spotted at once on the ground to one side of the bench.
Sean Col walked to the bench and sat. “It’s okay.”
“Yes. I know. It’s okay.” The man looked forward, not at Col.
Reaching down, Col took the stone in his hand. He struck without hesitation, hitting the man’s forehead. It caved.
The man jerked back, then pitched forward onto the ground.
Col knelt down and placed the rock under the man’s crushed face, ignoring the stertorous gasps. “Got drunk, passed out, hit yer head.”
He waited by the man. He checked his own hand and forearm for spatter, waiting out the erratic panting. “It’s okay, it’s okay.”
Breathing stopped and a galvanic shudder rippled through the man.
Col wondered if that meant a soul had left the body.
He doubted it. Just nerves. One last flutter.
He walked away calmly and let Emily guide him via phone buzzes to a downtown lobby. As he stood in air conditioning, a taxi pulled up.
His phone gave a long buzz.
He got into the taxi and the driver said, “Airport, right?”
“That’s right.”
“So, whatcha do for a living?”
“I’m an actuary.”
“What’s that?”
Col smiled. “I figure out how likely things are for an insurance company.”
“Pay well?”
It was hard to avoid saying, ‘It’s a living,’ so Col leaned back and told the driver, “I’m thinking of becoming a CPA.”
“A what, now?”
Sean Col laughed. “Certified Public Accountant.” After all, he balanced accounts, didn’t he? Supplied the red that kept things in the black.
“Sounds kinda boring, you don’t mind me saying so.”
“Maybe so.” He held people to account.
Balance, he thought.
Poise.
Worlds within worlds within worlds. Omphalos. Fulcrum for reality. Pivot point on which the world spun.
Every snowflake had a hidden mote of dust but not every snowball had a hidden stone.
“Hidden stone,” he said, aloud. He liked the sound of that, wondering who’d hidden it for him to use.
Emily, of course.
The driver, too busy passing a semi as the cab mounted the soaring highway bridge that took them over the river toward Eppley Airport, didn’t catch or ignored this blurt.
Sean Col found an electronic ticket to San Francisco on his phone and used it to get a boarding pass. He had time for lunch before the flight.
He had a salad and a cup of black coffee.
/// /// ///
