Loop Day - Chapter Five
Wikilooks Against Empire
LOOP DAY — A SERIALIZED NOVEL
Two low-level Oval Office aides relive the day of their deaths over and over again, in a doomsday time loop that will end only if they foil the plan to assassinate the President and save the world.
Previously: In the Oval Office, President Tyrump fixates on news coverage of his insane plan to attack both Texas and Mexico. Showing off with his ancestral Bavarian sword, Tyrump stabs Navajo presidential aide Leif Oak in the back. Leif dies but is reborn into the same day by way of a mysterious time loop of which he is newly aware. An extinct giant teratorn haunts Leif in the Rose Garden. Leif’s lover White House kitchen aide Dhyna Durango and Leif both hope to quit covert work for the socialist Resistance in the White House to go live a new life together as growers in Leif’s high desert home. The time loop thwarts their dream, trapping them in the day — the day the world ends. The loop must be broken to survive the day, to save the world, and to escape the Oval Office — unless another cataclysm and time loop forces the lovers to save the world over and over again without end.
A giant map of Texas covers the Resolute Desk in the Oval Office. The ancestral Bavarian sword of President Donbo King Tyrump lies on the map. Tyrump strokes the sword and watches a television on the opposite wall.
A Wolfe News Moderator reports in disbelief: “After last night’s bombing of the historic Alamo, President Tyrump is planning an invasion of both Texas and Mexico. Yes, you heard correctly. An invasion of the Lone Star state.”
Presidential aide Leif Oak stands behind the President. He stares into the Rose Garden where a massive bird lands with an impressive thud. The giant teratorn. It spreads its wings and roars at Leif.
Tyrump taps his billion dollar nails on the burnish of the steel blade of his sword. “My glorious invasion,” he says. “My lovely incursion. I have made my America great again. I have renamed the Gulf of Mexico as Gulf of America. The Gulf of Conquistadors! Gulf of Empire! I am the King of the Realm. The King of Real Estate! I have restored Mount McKinley and wiped out Denali. Next I will rename the mighty mountain as Mount Tyrump — tallest mountain in North America — all of which I must own. Do I offend your Native ancestors, Leif? Too bad! Losers! Annex Canada and Mexico! Buy Greenland. On to Panama! Get the Canal back where it belongs. To America! Land of Conquest and Profit! Hemispheric, global, universal!”
Land of Pillage. “Whatever you say, Sir.”
“President McKinley — McKingsley! What a man! The gold standard! The tariffs! The conquistador of the Philippines and Guam, Puerto Rico and Cuba! The annexer of Hawaii! Victor of the Spanish-American War! Manifest Destinies galore! A great King of Empire! It’s a good thing we’re a peaceful people, Leif.”
“How’s that, Sir?”
“Otherwise imagine the terrors we would inflict.”
“Empire all in, Sir.”
The teratorn roars at Leif, who imagines flames shooting from its frightening maw, flames like dragon fire, engulfing the Oval Office and incinerating the seat of power. Epic uncontrolled power.
All the recent polls find America — with its behemoth and angry attacking global Empire — to be the greatest threat to peace in the world. So much legal, martial, financial, and cultural power weaponized by the fierce assault of the plutocracy.
Imagine the terrors.
The teratorn screams at Leif a final time, then leaps up and flies off, as if in disgust.
“McKinley was shot and assassinated in his second term by an anarchist, was he not, Mr. President? A gruesome event that kicked off the Progressive Era.”
“The great ones dodge bullets, Leif. I should know. We dodge bullets and we dodge our wives — the whole lot of them. McKingsley died by infection — not by any low-class bullet. We make better medicines today, Leif. Much better. You should know.”
“I’ll get your meds soon, Sir.”
“Later, Leif, much later. First we conquer the continent! Mexico! Canada! Texas! Greenland! Panama! Antarctica!”
“Texas is yours already, Sir. Maybe go easy there. Texans are a tough bunch. Quick on the trigger.”
“Who in Hell do you think you are, Leif?! My Chief of Staff, Lyin Lewybody Lyar?! That no good son of a bankster—”
“Lyin Lewy died, Sir. It’s just you now.”
“It’s good to be King, Leif. At least Lewybody bought into my great deals in the Antarctic before he kicked off. When Earth burns to a crisp, Antarctica will become my tropical paradise. Palm trees from shore to polar shore. Collapse here is great for business there. I’ve sold Antarctic time shares for decades, Leif, my whole life. Future shares for future cares. Get ‘em before it gets too hot. All the richies snapped up their shares first thing to get a place by my future golf resort, site of the prestigious Antarctic Open. The future is polar, Leif! Bipolar!”
“It would seem so, Sir. It’s not only the planet heating exponentially.”
“The future goes at only one speed, Leif. Fast! Catch it while you can. I need more investors for my Bipolar Express! My pole to pole glory road!”
“To speed through all the burning fires of the world, Sir?”
“Speed! Those were the days, Leif. Today Antarctic crypto coin will fund my Bipolar Express! It’s the real deal. Polar currency! Bipolar! No Losers allowed! No losing! But first we take Texas! And Mexico! We need to dispose of the Evil Queen who currently rules that Communist land of gobbledygook. What’s her face.”
“President Solari Socialiste Solidaritee, Sir. She’s raising living standards with wages. Improving health, protecting the vulnerable, securing peace—”
“A traitor to Empire! Evil unleashed! Call the Generals! Speaking of Losers — is the Cabinet ready, Leif, goddamn it!”
“Soon, Sir.”
“Now, Leif! Heil now! Heil yes! Get my carpetbagging Cabinet in here once and for all, Leif — let’s be done with them! And bring on the Generals! We’ve got worlds to conquer! Poles to mount! People to pound! Profits to pocket!”
President Donbo King Tyrump is not the only one who will have his say on verge of his war with Texas and Mexico and lands beyond. All the other high officials gather in the halls and Cabinet Room near the Oval Office where they show off their most advanced spy gadgets and gossip about the wars of the past, present, and the wars to come. Far be it from the plutocratic elite to refuse any invite to war.
The military commanders burst from the hall into the Oval Office, followed by all the Cabinet members, alongside leaders of both the House and Senate and assorted other high officials.
“Here come the cops, Leif! Hands up!”
Leif backs against the wall.
The officials are there in the Oval because they are important, and they are important because they are there in the Oval. Rich too. They gather round to have their say about the emergency of the day. Most are forced to stand, given too few chairs and couches.
Joint Chiefs Chairman General Krushin Karvin Kilman is first to the Resolute Desk. “Mr. President, there’s much better seating in the Cabinet Room. Shall I lead the charge?” He unsheathes his dress saber and points to the hall.
“Fuck you, Kilman. And fuck the Cabinet Room. Fuck the Cabinet. Let the fuckers stand. Everybody up!”
All the seated officials rise and stand with the others. President Tyrump alone remains seated.
He points to the ceiling where a spherical golden drone hovers silently, shimmering, as if a bright hologram.
“It’s back! Somebody do something about this horrible monster!” Tyrump slaps the Resolute desk with both hands. “This terrible object aims directly at me and my bank accounts! For weeks on end this godawful menace invades my private realm!”
“Public! Public realm!” says Vice President Rob Loot Thief. “The White House and Oval Office are public spaces, Sir. I have the right to be here! You can’t kick me out!”
“You Ass, Loot Thief! I’m the President! What I say goes! And what you say blows, you devious Devil!”
The golden drone bounces through a neat geometric formation — as if to laugh, flex, or mock.
“Look how that terrible thing dances on my head!” says President Tyrump. “Who let the drone in! Who? Who? Who?!”
“Catchy! Snoop Dogg!” says Senate Leader Richi Rich Rich. He tries to elbow his way to the Resolute Desk alongside VP Loot Thief. “Who let the drones in! Who! Who! Who!”
“Shut up, Richi!”
“If a drone can enter the Oval, then so can I,” says Vice President Loot Thief. “You chose me to be here, Mr. President. You know you did! Don’t deny it!”
“I should have named Snoop Dogg my Vice President, Loot Thief! And maybe I will yet. At least he sings for his supper. Better his crypto rapping than your hellacious yapping!” President Tyrump screams at the room: “Who let the drone in!”
All the high officials point at one another, blaming everyone but themselves. Joint Chiefs Chairman General Krushin Karvin Kilman, CIA Director Creepy Coupy Cutthroat, FBI Director Payne Prison Pillory, NSA Director Allsee Allhear Allspy, and Treasury Secretary Deadly Dollar Dealer — these five stand closest to the seated President and try to block everyone else out.
“This goddamned drone is smarter than all you cadaverous clowns combined! I’m the one who approves drones bombing and spying and pissing across every part of the planet! How am I a target? Goddamn it!”
“We believe the drone is unarmed, Sir,” says General Kilman.
“And no legs, either,” says Senator Rich.
“Fuck you all!” shouts President Tyrump. “The People love me! The People love me like a God on high!”
“A very naughty God,” says Loot Thief. “Unlike me.”
“Nothing like you, Loot Thief!” screams Tyrump.
“That’s the power of propaganda, Sir,” says NSA Director Allspy. He winks and nods at the President.
“They hate you! They hate your guts, you murderous shits! They love me!” says the President.
“Tell it to the drone,” says Director Cutthroat. “The drone defies you, Mr. President. We blame Wikilooks for the drone.”
“Get this thing out of my goddamn office!” screams Tyrump.
“My apologies, Sir. The tech is beyond us, I’m afraid,” says Director Cutthroat.
“Your apologies.”
“My apologies.”
“You be afraid, alright, Cutthroat. You and your apologies.”
The brilliant orb gleams.
“Leif, goddamn it!” shouts President Tyrump.
“Mr. President.” Leif steps forward.
“These worthless tools in my Cabinet and in my Congress and in my military are after one thing only. Tell me what it is, Leif.” President Tyrump speaks to Leif as if he and Leif are alone, as if the high officials are not gathered directly in front of him, as if the more the elevated and inflated egos and pride he can smash the better.
“I would hesitate to guess, Sir. Money?”
“Power! They want my power! I am the greatest most powerful person in the world — in history! — ever! — and they want to carve me up and eat my body and drink my blood all day everyday — and splash it on the news. They would do it if they could. They want to rule the world themselves like happy hucksters, like klepto killers, like crypto conquistadors, like—
“Pillagers, Sir?”
“Like Pillagers, Leif! You Natives know pillagers, right?”
“We certainly do, Sir.”
“They want me out! Impeached, persecuted, imprisoned, executed! My own Cabinet!”
Leif glances around the room at the powerful conglomeration of officials who are accustomed to the rant, the insults, the accusations — which they ignore. A few seem captivated by the drone. Senator Rich straightens his tie and looks up and poses as if to impress the golden orb.
“Sit down! You sniveling twats, you twits, you twisted teets! Down with you all!” says the President.
Like a mad armed game of Musical Chairs, the high officials scramble for seats — pulling chairs out from under one another, body checking, and lunging. The slowest crash on their spines to the floor as chairs are yanked from beneath them. Most are forced, unceremoniously despite their regal finery, to sit beneath the feet of the President. They peer over and around end tables and the coffee table decorated with fake flowers in gold vases and silver bowls of fake fruit.
Leif sits alone, back against the wall.
Meanwhile, the drone shines above all. Leif looks up and wishes the awesome drone had taken his place already as the eyes and ears of the socialist Resistance in the Oval Office. If only the drone were fully operational, then Leif and his lover Dhyna Durango would have fled the plutocratic cesspool of the Oval for the sunlit land of the high desert long ago. A great pity that the Peoples’ Drone was not at full power in action everyday.
A great pity that Leif and Dhyna were trapped in a doomsday time loop at the end of the world. Late stage, last stage Earth — the final extermination — the extermination of exterminations. Trapped to die over and over with the impossible extinct giant Teratorn — come to haunt them both with all the demands of the dead.
“Get rid of this monster!” screams President Tyrump. “Then we take Texas!” The President flips off the brilliant sphere above. “The Texans and Mexicans and Texicans will know we are coming!”
“They already know, Sir,” says Director Allspy. “You told them.”
“I told nothing!” says President Tyrump.
“No — you did, Sir. You’re all over the news saying it.”
“Fake news!” says President Tyrump.
“But it’s you, Sir.”
“Fake news!”
The Cabinet argues all at once. Everyone talks, no one listens.
“You clinical imbeciles! Shut up! No one speaks until I call on you by name!”
The drone glitters and bounces again near the ceiling center. Various officials raise their hands to speak. Tyrump picks on them one by one, raised hand or not.
“My splendid village idiot, Vice President Rob Loot Thief — how will you earn your keep for once and get rid of this horrid drone?”
“Call the cops! We’ve been bugged! Targeted! Fruited!” says Loot Thief. “Call the billionaires!”
“We are the cops!” screams Tyrump. “This drone should target you not me! We are the billionaires! More than a dozen in my Cabinet alone!” Tyrump throws forward his little hands as if to strangle his Vice President.
“The drone will never get me. I have my own security detail,” says Loot Thief.
“That can change,” says Tyrump. He glances around. “FBI Director Payne Pillory. You top cop. Your advice?”
“I can confirm, Sir. We are the cops. And the billionaires.”
“Just cuff yourself, Pillory,” says Tyrump. “Why is this drone not behind bars!”
“No prison will hold it, Sir. Not for lack of trying.”
“Cry me a river, Pillory. Joint Chiefs Chairman, General Krushin Karvin Kilman — I order you: Kill the drone!”
General Kilman rises to his feet and shadow boxes beneath the drone. The gold orb pulsates then pops a series of dazzling camera flashes, blinding Kilman. He shields his eyes, too late, and hollers, “I’ll kill you with my bare hands! I’ll carve you in half, chew you to a nub, and shit you out!”
“Disgusting, Kilman,” says Tyrump. “Sit down.”
Secretary of Education Shammi Shilling Sharlatan pulls Kilman back to the floor beside her. “I’ll teach the drone a lesson it will never forget,” Shammi whispers in his ear. “I’ll dim its lights permanently.”
“CIA Director Creepy Coupy Cutthroat,” says President Tyrump. “Your astounding insight.”
“We need to uncover the drone’s hostile point of origin, Sir. We need to hit it where it lives — who, what, why, when, how, where. Once we know that, we will obliterate the guilty parties. The Agency’s own drones are lined up and ready to go.”
“It’s been fucking weeks, Coupy! No rush! Attorney General Lawkemup Libelem Lawless — your terrible take?”
“It’s criminal, Sir, whatever it is. I condemn it to death,” says AG Lawless. “Show me where to sign.”
“Lawless, when you get literate enough to spell your own name, you let me know.” Tyrump taps his fingers on the heavy blade of the sword as if he thinks about using it on the pale collar-and-tied neck of the Attorney General. “Secretary of Education, Shammi Shilling Sharlatan.”
“Like I told General Kilman, Sir, I’ll teach that uppity little drone a lesson it will never forget. Send it to my office, and I will put out its lights permanently.”
“How terribly instructive, Shammi. Why don’t you get a rope and drag the thing into your zone of brilliance all by yourself? House Speaker Thuggy Thug Thuggun — your solution to my great problem? Let me guess — a pistol and a prayer group.”
“Give the drone a taste of its own metal, Sir. Guns, bullets, and blessings. Blast it to Smithereens. Blow it to Hell. That’s what a Godly man does.”
“Without a doubt, Thuggy. For now, though, keep all guns holstered in my presence. My safety first, last, and forevermore.”
“Blessings and bullets to you, Sir.”
The drone gleams and flashes. Senate Leader Richi Rich instinctively smiles for his photo.
Leif texts Dhyna. Hard to imagine, but the day seems even more hopeless than usual.
Tyrump catches him.
“Got a hot date, Leif? Don’t let us keep you.”
“I’m checking your med schedule, Sir. All good.”
“All bad, Leif! Can you not hear my incompetent Cabinet!?”
The drone pulses and dances along the ceiling.
“Turn me loose — I’ll kill it!” shouts Speaker Thuggun. He cocks his fingers like guns and pretends to shoot the drone.
“Keep it in your pants, Thuggy!”
Speaker Thuggun jams both hands into the pockets of his slacks. With his right hand, he grabs something that looks suspiciously like a gun.
Tyrump scans the room again. “NSA Director Allsee Allhear Allspy! Speak, you Moron!”
“The red hand of China, Sir. It’s all over this drone. See how it laughs! At us, Sir! Like a Communist fruit from Asia. A big spy pomelo. Very yellow, Sir.”
“Chinese? Allspy? Think Wikilese. Wikilooks has claimed credit for this Evil Eye in the sky for months now! Are you sure you’re not Chinese yourself, Allspy? A sneaky app from the other side of the world? A multibillionaire double agent?” Tyrump scans the room. “What good is a Police State, if you can’t smash the enemy! I will make my Police State Great Again! This is no proper White Empire! You are all too weak! Sieg Weak! Sieg Weak! You would make America a Piece of Shit State — to secure your fantasy of glory, each and every one of you!” Tyrump shakes his puny fist. “I’ve got choir girls for a Cabinet! Flower children for a military! Soiled infants for Congress! Billionaire bloodsuckers all!”
The drone pulses.
President Tyrump waves obscene hand gestures at the drone.
The drone shimmers.
“Fuck you too!” shouts Tyrump.
Kitchen aide Dhyna Durango maneuvers through the sitting mob of high officials. She carries President Tyrump’s diet cola. She glances at the drone and feels hopeful for a moment.
Tyrump watches Dhyna approach with his drink, napkin, and straw. He fixates on her shape. She is a sight moving through the seated crowd of officials. More than a few cock their heads as if to look up under a skirt though she is wearing work pants.
“Mr. President, your cola.” Dhyna sets the cola on the desk.
Tyrump raises the cola, toasts Dhyna. He manages to look her in the eye for a moment. “To my great and glorious day,” he says.
Dhyna walks back through the seated mob of officials. She looks to Leif at the base of the wall and shakes her head. Not today. He gets it. They are probably too late.
Leif refuses to give up. Not because he feels noble. He wants out of this place, this cult trap of death, as soon as possible, before he and Dhyna meet their ultimate fate.
President Tyrump sets down the cola, smacks his lips, then flips off everyone in the room with both hands.
CIA Director Creepy Coupy Cutthroat, fearless and smug, flips off the President in return.
Dominoes fall and everyone flips off everyone else. Kilman and Allspy, Shammi and Thuggy, Richi and Rob, AG Lawless flips off Deadly Dollar Dealer, the Marine Commandant flips off the Army Chief. The Air Force Chief flips off the Navy Admiral.
Tyrump is sourly amused. “Shit really does rise to the top,” he says. “Stand up, Idiots! You look ridiculous sitting on the floor!”
Everybody rises upon the President’s command. Leif gets up too and weaves behind the officials to meet Dhyna by the exit farthest from the Resolute Desk.
He takes her hand. “We’re too late today, aren’t we?”
“I told you. No Cabinet meeting.”
“Look at them. Look at him. He’s like a bullsnake eating its dinner in the weeds. I saw a creature like him, once, back home, at the Window Rock Zoo for injured and orphaned animals. That was before the zoo sent the snakes packing because they’re a bad omen among the people.”
“Snake pit full here today,” says Dhyna.
“Maybe we can still win.”
“I should kill you now, Leif. Get the day over with. Try again tomorrow.”
“Don’t do that.”
“Admiral Bentcan is loose. He’s fully armed. We’ll be dead before dawn. Long before.”
Leif watches Admiral Bentcan standing nearby. “He’s still here. We’re still here. And you’re still pregnant.”
“Pregnant women can kill, Leif.”
“Don’t do it.”
“Give me a weapon.”
“What if there’s another way?”
“There’s not.”
Deep in an arroyo in the high mountain desert, Leif and Dhyna are intimate, pressed as one against each other, flush with the scalding hot red sandstone ledge. Everything solid feels liquid, so full of the intense energy of the sun. Leif and Dhyna melt together body, mind, emotion. Rock and flesh, hot fluid, melding one into the other, stone into skin and blood, skin and blood into stone. The novel day, the vibrant moment burns through them, floods their bones. Dhyna and Leif are heat and blood drunk in the energy of the high desert sun — sky and rock become as liquid as the water of their muscles and skin. Hot stone flesh fused into a new creature, a new act, a new hour of Earth.
Quavering, quivering, quick air rises, smolders above red rocks. The hot energy appears and disappears and heals all in its touch before vanishing to sun and sky.
Leif and Dhyna separate and rearrange and reconnect and melt again into the liquid stone of their day.
Leif wakes from his daydream.
Trapped in the Oval Office — deadly and dated, quaint church of Empire.
“Let’s get to the supply room.” Leif squeezes Dhyna’s hand. “We can be alone there.”
“Not today, Leif.”
“Only today.”
Admiral Bentcan exits the Oval.
“There he goes,” says Dhyna. “Lost to Texas. We lose him and the nukes fly into the Oval. And then more nukes fly and we lose the world.”
“What’s wrong with Texas?” says Leif. “They love their guns more than their own mothers.”
“Stolen Texas,” says Dhyna. “It’s a sick history they’re so proud of. They teach a twisted version of it in all the schools. Mandatory brainwashing of the people. Fake texts of Empire. Guns are how you steal from Natives, Leif. You know that.”
One cycle, one day, Dhyna tried to convince President Tyrump to invade Greenland instead of Texas since he hoped to anyway. Fewer nukes to fight back in Greenland. Maybe some at America’s Thule Air Force base. Plus the one the Air Force lost in the ice, decades ago. Nothing compared to the hundreds of nukes refurbished every year at the Pantex plant in Amarillo, Texas. Not to mention the many massive military bases throughout Texas that are locked and loaded and ready to fight back from any attack by the President.
“Anyway,” Dhyna tells Leif, “I thought that if the President could be convinced Thule was under attack—”
“By seals and walruses?”
“Natives. Always the Natives. Brown people like us. The Inuit in Greenland. Get him fixated on Greenland, then maybe he forgets about invading Texas and Mexico, and there’s no nuclear war. You and I survive and escape to the high desert. Greenland would be screwed but at least the world survives.”
“He didn’t go for it?”
“Fuck no,” says Dhyna. She stares at the Resolute Desk. “We’re still trapped here, aren’t we? President Tyrump prefers a different day of death. And it’s always coming. Coming for us all.”
Tyrump holds up his arms for silence — flexes his stubby fingers. “Treasury Secretary Deadly Dollar Dealer! You control the money of the world! How do we kill this contemptuous villain who dares hover over me!”
“Hard cash,” says Deadly. “Trade the drone for hard cash. Make big bank on Wall Street. Buyer beware. Give me two calls. My commission on the sale alone would be worth—”
“Fuck you, you filcher Deadly! I take commissions, not you! No enemy of mine will get this drone! Not you and your klepto cronies, Deadly!” President Tyrump surveys the room. “Senator Rich, your views I’m sure will be abnormally enlightening.”
“Willing buyer here.” Senate Leader Rich raises his right hand. “I would advertise the drone, mark it up, list it online, sell it, buy it back, polish it, then resell it for trillions more. Or maybe you could trade the thing for the entire country of Canada.”
“Fuck Canada. Cold air is Canada’s only export. No one values Canada, not even Canadians, especially not them. They don’t dare be a great Empire like America!”
“Sell the drone to the Chinese,” says CIA Director Cutthroat. “We buy enough shit from them. Let them deal with the thing.”
“Fuck the Chinese! Fuck the Russians! Fuck the Iranians! Fuck Greenland!” shouts Tyrump. “Fuck Canada! Fuck the drone! No sales. I want destruction first, sales later, you Proverbial Idiots!”
“He makes fun of us, I believe,” says Vice President Rob Loot Thief.
“Canada! Greenland! Panama!” shouts Tyrump. “Venezuela! Syria! Palestine! Yemen! Lebanon! Iraq! Iran! India! Brazil! Sudan! Congo!”
“Russia! China! Russia! China!” The officials chime in.
“Our Manifest Destiny! Drones above all! Go full McKinley!” shouts President Tyrump. “But I want Texas and Mexico first! Border wars are the best wars, especially where it’s warm. We will stop the illegals once and for all!”
“Not Texas, Mr. President.” Leif steps forward. “Sir, might I suggest — any invasion of Texas would be met with deadly—”
“Jump right in, Leif! You’re a big part of the brain trust here!” says President Tyrump. “Somebody hit him.”
The officials nearest Leif turn with their fists jacked. Dhyna steps in front to protect her lover. The officials hit Dhyna instead — direct into her pregnancy. She crumples to the floor. Leif falls with her, and covers her body with his own. The officials don’t miss the opportunity. They kick Leif while he’s down.
“That’s better.” President Tyrump slaps his hands on the map of Texas on his desk. He rattles his ancestral Bavarian sword. He glares at his Cabinet. “Did this drone swim the Rio Grande, clamber up my glorious wall at the border, then fly into the Oval!? CIA Director Cutthroat? I demand your final answer!”
“I’ll capture it and rendition its ass to a black site, Mr. President. I’ll strip it naked and use wires and pliers. Drills and fire. Water. Ice. Gas. Chemicals. I’ve got every way the world ends in my little shop of tortures— I mean, horrors— I mean — I will get this damned insurgent thing to say whatever you want it to say, Sir, even if I need to pull its balls up through its throat with my own bare hands and bite them off with my own white teeth!”
The entire room stares in silence at CIA Director Creepy Coupy Cutthroat.
“No offense, Director Cutthroat,” says President Tyrump. “But we may need to render you to a black site.”
“Not funny, Sir,” says Cutthroat.
Director Cutthroat taps an encrypted note to himself on his handheld: “OVERTHROW PRESIDENT.”
Standing next to him, NSA Director Allspy observes and runs a program on his own handheld that hacks and deciphers Cutthroat’s note. Allspy scowls, smacks Cutthroat on the shoulder.
“No coups, Coupy. Not here. Not yet. Not today.”
“If torture gets you off, Coupy, far be it from me to intervene,” says President Tyrump. “But please, don’t destroy the world as you go about your fun, Coupy. Okay, Coupy? Thanks, Coupy.”
“You hurt?” Leif asks Dhyna.
Of course she is. Dhyna struggles to speak. “We are so dead,” she says.
Leif is furious. He stands and faces the President.
“Mr. President, if anyone in this room were tortured, the first thing they would do is have a heart attack. The second thing they would do is tell their torturers whatever they think they want to hear. Torture makes truth irrelevant, Sir. People lie like mad to try to save themselves whether they know anything or not. It’s human nature. Plus, torture is completely monstrous, Sir. And how dare you hit Dhyna, Sir!”
Tyrump jumps up and leans over the Resolute Desk. He roars at Leif: “How dare she persist in my right domain! Shut up, Leif!”
CIA Director Cutthroat steps toward Leif and studies him. “Are you trying to confess something, young man? I’ll give you every chance to confess whatever you like once we’re done with this little dance in the Oval Office.”
“He’s a mere bottle aide, Coupy. Ignore him,” says NSA Director Allsee Allhear Allspy. “He knows nothing. Believe me.”
President Tyrump points up at the drone. “You billionaire beasts! You base bores! Kill the drone!”
“We don’t understand its source of power, Sir,” says Allspy. “Once we know that, we’ll take it down. Trust me.”
Treasury Secretary Deadly Dollar Dealer leans forward. “We don’t know who funds it, Sir. Once we know that, we freeze the funds — it’s dead.”
FBI Director Payne Prison Pillory taps his phone. “I’ll order the arrest of ten thousand people who might or might not know something.”
“Make it twenty thousand,” says Director Cutthroat.
“Fifty thousand!” says Allspy.
Senate Leader Richi Rich Rich raises his right hand: “Do I hear one hundred thousand?!”
Secretary of State Oily Oily Oily steps forward. “We must force this drone to surrender! Drive it into the ground, underground, deep into the dungeons! Sanction it! Bomb it where it hurts, hit it in its home, destroy its homeland! Where is Defense Secretary Warren War War when we need him? Get him off his bazooka to finally do something worthwhile!”
“Secretary War, move up here!” screams President Tyrump.
General War shoves his way through the officials to the Resolute Desk. He points at Secretary Oily. “What now, Oily? We’re bombing the shit out of most of the world as it is!”
Oily points right back at him. “We need you to move the 4th Fleet into position, General. At least three aircraft carriers and plenty of submarines. Time for the big guns to get involved! Target the drone!”
“I’m the President, goddamn it, Oily! I give the orders around here, not you!” President Tyrump sniffs, wipes his nose. “Go ahead, General War. What he said.”
Vice President Rob Loot Thief waves his right hand at the President. Tyrump tries to ignore him. Loot Thief won’t stop.
“My favorite person in the whole wide world,” says Tyrump. “Speak now Loot Thief, then forever shut your yap.”
“Should we really target the Oval Office with the 4th Fleet, Mr. President? I’m standing here. Right here. We all are.”
“The military knows what it’s doing, you Bitty-Brain,” says General Kilman. “Don’t be insulting.”
House Speaker Thuggun raises both hands, fingers cocked like guns. “Oily is right! The Generals are right! Guns are the only answer! Let’s splat the fruit!” Thuggun aims his hands like pistols at the drone.
“Holster your ass, Thuggy! You’re not going to splat anything all over my high-end carpet,” says President Tyrump. “Director Allspy! Can this thing see, hear, smell, cry, or shit? What does it do? What can we make it do?”
“We told you everything we know, Sir. The drone tracks you like prey and exposes you to the world. It’s on the blink now, but when working it releases audio and video of you everywhere — counting coins at the front door, buying weapons and stocks and weapon stocks at the backdoor, dining with white supremacists at your resorts — and, well, most places — chilling on the commode — no shame, Sir. You make a spectacular live-stream, Mr. President. Some call it, the Peoples’ Drone. And you, the Peoples’ Prey.”
“Fuck the People’s Drone! Snuff it out! Blind it, drug it, deafen it, maim it, decapitate it! Brainwash it! Make it go berserk! The usual business.”
“The CIA is hard at work, Sir.”
“Don’t strain yourself, Coupy! Waterboard it, electrocute it, hang the drone upside down by its genitals already. What are you waiting for? We gave you explicit permission during the Iraq wars! Torture away!”
House Speaker Thuggun yells at the drone in a Mexican accent, “Do you speak Eeenglish?! Eeenglish!”
“That’s right!” says President Tyrump. “English only in the Oval Office. If the drone can’t speak English, kick it out! Lay down the law, Lawless!”
Attorney General Lawless shrugs. “Protecting the rights of the President is the preeminent problem in legal circles today, Mr. President. The public has no right to transparency in the Presidency. And of course nothing but the English language in the Oval. We are Americans after all! English only!”
House Speaker Thuggun looks confused. “Maybe we should speak American.”
“Just show me where to sign!” says Attorney General Lawless.
“This drone looks suspiciously gender neutral to me!” says Speaker Thuggun.
“More laws! More laws! We need more laws! We are a lawful nation or we are nothing!” says AG Lawless.
“No gender neutrality, no gender complexity in the Oval Office. Nor anywhere else!” says Thuggy Thuggun. “We are men and we are women or we are nothing! We are righteous straight shooters! We must defend ourselves from the unholy invasion of the LGBTQ-PMS alphabet stew — the sacrilegious trans takeover of the World!”
“Get them out of my bathroom!” screams Secretary of Education Shammi Shilling Sharlatan. “No alphabet stew on my watch! They are uncivil and improper — unlike all of us.”
“Amen!” All the high officials in the room join hands. “Amen!”
Suddenly the brilliant drone marks the forehead of President Tyrump with a bloody capital letter A.
ASSASSIN occasionally flashes in place of the single letter. ASSASSIN alternates with another word that begins with A. A dirty word. A shitty word.
Officials gasp at the bloody branding. Tyrump uses his handheld as mirror to inspect his forehead. He sees A and ASSASSIN and ASSHOLE flash bright red on his pale skin.
“I’m branded for life!”
“And death. Mostly death,” says Dhyna. She looks up from the floor. She feels better. She could stand again with the others. She could go back to the kitchen. She considers the options and remains where she is, for now — with Leif standing by her side.
Tyrump ducks under his desk to escape the bloody branding, but the red letter A glows on the desktop marking the precise location where the President attempts to hide.
General Kilman unclips his saber and slashes up at the drone, to no effect.
Director Cutthroat steps onto the coffee table and swats at the drone with his phone — also to no effect.
Director Allspy powers off the lights in the Oval via his handheld. The drone gleams brighter, the bloody letter A glows bloodier. Then power restores to the Oval. Allspy punches his handheld. “Time to upgrade.”
“Goddamn it!” House Speaker Thuggun rips off his right shoe and throws it at the drone. The shoe misses wildly and bounces off a granite bust of Martin Luther King, then smashes through a collection of Native American pottery.
“Good shot, Thuggy,” says FBI Director Pillory.
Thuggy grins. “Good old-fashioned police work, Pillory.”
President Tyrump clambers up from under the desk and gets back into his chair where he sits disconsolate, a marked man. He points at the shards of Native American pottery next to Thuggun’s shoe. “That’s what Speaker Thuggun thinks of you and your kin, Leif. How do you like it? Our Thuggy. A real man of the State. Bit out of control.”
“In 1492 Columbus sailed the ocean blue,” Dhyna says to Leif. “500 years of conquest coming for you, and you, and you.” She stands and pokes Leif in the chest three times. “But we’re still here. If sometimes only barely.”
Leif whispers in Dhyna’s ear: “Thuggy is a real man of the plutocrats.”
“What say you, Leif?!” says President Tyrump.
Leif considers the shards of Native pottery. “The conquest continues,” he says.
“We can all thank God for that,” says House Speaker Thuggun.
Attorney General Lawless steps forward and holds his smartphone near Tyrump’s forehead to try to block the bloody letter A — to no avail.
“Goddamn it!” screams Tyrump. “Get me Press Secretary Bullcrap Baloney Bullshat! He can talk anything out of existence.”
Like genocide, thinks Leif. Homicide, tribalcide.
“Poof! Gone like it never happened. Even when you’re staring directly at it. That’s his job! Get Bullshat here right now!” screams Tyrump. “Where’s Bullshat?!”
“Out sick, Sir. Laryngitis,” says Leif.
“My speaker can’t speak! I have no fucking voice! No official vision and revision of the world!” Tyrump throws both hands into the air and hollers at the drone, “You lousy scum Socialist! You dirty axis of Resistance! You cowardly Communist! Come down here and fight us all like a man at once!”
“The Drone is a Socialist?” says the Vice President Rob Loot Thief. “I thought the drones were all Capitalist and on our side!”
“Shut the fuck up, Loot Thief!” says Tyrump.
“It’s the end of the world as we know it — if the drones are against us!” says Loot Thief.
“Shut the Hell up, Loot Thief!”
Suddenly, House Speaker Thuggy Thug Thuggun pulls from his pants pocket a fully working plastic pistol that he smuggled past the metal detectors and the Secret Service. He waves it at the drone.
“Hold your fire, Thuggy!” shouts Tyrump.
“No yellow drone will take away my God-given right to use a killing machine!” Thuggun aims at the radiant drone. “Got you now, you traitorous tricky treason! Stick ‘em up!”
The drone beams down.
“If video of this gets out, we’re doomed,” says Attorney General Lawless. “Droned to Hell. Everyone turn off your handhelds!”
No one does, including Attorney General Lawless.
President Tyrump tries to rub the scarlet letter A off his forehead with his bare hands. “Help me!” screams Tyrump. “I don’t deserve this!”
“The drone has come home to roost,” says Dhyna.
“Was only a matter of time,” says Leif.
“Surrender! Hands up!” shouts Thuggun, still aiming at the drone. Suddenly upon Speaker Thuggun’s forehead glistens the phosphorescent image of the buttocks of an enormous man.
In a panic, all the officials use their handhelds to examine their own foreheads.
“There’s a butt on my head!” says Thuggun.
“Just noticed?” says Dhyna.
Senate Leader Richi Rich opens his arms to the drone. “How much for your services?”
“Shut up, Richi!” shouts Tyrump. “Director Pillory, arrest this drone once and for all! Do what must be done! Read the drone its fucking rights!”
“Drones have rights, Sir?”
“Just do it, Pillory!”
“You have the right to remain silent! Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law. You have the right to speak to an attorney, and to have an attorney present during interrogation. If you are rendered to a black site, no law applies. We will do with you whatever we want, in any prison, anywhere, so help your goddamned Soul, goddamn it! I order you to surrender to the law!”
The drone speaks: “Go to Hell, FBI Guy.”
“It’s alive! It speaks! It gives orders!” says Tyrump. “Kill it! Kill it!”
“This thing grows more valuable by the minute,” says Senator Leader Richi Rich Rich.
Vice President Rob Loot Thief fouls his pants. The dark stain is obvious, as is the stench that permeates the room. Officials hold their noses, wave at the air, and back away. VP Loot Thief slinks through the room and exits.
The Drone speaks again: “Vice President Rob Loot Thief is not the only one among you who is completely full of shit.”
“I know that voice!” says Secretary Sharlatan. “It’s What’s-His-Name!”
“What’s-His-Name! What’s-His-Name!” The officials chorus.
“Who’s What’s-His-Name?!”
“It’s What’s-His-Name! What’s-His-Name!”
“Holy fuck, shut up!” says President Tyrump. “You colossal tools! You gilded no-nothings! Who’s What’s-His-Name?”
“I know it! I can’t think of it,” says NSA Director Allspy. The Director taps rapidly on his handheld.
“It’s Justice Assured,” says Leif.
“Of Wikilooks,” says Dhyna.
The drone shimmers. The voice of Justice Assured speaks from the brilliant orb: “Got you! You Billionaire Bad Boys Club, you Executers of Empire, you Gods of Genocide, you Killers of the Climate, you High Priests and Banksters of the most militant and destructive country in the history of the world — in all the galaxies known and unknown!”
“You can’t say that! People will get mad!” President Tyrump lurches to his feet. “I’m mad as Hell and I’m not going to take it anymore!”
“You certainly are,” says Justice Assured.
“It’s time to call Wikilooks what it really is,” says Director Cutthroat. “A hostile spy agency aligned with enemy states like Russia, China, Iran, and California.”
“And Chicago!” shouts Speaker Thuggun.
Justice Assured: “It’s time to call the CIA what it really is: the world’s most notorious state terrorist agency, drone bombing civilians overseas night and day — and rallying to genocide. And the President in the White House is the hands-on boss of the Director of the CIA.”
President Tyrump panics. “He says it out loud! You can’t say that! Who told him! I blame you all!”
Attorney General Lawless wags his finger at the drone. “Justice Assured, you could have been a simple fake rebel journalist. But no. You screwed the pooch. You went all-out revolutionary. Signed your own death warrant. Don’t think we won’t get you yet!”
“You goddamn fool!” screams President Tyrump. “It’s us who he’s got!” Tyrump scratches at the bright letter A on his forehead. “You Entirely Useless Trillion Dollar Thieves! I’ll do it myself!”
President Tyrump grabs his sword and attempts to stand on his chair but slips and falls off. He knocks his head on the oak edge of the desk, then thuds to the floor.
Secret Service agents rush to his still form.
Senator Rich opens his arms again to the drone. “My golden friend, I’m sure we can come to some mutually rewarding arrangement.”
“How dare you, Senator! Traitor!” screams House Speaker Thuggy Thug Thuggun. He shoots Senator Rich in the chest with his plastic handgun.
Senator Rich collapses onto the Oval rug.
Several officials turn on Thuggun. “I was aiming at the drone!” Thuggun belatedly waves his gun at the drone and fires a shot that passes through. The drone sparkles as the bullet rips through the Presidential Seal on the ceiling. Thuggun pivots and shoots the marble bust of Martin Luther King. The bullet ricochets off the marble and blasts Leif in his left thigh.
“Of course,” says Leif.
Leif falls back against the wall, clutching his leg. Dhyna catches Leif. Then she tries to pry open Leif’s hands to see the wound.
“Stop shooting, Thuggy!” screams General Kilman. He tackles Speaker Thuggun and drives him to the floor.
NSA Director Allspy taps a quick note on his handheld. “High Alert! All ground, sea, air, and space forces — the White House is under attack, possibly by Russians, Chinese, Iranians, jihadis, or Californians. Go to High Alert.”
Secret Service agents and Special Forces rush into the Oval Office shouting, “Get down! Get down!”
The high officials scream and duck, crouch and dive to the floor.
Leif, as nearly the only person of color among many armed white men, raises his hands.
“Don’t shoot! I’ve already been shot!”
Leif and Dhyna are tackled and slammed into the wall.
“I can’t breathe!” says Leif.
“Where have I heard that before?” says the Secret Service agent crushing him. “You shot the Senator, you criminal!”
“Wasn’t me!”
“Thought you said you can’t breathe!”
“Can’t! Not in. Only out.”
And not for long.
Leif loses consciousness pinned upright against the wall. His head droops.
Secret Service agents continue to swarm the room and surround President Tyrump lying unconscious on the floor.
The agents are so crowded as more flood in that they accidentally knock aside the agent choking Leif, who drops to the floor.
When Leif regains consciousness at the base of the wall, he finds himself pressed against Dhyna who examines his bleeding wound.
“Have you lived this day before?” Leif asks Dhyna.
“Feels like it,” she says.
“Different day, same death,” says Leif.
“Same day, different death,” says Dhyna.
“Let’s go to the kitchenette, Dhyna. Let’s bar the door. Then maybe we contact Bentcan. If we threaten him with the truth—”
“Tried that,” says Dhyna. “Bentcan will laugh in your face. It’s too late anyhow. Soon the missiles will hit. We need to stop Bentcan and the rest another way. But we’re lucky this time, Leif — we will die instantly, you and I. No lingering.”
Dhyna thinks back to a less lucky day.
Post nuclear bombing of the White House, traffic blocked on the beltway, Dhyna and the other travelers open their car doors and fall out, blinded, burnt, drowning in smoke and fire, reaching to slug any drink at hand, screaming for anyone who might help. But there is no one to respond to apocalypse.
President Tyrump lies unconscious by the Resolute Desk as agents try to revive him.
Flat on the rug in the center of the Oval, Senator Rich lies bleeding out. Agents work his wounds, call for water.
Nearby, General Kilman kneels on Speaker Thuggun, whose four limbs are wrapped behind his back in a pretzel of impossible angles.
Kilman ties up Thuggun with an unusually long belt from Director Cutthroat.
Panicked agents continue to work on the prone President and yell at their radios for assistance.
Leif pulls himself up by the bullet-chipped bust of Martin Luther King. He sees the President down, the agents useless, the officials — some scared, others excited, thinking toward an evermore profitable future.
“I can help,” says Leif.
“Don’t,” says Dhyna.
“We can learn more about the day.”
“We know enough already, Leif. We need to act — but tomorrow. Not now. Tomorrow will be today.”
“I can do this,” says Leif. He puts both hands in the air. “I’ve got this!” Leif hobbles, hands held high, toward the President. His left leg feels like a pillar of fire. “The President needs his meds! The medicine! I’m the one who gives the President his meds. There in the desk. It’s locked.”
Secret Service agents allow Leif to limp through their gauntlet of guns — hands to sky.
The agent who tackled him leans in. “One wrong move, Brownie, and you’re toast.”
At the desk, Leif taps code, unlocks the special compartment. His coding seems to impress the agents who give him space to work. Leif preps the meds then squirts liquid magic into the nostrils of President Tyrump, who smiles, weakly, but remains unconscious.
“Come on, Mr. President, wake up. Just another day at the office.”
Leif rocks Tyrump gently and selects a second bottle of nasal spray.
Secret Service agents crowd Leif again, while others work furiously on a problem at each of the four entrances to the Oval. The doors are locked and will not open. The security system has been hacked and used against itself.
Leif slips another bottle into the nose of Tyrump.
The President’s arms flail. He screams, “You’re killing me, Leif!”
Leif backs away as fast as he can. Not fast enough. The agent of Leif’s nightmares hauls him off, then hoists him, and flings Leif at the wall.
Leif lies crumpled at its base. He imagines a trail of blood and tears if he tried to crawl out of the Oval now. He also imagines returning on foot, or maybe on horse, with a spear. Or maybe a tank. Or flying a plane. He thinks of the missiles that will soon end the day, and he knows there must be another way.
Dhyna comes beside him. She holds Leif’s face in her hands. “I told you,” she says.
“Don’t kill me now,” he says.
“Not yet,” she says.
“The teratorn will be more pissed than ever.”
“No more than you and I.”
“Empire All In,” says Leif.
Dhyna holds Leif.
The day holds them both.
Dhyna and Leif stare across the room at the ongoing chaos by the Resolute Desk.
By some miracle, they are still alive, deep in the doomsday time loop of it all.
For once, they rest and leave the world alone. They’ve done enough for now. Everything they could. They can only wait for the whole damn day to reset.
