The Big Bang (10 page)

It must have been the right thing to say. The kid looked at her, straightened up. He rubbed his face on his shoulder, looked back at his mother. “I love you!” he called.

Finally, Molly saw her sister. There was something about the way she stood, or her profile. It was Ginnie, but a blurred, smudged image of her vibrant sister. Her skull was bare, with gouges from the shears. One eye was bruised, and her jaw was swollen. “Ginnie,” Molly cried. Her voice came out high, almost a shriek. Her voice didn't carry over the weeping of the prisoners, the angry mutters from the American audience, the restrictive cloth of the damned niqab, or the settlers' party. The boy was still beside her. His voice was low, rumbling, commanding. When he called, “Ginnie!” her sister looked up, and Molly waved. Ginnie lifted her hand to her cracked lips and blew a kiss.

Again, the tears in Molly's eyes, burning her cheeks. She blew a kiss back, looked up at the boy who towered over her. “Thank you,” she said simply.

“You're welcome,” he said without taking his eyes off his mother.

After that, all they could do was wait.

Molly wanted to keep her eyes on her sister. Something inside her promised that as long as Molly locked eyes with Ginnie, her sweet little sister, nothing would happen to her. She'd be safe. The tears pricking her eyes, Molly knew it was magical thinking of the worst kind. It was no different from when she was a girl, trying to will herself to stay awake on Christmas Eve. She had to stay awake until she heard Santa. Then she was going talk to him and make him understand it just wasn't right for those poor Mexican kids across the crick to get secondhand toys, and for them to come to school in those clean but secondhand clothes. She knew she could make him understand and then everything would be all right for the Ortiz family. But she could never manage it, always fell asleep, and then she would feel guilty when she saw those children after Christmas.

The show was starting. The stadium speaker system rumbled to life. The Prophet's Chosen in the stadium had taken up positions around the Americans, weapons ready in case anyone lost their reason and rushed the field or the settlers.

An Imam was up on the platform, along with two of the Palestinians and the Headsman, the huge curved sword hanging at his side. The Imam harangued the stadium, and the settlers wailed and ululated back at him. On a strictly audio level, it was no different from any one of fifty or so Revival Meetings Molly had seen. The difference was when the Baptists got going, somebody might be smote with the Holy Spirit and might speak in tongues, but the only creatures that had to fear for their lives were the chickens that were going to be fried for dinner afterwards. Over the sound system, somebody was translating what the pinhead Imam was saying. The son of a bitch had a California accent. Collaborating scumbag. “These harlots,” the California collaborator was saying, “have dishonored the Prophet, Peace Be Upon Him, by violating the Holy Koran's injunctions to modesty.”

When they brought the first woman up, Molly looked back to Ginnie. But that magic sense was gone, destroyed by the ranting of the Imam, the partying of the settlers, and the angry muttering from the American side of the stadium. All illusion was gone, irrational hope had vanished, and fear bubbled to the surface of Molly's consciousness.

The first woman was struggling and kicking. “Good for you, darlin',” Molly said, watching her image up on the screen. The Palestinian slammed an elbow into the prisoner's face and the fight went out of the woman. Her arms were wrenched back and somehow tied to her feet. Perfect kneeling position. The Headsman unlimbered his sword and brought it slicing down. Molly heard the beginning of the sound, one she would hear in her dreams from time to time until she died, a sound like a pool cue hitting a side of beef, but it was almost instantly drowned out by the settlers. You'd have thought the big bastard had kicked the winning goal in the World Cup from all the cheering.

“Jesus,” the teen-aged boy breathed.

Molly took his hand. “It's not going to get any better. Are you sure you want to watch this?”

“That way, I'll never forget.”

“Ah, darlin',” Molly told him. “There's things in life you'll wish you could un-learn, un-hear, and un-see. This could be one of them.”

He shook his head.

And the executions went on.

Molly had been counting as each woman went to her death. She was up to fourteen when she noticed all the prisoners were women.
What, was The Gasbag on a recruiting drive? Did he need a fresh batch of women for the Prophet's Chosen to abuse?
Some went quietly, some fought, some seemed dazed. They all died, and Molly would have bet they were all dhimmi, all citizens of the former United States.

Ginnie was number fifteen. She kept looking over her shoulder at Molly as the Chosen led her to the platform, shaking her head. You don't have to do this, she was trying to say. Molly knew her sister well enough for that message to come through. Instead, Molly stood straight, grasped the rail in front of her with both hands. These bastards and their scumbag settlers would not see her crumple. She would not give them pleasure. They could laugh about the weeping relatives of the Americans they'd Purified, joke about them if they wanted to, but they wouldn't be able to tell that story about Molly Ivins.

Forever afterwards, Molly would remember how the world narrowed down to her sister on that platform. Everything in Molly was focused on that small image, so focused that the sounds of the place faded away, the Palestinians tying her sister's feet became blurs, even the huge figure of the Headsman was lost for a moment. Ginnie didn't fight or weep. She knelt, proudly, under her own power. The Caliban could take her freedom, they could take her life, but to the last, Ginnie had her dignity.

“Oh, God, I love you,” Molly whispered, her hands tightening on the rail.

The boy next to her asked quietly. “Your family?”

“My sister,” Molly said in a level voice. One part of her, the part that had been a tough ole Texas girl, wasn't surprised. Another part of her was scared by the flatness in her voice. Worried that she would never feel anything again; never experience anything besides an implacable, unblinking, unwavering hatred of the Caliban and anyone who stood with them.

Then, that sound again, the pool cue thwack, and her sister wasn't there anymore. Two pieces of something that had been her sister lay on the platform, her blood splashing across the white wood and raining down onto the grass as the settlers cheered on the other side of the stadium. The Headsman raised his arms in triumph, particularly proud of his work this time.

You will die
, Molly promised. She might have meant just the Headsman, or she might have meant every single cheering invader who sat in that stadium. Someone was going to die for this, and she didn't care how many someones it was.

She looked down at her hands. Her nails were white, her knuckles red from grasping the rail so tightly. She had to consciously tell her hands to relax. With an audible pop, her hands came loose from the metal rail. She looked at her palms curiously. Chipped paint had gouged into her skin. She brushed her hands roughly together and turned to find an exit. She was done here. She had work to do. She had to figure out how to kill as many of these motherless sons and daughters of the desert (or whatever shithole they had crawled out of) as possible.

The boy's hand fell on her arm. “Please. My mom.”

It didn't matter. She could help this boy watch his mother die. She might even be able to use him. There wasn't enough hate in California, as far as she could tell. Way too much resignation. Molly allowed herself to be pulled back to the rail.

The boy sobbed silently, jaw clenched, tears leaking from his eyes as the dreadlocked woman was led the platform. Molly was idly watching the display screens, waiting for it to be over.
Lordy, those dreadlocks looked nasty
, she observed as the cameras zoomed in on the woman and the Headsman.

The woman knelt, her head bowed in a way that seemed to say she was communing with a higher power, while the Yasser-bes stood on either side of her. The Imam was doing the whole reading thing, shaking his fist, while the settlers roared their approval. The collaborator-translator continued translating for the captive American audience. “And this Christian apostate shall feel the full measure of the wrath of Allah for denying the truth of the Holy Koran and God's Prophet.” Molly made a mental note to find out who that traitorous young fella was. She was going to work up something special for his yellow ass.

On the screen, the dreadlocked woman was obviously praying. Her hands were clasped. She looked up as the Headsman approached. The woman looked out at the crowd. “I forgive you!” she cried, the speakers bouncing her declaration across the stadium.
Woman's a better Christian than me
, Molly smiled.
Better than I'll ever be again
.

When her statements were translated, the settlers screamed, some stood and shook their fists at her. There were muttered prayers and invocations from the Americans.

“I forgive you, George Bush!” the dreadlocked woman cried out, her voice booming out into Candlestick Park.

“What the blue bloody hell?” Molly said.

That cringing California-boy traitor translated the woman's remark. The settlers applauded now. The Americans were stunned into momentary silence by the woman's outburst. She wasn't finished. Tears streaming down her cheeks, she looked to the skies. “I forgive you, George Bush, for making them do this to me!”

Molly found herself ripping the niqab from her face, standing on the rail, bellowing at the top of her lungs, so loudly she was heard across the stadium. “DON'T YOU DARE!” The kid was shocked out of his grief by her explosion of rage. “DON'T YOU DARE, YOU IDIOT! GEORGE BUSH ISN'T THE ONE WITH A SWORD AT YOUR NECK, YOU NINNY!”

Some of the Chosen were moving toward her nervously. This was just the kind of outburst that they didn't want, an emotional event that could ripple through a crowd to precipitate a full-scale riot. Even if the occupiers had the advantage of weapons, they knew that an enraged crowd might be able to get one or two of them. Being torn apart alive by the citizens of San Francisco was not in their game plan.

The Americans began to boo and hiss, stomping their feet on the stands. By now, the translation had been made, and the settlers were applauding again. The Headsman paused, one hand to his ear to catch the translation. One of the Palestinians said something to him. They all laughed. They were still laughing when the dreadlocked woman's head went skittering past their feet.

Molly continued to scream. The Americans behind her were booing, their stomping feet drowning out the sound of the settlers' party. Big hands wrapped around Molly, pulled her away from the rail. She fought them now, unhinged with rage. A hand fell across her mouth, a tanned, calloused hand. She kept fighting, hating them for letting this happen, hating them for just sitting there. Someone clipped her jaw, really hard, and then she was out.

A lifetime later, Molly opened her eyes. She winced and closed her eyes again. Her jaw hurt like she'd been kicked by a mule. She gasped as fear blossomed in her chest. The Chosen. They must've grabbed her. She could feel her muscles tensing to leap…leap and do what? Go where? If she was in one of the Treasure Island cells used by the Caliban, then she was dead already. She willed herself to lie still and quiet. She'd make sure she sent one or two of those cowards to Paradise without their cojones, that was for damn sure.

Slowing her breathing, she opened her eyes. She was in a room somewhere, lying on a lumpy double bed. Okay, not a cell. She'd seen enough jails to know that instantly. Under her hands, a knitted afghan of some kind. She turned her head. Tiffany-style lamp on the bedside table, a well-thumbed Bible next to it.

“How are you feeling?” a voice asked from beyond the foot of the bed.

Molly made herself sit up. “Depends on who's asking.” Her head spun, and she bit down on the inside of her cheek to keep from toppling over.

“You're among friends,” the voice said easily.

“Friends of the Prophet?” she replied testily.

“This is my mom's house,” a more familiar voice said. It was the boy who had stood beside her at Candlestick Park. He walked into the room with a ratty hand towel. It was damp, and clean, and he knelt to wipe off her face with a surprisingly delicate touch. She took the rag from him, held it against the tender place on her jaw.

He squatted down in front of her. “You went a little crazy. We had to…”

“We had to shut you up,” the other voice said, coming into the room. It was a short, muscular man of about forty, with a face seamed from being outside too much, wiry red hair, and abnormally large hands at the ends of his wrists. They looked the size of Hormel hams, Molly thought.

“You the one who hit me?” she asked.

The ham-handed man nodded. “And we haven't even been introduced. I'm Henry…Hank, most people call me.”

Of course they do
, Molly agreed. The boy had taken the rag from her again, and was fussing with her face.

“I'm sorry you had to hear me say those things about your mother,” she said.

The boy paused, and continued to wipe her face. “My mom was always a little bent about the Republicans, and George Bush, especially.”

“A little?” Molly couldn't help herself. “Good Christ, the Caliban killed her, not George!”

“I know,” the young man said simply. Real steel crept into his voice. “She didn't deserve to die like that.”

“None of them did.” Molly felt her heart softening, just a touch. “What's your name, son?”

“Jake,” he answered.

Hank sat on a sewing chair across the room. “What do we call you, missy?”

“Molly will do.”

He smiled. “Every Molly I ever knew was crazy.”