Moments

The Kingmaker - I

It was Christmas Eve. The festive season drove everyone into a frenzy. The choirs in the churches were practising carols throughout the day. Till they closed, all the malls were so full that they were spilling out people. Until it was right in the dead of the night, there was no calm in the city. But even then, even in the empty streets of the capital, all those in the know were aware that this night was crucial. They were going to witness a decisive showdown — a bloody battle. Even the police didn't dare to pay too much attention to people who might be associated with the organisation.

In the control room of the Skeleton's Smile, the deadliest knife Caflan's government possessed, a grave silence prevailed. The man who seemed to be the head of the ongoing operation had a disgruntled expression. "I don't believe that he is that omnipotent! Pull out the Level-3 shooters!" he yelled.

The low-level agents followed his orders bitterly. They knew that no matter what they did, their success would inevitably lie on a bed of corpses. It felt terrible to send their comrades to their deaths. They looked at the radar with complicated expressions. The man on the radar, the one they were targeting had once been one of them. They didn't know what happened between him and the higher-ups. They didn't know what words were said and what blows were exchanged. They only knew that they woke up one day to find that the man they had all admired, the man they had hero-worshipped to the point of stupidity, was now a wanted fugitive.

Code Name: Shark. That wasn't a name he had assumed. It was a name that was granted to him after observing the way he dealt with various cases. Once Agent Shark spotted his prey, he would latch on to it viciously, chew it into bits and not even spit out the bones. He would give it no room for retreat and that's what the government both hated and loved about him. Because they knew that one day, like it was happening that day, if Shark found something undesirable about them, it was guaranteed that he would turn on them. And when he did, he would gnaw on their bones and tear apart their tendons, destroying them from within.

As the government watched the situation unfold with tenterhooks, the man in question, Agent Shark a.k.a. Lucas Starling, was lazing around on the tallest building of the city. He had installed a hammock there the previous week – he had known that the day would soon come when this rooftop and him would communicate on intimate terms. He had also setup a small shack where he had stored all his necessities. Especially Red Bull. He needed those blue cans because his life depended on them.

As he stared at his laptop screen, lines of code appeared on them as his fingers flew over the keyboard. Once he finished, he pressed the return key. A few clicks later, a pop up appeared on the screen.

[Run program "Caflan's Doom"?]

[Type Y/N]

Lucas's lips curved. He unhesitatingly typed 'y' and pressed the return key again. Numerous lines of gibberish only he could understand flowed across the screen. Lucas leaned back and relaxed. The show had started.

From when he was five to when he turned thirty i.e. eleven months ago, Lucas had worked tirelessly for the government. He had been sold to Skeleton's Smile, as far as he knew, and there was no way for him to know whether he had been trafficked or if his biological parents were the ones responsible for his situation. It was only later that he learnt that his own parents had sold him to the organisation in return for a substantial amount of money and government protection. 

They hadn't been very well off, so they had eagerly taken up the offer. After all, they had three other mouths to feed in the family.

The organisation had treated him well when it came to equipping him with skills. Lucas could proudly pat his chest and claim that there was very little he couldn't do in this world. He was a Special Agent. The type which needed to be duplicitous, cunning, insightful. The type which needed to act most of the time and pretend to be someone he was not and complete the mission. He needed to know everything but pretend to know nothing. The government-owned Skeleton's Smile had never entertained overly-clever people.

As his reputation grew as quickly as his intelligence and awareness, the organisation began to hold its guard up against him. The more perfect the rate of his completion was, the more wary they were. It was at that time that he decided to break free and lead his own life. But he knew too much. It was impossible for the organisation to let him go without silencing him.

So they decided to lure him with information about his parents. What they didn't know was that Lucas was extremely clear about his family circumstances and held no affection for such callous parents. He didn't care what it did with them. This made all the attacks of the organisation have no effect whatsoever.

It was then that they began their aggression. For one entire year, they made him miserable, chasing him, cornering him, attacking him... Lucas then decided that he had had enough. And so, he began his elaborate master plan.

Lucas smiled, gazing up at the stars. He knew this wouldn't end well for him. He knew the only end that was waiting for him was death. But he also knew that he couldn't let this ungrateful establishment go scot-free without experiencing the consequences. Many would balk at the thought of going head-on against a powerful country's rulers, but Lucas wasn't one of them. He had the ability and he would make full use of it.

At the finance minister's office, an employee shrieked as he stared at the computer screen. She stood up and ran to the minister's office, barging in, not caring about etiquette. The displeased minister was about to reprimand her when she shouted, "Sir, the other six major countries have decided to boycott all of Caflan's products!"

At the same time, the phone rang in the minister's office. The minister, who hadn't yet recovered from the shock, picked up the phone in a daze. "Sir, an estimated 4 trillion dollars' worth of fake currency has been injected into our economy. Since the information has been revealed, our currency valuation has been dropping rapidly since one hour. If this goes on, we will face a serious crisis."

In the defence minister's office, the army general strode with a heavy expression. He walked into the office unceremoniously and slammed his hand on the desk. "I told you to not provoke him. I warned you about his ability. I warned you to beware of him. You didn't listen. You took my words lightly. And guess what?" he gave a scary smile. "Rumis, Jukter and Freiten are at our borders firing at our men who had no intelligence about this unprovoked attack because Lucas Starling blocked any information from reaching us!"

Minutes later, news arrived that the defence minister had had a heart attack and was admitted to the nearest hospital.

In the prime minister's office, the phones rang incessantly. The prime minister, who had just finished yelling at his finance minister, took a deep breath and picked up the phone. "Prime Minister, sir, sixty percent of our members of parliament have defected under the leadership of the minister of home affairs. We don't have a majority in the parliament now. The speaker is asking us to prove our strength on the floor of the house. We have no way."

The prime minister's face turned puce with rage. "Starling!" he roared.

He couldn't believe that a single agent could cause so much havoc and could wield so much influence and power. In fact, this wasn't havoc – this was complete destruction. Caflan was done for. There was no opportunity for revival. As his immense experience could tell him, the prime minister knew that the only result of this massive crisis was the carving up of Caflan with different pieces going to different countries.

He knew he had lost. But before that, he had have the satisfaction of seeing Lucas Starling's dead body.

Lucas closed the laptop and climbed down the side wall and reached the ground. He walked barehanded into the streets where he knew his adversaries were waiting for him. He was tired. He had had enough. This life of his, he couldn't continue to live watching his back all the time. He raised his arms to shoulder level and looked up at the stars again.

Five gunshots were heard at a distance. The bullets lodged themselves into Special Agent Shark's body. Blood flowed copiously from his wounds, staining his pristine white clothes. Lucas sighed.

Before he took his last breath, he thought, 'should freedom taste this bitter?'