Fear Itself

It was December 30, 2057 when we took down League Tower #1. It was that very night that we assembled our team: Alex, Elijah Griffiths, Shane Brady, Dean, Avery, and I. As I’m sure many would find shocking, I was the only one unarmed. That was mostly because I was the one wearing a backpack full of explosives, and nobody else trusted me not shoot the backpack somehow. It was cold, and we were out there for a while, hiding about a block or so away from the plaza that held all five of the towers, sitting in a patch of forest, dressed all in black, gathered around a makeshift trash can fire that we started with a bunch of newspaper and branches and lit with Avery’s lighter because it was colder than I ever remembered being. Luckily, I had stolen a fleece jacket from Liberty Markets just days ago because I was sick of being so cold all the time.

Dean had his arm around me, and Avery sat on the other side, watching, even though he tried to look like he wasn’t. Alex was telling some strange story about a woman who found a chihuahua on the side of the road in New Mexico and took it home only to find out that it was a hairless, Mexican sewer rat, and that was enough to make me want to vomit, so I had stopped listening to whatever weird story he was telling about twenty minutes ago.

“So three days later, they wake up, and this dog is dead in the corner,” Alex continued. “And it’s foaming at the mouth, and rigor mortis has already set in, so—“

“Eyebrows, what the fuck kind of story is this?” Dean interjected. I giggled, and he hugged me just a little tighter.

“It’s an urban legend,” Alex huffed.

“From when? 2005?” I mocked him, and Dean stopped to high five me.

“Nice one, Blondie,” he commented with a laugh. I shrugged my shoulders a little, and I glanced over to Avery, grinning.

“Isn’t this fun, Mumbles?” I joked, reaching over to nudge his shoulder. He gave a breathy laugh.

“Yeah. A real blast,” he grumbled.

“I see what you did there!” Dean laughed. “Good one, mate.” Avery didn’t answer, just glanced at him, huffed, and turned away. Trying to break the awkward silence, I tried to think of something to say.

“So, Shane, Elijah,” I piped up. “Tell me how you made the bombs. I’m quite interested in it, actually.”

“Common fertilizer,” Shane explained with a nod, his unruly blonde mop of hair concealed under a black beanie. His black sunglasses were tucked in the collar of his shirt. We all wore something similar. I didn’t bother. There wasn’t much you could do to hide my mane of blonde curls, but I still had the sunglasses. A recent breakthrough led Sam to believe that the most important thing to block from the cameras were our eyes, so we did just that. Still, Avery and Dean were supposed to take out the cameras in the main room before Shane and Elijah entered because they were wanted men, and nothing alerted the cameras like a fugitive.

“We actually picked it up at Liberty Markets,” Elijah explained. He already had his sunglasses on, but he always wore them. He was uncomfortable with how his eyes looked, not that there was much noticeable about them, not to point out that he was blind, anyway. He did have some scarring; the League didn’t care much for precision during torture, it seemed.

“You mean, you stole it,” Alex corrected. “I was there.”

“Yeah,” Shane agreed, nodding. “We picked it up.” Alex rolled his eyes, and Shane gave him a cheeky grin. “Anyway, we mixed that with diesel fuel into soup cans. You’ve got about 12 in your backpack there. Every two cans is hooked up to a cell phone speaker by a relay.”

“Many of which were obtained by threatening the citizens of London,” Elijah added.

“Correct,” Shane continued. “Also in that bag are six other cell phones, also stolen, with the numbers of the other six programmed in. Once we’re safely away from the building, all we have to do is dial. The cell phone speaker sends an electrical current through the relay, and into the detonation cord.”

“And boom!” Elijah exclaimed. “Bye, bye, building.”

“Speaking of buildings, I think it’s about time we’ve blown one up, don’t you?” Dean interjected. “Considering it’s about 10:30 PM, and it should all be cleared out by now.”

“What about security?” I asked.

“Garrett and Larson were due to have taken them out about a half hour ago. Besides that, we had Ryan, Emma, and Lola stationed on nearby rooftops with sniper rifles to get anyone they missed. All we need is your eye to get in,” Alex told me.

“My eye?” I blinked, utterly confused. Alex just rolled his eyes.

“Yes, because your eyes are virtually identical to your father’s, unfortunately, so you’re our ticket in, past the scanners. Do you think we actually brought you because you were vital to the rest of the mission?” he scoffed.

Sadly, I turned my head to Dean and whispered, “Dean, you said I was team leader this time.”

“You are,” he whispered back, assuringly. Avery just laughed behind me. “C’mon,” Dean addressed everyone, standing up and grabbing my hand to help me up as well. “Time to move out.” I looked up and nudged him in the side. “Oh, right,” he corrected. “Go ahead, Blondie.”

“Alright, boys!” I exclaimed. “Move out!” With that, we all headed toward the plaza. Dean leaned toward me, grinning.

“Do you feel better now?” he asked.

“Yes, as a matter a fact, I do,” I told him. When we thought no one was looking, he leaned down and kissed me quickly, but I could hear Avery grumbling behind me, so I very quickly pulled away and put some space between us. Sometimes, that creeped me out about Avery: he was always skulking somewhere. Skulking and brooding.

When we got closer, we all tossed our sunglasses on and headed for the main entrance. With security gone, nobody was going to see us. I was safe to open the scanner and tilt my sunglasses down, spreading my eye wide open so it could get a good look. “Welcome, Board Member Giroux,” it greeted me. “Please come in.” The gates shifted open to allow us entrance, and the boys immediately encircled me, armed and ready to shoot if they had to. Dean attempted to take the back, but Avery stepped in behind me, so Dean settled for the front instead (even though I was team leader, and it really should have been me up there). We cut straight through the garden and up to League Tower #1, settled in the back of the plaza. It was daunting, tall, and the All-Seeing Eye sat on top. It was the first time I had ever truly seen the thing.

It was a large, golden pyramid with a literal eye in the center. If it couldn’t get any stranger, the eye seemed to function as the camera; it moved and rotated like a human eye, changing angles and focus. The thing even blinked. I couldn’t think of a function for that. Perhaps it was taking a still shot. We approached the door, and the boys broke to let me show the next lock my eye. It greeted me again, welcomed me, in fact. I pushed through the door. Avery followed in behind me, taking out cameras as we stepped through. Dean came as well, making sure none were missed before he waved Alex to bring Shane and Elijah inside.

The building was massive, even just the lobby, adorned with black and white checked floors and large statue of a black triangle in the center of the room. A reception desk sat on the right. There were two elevators situated at the far side of the room, all the way at the back. On the left side of the room was a staircase. “We need that,” Dean said, nodding toward the exit sign glowing above the door. “Wanna let ‘em know, Blondie?” He nudged me. I looked over my shoulder toward the other three and whistled, waving my arm toward the stairs, and we ran for them.

We booked down the next flight of stairs, taking out security cameras on the way down, trying to avoid the tiny sparks flying when bullets severed the wiring inside. We came to the last level and pushed through the door. We had to be quick. More cameras, lots of them. Avery, Dean and Alex rushed in, taking cover and taking out what they could see, then moved onto the next area, motioning for us to follow them in on the way. We rushed in, taking cover in the center of the basement, among crates and crates, full of what, we weren’t really sure, but that wasn’t why we were there.

I set the back pack down. Each of us took two cans each. “Okay,” I said. “To get the most effective blast, we need to set these at six key locations. One in each corner, and two in the center because the center is really what needs to come down. Even if the sides don’t go like we hope, there’s still a good chance the building could topple inward if the center comes down. Okay?” I looked around at everyone, and they nodded. I nodded back, and they dispersed, except for Avery, who stayed with me, rigging a second bomb near the center of the room with me.

“Got it, Mumbles?” I asked, barely watching him as I double-checked the wiring on my own. Once satisfied, I glanced up to him.

“Got it, Princess,” he grumbled, rising to his feet just a few feet away from me.

“Perfect,” I mused as I moved back to grab the backpack, zip it back up, and throw it back on my shoulders. Soon enough, everyone else came rushing back. “Peachy,” I chirped. “Let’s take our leave, then. Shall we?” Just like that, we made our way back up the stairs, just as quickly, and just as carefully, making sure nobody had stopped in while we were down there. Eventually, we made it out of the building, out of the plaza, and back into West London, safely taking safe haven on the rooftop of an apartment complex in West London where I opened the back and handed out the cell phones.

As Shane counted to three, we all hit the call button. One ring, two rings, three rings, and then a loud boom. We waited in anticipation, but suddenly, there was fire, and smoke, and a cloud of debris rising up as the building sank, no crashed, straight toward the ground, sending the All-Seeing Eye toppling down with it.

I never remembered seeing something so glorious in all my life, and there was nothing but silence other than the sound of the tower toppling over. There was a tiny gasp coming from each one of us, except maybe Avery. Our phones seemed to drop from our hands in unison, and the most glorious triumphant cheers rose from our throats like a war cry.

It was truly picturesque.

As the flames flickered and climbed into the night sky and the debris smoldered below, I couldn’t help but throw myself at Dean (who thankfully caught me in his arms) and kiss him hard. After a bit, I jumped off of him and rushed over to Avery, grabbing the sleeve of his jacket and shaking him. “D’you see it, Mumbles?” I asked him excitedly. “D’you see?”

“Yeah,” he mumbled. “Yeah, I see it, Princess.”

I squealed and hugged him. “Mumbles, we did that.” He laughed a little, rustling his hand in my hair.

“You sure did, Princess,” he chuckled under his breath. “You sure did.”

Sirens blared from East London. No doubt, Kennedy was furious. I couldn’t blame him. If somebody blew up my building, I’d be pretty livid too. We fled to the tunnels, where Sam greeted us with celebratory beers that he apparently came out of hiding to purchase for us. We sat around the meeting tables, laughing, and drinking, and when Commander Kennedy called Dean to rant about the tower being blown up, we all had to sit there and try not to laugh. Even Avery snuck a smile at the exchange. I didn’t spend the night there; I went to Dean’s, where we did some celebrating of our own.

The image of the tower burning stayed with me through the night and gave me hope that maybe we were getting somewhere, and I hoped that maybe that image gave some people hope that there was a better life for them on the horizon. That was what we were fighting for, anyway: a better tomorrow. At least that’s what I was fighting for.

And for now, it seemed like we were surely winning the war.