Chapter 53

December Twenty-fifth 1:00 a.m EST

Arthur gazed into the city from the top of the Washington Monument, his face cast alternately in shadow and bright orange light from the fingers of flame that still shot high into the air from the Capitol Building. Other fires raged through many of the city's districts. The fire fighters who might have stopped them were scattered, dead, or at least no longer living, across the steps of the Capitol. In the distance, a fireball rose languidly into the sky as the flames reached a gas station or propane storage tank.

Except for the fires and the headlights of vehicles, the city was dark. The headlights were motionless - the massive barricades that had been put in place along every route out of the city saw to that - and twinkled like stars as terrified people and the beasts that hunted them ran back and forth through the streets in front of them.

From the lawn of the National Mall below him, he could hear rhythmic pounding as stakes were driven into the ground and the weak screams of those who occupied the ones that were already in place.

"Sic transit gloria mundi," he intoned softly to the Chief of Staff, who sat gagged and bound to a chair, his eyes fixed with morbid fascination on the explosives in his lap and the digital timer that counted down the seconds until dawn.

"Ceux qui rient le vendredi, pleureront le dimanche," a wheezing voice answered from the top of the stairs.

"Perhaps," Arthur replied sarcastically, "But while I would never dream of questioning your back country Gallic wisdom, I plan to be laughing just as loudly when that Sunday comes."

Turning to face the speaker, Arthur was somewhat taken aback by Jean's appearance. The younger vampire's limbs were grotesquely bent and twisted, and his chest and stomach were sunken and emaciated.

"Hello, Jean," Arthur said mildly. "I must admit that I'm surprised to see you, or at least what's left of you. Kelly told me that you had run into some difficulty."

"Some," Jean agreed. "Marcus was in Pittsburgh, and he politely asked me to deliver a message to you."

Although Arthur waved a hand in a dismissive gesture once the message had been delivered, Jean could see that he was shaken.

That uncertainty was not apparent in his voice when he spoke. "The world is a very large place, and I plan to be far from here after tomorrow. He will lose interest and return to the ruins of his beloved city long before he finds me."

Caustically, Jean replied, "So, you plan to just run off? What of all the fledglings that ultimately answer to you? Do you mean to just abandon them?"

"Of course. They have served their purpose. Nearly every major city in the United States and Canada, from the East Coast as far west as Denver is in a state similar to this one."

"What of those farther west?"

"Unfortunately, the attack on San Antonio ran into difficulty when an elderly bomb sniffing dog, being taken home for some holiday pampering by his handler, triggered on the fledgling coming into the station to blow it up. The battle there still rages in the streets, but they were able to get warnings out before communications could be severed. Forewarned, some cities farther to the west may manage to raise an effective defense. It is still too early for the reports I've been receiving to be clear whether or not this is the case.

"In the long run, it hardly matters. While shock from the nature and extent of the attack might paralyze the populace for a day or two, eventually people everywhere will rise against the attackers, and there are not enough fledglings to resist such overwhelming numbers for long. That is as it should be. There are far too many of us now. Unchecked, we would exhaust our food supply in a matter of years. Oh, a few fledglings will survive: the strongest, the smartest, and the most ruthless. That is also how it should be."

"So, all of this was for nothing?" Jean replied, aghast.

"Hardly. The vast majority of the continent's police force, often called the thin blue line between order and chaos, are gone. Also no more are the lawmakers, the leaders, the media and those involved in the administration of justice. The ones who eventually eliminate the fledglings, and who will die in great numbers doing so, will be those who might have had the strength of will and character to put things back together. All that will remain is the rotten core of society: the weak, the apathetic, and the complacent.

"They will be left sitting in their dark homes: cold, frightened and, soon enough, starving. The starvation will not only be of the flesh, but of the spirit as well. The loss of the churches and community centers should see to that. As a final nail in the coffin of civilization, one of the fledglings is busy making copies of the recording he made of the members of the nation's most powerful political body fighting each other to the death. Distribution will be slow with communications down, but it will spread, as bad news always does. It will drive home the fact that no one is safe. It will also go far to dispel the illusion that is the last defense of the desperate: that someone, somewhere knows what is happening and is taking action to stop it.

"To borrow from the old adage, even in the best of times, all that separates humanity from barbarism is two meals and twenty-four hours. While it might take longer than a single day, it won't be long before the entire continent is consumed by anarchy.

"I have also set in motion events that will undoubtedly lead to war across the Middle East. Wars that, without the calming influence of the west, will devour the region and, possibly, spread elsewhere.

"In Europe, paranoia, inspired by the events here, in Rome and the Middle East and fed by the fledglings I have in place in the capitals, will run rampant. Borders will be closed, policies of isolation will be put in place, and a fortress mentality will set in. It will not be long before those nations collapse under the weight of their own fear.

"In the east, the burgeoning but fragile economy of China will shatter with the loss of its trading partners, leaving millions of abruptly unemployed and disgruntled workers. The fact that two nuclear powers are waging war on their border should provide an additional destabilizing influence. Japan, so dependent on food imports from China and the United States, will starve. Freed of outside constrictions, the insane and egotistical dictator in North Korea will turn his eyes south.

"In short, the world will devolve into chaos. In the ensuing anarchy, no one will so much as notice our predations or excesses. It will be the dawn, so to speak, of the age of the vampire."

"You truly are insane," Jean said slowly, "A barjot. There is one thing I don't understand, though: if you've already accomplished everything you set out to do, why are you waiting for tomorrow to leave? Why not tonight?"

"There are still a few minor tasks that need tending. I have made arrangements with General Rutherford for a little object lesson, one that should make people hesitant to make a frontal assault on the fledglings. It will only delay the inevitable, but it should buy the fledglings enough time to spread the destruction into suburbs and rural communities.

"After the populace has a day to recognize their plight, I also intend to have the President and his family give a little speech at the city's only remaining radio station, extolling those who continue to fight to lay down their arms and giving assurances that those who do will be shown mercy. I have had similar radio stations spared in the other cities. The message will be picked up and spread."

Jean shook his head in bewilderment. "Why bother with the speech? People would have to be fools to believe it."

"True. Fortunately, if there is one thing that is never in short supply, it is fools."

The conversation came to a halt as they watched a pack of ferals chase a group of people down Pennsylvania Avenue. In only a few seconds, the pursuit came to an end with a few final, terrified screams.

"Why ferals?" Jean asked. "They are nearly as dangerous to us as they are to mortals, and true fledglings are nearly as easy to create and more likely to rise. Not to mention the fact that, with true fledglings, you likely could have ruled this nation instead of destroying it."

Arthur laughed contemptuously. "Do farmers declare themselves kings over their swine? Of course not. Like them, I have no interest in ruling my pigs, only eating them. My intent is to destroy the very fabric of society, and, at this stage of the game, ferals are far more useful for that purpose than true fledglings.

"Without orders - and there wasn't nearly enough time for those doing the killing to wait around for each new fledgling to rise and be given instructions - true fledglings would likely only kill once before giving into remorse, grief or something equally pathetic. Ferals, on the other hand, will kill again and again until they, themselves, are destroyed. Their voracious appetites will more than compensate for the lower probability that any particular victim will rise again. This is especially true as I am given to understand that less than two in ten are rising, even for normal fledglings.

"Finally, there is the fact that the unbridled savagery of the ferals inspires far more fear and despair than a true fledgling could ever manage. So, to answer your question, while it is certainly true that the ferals will inflict casualties among our number, that is a small price to pay for the benefits they provide."

Jean shook his head slowly in disbelief before asking, "When I was passing through the city, I overheard complaints concerning your order to focus on children when creating ferals. Please tell me that I misunderstood."

"You did not. As you are no doubt aware, the main weakness of the ferals is their inability to reason. They will charge straight at a line of well armed men without giving any thought to self preservation. However, most people have the same abhorrence to killing children that you just demonstrated. Because of it, they will allow a child to approach far closer than they would an adult before they open fire.