Manhattan Revision

This is the begining of a book I hope to have finished before the end of time and it has just come to my attention that it's missing a huge chunck in the middle that didn't paste. So I'm putting up some orange cones and yellow tape so nobody falls in.

Manhattan Revision
Chapter One

Boom. August, 1945 a “Little Boy” fell from the sky. At 8:15 a.m. He eliminated the city of Hiroshima, Japan. Little Jack Horner…

Little boys do not often fall from the sky but this boy was special, he was a large chunk of metal containing 375 moving parts and purified Uranium 235. Little Jack Horner, sitting in a corner…

This little boy vaporized twenty thousand people with flames and heat at temperatures of nearly seven thousand degrees Fahrenheit. He crushed an entire city by calling up winds of nearly one thousand miles per hour with as much as eight thousand pounds of pressure per square foot. Then, this small child set to working his true evil… he spread a terrible disease over everyone he could grasp. He opened up the skin of his victims, pouring into them pure evil, pure radiation. With this his final act, he lives on –killing and deforming even now, 69 years later. Little Jack Horner, falling from a plane…

The “Little Boy,” was the first of his kind. He was young and, compared to his offspring, he was small. But he was born with no virgin aesthetics. He…it was a bomb of magnificent proportions, it was not large but its cargo and its history were massive. This boy’s landing and subsequent detonation is quite possibly one of the most important events in history, especially today, if not then.

The idea of the atomic bomb was researched and produced by a governmental group, The Manhattan Project. Their goal was to purify Uranium 235, eliminating from it the more common Uranium 238 to create a weapon of mass destruction. Their work succeeded but has been improved upon many times since the “Little Boy” fell from the sky. Boys have become men, bombs have become missiles, and weapons have become tools for extinction.

The sound of the blast rolls over like thunder in the distance. The distance. A human would never hear the blast unless at a distance. At a close proximity to the explosion, nothing would be heard except for the gasp of air rushing from the lungs just before they are incinerated. If one could hear, he could also hear his organs boil in the heat around the same time his charcoalized skin begins to crumble. A mile away, others are also not hearing their breath escape from their boiling lungs and crumbling charcoalized lips.
Evil knows no sides in war; it knows no time limit or treaty. Evil does not learn from its mistakes. So evil repeats itself, often deadlier than before. And against the masters it once served.

On October 4, 2014 at 8:32 a.m., a nuclear weapon has once again been used in the name of evil. And evil begets evil. The city is…was named Los Angeles. The City of Angels. Nearly all would agree that most of the souls that departed from the four million in this city on this day did not rise to heaven like angels. Like the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah, destroyed by God for its people’s wickedness, Los Angeles was also swept from the earth. This time, it was not fire sent by heaven that sent the sinners to hell, but the grandchild of what was once a Little Boy. God cannot take credit for the rolling thunder and the bright burst of light that consumed a city and lay waste to the fate of humankind. The lead taste of fission in their mouths.

The cloud roared toward the sky, chasing the few angels that did exists in L.A. back to the heavens. The wind shook the ground and laid waste to every man-made structure. Even those structures erected by God Himself fell beneath the awesome power of this atom bomb. The scene was everything that Hiroshima and Nagasaki could muster… but a hundred fold. The “Little Boy” had grown into a giant beast.

As it was once known in the days of WWII, war had irreversibly changed with the atom bomb. That change ended the war and was the veiled reason for the Cold War. But it had now finally been truly revealed. The United States has led the world in waging its war against terror ever since the attacks made on the U.S. World Trade Center back on September 11, 2001 and it seemed that the war would be over sooner than expected. But war can only be over with complete victory.

Genocide. Genocide is the only means of complete victory. If the smallest isolated pocket of evil remains, there is no victory. Evil will rise again. Evil was not killed and has now risen again to, once and for all, wage its war. And this war has lead to the end of war. America’s War on Terrorism has now hit its apex. The thing so many people had feared has finally come to be. Nuclear war has finally begun. Little Jack Horner, sitting in a corner, eating his pudding pie. He stuck in his thumb, and pulled out a plumb, and said, “What a destructive force am I.”


Chapter One B

She runs. It runs. It runs faster. When she is caught, her screams fill the empty, cavernous halls – not from pain, but from fear. This young girl, only eighteen years of age, has already lived through more horror than one might expect to find in Dean Koontz’s latest novel. Yet, she still fears this ominous creature trailing her. The memories of staring death in the eyes for so long have been compacted into the last 45 seconds of running and crying out for help. Then her screams end, suddenly, forever, and not by her own choosing.

She was not a weak flailing princess or she would never have been here in the first place. She was strong, fast, intelligent, and willful. Almost a match for her pursuer, except for the strange mixture of insanity and calmness in its eyes that terrified her beyond all reason.

Monsters are always “its.” If they were called “he” or “she” then gender would be implied and that would mean that it was one of God’s creations. This monster has made itself or been made to be so very distant from anything left in creation. The devil himself could only look with awe at his gruesome work, his demented thoughts echoing Satan’s own destructive nature.

She ran. It ran faster. It surveys its kill. Blood and sweat are wiped from its brow. If it was capable of rational thought, you would swear it had the slightest hint of pity in its eyes as it quickly turned and walked away, back toward the others. Back towards it's sheep.

Chapter Two

October 4, 2013 Saturday
Suits and ties. Hats and badges. Medals and tears. These objects standing and sitting around a table. Some at rest; others fall. Some make metallic sounds when knocked against others of its kind; yet others sit and wait for the day when they may come under a tired eye, some longing to no longer be needed. There were men inside them in years past. The bodies may still move and talk, but their souls are elsewhere, not having the courage to listen to the news they speak any longer.

It is now a crisp October day in the year 2013. Eight hours and forty-seven minutes have passed since Los Angeles has disappeared and four hours since most of the western seaboard had begun experiencing symptoms of radiation poisoning.

The President’s suit sits crumpled over the end of a long steel and plastic table, the classic sophistication of mahogany had lost its war years ago. The shoes sit on the floor twisting together, belaying their fear.

“In the name of God, what have we done?” The president’s collar tightened as the words came from the space above it. The tie that was worn by the suit was pulled loose to alleviate the pressure on the neck that really was not there.

“We made the bastards pay. We did what we had to do.” A highly decorated green military jacket, sitting across from the president, softly spoke the words. The words flowed through the heavily recycled air of the military bunker to where the ears of the president should be.

“Did we? Or did we just start World War Three and end history?” Another suit and tie jumped in less calmly but closer to the Armani suit of the President. No one broke into grin over his accidental rhyme.

The words that had come from the area above the collar on the Presidential suit had been more of a lamentation rather than a question to be answered. The book of Psalms is full of similar unanswerable questions, but the suits sitting around the table felt they needed to reply to the question for the third time, as if they shared this intimate knowledge with God.

“President Harris, you know as well as anyone here that if we did not retaliate we would only leave ourselves open to further attack. We made the bastards pay and our actions today have secured the enemy’s inability to strike again.” This voice was new, having not yet voiced its obsessive violent nature. What the unnamed military man means is that no one can retaliate if their entire country is no longer there.

“We are all fools. We have not ended the war, we have only set the end in motion.” The President could not regain any positive thinking. Moments later, a phone rang and a dark green suit reached for it, a gold Rolex flew to the sound and the receiver was yanked to the space above the padded left shoulder of the suit. Intense words were probably said and heard. If there was a face worth looking at on the man that should have been holding the telephone, it would have been one of already knowing, knowing the terror that was crawling up the back of his neck. The fears of others in the room were quickly affirmed by the sounds of other phones ringing and faxes faxing and video monitors springing to life with newly videoed monitorings.

It is eight hours and fifty-three minutes since Los Angeles got nuked. It is also seven hours twenty-two minutes since the sovereign United States lunched its rebuttal. And one hour and six minutes since five state of the art nuclear warheads detonated on their individual targets, bringing catastrophe to an already calamitized country, in a terrorized region of the world.

The suits and ties and medals who run the military – and in the last few years, most of the business of the United States – have also just learned that it has also been zero hours and twelve minutes since eight warheads began launching from several different sites throughout the world. It is official: Nuclear War. The first nuclear weapon used on a society in sixty-nine years had come at a most fearful time. The retaliation on the part of the offended society has set off a chain reaction of fear. Every nuclear power in the civilized world has begun to act just as America had acted. Assuring that no power-hungry-hate-filled-holy-war-bent-crazies could attack their freedom, their sovereignty. Unfortunately everyone had the same idea and the same unwillingness to think about the consequences.

India fires on Pakistan, and Pakistan fires back, North Korea launches on Japan, China Launches on North Korea. One attack had led to another of even greater power and had then been followed by all the evil the world had to offer. Almost all.

Evil begets evil and all that… but evil knows no time limits.

“There is only one piece of advice I can give. Only one thing we have left to do. We must put the Manhattan Revision into effect.” The suits around the table suddenly regained their life, but not because of hope but because the suggestion that had been made was one of sheer desperation uttered by a hopeless man in a lifeless suit.

The soulless fashion settled around the table, reflected on the words, and mixed their emotions into the boiling pot.

Agitation gave way to fear and anger. Fear and anger have been wed long ago in these top secret rooms with their seven foot thick concrete walls with radiation proof lead lining under millions of tons of soil and rock. The suits and ties sitting in this room know that in this bunker they will be safe from any attack but that is little condolence.

“Is that all we can do?” Asked one idealistic pinstripe.

“We’re facing extinction in less than six hours. Our counter measures barely have a ten percent success rate and we can only survive in this bunker for ten years tops. Radiation might not get us but our sanity will crack long before we run out of air and water.” The voice of the coatless white oxford with the cornflower blue tie spoke the words that they all knew.

The Presidential looking suit gestured towards a man monitoring live satellite from around the world.

“He’s right sir, there are at least eight warheads that should find ground zero within our borders.”

The President’s barely existent eyes went cold.
The room in which the clothes sat mirrored their dark fear. High dark metal walls leading to unseen dark ceilings. The hard tiled floors creeping out from under the heavy table to the four dark corners of the room. But even here, hiding in the dark, these men of cotton and wool can only survive for so long and the evil outside their door has a half-life of fifty years.

The clothes and medals and undergarments that surround the table up until this point had been set on the ideas of conquering their foes as if that were still possible. But now the atom had leveraged its way into the equation and all force dealt would be force awarded back on its source. Evil begets evil… and all that.

“Go with the Manhattan Revision.” The Armani President said and without a word stood on his wobbly matching dark blue slacks and loafers and made his way to his private living quarters to tell his wife and children what he has done to them all.

A momentous strike had occurred on U.S. soil, the likes of which had never been seen before. In one swiftly acted but carefully planned deed, more destruction had been dealt to the country than any previous endeavor including the United States’ own use of two atomic bombs on Japan at the end of World War Two. Some would comment that vengeance had been served. Evil begets evil…and all that.

The vocal pinstripe voiced his approval and the green and dark blue and gray military jackets made their phone calls. Setting into motion the already in motion Manhattan Revision. The project started seventeen years earlier and only recently has become fully available as a source of salvation for the chosen few within its walls and tubes.

Clothes make the man and clothes are now running the country, that’s all anyone has left. At this same moment Paul and Sherry Darr are huddled together with two of their three children. What they are wearing is the last thing on their minds. Usually Sherry would scold Jeff for the ice cream stain on his shirt, or tell Karen that her skirt is much too short. But not today, today is not usual. Today they know they are about to die. For all their despair and fear they have one shred of hope left. They are about to lose everything; their children, their home, their friends, and their lives. But on a prayer flies their hope that one life will not be lost. Alan Darr is not clutching the hands of his parents, though he wishes he were there with them, he is not. He is safe, and that is only the beginning of his torment.

Chapter Three

May 15, 2013 Thursday

Bang. The front door. Someone knocking. Alan’s eyes dart around the otherwise quiet bedroom. His bedroom. The floors covered in clothes from the previous days of non- nudism. Homework from Geography class, second period, forming a strange geography of its own as it sprawls across a small mahogany desk. The computer screen that had kept Alan detached from his homework was still displaying the 3D fish tank screen saver, hiding the action of games such as Half Life underneath its calming surface. Alan stared blankly at the fish as they floated around in their usual patterns, blowing bubbles. He did not consider himself a gamer or a computer nerd or a psycho. Alan enjoyed many of life’s nuances, it just so happened that computer games were the one thing he could do without leaving his room and thereby alarming his parents to the lack of progress he was showing with his schoolwork.

Crap.

Alan slowly pulled himself from the bed and stood up just in time to turn off his nature sounds alarm clock. Why would anyone ever want to wake up to the sound of water rushing down streams and over rocks? I have to piss bad enough as it is. His arms and back stretch themselves almost having a will of their own. He was of average height and build for a middle distance runner. His six-foot tall frame was held together with 165lbs of pure dysfunctional teenager. He moves to the bathroom and empties his bladder and then he is onto the shower, and so he moves through his daily routine the same as any other day but this is not any other day.

Today is the first day of the rest of his life. Today is the last day of his high school career and three days before graduation. Alan has looked forward to this day for the last three years at least. He enjoyed high school, he had his group of friends, his grades were good, if not great, and he enjoyed the athletics he participated in, if not excelled in. But it was high school, Alan had spent the last four years of his life trapped in this institution and now he was ready to escape, to reinvent himself in a far away land, college.

He hummed to himself the song that was playing on the new rock station on his satellite radio that softly filled the air with its cacophony. With his teeth brushed and hair molded into the latest fashion, Alan made his way down the stairs into the living room and then the kitchen where the rest of his family hastened through their breakfast.

“Who was at the door?” Alan asked only half caring, too enthralled by his own future to really care about a noise in the night.

“It was UPS.” Paul Darr answered while barely looking up from the stock market research that accompanied him wherever he went. Alan’s father sat at the kitchen table sipping Columbian coffee, chewing on lightly buttered toast, reading his computer screen, and all the while keeping a weary eye on the family that he loved so much. He would die for his children and he knew he was truly fortunate to find the woman that was mother to his offspring.

“You ready for the big day on Sunday Alan?” The chance to die for his children, to prove his love had never came up, so instead he choose to do the next best thing; work as hard as possible to give them everything they desire, even when that means not always being the most visible person in the family. As head of IT for a large insurance company Paul Darr had done just that.

“Yeah I think so…you still think you’re going to be late to the ceremony?”

“I’m trying everything I can Alan, I promise to be there.” Paul gave his eldest son one of those stern but loving looks that are suppose to provoke trust in all that encounter its gaze, and then went back to his breakfast and pre-work work. Alan decided not to pursue it any further and set to work on his juice and bagel.
Moments later Sherry Darr enters the room prodding two grumpy students who did not share Alan’s excitement for the day. Karen was fifteen and a sophomore at Whitmer High school with Alan. She carried the light brown hair and athletic features of the rest of the family and if she were older she could be Alan’s twin. This morning she was running late after the fifteen minutes of scrubbing extra mascara off her face and the changing out of a short black skirt and tight blouse into a much more acceptable sweater and jeans. Jeff a twelve year old eighth grader at East Junior high had a much simpler reason for displaying attitude this morning, he just did not want to be awake this early, but then again, he never did.

The two of them lazily slouched into chairs at the table on either side of their father, while Mrs. Darr quickly poured a bowl of cereal for each of them and set toast, orange juice and milk in front of them.

“Now perk up and eat, you only have ten minutes and then were out of here.” Sherry’s daily routine sent her to two schools every morning to drop off the kids before cruising into her own school just in time to ready her thoughts for the harsh realities of teaching third grade.

“Alan.” Sherry glanced up from her coffee with a sudden thought. “Have you put any more thought into that summer internship, it sounded like a great opportunity.”

Crap, one more chance for my parents to make me into something I don’t want to be.
“I don’t know mom, it sounds like too much chemistry and biology and not enough…” Alan pretended to struggle with the words. “Not enough summer.” “Alan, listen to your mother.” Here’s where dad chimes in. “It sounds like an excellent opportunity even if you don’t choose to continue your studies in those areas in college, it will be a great resume builder.”

“Right. Resume builder. I know.” Alan always knew. Not necessarily everything, just the right things to say and the right way to say them to keep his parents off his back, and keep him in their good graces. He wasn’t lying to them, he was just protecting them from the harsh realities of life. He protected them from the knowledge that he would be very much drunk this weekend at the graduation party they knew he was going to attend. Protected them form the knowledge that his girlfriend Alicia and he did not talk about algebra when they were alone. I’m always the driver, he had told them. We were talking about how stupid our class is. Acknowledging the presence of alcohol while leading his parents to trust that he was too smart to be the one drinking it. He always knew to tell them some of what happened so that they wouldn’t dig any deeper then he wanted them to. On the other hand Alan was less of a drunk then some of his friends and generally did drive them home but that may have also been the influence of Alicia.

“I’ll return the admission form today, just don’t be sad when they write back to tell me that I didn’t get in.” Alan found that a little self-doubt went a long way towards sympathy.

His mother gave a sympathetic nod. “Have a little hope Alan, you’ll do fine.” Encouragement had always been his mother’s strong suit along with control; maybe that’s why she had become a teacher, and a mother, for that matter.

Okay there is a bunch of stuff missing here where Alan gets dumped, drunk and in a lot of trouble. Sorry, now if only I can find my original.

Chapter 6
June 1, 2013

Alan glanced at the clock on his cell phone. 3:47 p.m. Only fifteen minutes until he would arrive at the Marion Airport. He was to be picked up by a Hubert Mann, one time researcher and now recruitment officer for The Manhattan Revision Research Group. His parents had wanted to drive Alan to his destination as a type of family trip, but their schedules would not allow it. Alan didn’t care. He was glad to be out and on his own. He had been virtually chained to his bed for the last two weeks. He put up no fight against his imprisonment. Why would he? He had no place to go. He had not spoken to Alicia since that day at his locker, unless of course you count the string of profanities that he screamed into the phone as she listened on the other end right before he proceeded to further his intoxication to the point of hacking up his intestines on the back lawn. Alan had not even spoken to Kyle or any of his other friends for that matter. He was tired of them all and now with college approaching, he had a chance to rebuild his life from the ground up. New friends. New ideas. New girls. And maybe “The” new girl.

Alan spent the rest of the trip trying not to think about the boredom that awaited him in Virginia. He watched, as the flat plains of the Midwest became the rolling hills and eventual peaks of the Appalachian Mountains. The 737 landed safely sixteen minutes later and caught himself wishing for something a little more exciting than safe. He quickly exited the sparsely populated aircraft and entered the equally sparse airport terminal.

“You must be Alan Darr!” Hubert Mann was a very excitable man. Fairly short and fairly round, and very white, he resembled a volleyball that had been out of action for far too long. He popped up from the eighties-orange-plastic airport chairs that were bolted to the floor and offered his stubby fingered hand to Alan.

“That would be me. You must be…” Alan stuck out his hand but was not able to finish his sentence as the excitable Mr. Mann finished his thought.

“I am Hubert Mann, Director of Admissions for the Manhattan Revision, and at your service.” He smiled buoyantly, impressed with himself.

“If you would like to follow me we have a three hour drive ahead of us and we really should get going. I can answer any questions you have once were on the road.” Alan only nodded at the strange man’s abruptness, and after a quick stop at the restroom, they were off.