Kingdom: The Complete Series (56 page)

“
Fair
enough, man. Fair enough.”

They both stop talking
as the Trespasser's ancient mobile phone squawks its tinny ringtone around the
room. All eyes shoot to him as he lifts it to his ear.

He cites off a garbled
list of codewords and nonsense, and then listens intently. After a few minutes,
he grunts an affirmation, and hangs up.

“
Who
was that?” asks Mark.

Trespasser One looks at
the phone, then closes his eyes and puts it back into its pouch.

“
It
was the Agency,” he says. “Giving us an ultimatum.”

“
Giving
us
an ultimatum? What for?”

“
They
want our help to stop the King. Preferably, they want him dead.”

Jamie laughs. “Yeah,
no. He can't be killed by anything they've got.”

“
Nevertheless,”
says the Trespasser. “They've given us three days.”

“
What,
to kill him?”

“
Or
find
them
a way of killing him, yeah.”

“
And
what if we don't?” asks Jamie. “What happens when the three days are up?”

The Trespasser shrugs.
“They drop a neutron bomb on Glasgow.”

Episode
7

Funeral
For One

“
A
neutron bomb?”
Mark stands up, almost knocking the camp bed over. “Like
a nuclear bomb?”

“
A
neutron bomb has a different kind of payload, but yeah: it's a nuclear device,”
says the Trespasser, putting his hands on his hips. “It's detonated higher in
the atmosphere – much less fallout. Glasgow would habitable again in a few
weeks. Six months afterwards it would be absolutely fine for civilians.”

“
But
it's still a nuclear bomb, right?”

“
Pretty
much. It would leave most of the buildings intact, though. We're talking maybe
a three hundred foot radius of destruction at ground zero, and an intense burst
of gamma radiation. The heat pulse would kill everything in the city. Any
humans would be vaporised.”

Stacy looks at them
both, standing up herself. “Would that stop the King?”

“
No,”
says Mark.

“
Maybe,”
says the Trespasser.

“
Ok,
maybe,” shrugs Mark, “but even if it did, it would kill
everyone
in
Glasgow.”

Stacy lowers her voice
as though afraid of her words.

“
When
the sun comes up, everyone that's still here,
wants
to be here. They
want to be a part of the Kingdom.”

“
You
know its not that simple, Stace, the people are afraid.”

“
Mark's
got a point,” says Chloe. “The King's broadcast said that Glasgow was only the
start. Maybe people are staying so that they can get in on the ground floor –
better to reign in hell than serve in heaven, y'know?”

“
Then
they deserve everything that comes to them,” says Stacy. “If they bow to the
King, they're just as bad as him.”

“
They're
afraid,”
shouts Mark. “You want to just leave and let the Agency nuke
Glasgow?”

“
Neutron
bomb,” the Trespasser corrects him. “And it may be our best chance of killing
him.”

“
He
survived Donald stopping his heart,” says Jamie, shaking his head. “I don't see
any reason a neutron bomb would kill him.”

“
Well,”
says the Trespasser, “it would subject the blast zone to temperatures hotter
than the surface of the sun for a split second. That kills most things.”

“
The
King is an exception to most fatalities,” says Mark. “There's no guarantee.”

“
If
you have a better idea,” says the Trespasser, “then by all means let's go for
it. I'd like to avoid bombing my home city if at all possible.”

The Trespasser's phone
goes off again; he lifts it to his ear and listens for a moment, before putting
it away.

“
Agency
satellites are on Glasgow. They've got a location on the King.”

“
Then
what are we waiting for?” asks Stacy.

“
We're
waiting,” says Jamie, “because not an hour ago we
tried
to fight him and
everybody died, Stace.”

“
He's
right,” says the Trespasser, “we need a plan of attack.”

“
No
attack,” says Mark. “Force doesn't work. He's impervious to anything we can
throw at him. Let me try a different approach.”

Mark lifts his jacket
from the camp bed and eases it on, wincing at his aching muscles.

“
What's
your plan?” asks Stacy.

“
I'm
going to talk to him. Where is he?”

“
Blytheswood
Park,” says the Trespasser. “Up near Pitt Street -”

“
I
know where the park is, Tony,” laughs Mark. “Ok, if I'm not back soon then tell
my mum I love her.”

“
Woah,
woah,” Jamie stands up, putting a hand on Mark's chest. “Are you going alone?”

“
I
can take a punch from him if it comes to it,” says Mark, zipping up his jacket.
“You lot can't. Let me go – I'll run if I end up in a fight.”

Jamie steps back. “What
are you going to tell him?”

Mark faces all of them.

“
I'm
going to convince him to stop this. Maybe we can't kill him, but we can stop
the Kingdom at the least.”

“
And
if it doesn't work?” asks Jamie.

Mark lowers his head
and his voice with it. “Then there's always that
other
thing we talked
about.”

“
Oh
yeah. Jesus...”

“
Right,
wish me luck.”

“
Mark,”
the Trespasser stops him.

“
Yeah?”

He tosses him a phone
with a set of earphones wrapped around it.

“
Stay
in touch. Chloe will phone you – put one earphone in and your phone in your top
pocket. We'll be listening.”

“
Got
it,” says Mark.

“
Good
luck,” says Jamie.

The two share a look,
and Mark gives him a nod.

“
I'll
be careful, don't worry.”

The King stands in
Blytheswood Park.

It is a caged, tamed
piece of nature in the heart of the city centre. Ringed on all sides by fancy
hotels and offices, the King is used to seeing it corralled by cars that cost
more than the average house. Unkempt and overgrown since the Destroyer's
attack, the park is nothing but muddy puddles; decrepit trees and flowers
choked by the invading weeds. Nature is victorious here, whilst the
once-glistening offices jealously standing guard have fallen into disrepair;
lying empty with boarded windows. They have been forgotten like so much else.

The King shrugs; time
will bring prosperity back to Glasgow under his reign. A little sacrifice in
the short term is worth the gain in the long term.

Taking off his suit
jacket, he tosses it aside. The navy-blue fabric melds with the darkness till
he can barely see it. Rain lashes his back, turning his white shirt into sodden
cloth.

A body lies on the
grass, crumpled and pale in the inky rain.

Gregor, the King's
right hand man, stares into the dying trees with glassed over eyes. There's a
dark red hole in the centre of his forehead, and the rain is washing the
scabbing blood from his face.

The King sighs, and
gets to his knees. Flattening his hands likes shovels, he drives them into the
ground and begins scooping the earth up in great chunks, heaving it aside.

Rain fills the grave as
he claws the earth out, ripping up tree roots like arteries.

The ground trembles,
and a wet splash erupts from the nearby grass. Looking up from his fox-hole,
the King sees a familiar figure standing in the rain. He gets to his feet,
growling, cracking his knuckles.

“
Woah,
woah,” shouts the figure in the rain, holding up his hands. “I don't want to
fight. I'm here to talk.”

The King stops, wiping
his soaking black hair across his face as it turns into a curious scowl.

“
I
don't know if we've got anything to talk about, Mark.”

Mark comes forward, his
face clear in the rain, and holds out his hands as though trying to catch the
rain.

“
Hell
of a night, isn't it?”

The King screws his
eyes up in the rain. “I don't really feel the cold anymore.”

“
Strange.
I do, just – not that much, I guess.”

There's a strange
silence between the two, and Mark takes his jacket off. The King tenses, but
Mark only tosses it aside.

“
Don't
know why I wear a jacket, still, if I don't need it.”

“
Force
of habit,” says the King.

“
Yeah.
What are you doing up here anyway?”

“
Burying
a friend.”

Mark looks past him, at
Gregor's limp form, a pale ghost in the darkness.

“
Oh.”

The King twists his
mouth, a facial shrug.

“
He
knew the risks. Gregor was a good soldier.”

“
You'll
understand if I don't share in any sympathy.”

“
It
would be an insult if you did.” The King looks back at Gregor's body, and then
up at the angry, grey clouds backlit by the moon before looking sideways at
Mark. “You, uh, mind if I finish -”

“
Go
ahead,” says Mark. “I'll wait.”

With a faint nod, the
King turns and lifts Gregor with one hand, and puts him over his shoulder like
a fireman. He drops into the hole with a loud splash, and after a few moments
he emerges without Gregor. Piece by piece, the King begins piling the earth
back upon his old friend, until he is left stamping the sodden earth back into
place; eventually there's nothing left but a well-trodden mound.

The King stands in the
rain, soaked to his skin, staring at the mound.

“
You
two were close?” asks Mark, coming and standing beside the King.

“
He
had something that most people nowadays don't.”

“
What's
that?”

“
Something
that both you and I have. He believed in something greater than himself.”

“
I
don't know if conviction in
your
particular beliefs is a virtue.”

“
Well
that's the point isn't it? If you weren't entirely certain of your own ideals,
you'd share mine.”

“
I
guess so. Good thing I'm certain.”

The King looks at him
sideways.

“
You
didn't come here to fight, then? Really?”

“
I'm
done fighting you,” says Mark, sighing as the rain bounces off his shoulders,
silhouetting him.

The King chuckles. “The
boy wonder has grown up? Finally stopped trying to punch all of your troubles.”

“
Punching
you doesn't
do
anything.”

“
True
– although you hit like a freight train.”

“
Likewise.”

“
It
just so happens that doesn't hurt me either,” the King laughs.

“
What
about a nuclear blast?”

The King stops laughing
and lowers his voice.

“
Well,
there'd only be one way to test that, wouldn't there?”

“
I'd
give you maybe ten-to-one that you'd survive it. Ninety percent chance you
won't.”

“
Better
odds than most people get in a nuclear blast. You thinking of nuking me, Mark?”

“
You
know me better than that – I'd never do that to the city.”

“
No
– but the Agency might.”

Mark smirks. “Nailed
it.”

“
You
think I didn't see a nuclear strike coming? They know that a ground invasion
would be a disaster. They can't hurt me with anything else – let me guess,
neutron bomb? Try to preserve as much of the infrastructure as they can?”

Mark looks at him,
eyebrows raised. “I'm impressed.”

“
It's
only what I'd do if faced with an immortal, unstoppable being threatening the
world order. I take it, since you're telling me this, that you'd like me to
stop before they do it?”

“
Ideally,
yes.”

“
Would
you stop pursuing your dream, just because somebody asked you to?”

“
Of
course not. Difference is, my dream doesn't come at the cost of people's
freedom and safety.”

The King laughs again,
a heart, friendly laugh.

“
And
why do you want to preserve the current order so much anyway? You have any idea
who your masters really are Mark? You were bought and sold a long time ago to
the highest bidder, as were the government and everybody down from there. Money
makes this planet turn, and it hurts so many people, Mark. I can reshape it – I
can give them a world where at least they know the face of their master. I
don't want money, Mark. I want humanity to thrive. I'm a humanist if nothing
else.”

“
And
how are you going to do that when you're busy killing people that don't agree?”

The King laughs. “Mark,
what do you think I'm going to
do?
The Glasgow that you wake up to
tomorrow will be exactly the same – except for the one very important
difference: no crime, no poverty, no corruption. There'll be jobs for everybody
rebuilding this city. People will return when they see that things are better
here. Things will actually work like they were meant to. Efficiently.”