Eye in the sky

Conan paced the small dark room, cutting back and forth across the one beam of morning sunlight that pierced the shutters. He needed it to gauge how long he’d been at it, how long he’d been in this damned place preparing. Sweat beaded against his forehead, his mind alive with a thousand possibilities, a thousand thoughts from people he could not see. It was this day, he had told them. This day the target would try to assassinate the future president. He could hear his desperation, hear his incessant, obsessive thoughts, his fractured mind. Tracking the consciousness of a paranoid schizophrenic was no mean feat, like riding a rollercoaster with no seatbelt. Most people were a gently flowing stream, simple, predictable with a clear path ahead. Not Mason. Mason, the would-be assassin, had fallen into madness. Then again, Conan could almost sympathise, terrified by how similar his thoughts sometimes sounded to his own.

He had been ten years old when he had been taken away from his parents, away from his home country in rainy old England. They had put him below ground, tested, trained, experimented on him beyond belief and then deployed him on duty. His uncle overseas had arranged it after learning of his gifts, and he had been treated relatively well despite living in a laboratory until he was eighteen years old.

‘The United States of America will not forget your service son’ he had been told over and over, very aware he had no choice but to serve them, very aware that they would take care of his cancer ridden mother, and put his alcoholic father behind bars where he belonged. She had survived, given the best treatment in the world. In return, Conan had been the eyes and ears of the country for twenty years and paid handsomely for it. He had seen over the safety of six presidents, thwarted thirteen assassination attempts, four nuclear fallouts and two instances of all out world warfare.

The government didn’t understand his abilities. Truth be told, neither did he. All Conan knew is that people’s thoughts appeared to him as a stream, linking to versions of reality, versions of reality hinged on simple actions. A train thirty seconds late here had saved ten people dying in a fire two months later there. One decision, rippling through time, creating a new reality. For him, he could simply step over, avoid, see these realities as they popped up, a block clearly visible in the road, the road of other people's thoughts and actions.

To him ‘commonly sentient’ people, as the government had put it, drove blind. This still did not mean he was invincible, however. Crashing was still a possibility - in fact the confidence of some people was only present because they could not see the sheer magnitude of danger around them. Conan had always envied this. No fear, assured your path was the one you should take, assured you had no choice, there was nothing you could do to change it. If only they knew.

‘Damn it these fuckers think about some utter crap!’ he shouted as the thoughts of the apartment block he stood in washed over him like a wave. He usually liked to keep himself active the day of a major event, get tapped into the pulse of the people around him and on his toes. Today however, he pulled himself away from the stream, grateful for the silence in his mind. He could not hear the target's thoughts either now, but that wouldn’t matter too much, he figured. Mason would be cleaning his gun and reciting bible verses for the next seven hours anyway. The old lady down the hall would fall and break her hip in two weeks if she went to the shops at 9:15 am, 9:17 and she would avoid it. That gave Conan an hour and forty five minutes before he had to go and talk to her on the stairs. Perfect. He slumped down in the red leather armchair of the dusty studio apartment, in front of the TV as he turned on the news.

Every channel was covering the rally, the speeches of the presidential candidates that would take place later that evening. Conan had told the secret service they could kill two birds with one stone by allowing Mason to be apprehended in public; a failed assassination attempt and the soon to be president's strength in response effectively winning the election for him. His opponent, someone unpredictable, capable of great horrors and poor leadership despite massive charisma would have no impactful response to honest bravery after a neck and neck election. Conan watched the glittering speeches of the man he had been protecting for the last six months. He had been cancelled, humiliated and fallen into obscurity through the path of his own life. Through his direction, he had made it through these roadblocks and was set to walk into the white house. After one attempted killing that was, although if all went correctly it would be more like a shot into the sky and a witty remark that would be swiped, liked and shared on instagram reels, facebook and twitter millions of times within twenty four hours. Conan had not even asked why those who worked in the government had picked him of all people to be president. Truth be told, he didn’t care.

So many people were so more worthy, so many people were so much worse. Now Conan was two weeks away from his retirement, which meant a home in the country for him and his mother, and more money than he could ever spend. His job was simply to keep Mr. Future president safe and liked by all. He chuckled as he watched him following his instructions during interviews, simple moves that would be indiscernible to all that watched except him and around two other people on the planet. They were all fools really, he thought. But then again he had never truly experienced driving blind. Conan reached over to the coffee table and retrieved his weighted eye mask and ear plugs. He then set a timer for thirty minutes and put his phone in his pocket as sleep fell over him and whispers of strangers' thoughts seeped into his dreams.

The silence was absolute, a floating silence, crackling almost with its potency. The metal fell through it, through clouds, water and air. Soon it had fallen into the city and almost before it had made impact the rushing wave of force that erupted from it overcame everything, metal, trees, people, all absorbed totally by a light worthy of the sun itself. This happened over and over again, over and over again, over and over again.

Conan lurched forwards. Sweat flew from his body, his mask falling in an awkward way across his face. His alarm was due to go off in one minute and he had fallen into fevered sleep, touched by something beyond. The old lady downstairs flicked the remote with deliberate disappointment, a racist remark loud in her mind and nowhere else. It seemed to be the only thought now in the building. Conan chuckled and shook his head, both disgusted by what he had heard and relieved to be back in reality, away from the ominous, relentless dream he had just experienced.

‘Fucking freakshow’ he muttered to himself as he stood, not quite sure what he was referring to and referring to everything at the same time. He threw his mask down next to him and headed for the shower as he turned off his phone. Once inside the warm water washed away the sound of anything else, soothing him. Not too long now. A quick walk and a briefing, and it was time.

Conan slipped through the throng of people waving small flags, cheering as they marched towards the stands before the podium. He would be here any minute. The target, Mason, had prowled through the crowd moving with a stillness brought on by the weight of his thoughts, the weight of the voices that circled him.

He would move up through the busy streets, slot in with the crowd, before attempting to rush the stage with a stolen police issued hand gun. He would be successful, if Conan did not intervene, had not spent hours upon hours trying to breach into the stream of the thoughts of the man he had seen in his vision, killing the future president.

The secret service had flown him all over the country, every state nearly in search of the link, the link that was made stronger by being nearer to Mason. Once close, he could hear his every thought. The proximity was overwhelming.

Conan watched as Mason exited an alleyway, a black hat low over his furrowed brow, both hands in his jacket pockets. As soon as he laid eyes on him Conan was hit with a wave of moving thoughts, so loud, oh god. So, incredibly loud. Men shouted, pleading with him in his mind to seek blood, berating him. Conan could not help but feel empathy. It must be torture. He froze and watched him merge with the general population, their thoughts floating through like logs in a stream, gentle, subdued. Some were animalistic, a surge of inner energy as a man looked at a woman in an unfavourable manner, a craving for food, to get out of the heat. Most were happy, in a blank, sedated way that was.

‘Tragic, isn’t it? Both the dimness of the herd, and the ferocity of the darkness that grips him’ a voice said. This was not the voice of a man speaking through his physical body, not one that could be heard out loud. Conan clutched at his earpiece but heard nothing but static. Someone had spoken directly into his mind.

‘Don’t mind me… you haven’t fallen to poor old Mason’s level, yet’ the voice continued. It was the voice of a man around the same age as him, deep, resonant and seeming to talk with a boundless ability to insert himself into Conan’s psyche.

‘Saying that, Mason is nearer the mark than you despite his madness… even with all your so-called knowledge’ the voice continued. Conan could find no words to respond, scanning around for a source, sensing nothing, feeling nothing. Someone was blocking him from making a link.

‘Eyes up’

Conan looked to the buildings over the parade and saw a shadowy silhouette wave before fading away into the darkness. His thoughts were empty, totally empty. Curious.

‘You’ve been tricked, you know. The loudness of Mason’s thoughts have blocked the pathway of someone’s future, someone with lets say… a talent for blind confidence. Our future president is infinitely more dangerous than your target’ the voice explained. Conan heard Mason’s thoughts rising to a crescendo as they made it past the outskirts of the city and into more open ground. The stage was visible, the protected candidate would be making an appearance momentarily. The crowd began coming to a halt.

‘They told you to keep him safe, the only time they have asked you to do this and not check if he, himself, was safe. Ask yourself why they are allowing you to retire. Absolute domination. After this they will have achieved it’

Conan felt a chill run down his spine as his dream surged through his mind, a flashing vision, destruction untold. The future president began walking out onto the stage, met by thunderous applause. For the first time ever Conan tore free from Mason’s insanity, past the crowd and honed in on him as he walked towards the podium, lapping up the cheers of the crowd.

‘What mark shall we take?’ a voice said, this time from Conan’s earpiece. He put a finger up to it but did not reply. Now he was surging into the mind and fate of the one he had been tasked with protecting. He saw great victory, spitting words met by rapturous applause. And then, the same silence that had filled his dreams, inflicted upon others. He would attempt to take it all - nuclear war would be his hammer. A damned fool, even more so that Conan could have imagined.

‘You fail to stop him half the world dies. You don’t, you die, almost unavoidably. And so does your mother’ the voice cut in. Conan could not breathe.

‘There has to be another way’ Conan muttered to himself. As he said this, visions of what it would take to survive the wrath of the service he had sworn himself into crammed into his mind almost against his will. Years of hiding, evading. He had made his choice.

Conan gripped Mason’s hand as he attempted to withdraw his weapon.

‘Not here. Make a count of thirty, one mississippi, two mississippi, keep it going as soon as I let go and then walk towards the right corner of the stage. When he smiles and turns to the right, run forwards centre stage, you’ll see a man in a purple jacket. You’ll kill him if you’re behind him when you fire’

Conan released his wrist and closed his eyes as he threw his earpiece into a drain. Two minutes later, blood coated the red white and blue flags above the podium and the crowd burst into a frenzy that a man could slip away into unnoticed with ease, even while driving blind.