The Milestone Protocol Ernest Dempsey (best short novels of all time .txt) 📖

you his slave? He is going to kill people, Niki. Billions of innocent lives will be lost. You can help us make sure that doesn’t happen.”

He tilted his head to the side and puzzled over her statement. “It must.”

Adriana scowled. “What? No, it doesn’t have to, Niki. We can stop it.”

“The planet needs healing. Humans have been poor stewards of it and its resources for far too long. If we want to keep this place, and what we have built, many must fall. We must reset the balance.”

Sean felt like he was listening to a brainwashed cult member. In short retrospect, he was—at minimum—half right.

“I understand what you’re saying,” Sean said. “Eventually, the planet is going to be too populated to sustain everyone here. If we don’t get our technology and knowledge advanced fast enough to maximize what we have, we will lose everything. Mass starvation, disease, pestilence, droughts, warfare, chaos…all of it will consume the planet. Billions will die if we go that direction, too.”

“Yes.”

“So, either way, there’s going to be a bad ending. Or is there another way?”

Niki frowned at the question. “What do you mean? There is no other way.”

“There is if we give humanity the chance to figure it out. I know we’ve spent the last twelve thousand or so years screwing things up, and that we aren’t always the most adaptive species, but when the chips are down, the human race rises up and gets the job done to keep pushing forward.” Sean gambled a step closer to the younger man, locking eyes with him. “All we’re trying to do is give humanity that chance.”

“Humanity has had plenty of chances.”

“True,” Sean agreed easily. He turned and took a leisurely step in one direction as if he might pace for a while, then he wheeled around. “When I was growing up in the late 1970s and in the 1980s, everyone told us we would have jetpacks by the time we were grown-ups. By the end of the 1990s, we believed that there would be flying cars everywhere, and people zipping around through the sky, getting places faster than humans had ever managed before. There were books about that fantastic future that awaited all of us, one where space travel was as common as hopping on a plane to visit another country.”

“And what happened? None of it came to fruition,” Niki said. “Unfulfilled, unrealistic dreams.”

“Perhaps,” Sean hedged. “But look at what we have done. Watches you can use as a phone, a calendar, a fitness tracker, and a million other things. Phones that take better video than major motion picture cameras did just a decade ago. You can pick up your handheld and call someone wirelessly on the other side of the world. We’ve made tremendous strides in the fields of medicine and agriculture. We’re investigating renewable energy resources more than ever. Heck, we just passed a bill to allow five percent more ethanol in gasoline, which will result in cleaner air and more money invested into farming.”

“What’s your point?”

“The point is that people must be given the chance to thrive, to survive, and to adapt. If Odin activates the cataclysm machine and wipes out billions of people, he could also be killing the ones that are our best hope for advancement.”

Sean stopped talking and took a few breaths while Niki pondered the statements.

He looked over his head at the cars driving by and nodded toward the rental sedan. “We should get out of here. It isn’t safe to be out in the open.”

“Does that mean you’ll help us?” Adriana asked. She looked hopeful.

“You ask a big thing of me. You ask me to betray the man who took me in as his own, educated me, trained me, and made me into what I am now.”

“What kind of man wants to slaughter women and children, grandmas and grandpas, innocent people all over the world?” Adriana’s question hung in the air among the drifting snowflakes. “Odin has used you, Niki. That’s all the leaders of Thoth’s clan have done for thousands of years. They use people and then throw them away.”

“How do you know so much about the Fellowship?” Niki wondered. “What do you know of the All Father and those who follow him?”

Adriana paused, considering her next words carefully.

All eyes focused on her. Sean was the only one who knew the answer she held back, considering what it might mean for her to share the truth.

After a deep breath, Adriana exhaled. “Because I come from an ancient order of Shinobi created to stop the cult.”

Niki tilted his head upward and looked down at her over his bottom eyelids, assessing her along with the preposterous statement. “I know nothing of such an order.”

“Well, if it makes you feel better, I didn’t either until this week. My father told me, along with the master I trained with when I was young.”

“Master?” Niki wondered.

“It’s a long story,” Adriana conceded.

Niki seemed to understand. He looked around again and then motioned to the car. “I have somewhere safe we can go. Follow me. And stay close.”

“Which car is yours?” Sean asked.

Niki pointed at a black four-door Maserati parked in the far corner.

“I’m not going to ask,” Tommy groused.

“Okay,” Adriana said. “We’ll follow you.”

He then turned and strode to the luxury sedan and climbed in. The group was still looking on when the engine growled to life.

“Are you sure this is a good idea?” Tommy asked. “How do we know we can trust him?”

“I’m with Tommy,” Tabitha agreed. “How do we know he isn’t leading us into a trap? You heard him. He was raised by this Odin character, who by the way, I’ve never heard of. And we have a list of nefarious characters. You think a few minutes in a snowy car park are going to undo whatever he’s been taught for the last however many years?”

Adriana looked over her shoulder at the Maserati as it backed up and pulled away from the retaining wall at the other end.

“I don’t know