The Last Days of Mr. Right

The two men sat silently for a time, Mr. Right forcing himself to remain calm.

"I can't do that, Bill," the President said. Mr. Right let out a breath he didn't know he had been holding. "We're in this together. All the way. I can't just cut you loose like that. I'm sure we can do something to keep this hushed up. I might have that whole platoon activated into a war zone and they will die there."

"But we're not at war anymore."

"Hell, Bill! I can fix that with a phone call and a press conference!"

Relief sank into Mr. Right when he heard those words. "Thank you, Mr. President! Thank you!"

"Bill, you have to be discreet from here on out. It is imperative. No more of this shit. Understood?"

"Absolutely, sir," Mr. Right said with a small grin. He felt as if a large weight had been removed from his shoulders.

"I want you stop this horrendous affront to Jesus, Bill. I want you to never commit another gay act in your life. But if you do…"

"I won't! I…" Mr. Right interrupted.

"But if you do," the President interrupted right back. "I want you to come to me and I will let you have my Chief of Staff. He will be discreet."

"Ken? Ken Rose is gay?" Mr. Right asked, shocked.

"No! Of course not! He's as straight as the day is long. But he's very loyal. If it will help the administration he will take one for the team."

Mr. Right nodded, very appreciative of the President's willingness to sacrifice a member of his inner circle in order to protect him. There was one other point of order before he could leave the Oval Office.

"Did you take care of the other problem while I was gone?"

"Oh, the film," the President said with a smile. "We believe we acquired all the copies and the original. Nothing got out and we destroyed everything, we're pretty certain. The man who shot the film was found and removed from play."

"That is really wonderful!" Mr. Right said, overjoyed. The bad news had turned and now things were starting to go his way again.

A knock sounded.

"Yes? Come in." the President called out.

Ken Rose walked in, a look of pure fear on his face. He went straight to the television and clicked the set on. "Mr. President, we've got a huge problem!"

The President and Mr. Right hurried over to the television and watched in horror as the footage of Mr. Right's rampage at the commercial studio was broadcast on national television. Every murder, every drug-induced scream of rage, right there on the small screen.

"Fuck," they said in unison, collapsing onto the couch.

Chapter Ten

Rush Manor

Two days later…

Bill Rush stood forlornly before his thrown open closet doors, gazing at the Mr. Right costume hanging there on its special rack. He felt as hollow as the empty suit. What do you do when the country you love insists on being something that you hate? What do you do when the people you have served turn on you? They just didn't understand.

The backlash from the release of the killing spree footage was swift and far reaching. Old allies, long time friends, had turned their backs on Mr. Right when the video aired, showing a side to their hero that no one had suspected. The video opened the eyes of a lot of people who had been happily living in the dark, always expressing faith that Mr. Right always did the right thing. Those who had always defended him, no matter how bad his actions appeared at times, were now tossing him out like yesterday's newspaper. The news channels were showing children tearing up their Mr. Right trading cards and posters, throwing their Mr. Right action figures and t-shirts on giant pyres.

Finally, America had woken up.

The call had gone out both far and wide for the arrest and prosecution of Mr. Right for the murders of the people at the commercial studio. The families of the victims were on television 24/7 demanding justice, but so far all they were getting was lip service from the Justice Department. No one had even approached Bill about the possibility of turning himself over to the authorities. The President had refused to condemn Mr. Right publicly, stating that, "In America a man is presumed innocent until proven guilty."

This time, instead of just accepting the President's word, the American people had questions. Such as, what about all the innocent people held as prisoners the world over by the American government? What about Camp Rainbow and Camp Triangle? What about all the people who just disappeared after criticizing the President? Maybe there was something to those rumors of the torture rooms beneath the White House? How right was Ron Moody when he stood up at the press conference and called the President and Mr. Right to task?

After seeing the video, Americans no longer gave the benefit of the doubt. They had been duped, abused, manipulated. And now they were angry. America was barely recognizable as the country it was supposed to be. In recent years a lot of things had changed, freedom no longer a guarantee, dissent looked at as treason. It was a horrific shell of its former ideal. But one thing hadn't changed. It still held true that there are few things more dangerous than a bunch of pissed off Americans with one vision.

Bill Rush had spent the last two days on the phone, trying in vain to find a country that would allow him sanctuary. Due to his severe nationalist policies, right in tune with the President's, Americans were no longer welcome many places in the world. Americans weren't liked, respected, and especially not trusted. No one wanted to open their country to Mr. Right, the very reason that America had fallen. Bill Rush had even had the nerve to call his two main rivals, France and Germany, who told him to, "Take a flying fuck at a rolling donut" and "Want in one hand, shit in the other, and see which one gets full first."

The translations were very rough, but he assumed both sentences meant "No" from the tone in which they were spoken.

Apparently the French were still upset about that whole 'freedom fries' incident. It was anyone's guess as to what was up Germany's ass. Fuckers. Mr. Right had never liked them anyway.

Bill's shoulders slumped in a huge sigh, his eyes falling to the floor. He shut the closet door and got ready for bed. Placing a kick into Laura's ribs as she slept on the floor at the foot of the bed with the dog, he smiled and slid between the sheets.

A few hours later he was shaken from a really scary dream by the ringing of the emergency line from the President. The dream slipped from his mind even as he reached for the phone, the way dreams often do, but he was covered in a thick sheen of sweat and his heart was pounding. It must have been bad. Bill cleared his throat and answered the phone. "Yes, Mr. President?"

"Bill! I need you now! Help!" the President cried into the phone. "They're coming for me! For us!"

"Who? What's going on?" Bill asked, confused, still trying to shake the sleep from his brain.

"The People, Bill! The fucking People! They're marching on Washington!"

Bill sat bolt upright in bed. "Even with all the soldiers? They're still marching?"

"Yes! The soldiers have refused to shoot them! Some of the generals have even refused to give the order to shoot them! It's horrible! Come quick, Bill! COME QUICK!"

"Calm down, Mr. President. Panicking won't solve anything," Bill said, rubbing his eyes. "We'll handle this and then…"

"Oh my god!" the President cried out in horror. "Oh my… god!"

"Mr. President! What is it? What's wrong?"

"Hurry, Bill! They've got a robot!"

"They've got what?"

"They've got a giant robot! It just smashed the Capitol Dome!"

"A giant robot?"

"Yes! A giant robot! Now quit repeating everything I say and get over here and protect me!" The President slammed the phone down.

Bill Rush rose from his bed, a sense of purpose in his stride, and he threw open the closet doors. The Mr. Right suit called to him, waiting for him to put it on and answer his destiny.

This was it.

The day he and the President had been dreading.

The Second American Revolution was underway.

Chapter Eleven

Somewhere over the nation's capital…

Sometimes navigating from the air was a bit difficult in the dark, but tonight Washington, D.C. was easy to find from Rush Manor. Mr. Right had but to follow the bright orange glow of a city in flames.

A large swath of devastation had been slashed across the landscape. Along the highways people streamed in and out of the city, abandoning their cars in the hopeless gridlock. No one could drive very far, it was foot traffic only. Mr. Right wanted to swoop down and pummel someone, but it was just so hard to tell who was who. And on top of that there wasn't much time. The President was in danger and he had to get to the White House as soon as possible. The soldiers didn't appear to be doing their jobs, and even if the Secret Service were still loyal, they couldn't possibly hold such an uprising at bay for long. The People had risen up and they were out for blood.

"Fucking ingrates!" Mr. Right snarled, putting on a burst of speed.

Soon enough the White House came into view. Or to be more precise, the burning ruins of the White House came into view. Smoke billowed up into the night sky, lit from below by the fires that engulfed the building. Looking down on the streets Mr. Right could see soldiers stripping off their uniforms and tanks fleeing their defensive positions.

The lawn of the White House was blanketed in dead bodies, some civilian, some military. The civilians had been blown apart with high-powered weaponry; the soldiers, for the most part, had been beaten to death. A powerful rage gripped Mr. Right, almost equally matched with a powerful fear. For perhaps the first time since he had gotten his powers he felt that he may have met his match, and that for once the outcome of the conflict wasn't predetermined. This time, Mr. Right might actually… lose.

Hovering above the lawn he could see giant footprints crushed into the earth. Some of the soldiers were crushed right into the ground, their bodies smashed into the hard-edged shape of the robots foot. Several yards closer to the White House there was another footprint, but no soldiers crushed into this one. Apparently the soldiers had had the sense to run the other way.

"Cowards!" Mr. Right bellowed, disgusted at this act of treason. These "soldiers" were supposed to stand their ground and, if necessary, give their life to protect the President. And they fucking ran? "Fucking cowards!"

The roof of the White House, right above the Oval Office, was caved in, as if under the impact of a giant's fist.

Mr. Right landed in front of the White House and ran into the burning building, his arm over his face, shielding his eyes from the heat. "Mr. President! Where are you? Mr. President!"

Bodies of men in suits, unclear whether they were Secret Service or staffers, lined the floor of the foyer. Some of them were on fire and starting to burn. The body of a man in a mechanic's uniform lay sprawled at Mr. Right's feet, and with a half-hearted kick, Mr. Right crushed the dead man's head. "Mr. President! I'm here! Mr. President!"

A rasping voice, choked with smoke and pain, came from the stairway. "Mr. Right! Help!"

Rushing to the stairs Mr. Right caught sight of Ken Rose, bloody and blackened from the fire, crawling down the stairs on his belly. Every inch he moved taking maximum effort. Mr. Right rushed to his aide and swept the man up in his arms and carried him quickly outside.

"Ken, what happened to the President? Is he still inside?" Mr. Right asked as he dropped the man to the ground with an unconcerned thud. "Where is he?"

A series of coughs wracked Rose's body when he tried to breathe deeply of the clean air outside. Mr. Right dropped to one knee and placed his hand on Rose's back. "Come on, Ken! Is he still inside?"

Rose still couldn't speak, but he shook his head vigorously.

"No? He got out?" Mr. Right asked, hopefully.

Rose shook his head again. With a loud hack the Chief of Staff finally found his voice. "They got him, Mr. Right! The People took him!"

"Took him? Where? Where did they take him? Is he okay?"

Rose shook his head. "I don't know. They dragged him out back. Into the Rose Garden."

Mr. Right stood up and turned on his heel, then launched himself straight up into the air, using his flight to augment a giant leap over the burning mansion. Through the smoke and heat he drifted to the back of the house, landing softly on the grass, right next to a bombed out tank, abandoned there in the Rose Garden. It's main cannon jutted up into the air at its full height. Bodies littered the ground around it, appearing to consist mostly of Secret Service and military personnel. But these bodies are not what commanded the attention of Mr. Right. He fell to his knees, struck by the sight of the President's lifeless body, hanging by the neck from the cannon of the tank. The President's eyes were bloodshot and bulging from his head, his face swollen and purple.

Tears streamed down his cheeks as Mr. Right sat there, collapsed on his knees and staring up at the dangling corpse of the President. They weren't tears of grief. They were tears of rage. Those motherfuckers! They were taking control away from him. Taking the country away from him. Taking everything.

Well, if that was how the People wanted it, so be it. They could have their country back. But first they had to pry it from his cold dead hands.

He let loose an anguished war cry and streaked into the air, leading with his fists and trailing out a scream of hatred behind him.

They say freedom is never free, and Mr. Right was determined to make them pay. Make them all fucking pay.

Chapter Twelve

The National Mall…

Finding the giant robot, even in the dark, was a piece of cake. Simply follow the massive footprints that cut through the swath of destruction. The robot hadn't gone far either. Mr. Right found it standing beside the Washington Monument, which it dwarfed, hands on its hips and waiting for him.

A cry went up from the People. "It's Mr. Right!"

Instead of it being a jubilant exclamation of hope, as it used to be, it was called out as a warning to the men controlling the robot. The "drivers" of the robot, as it were, sat behind the windows of its eyes, hundreds of feet in the air. They heard the cry and went into action, unleashing a barrage of missiles from the battery at the robots right shoulder.

His rage overcoming his common sense, Mr. Right didn't dodge the missiles, even though he didn't really know what they would do to him. He flew straight into the line of fire, the missiles exploding as he punched them, then flying through the blast and punching the next one. He came out the other side of the barrage none the worse for wear, much to the horror of the People on the ground.

Hovering above the stunned crowd Mr. Right let out a mocking laugh. "Is that the best you've got?"

Wisely, the People scattered.

Absorbed in his taunting, Mr. Right didn't catch the movement of the robots right arm, swinging toward him in a blindingly fast arc. The robots gargantuan hand delivered a crushing blow to Mr. Right, sending him spiraling out of control and crashing into the ground, cutting a groove like a crashed meteor. Showers of dirt rained down on the fleeing crowd.

Deep in the rut, Mr. Right shook his head, trying to clear the cobwebs from it. His bell had just been rung for the first time. Rising to his feet, balanced on wobbly legs, Mr. Right brought a hand to his face, feeling a warm trickle beneath his nose. When he looked down at his fingers and saw them covered in blood, for once his own, the red rage overtook him and he felt a new strength surging into his muscles. His thighs pulsed and began to shake, but now with power rather than weakness. Letting loose a scream, Mr. Right began to run, slowly at first, then building up a head of steam. His legs pumped and propelled him along with the power of a freight train. Given enough space to take off he could build up roughly the speed of a bullet train.

As Mr. Right emerged from the rut, running at full speed, he launched himself into the air, flying directly at the robot. At the same time he saw the robot reach out and grab the Washington Monument, snapping it off at its base, and set it behind its right shoulder, taking a powerful Sammy Sosa stance.

Mr. Right had committed to the attack and it was too late to turn back now. The best he could hope for was to divert at the last second and land a blow somewhere the drivers of the robot couldn't guard against. He aimed for the head, telegraphing his intention as much as possible. The drivers of the robot started to correct their stance, moving into position to block a headshot. At the last second, Mr. Right swooped down, away from the head and tried to land a hit in the torso, hopefully knocking the robot off balance enough to make another attack.

Unfortunately, Mr. Right telegraphed his re-direction too soon. The robot drivers adjusted their defense, drawing the Washington Monument back in preparation for a mighty blow. A further unfortunate event, Mr. Right just happened to re-direct his attack dead in the giant's strike zone. Right in the power alley. Even worse, the robot could apparently hit a curve ball.

Mr. Right met the barrel of the bat in an explosion of stone and mortar and rocketed backwards end over end, off like a shot. The robot got all of that one, to be sure. Back. Back. Back. To the warning track.

Pain lashed through Mr. Right's body as he slammed into the chest of Honest Abe sitting there in the Lincoln Memorial. The statue shattered and Mr. Right felt something inside of him break. The air was knocked from his lungs and he lay there amid the rubble, gasping for breath. When he could finally draw air into his lungs it brought forth wracking coughs as he sucked in the floating dust of the crumbled statue.

All through the National Mall cheers went up.

"You treasonous sons of bitches!" Mr. Right rasped with his first clear breath, struggling to his feet. Wincing from a sharp pain in his side, Mr. Right looked down to see two of his ribs poking through the skin. His skull felt like it had been jackhammered for about a month. A knife dug between the vertebrae of his lower back whenever he tried to move.

Staggering to the front of the memorial, Mr. Right stood between the center columns and watched the robot approach. It was coming to finish him. And finish him it could. He wasn't sure how much more damage he could take, but he felt like the robot could dish out a lot more than it would actually need.

The People were cheering loudly as the robot stepped into the long Reflecting Pool, striding purposefully toward Mr. Right.

"Okay, mother fucker! You can hit a curve ball. How about a change up?" Mr. Right hissed under his breath, taking to the air once again. But this time he was flying slowly. The drivers of the robot would assume that he was flying so slowly because he was hurt and they would drop their guard just enough. He was counting on it.

The robot drew back its massive right arm and prepared to deliver the deathblow to the broken hero. Its arm started forward, its trajectory and timing set to meet Mr. Right and send him to the grave.

The arm whipped out in a flash.

And hit nothing.

Mr. Right had stopped just short of the robots reach and hovered for a split second. Just long enough for the robots swing to miss him. The arm crossed the robots body in its follow through and Mr. Right seized his opportunity.

Summoning everything he had left, Mr. Right drew back his fist and dive-bombed the robot, landing one devastating blow to the center of its chest. The robot's chest crumpled and it staggered, rocking back on its heels. The drivers behind the window eyes panicked, scrambling to stabilize the robot and somewhat over corrected. The robot began to lean forward a bit too far.