CHAPTER 12

OCTOBER 22ND, 8:08 AM

--RAYSHE--

"Leslie? Your 8 minutes late."

"I apologize, Mr. President. I'll be right there."

"Sure thing..." Rayshe said as he lifted his finger off the receiver on his desk.

"You shouldn't allow incompetency like that."

Rayshe looked down at Ahnko who sat under his desk. She had her back leaned into the corner with her legs crossed over one another, knees bent to fit her legs inside. She leisurely checked her fingernails while shooting a glance up at Rayshe out of the corner of her eye.

"It's her first day doing my daily briefings. I'll cut her some slack," he said. "It's better than having to drag my ass to some big meeting every morning with 15 people."

"Mm, I know our big man doesn't like his meetings," Ahnko pouted. Rayshe gritted his teeth as he held his stare at the door.

"It's because it's a waste of time..." he clarified.

"And I meant it no other way," she said. Rayshe felt a tugging at his pant leg as he looked down to see her grabbing at it. "Please?" she asked while rubbing his calf.

"Not now," Rayshe rejected. Ahnko took her hand away and folded her arms together.

“You act like no one’s ever had sex in the Oval Office before.”

Rayshe rolled his eyes. “Leslie’s going to walk in here any second now.”

“She can join.”

“Relax.”

The door swung open as the secretary walked in, clutching a stack on papers in her arm.

"Goodmorning, Mr. President."

"Leslie," Rayshe responded. "What do you have for me," he said, kicking back in his chair.

"I have the report for the Mr. Fuld... situation," she started.

"Good. Let me see," he said as Leslie stood next to his desk. She laid out a stack of papers held together by a clip on his desk. It showed an aerial view of a home visible through a gap in a canopy of trees. What was left of one anyway. It was a mound of burnt wood, ash, and concrete. Rayshe held the picture close to his face.

"We have confirmation of Roger Fuld elimination," Leslie said subdued.

"Great," Rayshe said with a disingenuous enthusiasm. "I trust there were no issues?"

"No, but there is something strange," Leslie said.

"Elaborate."

She handed him another paper from her stack as she explained: "As far as we know, Roger should have been alone. He was found in the rubble, but his car was gone."

"Elaborate."

"We're not sure who took it. Or if they were in the house with him that night. But we do know where it's at," she said, giving him a paper from her stack once more. It showed a satellite image of a forest, with a gps marker in the middle. "It's in a wilderness not far from East Lansing, Michigan."

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Rayshe studied the image, propping his elbows on his desk. He stared at the low detailed image of the forest, as if he could uncover clues from it.

"Strange..." he said.

"Our investigators believe this is our best lead to the stolen documents from the break-in.," she said. "I can have it investigated-"

"No need," Rayshe said. "I'll do it." Leslie silently nodded her head. "What about our break-in? Suspect list should be easy, no?"

"If we are correct on our suspect being a shapeshifter-"

"I am, correct."

"Right... That means there are only 3 suspects. John S. Tark, Perseus Grant, and Francis Tolomongo. Tark is believed to have been dead for several years and Grant in currently incarcerated in San Francisco. Tolomongo is our only suspect."

Rayshe set down the papers in his hands and looked up at Leslie with an irritated stare. "Frank is a war hero, Leslie."

"I know, but-"

"But what? Frank is not a traitor."

"The evidence suggests that-"

"Shut up," Rayshe snapped. His head spun as voices starting to creep into his thoughts. Wails and screams echoed through his subconscious. He felt their maliciousness infect him. He squeezed his eyes shut hard, clenching his fists as he pushed them out.

"It's fine," Rayshe said, letting out a sigh. "You wouldn't have known." He rubbed his knuckles together, straining to hold his composure. "It's not him. Look into Tark. He might still be alive after all."

"Yes, Mr. President," Leslie answered.

"What about the experiment?"

"You didn't give me clearance for that," she mentioned.

"Oh. Yea, huh."

"You could just give me clearance I can go get the report," she implied.

"What? No, come on," Rayshe said as if her request was a joke. "I'll get it myself."

"Right," she said with an annoyed smack of her lips. "Moving on, there's the-"

"You hear that?" Rayshe interrupted. Leslie's eyes drifted around the room as she tried to listen.

"No?" she answered. Rayshe stood up from his chair and speed walked to the door. He swung it open and continued through the marbled hallways of the White House, Leslie following behind him. As he moved, the noise became louder, clearer.

Chanting

Of a crowd, uproarious. Coming from outside. Rayshe made his way out onto the curved balcony on the front of the building. Across the pond just below him, a crowd occupied the lawn. The fence had been pushed over as protestors took over the campus. They held their ground, chanting loudly, waving signs, and throwing trash over the hedges, into the pond. Their chorus of yelling boomed through the new day's air.

Hall has got to go! Hall has got to go!

The mob's voices coordinated to repeat that phrase over and over again. Rayshe stood idle on the balcony; anger filled him, true. But also, confusion.

"The fuck is going on here?" Rayshe looked behind him at the small posse of Secret Service behind him. "Get them off my fucking lawn," he commanded. They dispersed rapidly, leaving his secretary standing there alone with a phone in her hand.

"Mr. President, I think you should see this," she said while showing the phone to him. Rayshe grabbed it from her hands, turning his back to the crowd and read:

RAYSHE HALL'S SINISTER SCHEME REVEALED

An anonymous whistleblower involved in internal White House affairs has just come forward with shocking information. According to their testimony, Rayshe Hall is responsible for the death of Hardwell Regis, planning his assassination to assume power.

"Who fucking wrote this?" Rayshe yelled at his secretary.

"Some random reporter for the New York Times, I don't know," she answered flustered.

Agonizing screams clouded his mind as he kept reading:

We now know that Hall plans on exploiting the goodwill created by Regis with (name), attacking them on their scheduled arrival on November 5th. Hall has been in office for less than a week, and already he plans to thrust our country into a worldwide conflict just mere months after the deadliest one this planet has seen. What else is he planning? Can we be sure that we are safe?

Rayshe lost focus on the screen. His thoughts became overrun with screams. Shouts commanding death, harm to others. Harm to himself. They breached his psyche and drained his composure. He gripped the phone to where it almost broke. The chanting at this point had been completely drowned out.

They hate you. They HATE you.

You should hate them too. Why do you do this for them.

Kill them. You know what you must do.

Ignore them. Find the pieces. Become unstoppable.

He looked up and turned back towards the mob on the lawn. Another force had arrived; supporters of Rayshe. Defenders of his position. They rallied behind the protestors, pushing closer and closer. Just barely Rayshe could see the signs they held: Hall is a Hero. Hall will save us.

They pushed onto the grass, causing the protestors to turn their focus to them. Both sides pushed against each other, the frail, metaphorical barrier separating the two sides waned. A shove led to a strike. The wall collapsed, yells emanated, chaos ensued. They'd brawled violently in what certainly would happen again across the nation. Rayshe had the brink of a civil war on his hands.

"I'm going," Rayshe said suddenly. He forcefully pushed Leslie phone back into her hands as he stormed off.

"Where are you going?" she yelled after him.

"Michigan."