Page 38 of The Last Aquarius
“It seems to like showing off in public. Get someone in position and blow its head off in front of an audience. Kill the puppet and force it into a new body.”
“Which helps how?”
Aquarius paced, his hands moving as he tried to explain his reasoning. “Alien Jesus built a brand almost overnight. Videos are going viral all over. Fucker looks the part. Sounds the part. But what if it lost the face everyone’s gotten to know?”
“It would just start over,” Aries pointed out.
“Yup. In a new body, with a new face that it now has to re-launch to the world. Soon as it does, we shoot it again. Force it to keep cycling and, at the same time, put out our own message.” The next was the wacky part of his idea. “We need to start our own viral campaign, calling it the false prophet. Creating doubt about its so-called powers and origin. I mean, why can’t God protect his supposed son? Why can’t Jesus heal himself? Why hasn’t God eradicated the killers?”
“What you’re suggesting will create more non-believers,” Ishtar pointed out. “Exactly the people the Kukakk wants hunted.”
“And I doubt they want to be sacrificial lambs. They’ll fight back.”
“Not sure how that’s any better,” Aries murmured.
Aquarius swept a hand in the direction of the blank screen. “I would rather see people fighting each other than being fucking slaughtered. I’d rather they woke up from its lies and hid than help it achieve its goal. Not to mention, sowing chaos might slow it down.”
“Slow it down while we wait for what?” Aries hadn’t vetoed his idea outright.
“For me to figure out how we can safely deploy the weapon. And before you ask, I don’t know yet if we can launch it safely. I’ll head to my office immediately and start communing with Little Star to see its preliminary report.”
“Wait, we have the weapon?” Aries glanced at Ishtar.
“It’s still on Mars,” she replied. “Safer there than here, given what it can do, but Reece has all the information related to it. How it works. What happened when triggered. Everything.”
“Thank you, milady. That can’t have been easy to share.”
Her lips twisted. “Reece proved to be very convincing.”
Was that a spot of color in her cheeks?
Aquarius snapped his fingers. “Speaking of convincing, what if we launched a counter religion? Something for the non-believers, like Satan’s army or something. Anything to draw people away from Alien Jesus.”
“You know what, it’s better than nothing. I like the idea of reducing the amount of people helping it and making its life a little harder.” Aries paced, chin down as he thought out loud. “We’ll start with blowing the fucker’s head off and, while gross, make sure it shared widely. I’ve already got Leo and Scorpio keeping a close eye on its movements with other Zodiacs in other major cities its already appeared in. I’ll give them the go-ahead to take it out. But I do wonder, what’s its end goal?” Aries pointed the last at Ishtar. “What does it get out of causing all this mayhem? I mean, its foot soldiers, basic as they were, I understood. They killed to eat and grow, but this fucker doesn’t seem to be interested in people as food.”
“The Kukakk wants power, and don’t be fooled; it is always hungering. It feeds off the emotions released by violence and mayhem. Delights in death. But the worst thing it does? It takes people’s souls.”
CHAPTER 13
After Ishtar’s announcement,silence fell until Sage whispered, “The cruelest of deaths is having one’s spirit taken. Imprisoned rather than floating flee. A torture without compare.”
Aries cleared his throat. “Meaning it feeds on souls. Nice to know they actually exist. Now to see what we can do to prevent it.”
“I’m sorry. I know it’s not what you perhaps wanted to hear. However, it seems likely that their destruction frees those trapped in its energy web.”
“Meaning I need to get to work finding a way to blast the fucker without destroying Earth in the process.” Reece glanced at Ishtar. “And I haven’t forgotten my promise to you.”
She shook her head. “Forget about Mars. It was a foolish and impossible request. Saving this planet is more important now, hence why I chose to cooperate.”
“We’ll see,” was all Reece said. “If that’s all, boss?”
“Go. I’m going to contact those in the field and give them their new orders. Since you’ll be busy working on destroying our alien invader, I’m going to set Pisces on the task of creating aSatanic counter group.” Aries smirked. “Can’t believe I even said that.”
“You know,” Sage murmured to Aries, “you could be its leader. You still have those sexy leather pants from your rock and roll days.”
As Ishtar and Reece left, he chuckled. “You should have seen the boss back in the seventies. Rather than polyester bell bottoms and wide-collared shirts, he went leather rocker with spiked hair and chains.”
“I still remember my shock at how short the skirts were,” Ishtar murmured.
