Makepeace: Do you think the world is ending? I mean, as we're on the subject. These snowfalls, the low temperatures, three years of almost constant winter… There are some who would say civilisation is teetering on the brink. We can't withstand many more years of this. We won't be able to maintain a stable society if the situation continues.
Mrs Keener: Pish and poppycock! Things'll pick up. They surely have to.
Makepeace: And if they don't? Your critics have said you're being remarkably casual about what has the potential to be total environmental cataclysm. You haven't instituted a single policy to tackle it or even investigate the cause.
Mrs Keener: We know the cause. Volcanoes. What're we gonna do? Stop 'em all up with giant corks? Heck, maybe I should explode a few atomic bombs. Maybe that'd help melt all the snow away. Joshing, Pete, just joshing. The look on your face!
Makepeace: But have you -
Mrs Keener: Let me say something, Mr Documentary Maker Man, just so's the viewers back home in the UK don't get the wrong idea. I've made plans to deal with what's going on. Contingency measures are in place. Things have been trialled which need to be trialled, and no, I'm not gonna tell you what I mean by that, 'cause it's top secret. If there's anyone out there doubts I have the grit or gumption to go through with my intentions — when appropriate — let them be under no illusion. I do. I very much do. Where's that camera? See my face. Look into my eyes. I am not to be rejected or ignored or trifled with. I am not the type to take any kinda challenge or insult lying down. I am here to respond to things as best I see fit, and you would do well not to underestimate my depth of feeling or my determination to act in the name of what I consider is right. Is that clear?
Makepeace: [voiceover] As firm a reiteration of Lois Keener's presidential credo as there's ever been. And perhaps a hint as to her attraction to ordinary middle-class American voters. That forthrightness. That plain speaking. Although I can't help feeling she's strayed somewhat off-topic. When did the bad weather become an adversary needing to be faced down? I can't follow the logic.
Makepeace: [in studio, to camera] So, what have I learned during my time with the president? She is not someone to be crossed lightly, yet she retains an essential charisma. She has a rigorous command of the facts of any given situation, yet she also relies heavily on her instincts, and her faith. She is fearsome and fearless. She is a woman who has undergone a profound spiritual metamorphosis, one that has taken her from smalltown Georgia anonymity and propelled her into the driving seat of earth's last true superpower. There is steel beneath that courteous feminine exterior, yet warmth as well. She is a president of contrasts. Her true nature is elusive, slippery, tricky. Perhaps only she knows her own mind fully, she and one other, the God to whom she has dedicated herself wholeheartedly, believing implicitly in His plan, His mission for her, relying on His guidance. I've come away from making this documentary with a profound respect for Mrs Keener, coupled with a nagging unease. It's as if, for all that she's beguiled me, there's a part of me that recoils from that. The only way I can describe it is like being hypnotised by a cobra — the allure of something beautiful but dangerous. I'm hoping that her imminent visit to Britain will be as anodyne and uneventful as such state occasions normally are. And the very fact that I'm hoping that at all unnerves me. I'm Peter Makepeace. This has been Makepeace Meets… Thank you for watching, and goodnight.
Twenty-Eight
The tape ended. Skuld snapped the television off.
For a time no one said anything, so I felt pressure to break the silence.
"She's a foxy lady and no mistake," I said. "Not sure she's completely all there, up top." I tapped my temple. "But that's not necessarily a drawback. The more screws a girl has loose, the looser a screw she is."
Odin and the Norns just looked at me.
"What? I grant you, not the most PC remark ever made, but…"
Still looking at me.
"What? Am I missing something here? I am, aren't I? I thought I was going to find out who your Big Bad is, and then all you do is show me a programme about…"
Gid Coxall, king of the slowly dropping pennies.
"Oh no. You are kidding."
Their faces.
"You're not kidding."
I recalled the book Odin had lent me while I was recuperating from the accident.
"When you gave me her autobiography," I said to him, "I thought it was just… Well, at first I thought you must be a fan of hers. Admired her politics. I was halfway to thinking the Valhalla Mission was some kind of neo-Nazi outfit, and you approved of her views on gays and abortion rights and the rest. And then I thought, maybe not. Maybe you oppose her because she's big government. She's The Man. That was before I got the whole Norse gods thing clear, of course. But if you're against her, if she's the enemy… It is her, isn't it? You haven't got anything against Peter Makepeace? Because he's smarmy, yes, a bit of a prick and a know-all, but that's not a reason to set up an army. I mean, there are plenty of other TV personalities I can think of that deserve merciless hounding and execution. Simon Cowell and Piers Morgan spring to mind. Nothing wrong with those two that couldn't be solved with a Claymore mine down the underpants. But not Makepeace."
"It isn't him," Odin said.
"So — Keener. Christ. Shit. You really… Mrs Keener. You want to eliminate the President of the United States. The most powerful human being on the planet. Well, good luck with that."
"Don't you want to know why she's our foe?"
"No, Odin, I do not. What I want is not to know anything about any of this, not any more. Fuck, you nearly had me. I was thinking, 'Join the Norse gods on some military campaign? That could be cool.' But all you're after is assassinating President Keener. Bit tawdry, isn't it? And when's this going to happen? Her state visit, I suppose. You're going to bundle in with all your troops while she's on a tour of the Houses of Parliament or Buckingham Palace or wherever, take out her secret service detail, then take her out — and all because she's a warmonger, right? Forgive me, but that's not exactly very godly of you, is it? Or is it? Is that what gods do when they're at a loose end? Get in there amongst the mortals and create havoc? Throw their divine weight around, because they can?"
"Gid, you're coming at this from entirely the wrong angle," Odin said.
"Mortal," said Urd dismissively. Like someone else might have said simpleton or moron.
"Only seeing the superficial details," Verdande agreed.
"The broader picture eludes him," said Skuld.
I blanked them. Smug fucking bitches. "If you hate her so much," I said to Odin, "by all means feel free to. She's hardly my favourite politician, although her being a hot babe does take the edge off her for me. But what we Midgarders do in these situations is we try to vote the person out of office if we don't like them, or we go out on the streets and protest against them, or else we ignore them because if you do that long enough, eventually they go away. We don't just kill them. All right, sometimes we do. But not often, and only the real scumbags, the Ceausescus, the Saddams, the tyrants, the ones who wouldn't know a free and fair election if it came up and bit them on the ballot box. And also — America. Come on. You don't launch an attack on the leader of fucking America. That's inviting a complete deluge of shit to come down on your heads. Gods or not, the USA is one nation whose bad books you truly do not want to get into."