A Pius Man_A Holy Thriller Read online

  A Pius Man

  A Holy Thriller

  by Declan Finn

  A PIUS MAN

  By Declan Finn

  Published by Silver Empire

  https://silverempire.org/

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2017, Declan Finn

  All rights reserved.

  Dedicated to all those who have been victims of the new Holocaust.

  Foreward

  My writing career can be blamed on two people: Joseph Michael Straczynski (JMS) and my father. JMS created a television show called Babylon 5. It was essentially a filmed science fiction novel, where the primary author (JMS) was the executive producer. By reading his online posts about writing, learning about construction of story, the elements of character, my interest was piqued. At sixteen I came up with a concept for a novel.

  My father encouraged me to write what I had in mind. I designed my own characters, weaving stories out of loose threads of information in Straczynski’s universe. After a while, the stories were mostly my own, and it grew into a universe beyond the actual show I based it on. In fifteen months, I had created a science fiction quartet of over 575,000 words that sprawled all over a universe that was mostly of my own design. After that I was hooked on writing. Since then, I wrote multiple novels, some bad, some readable. I’m still working on creating a version of my science fiction series that will not get me sued by Mr. Straczynski. I wrote thrillers, a hostage novel, short stories that were mostly a result of my creative writing professor, James Sheehan.

  A Pius Man can be blamed on Professor Ralph McInerny, PhD, of Notre Dame University, and Prof. William Griffin, of St. John’s University. McInerny, whose claim to popular fame can be traced back to his Father Dowling mysteries, also wrote a book on Pope Pius XII. I read it, and it spurred me to such anger that when Prof. Griffin wanted a paper, Pius XII was a topic that sprang to mind. May they both rest in peace.

  A Pius Man is, in essence, a graduate paper gone completely out of control. It is the result when you cross a student of history, with an interest in Catholic philosophy, and who enjoys your average action film. It was originally written in 2004 over a period of only four months.

  Some things: I do not speak Russian, and I can barely spell Russian, especially since Russian can be transliterated into English about four different ways. Also, the Sudan referred to in this book is on the Human Rights Commission. This book was written when there was an HRC. It’s been replaced by a Human Rights Council, with a rotational body of nations on it – nothing prevents Sudan being on THIS HRC. And if you tell me it can’t happen, you can explain how Sudan got on the Commission for Human Rights in the first place. As the book was originally written in 2004, if there are characters presented as younger than they should be, please roll with it.

  A lot of the weapons are gleaned from details I found online. Some of this stuff is vaporware, and sounds nice, but isn’t here yet.

  Acknowledgements

  J. Michael Straczynski, for starting me off in this business—sort of. See Foreword.

  Ralph McInerny, RIP, for inspiring this book. See Foreword.

  To Professors Mauricio Borrero, Joseph Califano, Frank J. Coppa, Robert Forman, Arthur Gianelli, William D. Griffin (RIP), Father Robert Lauder, Alice Ramos and Konrad Tuchscherer of St. John’s University, for leading me to most of the factual background of the book.

  To my friend Manana, for being a good sport about being portrayed in this book. If the reader believes that the physical descriptions of the character Mani Shushurin is too hyperbolic to be real, I went to college with her.

  To Tanja Cilia, Walt Staples (RIP), Ann Lewis, Karina Fabian, and Randy England of the Catholic Writer’s Guild, for all the beta reading.

  John Santiago, SJU, 2004, hopefully a priest by now—obviously, I made good use of the slides.

  I should note that any and all mistakes in combat and moments where “that Bruce Lee stuff won’t work” moments are completely my fault...and probably written before I learned a combat system that worked.

  To Jason Bieber of the University of Dayton, I would like to thank for his suggestions on the media angle of the Pope and the journalists of the world.

  Matt “Funtime” Pryce, James Masciale, for the audio trailers.

  Barbara, for the support.

  And I’d also like to thank everyone who believed in me, even when I didn’t: Allan and Annie Yoskowitz, Colleen Eren, Daniel and Melanie Pietras, Amanda Kennedy.

  To Margaret and Gail Konecsni of Just Write! Ink, for editorial services.

  To Matt Bowman – he knows why.

  To Russell and Morgon Newquist, for dealing with my neuroses during the edits for this re-release.

  Everyone on the Facebook page. We made it.

  And to RM Hendershot, author of Masks, for everything.

  Prologue: A Pius Obsession

  David Gerrity had lived with eighty-five years of obsession.

  He had been obsessed with learning, which brought him into Harvard; history, which provided him with his Ph.D.; and, later, a wide range of other subjects, disciplining himself to no more than three or four obsessions at a time.

  His family was another obsession. When he married, it was to a woman whose interests were as wide-ranging as his, which allowed her to at least partially understand what he was talking about. Between them they raised three daughters and two sons, each of whom was hatched, then matched, then finally dispatched from the home to do likewise.

  His third permanent obsession was his religion, primarily in its philosophical aspects. He had even read the twelve shelf-feet of the fifty-volume Thomas Aquinas philosophical opus Summa Theologica during one summer break.

  His final obsession varied. Unlike many academics who knew one thing and wrote on the same topic over and over, once he had exhausted a subject, it amused him to go back to the student side of the desk. In that fashion, he earned his second and third doctorates in sacred theology and in law. He had made a modest fortune on his four-volume history, Lies Historians Tell: From Herodotus and Thucydides to Leni Riefenstahl and Michael Moore. This revision of the revisionists armed a generation of smartass high-schoolers and undergraduates to challenge their professors with all the far-more-interesting facts the teachers left out of the official version. Gerrity was thus superbly equipped by training, talent, time and treasure to pursue his latest obsession.

  His latest interest would become his last.

  The final obsession explained the pile of books in Gerrity’s hotel room in Rome. He bellowed, “God forsaken liar! Suffer eternal freezer burn!” as he hurled yet another volume with the force of a clay pigeon at a skeet shoot. It smacked against a wall, the impact sounding like a gunshot.

  In Gerrity’s mind, all of these books had been flawed. He had done exhaustive research on the records of the period, so he knew the authors had lied. He knew about what happened back then: the backroom deals, the failed assassination attempts, the intrigue, and the incompetent spy games they played, as well as all of the successful ones. Research was made harder because boasting was not in the nature of intelligence. He knew almost
a dozen condemnations by heart, as well as how the words were twisted. It had taken 50 years to prove that Alger Hiss was an enemy agent, that the U.S.S.R. was a paper tiger, that Sacco and Vanzetti were guilty… This would be done also.

  His new obsession was to correct one simple point of history; to settle the matter once and for all. There were few final victories, but to settle this for one generation would be enough — two generations had been poisoned already.

  He rolled out of bed, ignoring his body’s screams of protest as his arthritis flared up once more. The eighty-five-year-old had focused his attention on collecting facts; pain could be attended to later, assuming he noticed it.

  He grabbed his portable scanner and plugged it into his laptop, wanting to read all he had collected yesterday. When they allowed him into the library, he brought his scanner, as he would not have been allowed to leave with any documents — an official policy he disliked, but one that seemed to follow him everywhere he went. Technically, he wasn’t allowed to scan anything either, but he cheated. He had scanned each piece of paper so he could read them later, saving his eyesight and time in the vault. It had been a very well-lit vault, but he didn’t like being locked in.

  The day before, he had accidentally rammed his head against a top shelf. The shelf came loose and nearly decapitated him. Inside the shelf was a narrow, hollowed-out slit, where he had spotted one more piece of paper. It had been properly preserved, like the other documents, but who put papers inside of a shelf, not on it? Like every other document, he had scanned it, put it back in its proper place, replaced the shelf, and then forgot about it until now.

  That image was the last one he had scanned, and the first one he looked at now.

  Gerrity’s eyes widened and he stood, suddenly knocking the chair backwards. If this were true, he was going to have to change everything - the title of the book, the premise, even his own beliefs.

  Damn it, everything’s gone to Hell.

  Gerrity whirled, headed for the door, intent on demanding to be let back into the vault for the original paper. If this was correct, and if he could find data to support this, he would bring down an entire institution with what he knew. He would grind it under his feet, burn it and scatter the ashes, down to every last member. He would metaphorically kill them all, show them for what they really were. He hadn’t exactly intended on doing it when he had arrived, but now, he had no choice.

  Gerrity worked the locks and wrenched open the door. Standing on the other side was someone from room service, pushing a full dinner cart.

  “Io ho qualcosa!” he shouted. I’ve got something!

  The bellman blinked, and raised the water bottle in his right hand. Gerrity looked down and saw that the mouth of the empty water bottle had been taped to something else. A gun.

  Room service fired one bullet into Gerrity’s stomach at an upward angle, letting the .22-caliber round ricochet off of the back of his ribcage, into the breastbone, finally lodging in the knotted muscles of his left shoulder. Gerrity staggered back and was shot again, this time under the chin; this bullet did the job, bouncing off of the back of his skull, through the frontal lobe, ricocheted a final time, to finally embed itself in the top of the spinal column. Gerrity landed with a light thump.

  Clementi dragged the cart into Gerrity’s hotel room and closed the door, heading directly for the laptop. His improvised silencer would be good for at least one more shot. He raised his gun to finish the job. He had been instructed not to read anything Gerrity had left behind, only destroy it.

  Clementi disobeyed, having caught part of one sentence, and then again, and again… Clementi stopped and stared at the screen. The information in front of him was impossible. Perfectly, absolutely, utterly impossible. He could not believe some of the names on that screen. He could not believe the events it described. And he could not make another move without passing the information along.

  Clementi whipped out his cell phone and hit redial so he could immediately contact his superior.

  “Is it done?”

  “Gerrity’s dead, but the evidence — you must read it. We can’t work for him anymore. Do you know who he is? What he is?”

  “Yes, I do,” his superior answered.

  A moment later, three sticks of dynamite underneath the dining cart exploded. The concussive wave slammed into Clementi like a giant smacking him with sheet metal. It sent the computer across the room, and the assassin out the window, smashing apart all of the glass. The assassin shattered both legs against the frame as he fell to his death on top of a car below.

  * * *

  Several blocks away, the assassin’s superior officer, and his murderer, calmly strode out of the café onto Via Ottaviano, tucking his cell phone into an inside pocket. He looked out over the columns of the Vatican. Rome was rather pretty at this time of year.

  “Excuse me!”

  He turned, and smiled at an approaching mother and infant. “Yes?”

  “Father, would you bless my baby?”

  * * *

  Manana Shushurin was covered with sweat, and half-regretted wearing the T-shirt. The material on this one was definitely too thin. She gently slid the barbell back onto the rack and then swung her long legs over the side. It took three hours to get this much sweat accumulated, and she had barely noticed. She had slept from five p.m.—when everyone had left work — to nine p.m., and had gone down to the gym.

  But it was time to go back to work, whether she liked it or not.

  After the showers, she slipped into simple gray pants and a white blouse. Then she headed back to her office. She looked around the room. Officially, she lived with her mother. Unofficially, when she wasn’t in the field, she was in her office, sleeping no more than she needed to. There were few things in her office that gave a hint that she lived there — her closet, a bookcase, and the DVD/VHS player on her lamp table. All her other clothing and impedimenta were in storage.

  Shushurin sighed. Yes, that should be depressing, shouldn’t it?

  She dated, but not often. She had degrees in political science, philosophy and history, but men only noticed her body. She stared down at her well-developed chest, cursing mildly. At least her build was useful when she was sent into the field. It was easier to interrogate a man when he was too busy drooling to use discretion.

  She looked down at the paperwork on her desk, and grabbed a chair. She gazed from pile to pile, trying to figure out where to begin.

  Working for German foreign intelligence, the Bundesnachrichtendienst (BND), had some perks, like the workout room. Her office was tucked in the back end of the building, but was still as crowded as any cubicle. Her job was to sort through intelligence reports for the Israelis. As irony would have it, the BND gave a great deal of information to the Mossad. But some members of her own service thought the creation of Israel had stolen from Ahmed to give to Avram, and hence disliked giving Mossad intel. So, for doing her job to the fullest of her abilities, she was seen as “supporting Israel,” and she had been tucked into the back end of nowhere. Fortunately, she was too good to be tied to a desk for any length of time. She could lie, cheat and steal with the best, as evidenced by her generosity every poker night. After she cleaned everyone out, she ended the game by sharing her winnings with the pigeons she called colleagues.

  Manana Shushurin flipped a mental coin on what folder to review. Then, she picked up the latest folder out of Rome, and after she scanned the first three lines, her eyes lit up. This was something she needed to pass on immediately.

  The phone rang. She answered. The caller told her, “You’re going to Italy.”

  Chapter I: A Pius Cop

  Giovanni Figlia stood in the lobby of Leonardo da Vinci Fiumicino Airport in a solid black polo shirt and a black suit jacket. The color scheme made him seem shorter than his 5’9” height. His hand ached for his Beretta to reassure himself that he was still armed, but instead he ran his fingers through his thick dark hair.

  It must be something about
Americans that brings out the Clint Eastwood in people.

  He scanned the crowd for his target, comparing each face with the photograph he had memorized down to the dots on the color printout: hazel eyes, brown hair, Germanic cheekbones, not bad-looking. Wilhelmina Goldberg, a former member of the Americans’ National Security Agency, with degrees in esoteric languages and mathematics, had transferred into her current profession some time ago, and was supposed to be good at it.

  Now all I have to do is hunt her down.

  “Looking for me?”

  Figlia looked down. Three feet away from him stood a woman just under five feet tall. He recognized her as Goldberg; she wore black jeans and a tight-fitting, long-sleeved turtleneck. Over one shoulder she carried a duffel bag as large as she was. She also dragged a wheeled suitcase as big as Figlia.

  “Io ho pensato che Lei ha… supposed to be in formal attire,” he said in his own combination of Italian and English. He glanced at her. “Not attracting attention.”

  She replied in crisp, formal Italian. “On the former, you thought wrong. As for the latter…” she looked down at her chest and shot him a look. “If 28B passes for attention-getting in Italy, you people need to open a Playboy, pop a Viagra, and get a life.”

  Giovanni Figlia stepped to one side. “This way?”

  “You lead. I don’t want you stepping on my equipment. You want this job done, we’ll need this intact.”

  He led. Goldberg moved forward. “You’re Gianni, right?”

  “Mi chiamo Figlia, si.” I’m Figlia, yes.

  “I’m surprised,” she told him. “You’re the head of this outfit; why would you meet me?”

  Figlia shrugged. “Because I like to get out of the office every once in a while. And we’ll be working together for a while. We might as well get used to each other, starting now.”