This is Chapter two which is from the Antagonist. His name has been changed and everything else. Since this is the internet, I have to stress that this is NOT based on anyone and that he only had the same position.
You may be as harsh as you like on this I have no idea whether this is how he'd really act!
Enjoy!
Mac
Spoiler! :
Spoiler! :
Chapter Two
Mustafa Ehab
After the eighteenth day of protesters occupying Tahrir Square, my vice president, Wael Kareem, decided to confront me about it.
How very imprudent of him.
Now, his fate was sealed, as if it were possible to put it inside an envelope, ready to be sent to executors.
“Mustafa,” he said, standing at the doorway, clutching a sheet of paper in his hand. “I think we’ve had enough. You and I both know what the protesters demand from you.”
“If you are suggesting that it is time for me to leave–”
“Mr. President, there are millions in Tahrir Square. Some sources suggest that there are four million, and there are many countries with a population under that.”
“Wael, I suggest that you vacate this room at once. “
“Your allies are turning against you,” he continued. “The military are refusing to shoot at the protesters. Soon, we could see the collapse of the Egyptian economy–”
“Any collapse that occurs is the fault of the protesters, not mine. The credit rating issue was due to the foolish idea of the protesters deciding to occupy the Square–”
“Soon,” he hissed, “there will be no doctors. There will be nothing. You will ruin the thousands of years of civilisation–”
“What a foolish idea of me to promote you to vice-president. I should have known the reason for your popularity among the public. I should have known that you were conspiring to get rid of me!” I said, my voice becoming louder. I stood up. “Leave. Leave at once!”
“No,” he replied, his voice quiet yet firm, glaring at me with fierce, dark brown eyes.
I grabbed him by the hem of his clothes. “Count your heartbeats,” I growled.
He wrenched my arm off his clothes. “Mr. President, I have no other way to say it, but you are one very foolish idiot.”
“Give me that paper,” I ordered. Surprisingly, he gave it to me. I scanned the sheet, before grabbing a pen with my left hand and hastily signing it with my right, deliberately in the wrong section. “Do you feel relieved of your 'duty'? Do you feel glad that you have fulfilled the public’s desire to get rid of me?”
“Mr. President–”
Lies. Lies! I should have never trusted my government. “I am leaving,” I announced, picking up my briefcase. “I am leaving the office for Sharm El Sheikh.”
“You–”
“Yes, Wael, you heard me.” I pressed the button for the elevator and entered. “I am going to leave you in peace for a while so I can relax in Sharm El Sheikh. My break was long overdue. I will not be seeing you or my unfaithful government–” the gleaming doors of the lift shut. “–for a while.”
I sat in my blue helicopter, waiting for my assistant to fly me to Sharm El Sheikh, where I would have a few stress-free days of pure relaxation and time to think about evicting the protesters from the Square.
My assistant boarded the helicopter. As we flew over the dark sand dunes of the desert, I daydreamed of peace. Just for a day. Then, when I returned, I could think straight again.
We were now flying over the Suez Canal when my assistant asked, “I must say, Mr. Ehab, you do surprise me.”
“In what manner?”
“You told us you would remain in power ‘to the end’ at the start of the unrest.”
“I will.”
“Oh. How peculiar. I was late because I watched the televised statement that Wael broadcasted. Apparently, you resigned.”
This could not be true. No. I certainly did not resign. But Wael made the statement...
Three days on, the General of the Army, who I had appointed during the first signs of unrest in Tunisia, was leading the country. This was not necessarily a bad thing, as the General would be under my control. He was my marionette. But that presented a question, an important question. How could I use him to reinstate me?
Youssef, my assistant, entered the room. “Mr. President, would you care for a cup of tea?”
“Call me Mustafa, Youssef. You’ve been loyal to your leader. With milk and two sugars,” I added.
As Youssef was making tea for me, I asked if there was a way to arrange a telephone line into the room. I was initially planning to stay at my Palace, but when I discovered that I “resigned”, I changed my plans.
“Perhaps, although...”
By now, he was stirring the sugar into my teacup, when–
“Go, go, go!” somebody called, in French.
I stood up and pushed the tea out of the way, the cup smashing on the floor. I flung open the door, discovering that three or four people had escaped the room.“Venir ici!” I ordered. I attempted to grab the nearest one to the entrance of the cave by the neck–
“Get–off–me!”
He thrashed around as he tried to wriggle out of my strong grip. Punching my jaw, my grip on him slackened before he tugged my hand off his clothes. He dived into the open depths of the dark sea.
How did they get escape?
I inspected the damage in my jaw with my fingers. “Youssef! Hati manadeel!” I ordered, in Arabic.
“Yes, sir!
While I waited for my tissues, I opened to the room that they were in and discovered that they had managed to undo the lock from the inside. I removed the handle to make sure that the only way to enter from the outside. Later, I would have Youssef install cat-flaps to let the food in.
Back in the war, their system of opening the door for food was certainly not clever. In fact, that was the precise way I had escaped! How foolish of me to forget. Just after the food was served, I picked the lock and my fellow soldiers and I escaped.
If I had to pull a lever to open the door, where was the lever? I found the metal lever which was next to the side entrance of the secret cave. I pulled it, the door closing. Now, there was no way to detect that the cave even existed.
Once Youssef finished making me another cup of tea after the first one smashed, I began to think about solutions to my dilemma. How would I be able to reinstate myself into power?
So soon after leaving, I could not ask the General to reinstate me. No. The public would be suspicious. They were already suspicious of the General, but if I left it for long then there would be calls for my trial. After all, what wrong had I done?
If I did have a trial, the jury would surely be biased, which was why the people could never be trusted. They demanded too much, and did not understand when it was not possible, and would always pick their friends or family even if they were biased.
I needed something to horrify, to reach the millions. The billions, even. I needed something to inject fear into the heart of the Egyptians. Perhaps it could be something to do with the people I had imprisoned after discovering the cave on that dark night. Those kids. Foolish kids who would do such silly things, including diving off the cliff. I heard them all.
Then I remembered why the cave existed. It existed for the captured.
I smiled widely. Revenge.
P.S. Thanks for reading! Can I ask? Are the names pronounceable for you as they're from Arabic which has letters and sounds we don't have in English.
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