"What So Proudly We Hail"
by David "Inky" Scott

He remembered when he first saw the Mark.

It had been some years ago, he no longer remembered the exact date, but it had been a short time before the President had come to power. He did remember that.

He remembered that he didn't think much of it at the time. In those days, people were always putting one affiliation after another on their clothes, their cars, or their shop windows. One more was just another symbol. Masons, Rotary, Optimists, Mensa, each one its own little tag, each one broadcasting solidarity to fellow members. Members of those groups supported their own as a result and everyone benefited.

In the beginning the Mark had been just the same to him. To many people, really, in hindsight.

He had worked for an accounting firm in the early years after his days at university. The senior partners had quickly realized the value of his abilities and he was promoted quickly in the coming decade. The economy boomed, big businesses paid handsomely for the services of his employers. A few years later, they paid even more for his when he himself became a senior partner.

It looked like he had finally made it.

He married, had children, bought a house.

He looked forward to an early retirement.

He remembered the Mark showing up more frequently after the President had been elected the first time.

The evening news had run a story on it, how businesses with the Mark were starting to cater only to those who also possessed the Mark and would refuse service otherwise. The reverse also became true, those who bore the Mark or supported the Ones who gave it would only go to those businesses. The leaders of the people of the Mark decried those who did not have it and urged their followers to shun those businesses who had not taken the Mark. The Mark appeared in phone directories, on lighted signs, and even on business cards to direct the bearers of the Mark to the properplaces.

He thought little of it until he noticed his own firm losing business. Many of his individual clients had taken the Mark and withdrew their accounts with him. Some offered him the Mark, for they yet respected his skills and desired him to join with them.

Still, he was steadfast. The Mark went against his principles. He had been raised with older, higher ideals. The Mark, and those who served it, were not a part of them.

He tightened his belt and went on.

He remembered the day his wife took the Mark, at the urging of her family. She offered the Mark to him as well. He declined.

She left soon after, taking their children with her. He remembered seeing the Mark proudly shining on a silver chain around his daughter's neck as they walked away. It was the last he ever saw of them.

Memory is a cold thing. He shook his head to clear it.

When the President was elected the second time, great change came with it. The Mark was now the symbol of the nation, the birthright of the people. By law, no business would be tolerated without it, no person would be accepted unless they carried it upon their person, and allegiance to the One behind it in their heart. In the minds of many, the President and the Mark became one and the same.

He stood firm and resolved he would not take the Mark. Many others refused as well. They supported themselves with a clandestine network so they would not starve or lack for other basic human needs. Yet to the people of the Mark they were no longer human. On his throne, now wearing the diadem of absolute rule, the President gave the word.

In darkness those-who-refused hid. In terror they ran, seeking protection from what they saw as an abomination to all they believed. Some fought, but there was no hope. The Mark was carried now by too many and they marched across the world, carrying their standard to all nations. The President held dominion over all, but now was called by a different name.

He remembered when they finally came for him, the day he could run no more. This time, they did not offer him the Mark, he was given it. He was strapped into a cold iron chair. Hot iron was brought near him, he could hear the metal singing with heat.

He screamed when they burned the Mark into his hand, a pain he would never forget, and an image that would last the rest of his life. Two curved lines, joined at one end, crossed at the other. A stylized fish: the Mark of the Beast.