Existential

by Ryan W. Aslesen

  “Shut up,” Max grumbled absently.

  The engine sputtered again, costing him another ten feet of altitude as he approached. He thought of putting down into the lake that abutted the tarmac, but he didn’t know how deep the water might be. In shallow water he would probably be fine, but if the water was deeper, the chopper would smack the surface and promptly flip belly-up due to the weight of the engine below the rotor.

  “Say again. Over.” The tower was not amused.

  “You might wanna send a crash truck,” Max suggested. “Again: out.”

  When the tower asked another question, Max turned off the radio to ride out the last half-mile.

  The bird’s engine stopped just as Max cleared the lake. He attempted to land via autorotation but ended up coming in too low and too late. The chopper smashed down hard on the concrete with a jolt that rattled his head, making him bite his tongue.

  Could be worse.

  He unbuckled from the pilot’s seat and exited the aircraft, every bone and muscle in his body moving reluctantly in aching protest. Dizzy, he leaned against the helicopter and vomited up a few strands of caustic bile. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d eaten.

  Max groggily refocused on the airport.

  A white pickup truck pulled up next to the chopper. From it alit a tall, gangly man wearing sports goggles. A small fire truck barreled down the runway toward him, red lights flashing.

  The tall guy didn’t bother asking if Max was okay. “Hey, you’re not the pilot!” He pointed an accusatory finger at Max.

  Max’s head cleared. “The fuck I’m not,” he growled into his face.

  The guy backed off with his hands raised in placation. “Okay, whatever you say. Jesus, what the hell happened to you, anyway? You get mauled by a grizzly or something?”

  Max didn’t answer. He walked to the pickup truck and climbed inside.

  “Hey, you can’t do that!” The man recognized his imminent death in Max’s gaze as they stared each other down. “Hey, whatever you want, jack. Is there anyone riding—?”

  Max drove off with his pickup. The men in the fire truck stared at him as he gunned the engine, bound for the hangar where the private jet hopefully still awaited.

  Max almost started to believe in karma when he saw his plane in the hangar, cabin door open and ladder extended. In a screech of brakes, he stopped the truck on the smooth concrete floor. The pilot appeared in the doorway as Max marched to the plane.

  “Mr. Ahlgren?” the pilot asked, not entirely certain with whom he was speaking.

  Max understood, knowing he looked his part as the sole survivor of a mini-apocalypse.

  “This thing topped off?” Max asked as he climbed the stairs into the cabin.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Good. Get us out of here. Now.”

  “Anyone else coming?”

  “There is nobody else.”

  The pilot gulped. “Uh, all right. I’ll start pre-flight inspection immediately.”

  Max shook his head. “No time for that. Fire this thing up and get us airborne while you still can. Before the FAA grounds all flights out of this state.”

  “Why would they do that?”

  Max pointed out the cabin door toward the northeastern horizon. The gray mushroom cloud had risen to the height of the stratosphere over the last hour. The debris was beginning to disburse in to the jet stream which could potentially carry radioactive particles all over the US and Canada. Innocent people would die from the radiation, though the vast majority of the population would live on, free from the threat of alien genocide.

  As ever, collateral damage was unavoidable in war.

  “Get the picture?” Max asked.

  The pilot nodded dumbly. “Where to?”

  “Henderson Executive Airport, Las Vegas. Don’t request clearance for takeoff. Just go.”

  * * *

  The luxurious jet featured many conveniences, among them a shower Max could barely squeeze into. He spent the first hour of the flight downing several bottles of water and part of a sandwich, bathing, and then dressing his many wounds, a couple of which would need stitches to heal properly. Anticipating infection, he would get himself looked over by a physician upon returning home. Considering what he’d gone through, the puissant foes he’d defeated, he figured his body had gotten off easy.

  Seven other men hadn’t been so lucky.

  He alighted from the lavatory in civilian clothes. He put his tactical uniform, the tatters soiled with the blood of man and beast alike, in a plastic trash bag and exhorted the stewardess to have it incinerated when they landed.

  Max wanted nothing more at that moment than to crash in one of the leather lounge chairs with a can of Diet Mountain Dew. Every quarter of his body demanded rest. His aches and pains would have their due soon enough. First, he had to look into something.

  His leather duffel bag was stored in a compartment at the front of the cabin, along with the rest of the team’s luggage. The sight of their belongings hit him like a boot to the gut, a reminder of his men and the devastating news he would have to deliver personally to their loved ones. Max placed his bag on the floor, then reached blindly inside the compartment for another, coming up with Sugar’s old green sea bag. He opened the top and saw a gallon-size plastic zipper bag containing the personal effects Sugar had stored when cleansing for the mission—pictures of his wife and family, a battered leather wallet, and a gold Rolex watch that had been one of his most prized possessions.

  Gulping down the ache of sorrow in his throat, Max sorted through the rest of their belongings, not to snoop but rather to remember. They had all been reborn as fighting men during their military training decades before, their individual personalities subdued and then flattened into non-entities as they learned to work as one with their peers. Their training never ceased; it simply became more advanced, tailored to a specific job. As the years passed, each man had cultivated a new individuality able to coexist with his military mindset. The personal items Max sifted through represented not only the men he’d known, but in some cases the men they had been before taking up the warrior’s life: LT’s Citadel ring, class of 1999; a worn 1978 silver dollar in Diaz’s belongings that Max never knew he carried; a thin tablet Red had picked up straight from Japan that he had been trying to hack and modify, the characters were Kanji; Gable’s first parachute badge, pinned inside his wallet for luck; a picture of two pretty, teen-aged girls in clothes from the 80s, found in Coach’s belongings; the bone-handled Böker lock-blade Irish kept clipped to his belt.

  Just tokens now, artifacts. But at least their families will have something.

  Max could look no more. He zipped and closed his team’s luggage and returned it all to the locker. Bringing his own bag back to his seat, he settled in with the finest-tasting Diet Mountain Dew he’d ever had the pleasure of drinking.

  His body begged for sleep the moment he sat down, but one final item of business remained. Max powered on his laptop and logged in. His home screen was nothing special, just a stock photo of a tropical waterfall. He’d stopped using pictures of his wife and son a while back, and now he was glad he had. He didn’t think he could handle another shot of loss and regret.

  Max clicked into the documents and opened a password-protected file folder titled “ALASKA”. Several files within detailed all aspects of the Greytech expedition that Elizabeth Grey had deemed relevant. He clicked on a PDF document labeled “ON-SITE PERSONNEL”, a simple listing of names and occupations with accompanying identification photos, and scrolled down alphabetically.

  Max groaned when he reached “KUMAR, DEAN Ph.D.” with his cantankerous, Abe Lincoln countenance. He was about to scroll past his profile completely yet forced himself to keep reading. “NEXT OF KIN: None.” And no students or faculty are likely to miss him, I’ll wager.

  Max scrolled through more profiles until he reached “ROGERS, ALEXIS Ph.D.”.

  The real Dr. Rogers resembled the alien Dr. Rogers, but Max
could tell them apart in an instant. The real doctor, relatively attractive, showed early signs of aging poorly. The alien Dr. Rogers’s facial features were better defined, more vibrant. The real Rogers had a desk-commando’s soft body that spoke of crash diets and birdlike eating habits to keep her weight in check. Though two different people, he could see how even her close colleagues would have accepted the alien as legitimate. As the Alexis he’d known had pointed out, people saw what they wanted to see, what they expected. She might have received a couple of odd stares from her colleagues, but no one had suspected Dr. Rogers had been replaced by an alien simulacrum. She had performed the perfect infiltration, and Max admired her for it.

  Took her few thousand years, but she accomplished her mission.

  And so had Max, who closed the laptop and put it aside. They would not be flying to Vegas just yet, he decided. He keyed the cockpit. When the pilot answered, Max announced, “Change of plans. Take us to Minneapolis.”

  “Yes, sir,” the pilot responded. “We’ll lay in the course now.”

  Max finally allowed himself to drift off to sleep. He didn’t remember the dreams that followed, but none were nightmares.

  Winter had descended on Minneapolis in typical and timely fashion. The leaden-gray sky spat the occasional snow flurry, and weather reports predicted a coming storm would dump six inches overnight. Enough snow to paralyze a city like New York, it wouldn’t slow Minneapolis in the least.

  Max strode the weekday streets amongst throngs of professionals departing work for the day. Traffic trickled along. Horns blared, and Max marveled at how overcrowded the city and its surrounding area had become in his lifetime. Still, it was nothing compared to Las Vegas, that place he had falsely come to regard as home.

  No, you just lived there. It was your refuge but no more.

  Max was ready to return to his family—to come home forever.

  Suddenly, he wanted a beer, just one, as he’d never been much of a drinker. He gazed through plate-glass windows into a couple of bars at the happy hour crowds of smiling, clean-cut yuppies and decided to move on. He had nothing against them, but they likewise shared nothing in common. Their lives were all presentations and paychecks, Starbucks and social media. They had no inkling of the diabolical forces at work across the world and within their own government, of how the powerful manipulated society and perpetrated heinous acts to satisfy their every want and whim.

  Max entered a chain sporting goods store and bought a football, regulation size. Then he moved on to a florist’s shop and purchased an arrangement of half a dozen white lilies, Janet’s favorite. He hailed a cab driven by a gray-bearded Sikh in a black turban and told him the destination. Darkness descended as they departed downtown for the suburbs. Snow fell in fat flakes, growing steadier and heavier by the minute. The cabbie drove like a native, unfazed by the snow, deftly navigating the slippery streets.

  “Right here is fine,” he told the driver.

  “Should I wait for you, sir?”

  Max shook his head. “No, my boy loves the snow.”

  The driver gave him a bewildered look as he accepted the fare and a generous tip. He gave Max a company card. “Thank you, sir. Do call our dispatcher when you are ready to return.”

  Max said nothing, got out, and closed the door.

  The Sikh drove off through the snow, back to the city.

  Max walked through the wrought iron gates and up the drive. He knew the way by heart and two inches of snow couldn’t hide the headstone from him. He could have found it under two feet of snow.

  He dropped to his knees before the stone and felt the wet snow soak through his pants. “AHLGREN” inscribed boldly across the cold gray granite. Max used his index finger to trace the epigraphs below: “David James 1998-2008”; “Janet McGrath 1976-2008”. Max placed the football and flowers before his family and reminisced.

  It had all seemed so open and shut, tragic and yet routine: a fatal collision on a rainy night. The driver of the other car, a stolen vehicle, fled the scene and was never identified. Such things happened all the time.

  I should have known Banner was behind it.

  Why the fool had been trying to start World War III by exposing covert American involvement in the brief Russo-Georgian War of 2008 still eluded him. But did it even matter now, kneeling at the graves of his family?

  Max shook his head as he considered his late wife. I did nothing but fail you. The long, multiple deployments; all the ghosts that hitchhiked home with Max from around the world, she’d dealt with it all and then some. And when she couldn’t take it any longer, Max kept heaping more on her. Mass military deployments to the Middle East were usually scheduled, but Max’s team stayed on call, ready to deploy at any moment. He remembered eating breakfast one day with his family and promising David they would go to the park and run some plays after school.

  I was in Venezuela when he got off the bus that afternoon. Max remembered the job, his second mission leading his own team, ordered to rescue two Haliburton executives from one of Hugo Chavez’s jails. They fought their way into the place, freed all sorts of random political prisoners. Yet one of their objectives disemboweled, and the other hung by his thumbs from the ceiling, skinned from the neck down. Max didn’t remember their names, but they still invaded his dreams regularly.

  Banner had recommended him for that job as well. He wondered now how if those events were somehow connected.

  Janet left after that and took David with her.

  I failed at the only mission that mattered...

  Memories flooded his mind: the first time he met his wife, the night he asked her to marry him, making love to her, the first time he held his son, rocking him to sleep as a toddler, wanting to savor every moment with him when he was home, playing catch on the back lawn.

  Then he remembered receiving the news of their deaths.

  Max’s Glock found his hand, the cold barrel pressed to his temple. He didn’t remember drawing it, but there it was, right where it needed to be.

  Dad! David’s voice cried in his mind.

  Max swallowed and choked back tears. Adrenaline filled his system and his stomach knotted. Now armed with adequate courage to finish the deed, he contracted his index finger, a couple pounds of pressure on the trigger. “I’m coming home, guys. For good this time.”

  Tears streamed down his face. He gazed up at the night sky. He wasn’t sure how long he’d knelt before the headstone. The snow had stopped and the clouds had passed for the moment.

  Dad, wait!

  I can’t wait any longer, son. Another pound of pressure on the trigger.

  Max saw them in the sky, David and Janet, peering down upon him like living constellations, and then, for a moment, he was among them in the stars.

  Max didn’t lower his right arm, he felt it pushed gently downward. Janet’s touch, her love. He’d loved it—would never forget it—and here it was again, even if he could only sense it. He likewise sensed her kiss on his lips and knew her soul lingered there beside him.

  Not yet, Max. It’s not time.

  When Max looked back to the sky, David and Janet had gone. The stars had advanced and tendrils of cloud had moved back in, vanguard of the coming storm. Max’s Glock lay in the snow next to the football. He stared at it for a second, examining it, as if the familiar tool would provide answers. Finally, he blinked. He wiped the snow from the pistol and holstered it, then stood, feeling the stiffness of kneeling too long.

  Their bodies remained buried here, but their spirits had departed once again. Max didn’t know if he would ever sense their presence again while he still lived, but it didn’t matter.

  They will always be with you.

  Max had come to terms with their death, but it didn’t give him the peace he sought. Instead, the wheels turned in the back of his mind about the orchestration of their demise. His body no longer cold, it felt warm in fact, as if a fire had been lit inside him, and his mind was suddenly crystal clear from the epiphany on
what needed to be done. At the thought of it, his eyes narrowed like hooded slits.

  This isn’t the end. This is only the beginning. Whoever did this to you will pay.

  Max bent forward and kissed the top of the headstone. For a moment he stared deep into the distant shadows, his mind drifted back to his brothers in arms, and the private hell he had just endured. He turned to face the darkness that lay ahead. As he walked away into the night, he glanced at the heavens once more, no longer feeling so alone.

  This book is a work of fiction, but the pain many veterans experience is very real. The brave men and women of our armed forces endure much in the service of our country. The wounds they suffer, both seen and unseen, stay with them often long after they have served. Veterans often return home feeling disconnected from the society they sought to protect. The feelings of isolation and carrying the sense of guilt knowing they survived when others did not, causes many veterans to turn to suicide.

  To my brothers and sisters in arms, you are not alone. If you or anyone has thoughts of harming themselves or others, please talk to someone. If you don’t feel like talking to a family member or friend, contact the number below:

  National Suicide Prevention Lifeline 1-800-273-8255

  Suicide is a permanent solution to a temporary problem. Please don’t waste the limitless potential inside of you. You alone decide how to write the final chapters of your life.

  Semper Fi,

  Ryan W. Aslesen

  About Author

  Ryan Aslesen is an author and security consultant based out of Las Vegas, NV. He is a former Marine Officer and a veteran of the War on Terror. His debut novel, Existential, is a highly-praised sci-fi/horror thriller. He is currently working on his next novel.

  Learn about Max Ahlgren's first black ops mission in the explosive novella Crucible