by TJ Martinell
“You knew this guy?” he asked.
My heart burned with a cold hatred. Seconds later I was numb to any fond memories of my friendship with Casey. I wanted to erase the first time we had met. The times when he had demonstrated a capacity for loyalty. The cold fire in me burned away all sentiment and fondness associated with his name and face. There was nothing left in the ashes but an unquenchable hate.
I marched through the marketplace. Along the street the buskers ceased their music and the vendors froze like statues. Griggs ran up behind me and threw away his cigarette. His eyes conveyed a strong opinion, yet he carefully restrained it in his expression.
“Do you want me to get the boys?” he asked.
“No.”
“Anything?”
“Yes,” I said.
“What?”
At the top of the street I stopped and turned to him, speaking inches away from his face.
“Meet me at King Street, ten o’ clock.”
“You want me to bring anything?”
“No. I’ll have the car, the gear, everything.”
“What are we going to do?” he inquired.
“You’ll find out tonight,” I said. “Everyone else can read about it tomorrow.”
“Read what?”
“His obituary. I intend to write it myself.”
***
Casey’s home was undistinguishable from the rest of the house on the block. I looked down at the curb where the address was marked clearly even in the night. The front porch lights were on, but the rest of the windows were dark. Except for one light in the top left bedroom.
Griggs sat in the driver’s seat, one hand on the wheel and the other hanging over his seat. He studied the house and then asked me in a low voice what I intended to do. I tried not to scoff as I replied.
“You’ve done these jobs before.”
“They weren’t people I knew.”
“You don’t know him.”
“Do you?” Griggs asked.
“I don’t know. Do I?”
“You tell me. He was your friend.”
I looked up at the bedroom window. Casey had to be there. His car was parked in the driveway. There were no extra police patrols in the neighborhood.
“How exactly is this going to go down?” Griggs asked.
I reached down and picked up a small black case, entering the combination on the lock, taking out a suppressor and a customized Colt pistol, designed to be dismantled and easily disposed of once its purpose had been accomplished. The bullets were reloaded, untraceable.
By midnight the pistol would be in two dozen pieces. Those pieces would be hundreds of miles away from one another. They’d be buried in garage heaps and chimneys and at the bottom of lakes and an ocean.
They would never know for sure.
I slipped on the suppressor until it fit snugly. I then produced a small container from my pocket and opened it and took out a false face mask. It had a face stitched into the fabric, creating artificial features. For the ordinary person in a moment of panic, they would remember those few details to give to investigators.
I put it on and smiled behind it.
“You just stay here until the job is done,” I ordered Griggs. “If you see anyone else come out but me, leave. Don’t wait for me.”
“I don’t like that idea.”
“So?”
He replied with the same bitterness in his voice. “Look, I don’t give a shit. I’m giving you my input, anyways. You sure you want to go through with this?”
“No shit. It has to happen.”
“Says who?”
“Me.”
He sighed. “I don’t get it.”
“It wasn’t your father he killed.”
He stared. “You’re not the only one to lose his dad like that.”
I swung the door opened and eased myself out. I held the door nearly closed and looked back inside
“If you had the chance to kill the person who murdered your father, wouldn’t you take it?” I asked. “Would you really just forgive them?”
“You’re right. What the hell would I know about forgiveness? It’s not like anyone I cared about got killed and when I got a chance to hurt the guy responsible I let it go.”
I slammed the door and walked up to the curb. I approached the house confidently. I had been there enough times to remember the entire layout. But I had also done some additional research. Original blueprints. All remodeling permits from the King County Recorder’s Office.
The home security system was a bit of irony. I still remembered the password Casey had given me. I approached the door and entered the code. The security system was soundless as it turned green and unlocked the door. I pushed it open and then closed it without a noise.
The hallway was dark. The kitchen hinted of light coming from the living room on the right. To the left was the parlor. My eyes remained adjusted as I entered the room and paused. On the wall were the pictures, ribbons, medals and framed articles. As I moved into the hallway the walls were also covered with framed pictures.
All were of Mr. Nowak in his uniform. Standing by his vehicle, at his desk or shaking hands with the ISA director during his many award ceremonies.
The kitchen was no better. The coffee mugs on the counter had Mr. Nowak’s face along with the years marking his birth and death. A family portrait taken when Casey had been an infant hung on the wall overlooking the dinner table. Mr. Nowak had died the same age as Casey was, yet the expression he wore was unlike any Casey had ever shown. He had had an arrogant aloofness Casey could never emulate.
I looked over to the family room. At the bottom of the closed door a bit of light seeped out. I put my ear against it. No noise. But someone was in there.
If it was Casey, the job would be painless. I had promised myself that much. No theatrics. No deliberations. Get the job over with it and leave. To prolong it would make it worse for me. He would certainly attempt to persuade me, to convince me it had been necessary for him to kill my father. I almost wanted to let him talk and see for myself how much of a liar he be.
A heavy voice bellowed from the family room and shook the walls, like a witch calling out an incantation.
“Casey! Did you take off your Prizm again! Put it back on! Come down here right now!”
His mother.
I holstered my pistol and took out a taser. I opened the door and immediately saw Mrs. Nowak sitting in her chair on the left near the sofa. She was a severe looking woman. Her had been hair cotton white since her thirties. Thin and lean, she seemed frail but there was an inner strength that allowed her to harangue Casey relentlessly for as long I could remember.
She didn’t get a chance to look at me. As soon as I saw her I shot her with the taser, paralyzing her. She fell on the floor and convulsed as her limbs locked up. I let the charge subside. Then I plunged a needle into the back of her arm, injecting a sleeping serum into her bloodstream. She dropped her head against the floor. I checked her pulse and confirmed she was alive. I then took cords from my pocket and tied her hands behind her back and her feet and then I carried her over to the sofa and placed it on it. I had no intent on harming her for the sins of the son.
More portraits of Mr. Nowak stared at me from the walls.
It was then I realized how much I hated him. Not Mr. Nowak the man, but the image. I hated the idea of him. I hated him as an object of worship, the idol created out of a real man. I was tempted to deface the pictures, but I walked out of the room without desecrating his temple.
The stairs leading to the second floor had several loose boards. I overstepped them as I climbed up. I avoided the banister as well. It had a loose screw Mrs. Nowak had complained to Casey about he had made it clear he’d never fix it.
In the small corridor, I turned around the corner and passed the bathroom. Casey’s bedroom was at the far end of the right side of the house, located in its own isolated cor
ner. As I approached I looked down and saw the faint light flickering in the cracks between the door and the doorframe. The house was so quiet the slightest gesture of my hand and the tiniest murmur in my breaths seemed to scream. Or the house wished for a scream to break the silence which had long filled it with self-deceit.
I closed my eyes and took a long deep breath. I would enter, sight him, carry out the job, and then leave. There would be no time for reflection. No time for regrets.
I pushed the door back against the wall and threw myself inside. I searched for him down my pistol’s sights. I expected to find him at his desk. When I saw it empty, I turned to his exercise equipment. He was not there either.
Frantically I glanced at his bed. It, too, was empty and neatly made.
I sensed a trap. But one came. No noise was heard. No one knew I was there.
Just when I was prepared to leave I heard a small sound come from the other side of the bed at the end of the room.
I found Casey sitting on the other side of the bed. His back was pressed against the bed. His coat was on the floor. His lunchbox was broken into small pieces. His shoes were on his feet but untied. His hands covered his face like a mask. Like my mask.
He lowered one of his hands. His cheeks were flushed. Tears streamed down from his moistened eyes. The upper part of his blue shirt was dark and damp. He didn’t seem to notice me as he sobbed.
I aimed at his head. A voice inside me telling me to kill him. Get it over with. Don’t think it about it now or it won’t get done. It has to get done. It had to be done. Do it.
My finger touched the trigger. I started to pull it back.
Casey looked up at me. A sense of familiarity in his eyes.
He knew who it was behind the mask. He was neither afraid nor surprised. And he knew.
I lowered the pistol. It couldn’t happen like this. Whatever came next, I had to hear him out.
He wiped his face and raised his chin up at the ceiling. His chest rose like an ocean wave and came crashing down with each gulp of air. He forced the words out his mouth like a baby as it took its first breath of life.
“They promoted me. Deputy Assistant Director. They said I―I deserved it.”
Silence.
“Speak, Roy. Say something!”
“I have no words for you.”
“You don’t understand! If only you were there!”
“Why the hell should that matter? Does it make any difference that it was my father? If it hadn’t been my father, it would have been someone else’s. Would that have made it alright? Do you assign value to people based on whether you know them?”
“Have pity on me, Roy.”
He had his hands clasped in front of him like a sinner begging God for mercy on the Day of Judgment. The day when hope had faded and passed. The day when all that was left to do was pass sentence for sins for which he had refused to repent.
I knelt and spoke softly, though my voice poured out the poison infecting my heart.
“Has it ever occurred to you that you are, to so many, the most terrifying thing they have ever seen? They fear something greater than you. It’s not just the weapons, the armored cars and drones and clubs and tasers and isolation cells. It’s the incurable insanity that causes you and others like you to murder people who were not pursuing you and to harm those who are not harming you and then actually think you should be pitied when you feel remorse for it. They fear you because they have a good reason to be afraid of you. There’s no evil more dangerous than the evil that acts under the delusion that they are doing good.”
“You will never understand me. You never did.”
“I’m not the one who was trying to harm you.”
“Then what are you here to do?”
I stood still.
Casey sat up and back against his bed.
“When will this end?” he asked. “How many more people need to die before you will stop?”
“Just one more. Only one…unless you care to resign tomorrow.”
“You are what you are. I am what I am. We are both tied to our own stakes. Neither one of us will say ‘Enough!’ until one of us is dead.”
I pointed the gun at his face. He stopped crying and wiped his face again. His eyes were clear as they looked at me.
“Aren’t you going to ask me for any final words? Whether I wish to tell my mother that I love her? Or have you forgotten what it’s like to have a mother?”
Casey’s face was the same face as McCullen when I had shot him. The same face as Port. And so many others. A look of resignation.
Death’s impending arrival was nowhere to be felt. It was not time. For the accursed, death was a blessing.
“You’re dead to me,” I said. “Whoever you are, you are not my friend. My friend is dead. Maybe he was never alive.”
Casey collapsed to the floor.
“No, no, no, no, no. I am your friend! I am your friend!”
“You are my enemy. And I don’t want to be like my enemies. I don’t want to be like you. That’s why I’m going to let you live.”
“Why?”
“I used to think it was hard to take life. It’s not, when there are no repercussions for it. That’s why your people do it all the time. It’s easy. Sparing a life that you deserve to take, a life that is easy to take; that’s what will always separate you and I.”
I took off my mask and looked at Casey. For a moment, he seemed to suspect maybe it wasn’t me after all.
“I don’t ever want to see you again,” I said. “If I do, one of us will not leave alive. Maybe you. Maybe me. Maybe both of us.”
The steps leading downstairs creaked and groaned beneath my feet. In the living room I untied Mrs. Nowak and checked her pulse again. She was stable. I studied her face. The harsh face of the woman who had spent a life-time ensuring her son fulfilled a prophesy she had made at his birth. The pride he had long sought to receive from her had not yet come. It would never be there because she had none to give.
I closed the door to the house and walked across the road. Griggs waited earnestly with one hand on the wheel, another grasping the pistol in his lap. When he saw me a great fear seized him. He frantically turned the car on.
“We got to get the hell out of here,” he said. “No idea how long it will be until he calls for backup. Can’t believe this shit! Can’t believe it! I knew you weren’t gonna do it!”
“He won’t call them.”
“The hell he won’t! Why wouldn’t he?”
“Not tonight. He won’t for tonight.”
“Why didn’t you kill him?” he asked.
“Why didn’t you kill me?”
“You know why,” he said. “I told you.”
“Then you know why.”
We drove into the tunnel and up into Seattle. As we drove down the abandoned streets we felt the liberation and familiarity of home. As soon as we parked in the garage, Hernandez inspected the exterior for any dents or scrapes. He grinned appreciatively when he saw none and waved to us as we walked back up to the surface.
“Why didn’t your friend call in backup?” Griggs asked. “He could have caught us.”
He laughed quietly and gave me a light punch on the shoulder.
“What was that for?” I asked.
“Glad to know you’re not a psycho.”
“Thanks. Didn’t know it was debatable until now.”
“Anyway, I’d say it’s an appropriate time to release those ISA memos. Might as well let people know what’s going on inside there.”
“No.”
“Why not?”
It was the wrong question. What good would it do?
Casey wasn’t the problem. He was just the symptom. The problem was the people. They were the ones who tolerated it all. The drone strikes. The ISA raids. The censorship. The common, ordinary citizen had to know the skinny. They had read my editorials. They had kept abreast of our coverage.
> Ignorance was no longer an excuse, if it ever had been.
If it had failed to entice them into action nothing else we published would.
All that remained to destroy was the pretense. Starting with their martyr. Starting with Casey’s idol.
“Griggs,” I asked, “How’d you like a new boss?”
Chapter Eighteen
Olan leaned against the side of his chair. An errand boy was waiting anxiously for him to give a written message he had yet to write.
He tapped his fountain pen against his desk nonchalantly. Right then the boy didn’t exist. He was too busy ignoring my one-sentence resignation letter stared up at him from his desktop.
“Sir?” the boy asked.
“Yeah?”
“They’re waiting for your answer.”
“Tell ‘em to cool it.”
The boy backpedaled out of the office. A group of eavesdroppers had gathered just outside. A loud throat clearing scattered them.
“I know ya lost ya old man,” Olan said. “But ya don’t do nothin’ desperate for it.”
“It’s got nothing to do with it.”
“Maybe ya should give it time.”
“No. I’ve made up my mind.”
He pointed at the office door. “That boy who just left; he’s carryin’ a note I’m havin’ sent to one of the pravda’s publishers, or some bastard he’s usin’ as a back channel. The SOBs are finally callin’ it quits, sort of.”
I raised my chin, dubious. “What do you mean?”
“This is all hush-hush and all that shit, but they’re tired of losin’ their boys to ours, so they want to call a cease-fire. They don’t want the war to end, officially. Gotta keep up appearances for their handlers. On the ground, though, they want the killin’ to stop. They don’t hit us, we don’t hit them.”
“You trust ‘em?” I asked.
“They’re scared. Word got around about your visit to that ISA guy’s house last night. Ya didn’t bump him off, but they know ya two were friends. Seems they don’t want the same visit to their place, ‘cause they know they ain’t getting’ the same consideration.”
He pounded the desktop with a fist. “And that’s why I need ya to stick around! I like the results.”
