Last War

by Vincent Heck

  Max’s insides kirtled. He hadn’t signed up for the husband to be involved with what was going on. He rather had kept Jason distant; it would make his behavior more acceptable to himself. Another text message came through.

  "Don't you dare tell Chrissie I've contacted you, or you will have problems. I just want to warn you. Have a good night tonight, but I am watching you from the nation’s capitol; you in your white blazer and black slacks. You with your pale skin and your brown gelled-up hair. You with your green eyes -- such a pretty boy -- ready to take a cruise on the elegant dinner cruise yacht."

  Max double checked his attire in disbelief.

  Another text came through. "Yes, Max, I am a bad man. After this, do not contact my wife ever again, or your life is ruined."

  Max caught a glimpse of Christine as he started to reply to the message. When he focused back to his cell phone, the messages were gone. With his amazing memory, Max remembered Jason's phone number to return the message, "Bite me."

  He took Christine by the arm and French kissed her.

  "Wow, Max. What has gotten into you?"

  "Your beauty, sweetie. Let’s go have a good time."

  The night was approaching and the air was perfect for a cruise. The Washington Monument lit up in the distant background with an orange-pinkish hue from the city lights behind it.

  The boat’s horn sounded as the couple took their table for two on the lito deck.

  

  Back at the Nebraska Avenue Complex in the DHS headquarters, investigators searched everything in Jason's office. With each analyst interviewed, the picture became somewhat clearer to the agents looking into the evidence on the floor.

  Michael Young walked into the office.

  "What have we found? It’s not Jason, is it?"

  A gloved agent turning over pictures on Jason’s desk responded, "It’s really not looking good at this point, sir. Everything points to your friend; we have witnesses here, too."

  "Well, there has to be a perfectly good reason as to why he was snooping around in the files--look he probably wasn't even snooping, sir. He's number two in this whole department with 20 years of faithfully serving this country. He deserves to know about whatever happens here. It’s a non-issue.”

  Michael became annoyed and frustrated the agents who were still rummaging through Jason’s things. “Look, everybody out." He hollered.

  The bustling work of the investigators barely stopped, although they did glimpse back at Michael.

  "Has anyone even tried to contact him?" Michael asked.

  "We've tried tracking him, he continues to cut connection." The nearest agent answered.

  "Tracking? Let me rephrase, for Pete’s sake: Has anyone tried calling him?"

  Everyone remained silent.

  "Sir we have a tracking on him now, we have his position, finally."

  The exasperation these agents caused Michael wore on his nerve. Idiots. All he could do was curl his bottom lip to the point just before his teeth would cut into it. He took a moment to settle before responding, "Alright, let’s see what’s happening, here."

  

  Wednesday, September 5, 2001 10:35 p.m. EDT

  “So, what happened after John and Pocahontas? Did the land thrive after that? Did the men from the other country try to stop John?”

  Jason put his phone on speaker and placed it on his desk. “Indeed, they did, sweetie.”

  “Did they try to kill him?”

  “Not exactly. When the economy of the new land began to pick up, then Britain wanted a piece of the pie. The folks on the new land had developed colonies, businesses, and their own tax system, and they were happy to be self-sufficient separate from the British government. They had been outcasts, and they learned to function without the country that abandoned them. But, the British government wanted to tax the colonies’ goods.”

  “Did they tax them?”

  “They attempted to. But the people refused to pay.”

  “Well, why didn’t they just pay Britain’s taxes and scrap theirs?”

  “It’s not an easy answer. Mainly, the British government wasn’t doing anything beneficial in favor of them, forcing them to earn and thrive on their own, but they wanted money from the people solely because of their own money problems.”

  “So, what happened? Did either side give in?”

  “Nope. After some rebellious behavior from the colonies, the British sent hundreds of war ships to force the colonies’ hands.”

  

  Manhattan, September 17, 1776

  The colonies, lead by men such as George Washington, John Adams, and Thomas Jefferson made up their mind once and for all that they were going to fully seek their independence—even if it meant war. The group of men had formed their own little society, and had been planning for a while. On July 4th, 1776 they signed a Declaration of Independence and prepared for the worst.

  After protecting the rebellious residents of Boston by driving the British out of that area, Washington took to protecting one of their most potential filled areas on the island of Manhattan with his rag-tag group of rebels. While continued to heighten, Washington and his men prepared the land for what may occur from the most powerful army on the face of the planet.

  Stationed in Lower Manhattan to watch the coast, Washington’s secretary noticed a thin layer of darkness on the horizon. As some time passed, he realized they were ships—British warships.

  Not only were they the biggest Great Britain had, but it seemed to be every war ship they had in stock.

  The secretary, at the time, tapped his assistant lookout. “Look, ye.” He pointed. “I can not believe they’re this determined. That’s over 400 war ships.”

  The assistant stood still in shock as the first round of cannons fired from the boats.

  “Round the men up. We’ve gotta fight.”

  The assistant ran from the room calling out to the group of men waiting for call.

  There was a silence—a muting moment—as the cannons hung mid-air hurling towards Manhattan at an unprecedented speed. Suddenly, without a thought in the secretary’s brain, the cannons reached land with a ground shaking eruption.

  `As the militia of men charged to the coast, sounds of smashing wood and concrete mixed with an earthquake sensation and human’s screaming in pain.

  This continued for minutes as the ships approached. The secretary picked up his gun, loaded it, said a prayer, and charged through the desolated field.

  Explosions to the right and left of him caused him to zone out while he charged as fast as he could. Although he had been screaming the entire charge, he couldn’t hear himself. He didn’t know what he was going to do when he reached his unknown destination—in fact, he was almost certain he’d die before he did anything.

  Suddenly, an explosion behind him singed his entire backside, lifting him off the ground, throwing him dangerously close to the harbor’s water. He landed in a huge wooden barrel which cracked open and tipped over. He rolled, in the barrel, to the tip of Manhattan’s island.

  When his vision zoned back into focus, he and the barrel were partly into the harbor water. He looked up to thousands of British soldiers storming onto the land, from Staten Island, killing everyone in their paths. A few of them held torches and they tossed them into windows.

  Within minutes of Washington’s secretary watching this, the entire lower portion of Manhattan was on fire. Soldiers wearing three-cornered hats and deep brilliant red coats continued to flood out of the ships. Manhattan was under attack.

  The revolution had started and it didn’t look pretty for the colonies.

  In fact, it looked downright ugly.

  

  Wednesday, September 5, 2001

  Jason heard heavy breathing on the other end of the phone. “Have a good night, angel. I love you.”

  He hung up. Back to work.

  

  VIII

  Saturday May 24th 2003

  Jason's head lay
flat on his keyboard when he finally opened his eyes. Waking up for Jason was a very disappointing feeling. Whenever he would wake up he would wonder if all the past events were a dream -- and for a brief moment, he would experience the euphoria of anxiety relief; his wife wasn't cheating, he didn't have a funny feeling about the most powerful group of men on the face of the planet, and sometimes—she was alive.

  It all felt like a bad dream for those few tiny seconds. Then, with the force and speed of a freezing cold, rumbling, avalanche, reality would surge back into his consciousness.

  As he cleared his vision to set eyes on the computer, he noticed the Tameka files were still active. Quickly he exited, but it was too late. He had been tracked.

  A message stood still, bright red in color -- threatening in its loiter -- in the lower right corner of the screen.

  ::Current position has been tracked.::

  He noticed a few shadows flash pass the front window of his home. They passed and disappeared behind the obstruction of his door.

  He heard the front door open and close.

  Someone, or a couple of people, were in his vestibule.

  Silence.

  Jason waited and listened for a knock, a doorbell, or anything that indicated someone wanted his attention, being that they were standing in his vestibule. He heard nothing.

  He waited; listened.

  Nothing.

  His heart rate elevated as his eyes tunnelled towards the door. The door was only four steps from where he was sitting—the door—it was unlocked.

  Quietly, he tip-toed to the door and carefully locked it.

  He pressed the ‘view’ button on his camera in the vestibule. As soon as the screen awakened, the man was standing there with his body standing straight towards the door, but like a weird-unhuman creep, the man’s head was cranked 90 degrees directly to the camera on the right of him. Standing perfectly still, he promptly ordered: "Jason Upton, open the door."

  

  Part Two:

  Chasing Jason

  

  IX

  Bed-Stuy, New York City:

  CURRENT HSAS: ORANGE - HIGH RISK OF TERRORISM

  Czyra dropped his bicycle on the pavement in front of his Bedford-Stuyvesant building in Brooklyn, New York. The air glided against his cheeks as he ran full speed through the metal door of the old rickety brick building. Two steps at a time, he darted up three flights of stairs to his apartment. Upon entry, his mother swung her head towards him from the living room.

  “Czy?”

  “I can’t right now, mom. Just gimme a second.”

  He ran into his bedroom and slammed the door behind him.

  “I thought you were staying in Connecticut for a few days.” His mom yelled out.

  “Not now, mom!”

  While searching through his old toy chest, he heard the doorbell ring. He paused and listened.

  In the background, he heard his mother, “I didn’t order anything.” She said.

  There was a bit of silence.

  “Oh, Czyra? OK.”

  Before she could call his name, he jumped to his feet, ran across his room, and swung open his bedroom door. There was a FedEx employee standing in the hallway outside of their apartment.

  “Yeah?” Czyra asked.

  “The man has a package for you, babe.”

  Czyra walked to the door.

  The middle-aged Polish man asked him to sign the device he had in his hand. The man stretched his arm out with the electronic pad towards Czyra.

  “Finger print.” He said.

  “No. Traditional.” Czyra responded.

  “I don’t have a pen.”

  Czyra’s mother dug into her purse. “Oh, I do.” She said handing it to Czyra. The man reluctantly hung the device onto his belt, and unfolded a piece of paper for Czyra to sign.

  The delivery man handed him a box that said “Fragile” on it. “Good day.” The man said as he turned for the elevator.

  “Well, what is it?” Czyra’s mother asked as she closed the door.

  “I—I ordered something from the electronics store down the road. It took some time to get here.”

  “Why wouldn’t you have just ordered it into the store instead of … you know what? I’m not even going to ask. Your dad was like this, too.” She said retreating back to her spot in the living room in front of the TV.

  Czyra scurried back into his room ripping open the box.

  A note.

  “When you stick your fingers into dangerous places, there’s a good chance you could lose them.”

  It was written on a Brendenhall Group notepad, and it was signed, “B.”

  He continued to open the package, only to find ten severed fingers. The fingers were pale, bloody and jagged at the knuckle. The fingernails were painted – the nail polish was the color he had recently bought for Jasmine. He had searched most of lower Manhattan to find just the right surprise-color for her.

  Czyra became nauseous. He dropped the entire gory package onto his rough brown government-issued carpet. Stumbling over the package, a bit, he reached for his trash can, and everything in his stomach flooded out of his mouth and nose into the can.

  “Honey?” His mom shouted from a distance.

  After his first session of throwing up, he attempted to respond. “It’s OK, mom. I’m—“ The vomit impeded his full ability to completely communicate.

  Another round of vomit bustled up his throat and poured into the bottom of his trash can. It felt like he was going to choke to death on this venomous, chunky, rancid, liquid in his nasal cavity.

  After a few short seconds, fresh air entered his respiratory system enough to respond, a bit. “I got sick on my travel back from Connecticut.” He continued, “I just need rest.”

  He heard the door knob jiggle. “Honey, open the door. Do you need anything?”

  “No. Not right now, mom! I’ll be fine.”

  “Well, I’m going to the bodega to get you some ginger ale.”

  “OK.”

  Czyra crawled back over to the box. As he straightened the box back out, and put a couple of his love’s fingers back into the package, emotion burned his eyes and nose. The mucus in his nose was mixed with vomit and it began a rapid run out of his nostrils. He did his best to hold his hysterical crying to a silence.

  “This is war.” He mumbled under his breath. The, out loud, verbal, declaration was enough to fuel his anger.

  Czyra ran to his computer and logged into his Unknown account.

  ::Compose message::

  he typed.

  

  X

  Potomac River, Washington D.C.

  CURRENT HSAS: RED -- HIGH RISK OF TERRORISM

  Aboard the Odyssey, a specially designed yacht, on the Potomac River, Christine and Max sat at a pearl-white clothed table. They made conversation the way they never struggled to. By this time, the darkness had consumed the sky, completely. The stars were out in full force, shining a silent brilliance, as the boat floated further from the city lights.

  The yacht wasn't your typical boat; it was long and flat. It was designed that way to accommodate the low bridges that crossed the Potomac River. The atmosphere on the boat was one of an upscale restaurant. The waiters and waitresses wore a blue shirt with a black vest and tie. They all donned an inviting smile. The atmosphere was elegant and there was live dinner music in the background. Christine looked into Max's beautiful green eyes. He had a smile to die for.

  The man was beautiful.

  "How are you enjoying your time, sweetie? It’s a beautiful night, right?" He asked, with a smile.

  "It is. I love this."

  Christine wasn't lying, she did love the moment. She liked having someone there. She liked having someone who wasn't so stone-faced about life. She liked to hear 'sweetie you are beautiful' and Max was very good at that. She only wished she didn't feel so guilty out there with someone
else. She, ultimately, wished that Jason could do what Max did for her; she should have never settled.

  "Is everything ok, honey?" Max asked.

  “Yes."

  As the waiter brought the main coarse meal to the table, the smell of the soy steamed off of the salmon. "One Asian Grilled Salmon." The waiter called out.

  Christine raised her hand to receive her food. Her phone buzzed. "One second, Max. Sorry about my rudeness." She said as she glimpsed at her phone.

  It was a text from Jason. "Honey I'm leaving indefinitely, I cannot tell you why for your safety. Please find somewhere safe to stay and if you are contacted by ANYONE tell them anything you know...it’s better that way -- just to keep you safe. Do not open any doors to strangers. And DO NOT COME HOME TONIGHT."

  Christine’s fingers tingled and suddenly became weak. Her reflex to cover her mouth mixed with her confusion as to what to do. She watched her phone tumble to the ground top over bottom before it clashed onto the floor into several different pieces. Her hand shook violently as she tried to gather her things.

  "Max, I'm sorry, this was such a wonderful night, but I gotta go."

  "What? Where? What do you mean you gotta go? What happened?"

  "I can't explain it sorry, Max I--I gotta--"

  "Christine, where are you going? We are on a boat. Just, calm down."

  "Well, I gotta find a way off of here. It’s an emergency."

  

  Michael had chewed his fingernails into a sand grain in his mouth as he awaited a response from the agents.

  "Has anyone heard from these agents, yet?”

  “We're sorry sir, they said he is not answering the door."

  "Ok, I'll give you a few more minutes, then I am calling him myself. Keep knocking!"

  "How many times you want them to knock?"