Mourning Reign

by Edward Hancock II

  Television didn’t help much. It either made him angry or put him to sleep and neither seemed like a helpful solution at the present time. Each time he looked at his wife or his frail son, Alex found he had enough anger inside. Any more might be dangerous.

  He’d tried talking to Lisa but even his words seemed to turn to empty promises of vengeance he would never truly be able to exact. She needed to heal. She needed positive voices, pure tones. Happiness.

  A reason to come back to him. A promise of revenge was not likely to do the trick. He tried repeatedly to simply say he loved her, needed her.

  He tried to remind her of their new son. A son she had yet to lay eyes on. As tears filled his eyes each time he mentioned the son she did not even know, Alex found himself at the same dead end.

  Dead end.

  Death.

  No matter where Alex went in his mind, somehow it always seemed to come back to death. The deaths at the police station, his wife clinging to life right this very moment, the way his newborn son narrowly avoided death with each shallow breath. Death surrounded Alex. The loss of life, the loss of vigor, the loss of happiness and there was no escape.

  Still, as he dozed, he thought that maybe a little television might perk him up just a little. He didn’t want to have to go for a walk. He didn’t want to leave Lisa’s side long enough for a bathroom break. Something told him she’d be awake soon. He just felt it. He just needed something to wake him up. Something to spark the neurons in his brain.

  He shrugged his shoulders repeatedly, trying to get the blood circulating. Then he began flipping through the channels, predictably ending up on the news, which, predictably, was still covering the recent bombings.

  “…three grocery and department stores in Edmond, Oklahoma were hit, along with confirmed reports in Joliet, Illinois of an explosion at a bank and an elementary school. We have also now learned that Elementary and Junior High Schools in Shreveport, Louisiana, Jackson, Mississippi, Fort Lauderdale, Florida and Abilene, Texas have all fallen victim to similar attacks. Just today, unconfirmed reports have claimed that cities in Wisconsin and Delaware were also hit by similar events. Police and federal agents investigating the matters are not speculating as to whether the attacks are linked to the same source or merely a timely outbreak of copycat wannabe terrorists…”

  “Schools?” Alex whispered, suddenly very awake. Surely he hadn’t heard that correctly, though he knew he had.

  Grocery stores, banks andschools?

  Anger met Fear and Confusion on the battlefield of Alex’s mind.

  And this would not be a contest quickly won. Financial institutions I can understand, he told himself. Landmarks possess a warped logic. But schools? Grocery stores? Maybe if you hit every bank in America, you might accomplish something but hitting one or two? What would that accomplish?

  And schools?

  Lisa began to stir in her bed. Her legs twitched slightly beneath the blankets. Her arms seemed as if locked weakly in a struggle for comfort, wrapping around herself.

  Alex laid a comforting hand on her shoulder; he bent forward and kissed her forehead.

  “Easy,” he whispered. “It’s okay. I’m here. Easy now.”

  She stirred more vigorously. Her hands dropped to her side, fists tightly gripping the blankets. Soft, distressed moans chirped in her throat.

  Dreaming?

  Alex sighed to himself and stroked Lisa’s hair.

  “No, no,” he whispered. “No bad dreams. Just rest. I’m here. Everything’s okay now.”

  Suddenly, her eyes shot open. She let go with a mind-piercing, high-pitched scream. Even in the dimly lit hospital room, Alex could see the confusion washing over her face.

  He gently took Lisa’s hand. “It’s okay, Honey,” he said, trying to calm her. “I’ve got you. I’m here.”

  Her screams subsided just as two nurses darted into the room. She turned her head quickly from side to side. One nurse flipped on an overhead light.

  “It’s me, Alex,” he whispered, “I’m here. Right here, Honey. Lisa? Look at me.”

  And she did.

  She looked at him with a mixture of fear, confusion and, Alex thought, something akin to anger.

  “Wh-where…” her voice was weak, barely a whisper. “Whwhere… am…” Her voice cut out, just as she’d voiced the final word of her question.

  “You’re in the hospital, Honey,” Alex confirmed. “Just relax. Don’t get too excited.”

  The two nurses pushed to the other side of the bed, one flipped another light switch, allowing more illumination to fill the room, while the other readied a hypodermic needle.

  “No!” Alex said, urgently, “Wait. Not yet!” Turning his attention back to Lisa, he said. “I’m right here with you, Honey. You’re okay now.”

  She swallowed a couple of times. Looked at the nurses, looked at the television—which mercifully had changed to covering events of the Pope’s latest travel schedule—then finally settled again on Alex. He fought for his bravest, most compassionate smile.

  She swallowed once more.

  “Want some ice, Honey?” He asked. Turning to the nurses, he asked, “Could one of you get her some ice?” The blonde nurse in the teal scrubs handed the hypodermic needle off to the younger brunette nurse and exited out of the room, smiling at Alex.

  “I’ll be right back,” she offered. Gone before a reply could be offered.

  Turning his attention back to Lisa, Alex said, “I’ve missed you.”

  Lisa smiled weakly. Her eyes seemed glassy, puzzled. Fear seemed unwilling to relinquish its hold on her face.

  “Who…” she began, passing a hand up to her belly, wincing slightly.

  Who had done this? Alex thought to himself. We don’t know. How do I explain to you that we just don’t know?

  “Honey, we…” He got quiet. At a loss, he sighed.

  “Who…” she began again, fighting for her fragmented voice.

  Where’s that nurse with the ice, Alex thought to himself?

  “You need to rest, Honey,” he said. “Just rest.”

  “Who…,” she said again, “are… you?”

  CHAPTER 12

  Seek Ye First

  The drive back to the station was almost tragic for Danny. The new station, which was a station only in name and only in the respect, that it gave the police department a central point from which to conduct business.

  He’d gone over the events more times than he could count. He’d explored the insanity, looking for some sense of reason where none existed. He thought about the pile of twisted steel and shattered glass that remained of his former headquarters. The bodies, the blood, and the honor-bound oath he’d made to Alex Mendez. He thought of Lisa, languishing in pain in the hospital and the baby Mendez clinging to life. He thought of any and every reason he could conjure to inspire him forward in the mission with which he was now charged. Discipline was easy to come by. He had a job and he would do it. Inspiration, however, was another story. A reason beyond duty. For others the reason was easy. A friend, a relative. A personal belief that we— however you defined “we”—had been wronged somehow.

  Danny’s loyalty was only given to few individuals. Over the years, his list of those to whom he felt loyal changed dramatically.

  Danny’s loyalty was more commonly defined by something intangible. Something you couldn’t really put your hands on. Not to the badge he carried, but to the ideas it symbolized. Freedom, protection, honor, duty and loyalty—concepts now lain to waste in the pile of twisted steel and rubble that he had once called home. What loyalty he’d felt to fellow officers was tarnished as well by the frustrated mistrust that had now manifested in Alex Mendez. And who could blame him? How would Alex ever understand Danny’s reasons for keeping the secret? Could Alex ever be made to understand the full truth? Could Alex Mendez ever reconcile the Danny he used to be and the Captain Peterson he’d become? It had taken Danny years to reconcile it himself. Truth be told, sometimes he wasn�
�t sure if the truth of the past had fully reconciled itself. Everyone had skeletons in his closet. A select few had graveyards in their closets. And what lay interred in Danny’s closet, he hoped would stay buried.

  Now, sitting in his office, Tisha Warner standing over him looking over his shoulder, he struggled merely to stay focused on the case. Too, he was struggling to trust. To add a necessary name to that loyalty list he’d kept so near and dear to himself. His most trusted friends were gone. He was forced to build a team out of rookies, washed-ups and has-beens. People who, like him, pinned the badge on every morning.

  Strangers. Faces on the same side as he, but were they really? Not one of The Few, that’s for sure. Not one of Danny’s club of elite. Danny had never fought a war where you could find your enemy in the eyes of your closest ally.

  This was a new war. This was a Vietnam. You never know who the enemy is. It could be the young black guy in the backwards cap or it could be the innocent-looking seven-year-old riding his Schwinn. It could be the guy drawing down on you or it could be the partner standing behind you reading the computer screen over your shoulder.

  “The Chief says that the FBI have been nosing around the Wal-Mart site,” Danny confirmed.

  “And the station?” Tisha asked.

  “Probably,” Danny said. “He didn’t say that specifically. But you

  can bet if they’re nosing around one, they’re probably nosing around both. They don’t tend to be very subtle. And they’re not going to just selectively investigate. It’s all or nothing.”

  “We can use the help.”

  “Maybe so,” Danny said. “But they’ll screw up somehow. This is a Longview operation, at most, an East Texas operation. Longview, Tyler, Gilmer, Kilgore. And cops that know the land should lead it.

  These Washington bookworms don’t know their way around. They are too far removed from the people around here. They don’t get it.”

  “Get what?” Tisha asked.

  “They don’t get us,” Danny said. “They don’t understand how life works here in Mayberry.”

  “We’re not some backwoods Gomer Pyles.” Tisha said, almost too offended.

  Danny’s look spoke more than any admonition. Besides, she wasn’t exactly wrong.

  “No,” Danny said, attempting to quell the sudden tension. “We’re not. But things run differently here than they do in other places. They think we’re Gomer Pyle and don’t understand any different. They don’t get it. And these Washington pretty boys don’t know how to finesse things our way.”

  “I didn’t know we had a way,” Tisha said, smirking. Inviting levity she obviously hoped Danny would buy into.

  Suddenly Danny’s computer screen beeped. The Internet search he’d conducted had finished.

  “Finally!” Danny said. He sent the items to print and looked at Tisha Warner. “This will be a good place to start.”

  “What is it?” she asked.

  “A list of terrorists from the FBI’s website. The active ones. The ones that are easily connected to known crimes. These are your top dogs, but I want somebody working on known associates. I want genealogies on these guys if we can get it. I want to know every library they owe money and every waitress they’ve ever stiffed for a tip. I want every Abu, Mohammed, Carlos, François, Mortimer and Billy Bob these guys talk to. I want phone bills, electric bills. Heck I want to know if these guys have visited a book store to replace their lost Quran, mailed a letter home to Mama or visited a back room brothel. I want to know if any of them snuck a bite of pork when nobody was looking. I want to know every fart that they’ve let as far back as we can go and I want to know it yesterday.”

  “And how do you propose to accomplish this miracle of

  information acquisition?” Tisha asked.

  “Not ‘I’,” Danny said. “We.”

  “We?” Tisha asked. “Got a frog in your pocket, Sir?”

  “Tisha,” Danny said, in a stern but respectful voice “If you’re going to work with me you’re going to have to work hard. We’re going to have to stay ahead of the Feds if we want to keep this investigation in house. And didn’t you say you’d already been working the net for terrorist information anyway?”

  “Sir, wouldn’t it be better if we workedwiththe Feds rather than against them? I mean if they don’t know the lay of the land, how about we help them get their feel?”

  “What for?” Danny asked, perhaps a bit too snappy. He let out a breathy sigh before finishing his thought, his agitation not the least bit diminished. “So they can do a more thorough job of screwing up this investigation? So that they can let another terrorist get away? So that more people can die? No, not on my watch.”

  “Aren’t you the one that said something about cool heads?”

  Yes, he was. And there was no denying it. Still…

  “Look, you’ll learn this in time, but the Feds care about one thing. Press. About looking good, and about looking powerful. About looking like they’re in charge. The problem is they’re not. Most of them aren’t smart enough to tell their butts from a hole in the ground. And they’re by the book.”

  “And that’s a bad thing?”

  “It is when it gets in the way of solving the crime.”

  “Why have the book?”

  Danny sighed. He was going down a road he didn’t want to walk. And lying besides. He was a by the book cop, sometimes. He just didn’t take the time to question moments when necessity dictated he step outside the rules and regulations under which policemen were sworn to effectively operate. Not the most by the book cop, but it all depended on whose book. Danny believed cop work often necessitated writing one’s own book. Or at the very least editing the “Bible” by which most cop work was done. Over the years, he’d become one heck of a writer. He didn’t really consider himself a by the book cop. But, at the end of the day, it all depended on whose book you were talking about. By the academy’s book? Not so much. By the Peterson Code?

  You bet.

  “The truth is I believe in rules. That’s why we have a chain of command if nothing else. We have to have rules. Structure, order, but there are exceptions. More exceptions than rules. And if we don’t honor these exceptions we lose. The bad guys don’t have a rulebook and the truth is that sometimes, yes, we do have to throw out our book to play by their rules. Sometimes we throw out all the rules and simply play the game as who we are: a man, a woman, a mother or father, a son or a brother. More times than not, we play the game based on our own personal code. Even if we somehow manage not to let the job get too personal.”

  “And how do you know when that time comes?”

  “The truth?” Danny said. “You don’t know. You guess. Cop instinct, Tisha. It’s real. It’s what separates good cops from not-sogood ones. And it is a double-edged sword. It can serve you well or come back and chop your nuts off.”

  “Good thing they’re already gone,” she said.

  Danny couldn’t help but laugh. The more he was around Tisha Warner, the more he realized how much like Lisa she actually was. Same sense of sarcasm and quick, sharp wit. Instantly comfortable around him, though obviously still figuring out where to draw the line with her superior. Obviously comfortable in her own skin, however. Not in the least unsure about herself. Insecurity in the presence of a ranking officer had proven little more than just that. Confidence was written on Tisha Warner’s face. Perhaps, Danny guessed, she was in shock, as they all were. Maybe, he hoped, she was just waiting for an opportunity.

  Danny met Tisha’s eyes. Each smiled uncomfortably. For a moment, he felt like a kid back in Junior High experiencing some adolescent crush. He wasn’t sure but he thought he saw the slightest blush form on Tisha’s cheeks.

  A knock at Danny’s door startled him. It sounded almost frantic, urgent.

  “Come in,” he said.

  Ernie Littlefield burst into his door. “Danny, you gotta see this!”

  “See what, Ern?” He asked, casting an urgent glance at Tisha. Her fac
e displayed the same ardent confusion he felt.

  “The TV. The idiots sent a tape to the news!”

  Danny and Tisha both darted from the room, each bumping into Ernie Littlefield en route to the conference room.

  “Made another tape, did you?” Danny thought to himself.

  And in Danny’s mind, a clock started ticking.

  CHAPTER 13

  One True Mirage

  “You’re not going in there!” Alex’s voice was firm, determined and rich with the all the authority garnered by his former status as an enforcer of laws. The two men had claimed to be with the CIA and though they looked every bit the part, Alex had gone into protection mode. Lisa was not to be disturbed—especially not now.

  The two men were not brick walls, but each gave the impression of solidity. They looked almost like carbon copies of one another and it was difficult for Alex to surmise which one might have been the original or were they carbon copies of some secret hybrid super-agent, hidden deep within an unknown secret vault of CIA headquarters?

  Each man stood right at six feet tall, looking to weigh about 190 to 200 lbs. Not brick walls, Alex thought again. Not really even large enough to be imposing. Merely fit. Alex was not intimidated in the least.

  The man to Alex’s left seemed to be the team leader. He had introduced himself as Agent Tucker. The other man, a silent statuesque figure, was introduced as Agent Morgan. Agent Morgan gave the impression of being slightly younger than his counterpart. Not a trainee but definitely the junior team member. His hair was thicker, not yet suffering the thinning temples of Agent Tucker. His forehead was thick, his brow threatened Neanderthal qualities. Receding or not, each man’s black hair was short and very thick. Behind dark sunglasses,

  Alex easily noted an air of nervousness on Agent Morgan’s face. His Middle Eastern complexion even appeared to periodically flush with color as the verbal exchanges continued.