The Unraveling

by James R. Clifford

“I’m looking for Mr. Firth. I was supposed to meet him here.”

  “Yes, of course, have a seat.” he replied in a thick eastern European accent. “Mr. Firth has been delayed.”

  West’s unease was pushing into the red zone but he couldn’t turn and run. Despite his rising misgivings he walked over to the table and sat down in front of the man. “Are you an acquaintance of Mr. Firth?”

  “More or less,” the man grunted.

  West stuck out his hand. “I’m West Collins.”

  The man smiled but ignored his outstretched hand.

  “Ivan,” he replied.

  West glanced around the room. It was dimly lit with dark wood floors, walls and ceiling. An enormous fireplace was on the far wall and there were no windows in the room or any other furniture.

  “Do you know when Mr. Firth is supposed to be here? I have to meet my editor for a deadline,” West lied. “I told him I was coming to the Black Crown first to meet Mr. Firth but that I would meet up with him at eleven.”

  Ivan smiled then stubbed out his cigarette. “Yes, your editor, a Mr. Simon Stossel I believe. He is the son of the deceased Senator Stossel.”

  West had no idea how–or more importantly why–Ivan knew that. “Yes, well I don’t have a lot of time so I guess if Mr. Firth is running late we should just reschedule.”

  Ivan’s smile disappeared. “That will not be possible. Anyway, if you are supposed to meet your editor how come he is at Restaurant Million enjoying dinner with a female companion?”

  “I am supposed to meet them there,” West stammered.

  He heard laughter from behind him and turned to see another man standing in the door entrance. He was tall and built like a solid piece of granite. He wore a black leather jacket and had dark sunglasses on. He walked in and shut the door behind him.

  “It is astonishing how blind these sheeple are,” the man spoke to Ivan, “For 30 years we have stripped them of almost all their freedom and rights but they’re so fucking blind they can’t even see it.”

  Ivan laughed. “They’re miserable serfs, Aleksei. What do you expect?”

  A shot of adrenaline surged through West’s body. Firth must have set him up. His flight response took over and he stood.

  “If you don’t mind please tell Mr. Firth I’ll call him later.”

  But before he could even turn, an explosion of pain ripped through his spinal cord. He lost control of his body and felt himself being slammed back into the chair.

  “Your appointment with Mr. Firth has been cancelled,” Aleksei said nonchalantly.

  “What the hell is this about?” West shouted.

  Ivan smiled. “Like I said, Mr. Firth is presently preoccupied. But we’ve been sent to answer all your questions. We mean you no trouble.”

  West heart raced and fear like he’d never known surged through his body. Aleksei stepped in front of him and began taking off his gloves.

  “So Mr. Collins, it seems as if you have a problem.”

  “Look I don’t know what this is about but I promise I won’t try to contact Mr. Firth ever again. This is all some big mistake.”

  The two thugs laughed and Ivan said, “I don’t think you’re ever going to have to worry about that. And do you know why?”

  West dutifully shook his head.

  “Because Nigel Firth is dead.”

  “What are you talking about? I just…,” West stopped as he began to understand. It was Graham who had entered Firth’s building.

  “Yes. You were saying?” Ivan prodded.

  “There’s some kind of a mistake. I need to talk to Agent Graham. I can explain.”

  Ivan stubbed out his cigarette. “Do you know what the Dracun is?”

  “I don’t know what you mean,” West stammered. “I swear. I’ve heard their name before but in the context of some type of urban legend.”

  The two men laughed and Ivan replied, “The Dracun are the ones that make the world go tick-tock. What do you think?”

  “I really don’t know.”

  “I think the Dracun is all bullshit,” Aleksei said. “We are the ones that make the world go tick-tock.”

  “Maybe so,” Ivan rebutted. “But Graham wants us to ask this peon about it.”

  “Tick-tock, tick-tock, Mr. Collins,” Aleskei mocked. “We want everything. But why don’t we start with some names.”

  “Names! Whose names?”

  West glanced over his shoulder toward the door trying to judge if he could make a run for it. A flash of pain tore through his midsection. It happened so fast he didn’t even see the punch coming. West collapsed onto the floor and involuntarily curled up into a tight ball. He gasped for air and felt like he was on the verge of suffocation. After a few minutes of agony Aleksia pulled him up by the lapels of his jacket and threw him back into the chair.

  Finally, West managed to get his breath back and he watched in horror as Ivan reached inside his jacket and pulled out a switchblade. He flipped out the knife blade and began cleaning his fingernails.

  “So, we will ask you nicely once more, why did you contact Mr. Firth?”

  “I was writing an article about the Federal Reserve and I thought he would be a good person to talk to because of his dealing with the Federal Reserve.”

  “Very foolish of you Mr. Collins,” Ivan replied.

  He opened a drawer and took out a metal tool that looked like a miniature garden pruner.

  “First, I’m going to need the name of the person who told you to contact Mr. Firth.”

  “Like I tried to tell you, nobody gave me his name. I am a reporter and I wanted to interview him for a story.”

  “That lie will cost you a finger.” Aleksei said as he grabbed West’s hand and slammed it on the table.

  West tried to struggle but he was completely manhandled by the two larger men. He couldn’t believe this was happening. West watched in horror as Ivan took the metal tool and with one quick snip nonchalantly snipped off his pinkie.

  West screamed for five minutes straight. Never in his wildest imagination could he have imagined losing a finger could be so painful. A hand slapped him across the side of his head.

  “Stop crying like a fucking girl,” Aleksei shouted.

  Ivan opened a desk drawer and threw him a towel. West was shaking while cradling his hand, trying to stop the blood flow. He wrapped the towel around his hand, causing the intensity of pain to shoot from a ten to one million.

  Ivan pulled out a small bottle from the desk and dumped a pink tablet onto the table.

  “Here, take one of these. Best painkiller you’ve never heard of.”

  The pill could have been cyanide for all West knew but the pain was so great he was willing to risk it. He swallowed the pill dry.

  West sat there in agony as Ivan stared at him. The pain began to subside after a few minutes.

  Ivan smiled. “So let’s begin all over. Who told you about Nigel Firth?”

  “A banker named Mark Sloan.”

  “See how hard was that? Please Mr. Collins, let’s make this easy for both of us from here on out. Please tell me what else Mr. Sloan told you about Nigel Rothschild Firth?” Ivan asked.

  West’s survival instincts took over and he decided there was nothing to gain by holding back so he started from the beginning. He told them every single thing he could remember about their conversations, including Sloan’s belief that the most powerful institutions throughout the world were controlled by The Dracun. They listened to his story without commenting or thankfully cutting off another one of his fingers.

  Finally, when he was done with his story Ivan asked, “And did Mr. Sloan say what the objectives of the Dracun are?”

  “He was talking crazy shit. He said they are the real power in the world and they’ve been around for centuries and their objective is to create a new world order. He thought some alien beings were behind it all. I mean it was all crazy shit.”

  “And how did Mr. Sloan say they were going to accomplish this New World O
rder?”

  West flexed his hand. The drug they gave him was some strong shit. He barely felt any pain, only a dull throbbing where his finger used to be.

  “He told me their grand plan couldn’t be accomplished until the technology had been developed to basically make people virtual prisoners without them really knowing it.”

  Why was he talking so much?, he wondered, before realizing the pill they gave him for pain was probably also some type of truth serum.

  He watched Ivan light another cigarette. “Typical American coward,” he said to Aleksei. “They never knew what they had. They don’t even know their own goddamn history.”

  Ivan glared at West and asked, “Do you know what your Benjamin Franklin said about liberty?”

  West shook his head.

  “He said those that give up liberty for security, deserve neither. And that is what you and your country have chosen my friend. So rest assured we are going to give you neither. But I don’t want you to hate us. See, our struggles against one another are really just about basic human nature. Man has chosen sides and fought against one another since the dawn of time. I do not personally hate you. Your problem is you just picked the wrong side.

  Anyway, it does not matter. I have one last question and I want you to really think about this because your immediate well-being will depend on your answer. Did this Sloan guy give you any documents or books of any kind?”

  West couldn’t believe he had forgotten about the book. A flicker of hope rose. Maybe he had been given a bargaining chip to try and save himself.

  “Yes. Yes,” West stammered. “I swear I wasn’t holding this back I just forgot. You can understand with all this…,” he raised a blood soaked towel. “But he did give me a book. I completely forgot about the damn thing it was so long ago. Well, it really wasn’t a book but a stack of random documents. I didn’t even really read it but I can get it for you.”

  “This is most helpful,” Ivan addressed West. “And where is the exact location of this book?”

  West thought fast. His answer would probably determine whether he had any chance of getting out of here alive.

  “I hid it. I can’t really tell you where it is because you would never find it or be able to get to it, but I’d be more than happy to take you there and give you the book.”

  Ivan motioned to Aleksei, who walked behind the desk. Aleksei leaned down and Ivan whispered something to him.

  Aleksei nodded and said, “Call Graham first.”

  Ivan stood and smiled. “Very good, Mr. Collins. Please excuse us for a few minutes. We have to touch base with a business associate.”

  Aleksei stabbed the stub where is finger once was, causing shooting pain to surge through his whole arm. He pointed his cigarette at West. “Don’t even try anything funny or you’ll lose another finger, or worse.”

  They left and the door slammed shut. West knew he had bought some time but there was no doubt, one way or another, they were going to kill him. He had to find a way to escape. West stared around the room. No windows. No exit other than the door. He was trapped, which meant he was dead. He got up and started pacing around the room.

  He wasn’t sure what he was looking for, a weapon. An escape route. A miracle. West felt a sudden draft of air. He stopped in front of the fireplace. He bent down on his knees and looked up into the flue. He couldn’t believe it but the crawl space was enormous.

  Was it possible, he thought? Could he fit inside and somehow jimmy his way up to the roof?

  A part of him wanted to wait it out and hope the thugs would let him go but his flight instinct was overpowering. He walked over to the table, grabbed his pinkie finger off the table and stuck the bloody stump into his shirt pocket. He crawled inside the fireplace and started inching his way up the flue. Ridged grooves inside the chimney helped him make quick progress but he still had to fight the rising panic that he wouldn’t make it before the Russians came back. He was sure they carried guns and he would be a sitting duck inside the chimney.

  Thank god for the pain medicine because he didn’t think he would have been able to climb up the flue without it. He felt a slight gust of wind and when he looked up he could see a few blurry stars in the dark night sky. He had no idea if the top of the fireplace had a big enough opening for him to crawl out, or if there was some type of grate, but he had no choice. He reached the top of the flue. A rusty grate did cover the top but it was not welded on and after a couple shoves West managed to push it off.

  West climbed out of the fireplace and out onto the roof.

  He scrambled over to the side of the roof praying that the building had some type of fire escape. He spotted one on the other side of the roof and ran over. He climbed down the fire escape, hoping his luck would hold.

  He reached the bottom with no sign of his killers and West didn’t hesitate. He ran down the street without looking back. After he had put a few blocks between himself and the Black Crown he found a cab parked at the curb.

  He jumped in and ordered the cabbie to take him to the hospital.

  “Every revolution evaporates and leaves behind only the slime of a new bureaucracy.”

  – Franz Kafka

  Chapter 15

  “Mr. West. Mr. West. Can you hear me?” A voice kept asking.

  West’s eyes flickered then opened. He scanned the darkened room through blurry eyes and was able to focus well enough to see a digital clock on the wall that read four-thirty in the morning.

  “Where am I?” he asked groggily to a lady dressed in medical scrubs, standing next to his bed.

  “New York General Hospital. Do you remember anything about last night?”

  He felt a dull throbbing in his hand. He raised it and saw his hand bandaged in a thick gauze that stretched past his wrist.

  Slowly, then very quickly the nightmare from the previous night flooded into his memory and panic began to set in. He had to get out of here because Agent Graham, the Russians or the Dracun would have tracked his admittance to the hospital by now.

  The nurse handed him a pill and a glass of water.

  “Take this, it will help with the pain. You came in last night missing your pinkie finger. But the good news is the surgeon was able to reattach it.”

  The door opened and a doctor entered the room. “Good morning…,” he glanced down at his chart then continued, “Mr. Collins. How are you feeling?”

  “Fine, I guess.”

  “Terrific. You’re very lucky. Your finger was cut off perfectly and the surgeon was able to reattach it without too much of a problem. You will have to be careful with your hand for a few weeks, but barring an infection you should be good to go.”

  West looked at his bandaged hand and was relieved to not have to go through the rest of his life, however short it was at this point, with a missing pinkie.

  “Quite a night you had,” the doctor continued. “We rushed you to surgery so there wasn’t much of a chance to gather information for the report.”

  “Report?”

  The doctor smiled. “We’re required to report all unusual injuries to the Department of Homeland Security Health Records Department.”

  “What do you mean unusual?”

  “Oh, things like gunshot wounds, knifings, domestic violence, any youth injuries and, as you could probably expect, unexplained missing fingers. All pretty standard stuff.”

  “What about patient privacy?” he asked.

  The doctor laughed. “That’s a good one. So we have your name, rank and serial number from your National Registration Card that we pulled from your wallet but I need to know exactly how your finger was cut off for the report.”

  “It was an accident.”

  “Please be more specific.”

  “It was a kitchen accident. I was chopping some carrots for a salad and I got a little careless.”

  The doctor’s smile disappeared and he turned toward the nurse. “Will you please excuse us?”

  She nodded and left the room.

&
nbsp; The doctor looked back at him. “Look Mr. Collins, to be honest with you I don’t give a shit how your finger was cut off. It really is none of my business. But here is the problem. I am required by law to report an incident like yours. If I don’t, I will be fined, and probably fired which also means I’ll lose my medical license. Then I can no longer support my family which includes two young kids. So we have two choices, I can check the box that you refused to disclose the nature of your injuries and you will have two agents from the Department of Health harassing you in 20 minutes. And let me tell you these are not nice people and if they’re not satisfied with your answers you’ll be placed under arrest until you decide to cooperate. Or we can do this the easy way which is you can give me a reasonable explanation that I can put in the report and hopefully your “little accident” will be cleared, and that will be the end of it. I don’t really give a shit either way but you are wasting my time and I have other patients to attend to. So let’s try this again, how was your finger cut off?”

  “I got mugged over on 55th,” he answered, realizing fighting the doctor–who was only a cog within the vast bureaucracy of a corrupt system–wasn’t going to help his cause.

  “The bastard pulled a knife on me. We scuffled some. It all happened so fast. I think I raised my hand in defense and I guess I got lucky or unlucky depending on how you look at it, but he made a clean strike cutting my pinkie off. I screamed bloody murder and the guy ran off. The last thing I really remember was picking up my finger and coming to the hospital.”

  “How did you get to the hospital?”

  “I flagged a cab.”

  The doctor jotted down some notes and smiled again. “See, was that so hard? We logged you in last night arriving via cab so your story adds up somewhat. It will probably pass through The System without raising too many flags but in case you do get a visit from the Department of Health boys you’d better come up with a little bit better lie than the one you gave me.”

  “I hear you. Thanks, Doc.”

  The doctor handed him the clipboard. “Just sign for me at the bottom and date.”