by James Hunt
A calmness washed over Dylan like an eerie fog over a lake at dawn. His mind had quieted, and when he moved his arms and legs, they felt like they moved in slow motion, yet when he looked down at them they were moving at a normal speed.
“Captain,” Perry said, once Dylan had answered. “You look tired. Have you been sleeping all right?”
Dylan remained quiet and watched Perry’s face offer the façade of sympathy and concern. It was all part of Perry’s sick game. The psychology, the mental torture that had stretched his mind to its limits, pushed him beyond what any normal human being should be allowed to handle.
Perry leaned in close to the camera on his computer. “Well, perhaps you just need a change of scenery. From what I’ve seen so far of the people who have you captive, I don’t feel like my demands are being taken seriously, but perhaps I was asking too much.”
“You knew exactly what you were asking for. Just like you know what you’re going to ask now. But whatever endgame you have planned, whatever you think you’re going to accomplish, you won’t win.”
“And why’s that?”
“You’ve tried to control too much, and you’ll slip up. You’ll overlook something small, something you didn’t believe to be important.”
“Pride comes before the fall, doesn’t it, Captain? Well, be that as it may. I want to still give you a fighting chance. Perhaps this will be your opportunity. Rising to the occasion to vanquish me. Tell your captors that in place of withdrawing their troops from around the world, I’ll accept you and Kasaika.”
No feeling of shock or fear gripped Dylan, simply an acceptance that this was what Perry had wanted. This was the price of all the debts Dylan had accumulated over the past weeks. The moment he went into Perry’s custody, he would die. But if he could get close enough, he might be able to save what was left of his soul and his family. “Okay, Perry. I’ll see you soon.”
***
The pain had mostly subsided, with the exception of any sharp movements of his shoulder, knee, or lower back. Kasaika paced around the cell like an old man without a cane. He chose to walk rather than sit. The pain reminded him that he was alive. He needed that pain; it fueled him.
But when Kasaika’s cell door opened and he was hauled away, he believed that life was going to be taken from him. They’d finally decided to end it, and while he knew that fate was inevitable and he’d accepted that long ago, the burning desire for revenge still glowered in his heart.
The guards tossed him into a room, barren of furniture and decorations, but white with the false light of a shopping mall that blinded his eyes. Kasaika stumbled around until his hand found one of the walls, and he used it to prop himself up.
“Hello, Kasaika.”
Kasaika whipped around, his eyes still adjusting to the light, but he recognized Dylan’s voice. “Is this who they send to finish me? A traitor to kill a murderer?”
Dylan’s body finally came into view. “I didn’t kill anyone. That debt is on you.”
“Negligence is not an excuse in your country, unless you have something better to offer your captors.” Kasaika spit on the ground. “And I would guess that’s why you’re here.”
“Perry set off a nuke in San Francisco.”
Kasaika froze, unsure if the boat captain was telling the truth. Had he done it? Had his people finally succeeded in paying back the infidels for Egyptian suffering all those years? When the captain showed him the images of the aftermath, he had his evidence. “Why would you tell me this?”
Dylan kept a phone in his hand. “To build trust, because what I’m about to tell you now is important. The CIA found the old warehouse where you and the rest of your men were hiding out. There were a few bodies there, marked and buried out back. One of them was your brother-in-law. Sefkh.”
The slight twinge of pain that flashed across Kasaika’s face was the only emotion he would let the infidel see. “He is with Allah now, in a far better place.”
“Perry killed him.”
Kasaika’s control over his expressions melted away as his face grimaced at the news. “Lies.” It was all a ploy to try and get more information from him.
Dylan extended the phone so Kasaika could see for himself. Kasaika slowly reached out his hand and took the device. The first image on the screen was Sefkh’s body. His skin was dirty and pale, but Kasaika recognized his brother-in-law. “The only thing this proves is that he’s dead. Your government probably killed him.”
“Swipe left.”
Kasaika moved his index finger across the screen, and a video appeared. The first shot was an overhead picture in the warehouse.
“Perry had security cameras installed,” Dylan said. “Probably because he wanted leverage in case things turned south.”
Kasaika’s finger hovered over the image, hesitant to press play. “Why are you giving me this? What does this do for you?”
“It’s not what it will do for me. It’s what it’ll do for you.”
Kasaika pressed play. The video was void of any sound. He watched the bodies move and jerk around as Perry pulled Dylan’s son out of the shipping container while Sefkh and a few of the men who’d been his comrades watched. Then, the moment Sefkh went to grab the boy, Perry jammed something into the side of Sefkh’s neck, stabbing repeatedly.
Sefkh’s body twitched and slowly collapsed to the ground, blood pouring out through his hands as he tried to stop the blood loss while the men around him did nothing but watch him die. Kasaika’s hands tightened around the phone, and the plastic case cracked from the pressure as he watched Perry step over Sefkh’s lifeless body. Kasaika tossed the phone away from him. “You think you can get me to cooperate after showing me that? I’ve watched Americans kill my people my entire life. I told Sefkh not to trust Perry. I was right.”
“The rest of your men still follow Perry, at least the ones he took with him,” Dylan said.
“They’re cowards.” Perry was powerful, and the men that had rallied to their cause latched onto that power like parasites, draining as much blood and life as they possibly could. The words of Allah only went so far in the minds of men before promises of the material earth outweighed those of the afterlife.
“Well, you’ll be able to call them whatever you want to their faces,” Dylan said.
The words caught Kasaika off guard. He took a step back, unsure of what the infidel meant. “What game is this?”
“No game,” Dylan answered. “This is an opportunity for both of us. We can bring Perry down.”
“We?” Kasaika tilted his head to the side. It was then he noticed the captain’s demeanor for the first time. He’d spent a lot of time with the captain during the transportation and delivery of weapons, and in all that time, he’d seen the pensive look in the man’s eye, but now the man had no look of fear or doubt. “You know, there is a school of Islam, true Islam, where I am from in Egypt, in which we teach young children from the very beginning of the treacherous ways of the Western world. It is during those early years that the foundation of our future is cemented. When those children are grown and have become men, they are hardened and strong. They understand that their sacrifices are for the greater good.”
“Hate. That’s all you’re teaching them.”
“I have looked those men in the eyes before they are sent out on their missions. Dozens of them. Their souls are covered in serenity. It’s a look you’re wearing now.” Kasaika had made his way across the room, so close he could almost touch Dylan, but even though Kasaika was within an arm’s reach of being able to choke the captain with his own bare hands, Dylan refused to flinch. “Is that your mission? Are you going to sacrifice yourself for your country’s greater good?”
“Not the country’s greater good. My family’s.”
Chapter 9
Cooper sat hunched around piles of faded and worn papers and folders. The lack of computer files had forced her to search through hundreds of filing cabinets with records dating back to the early sixties. The De
partment of Children and Family records hadn’t become digitized until three years ago, and anything older than twenty years wasn’t uploaded into the system.
It was a large web that Cooper had tangled herself in, and she was doing her best to try and piece it all together. Until she had something more than the word of a ninety-year-old woman living in an assisted-living facility, she wasn’t going to jump to conclusions, but the more she looked into it, the clearer the picture became.
The medical records Cooper looked into on the doctor who had examined Perry the night his father tried to burn him alive also supplied a psych evaluation on the father. The small town had lacked the necessities of modern medicine, so the doctor had often lent his services to anything medical related.
Perry’s father had had a history of alcoholism and had been sentenced to life in prison after he’d burned eighty percent of Perry’s body. Bipolar disorder along with severe depression were thrown into the diagnosis as well. It all added up to a very troubling childhood. And the burns weren’t Perry’s first trip to the hospital. Cooper also found medical records showing broken arms, legs, severe lashings to the face, back, and buttocks, as well as missing teeth and a gash to the back of the head that required sixteen stitches. Perry had been nothing more than a punching bag to his father.
The investigation into those dealings had also been incredibly poor. When Cooper searched for any filings during the years of Perry’s abuse, she found that a handful of case workers had looked into the domestic abuse but never followed up with any authorities, even after several nurses from the hospital where Perry was treated went to them personally with evidence of the abuse. All the documentation needed to put Perry’s father away had been there long before the boy was burned.
It was little wonder what had twisted Perry’s mind so much. Cooper leaned back and rubbed her eyes. Power had gone out in the archive room, and she was forced to look over the documents by the glow of flashlights and lanterns, which strained her eyes after staring for too long.
“Agent Cooper?” The old clerk snuck up from behind her, and she jumped from his sudden appearance. “Sorry, but I found those case worker files you wanted.”
“Thank you.” The clerk nodded, and Cooper took the thick reams of paper. Dust flew up into the air when she set them on the table and opened the first page. While there were more than a dozen DCF employees who had laid eyes on Perry’s case during his childhood, there were two particular workers who had consistently overlooked what was happening at home.
Neither of the employees had ever climbed the ranks of the government agency, and they’d seemed content on doing as little work as possible, waiting for their retirement dates to collect their pensions. Bernie Campton, the first worker she looked up, had retired more than ten years ago, while the second, Duncan Hostler, had retired three years ago.
Cooper jotted down their names and then swiveled over to the laptop she’d brought with her. The battery was nearly gone, but she had enough juice to do a quick search of the names, pulling up their current addresses. The wireless network struggled to populate the data, freezing on her twice. She leaned back, waiting for the screen to load, glancing back down at the files.
The screen finally beeped, and Bernie Campton’s retirement information popped up. When she scanned the monitor she nearly fell out of the chair when she saw his current address. San Francisco. She quickly typed in Duncan Hostler’s name and learned that he lived there as well. “Jesus Christ.”
A shot of adrenaline pumped through her heart as she checked her watch, looking at the quickly fading time until the next deadline, and fidgeted in her chair, the burst of energy too much for her to handle at the moment. The fact that San Francisco just so happened to be the residency of where two of the case workers lived that ignored Perry’s child abuse that he bombed wasn’t a coincidence. She reached for the other files of the case workers that had been attached to Perry’s situation, and found that the others were also retired, and living in Washington, D.C.
Cooper immediately grabbed her phone and dialed Moringer, her leg bouncing up and down as she hovered over the papers. “C’mon, c’mon, pick up!”
“Director Moringer.”
“I know where Perry is going to target next!” The words exploded out of her mouth like a gunshot, fast and loud. “It’s Washington, D.C.”
“What? How do you know that?”
“The child abuse that Perry’s aunt told me about was true. There were dozens of documented statements from nurses and neighbors stating that Perry’s father hit him, and his mother, a lot. The medical records alone could fill an encyclopedia. Two of the case workers that ignored those claims lived in San Francisco.”
Moringer paused for a moment. “You think Perry was targeting them?”
“It would make sense. The level of psychological damage that Perry went through as a child would trigger that need for revenge. And the three remaining case workers are all currently living in Washington, D.C.”
“But why all of this? What’s the bigger play?”
Cooper leaned back, shaking her head. “I don’t know, but this gives us something to work with. You need to get that city evacuated as quickly, and quietly, as possible.”
“Good work, Cooper. Keep it up.”
“I need one more thing. I need to speak with Dylan.”
“Give me a minute.”
Cooper’s heart was pounding at one hundred miles an hour. She chewed her nail nervously, hoping to god that she was on the right track.
“Hello?”
“Dylan, what was the name of your father’s ship? The one he captained when you were a kid.”
“What does that have to do with anything?”
“I’m looking into Perry’s past and I think your dad had something to do with Perry when he was younger. If I can find the old harbor records and manifests from the port authorities I might be able to piece a few things together.”
Dylan let out an irritated sigh. “The Fish Bowl. That’s what he called it.”
“Thanks.” Cooper hung up before he asked any more questions. She didn’t have time to explain everything, not now. The adrenaline in her body continued to pump and she quickly gathered some of the files and headed out the door. She had one more stop to make.
***
The small handheld radio in Mark’s palm shook slightly as the reporter added another hundred thousand to the death toll that was well over two million due to the surrounding suburban areas effected by looting, fires, and fallout. The longer he listened to the broadcast, the harder he gripped the wooden railing out on the porch. By the time he turned the radio off, his hand ached.
“Did my dad do that?”
Mark spun around to see Sean standing sheepishly at the doorway to the balcony. “Sean, I thought you were still sleeping.”
Sean walked over to the small bench next to the railing and sat down without a word. Mark had been watching the boy closely, and it didn’t take a shrink to know that the kid hadn’t worked through everything he’d seen. Mark wasn’t sure if he ever would. He took a seat next to Sean, still rubbing his aching hand, and then put his arm around the boy. “Did I ever tell you the story of the first time I went fishing with your dad?”
Sean shook his head, the dark circles under his eyes shadowing his face. The boy was too young to have such a burden hanging over his head.
“Well, your dad had just purchased his first fishing boat, and let me tell you, he was so excited, I thought he’d fall overboard from all the running around he was doing.” Mark chuckled and managed to get a grin out of Sean. “We left before dawn that morning, and I spent most of the trip getting everything ready, while your dad was charged with trying to find the fish. And boy, did he find them.”
Mark held out his arms wide, hovering over Sean’s head. “I tell you, we caught monsters that could swallow you whole!” He bent down over Sean like he was going to eat him, and he shied away, giggling. Mark tousled the boy’s hair and smiled
. “By the end of the day, we couldn’t fit any more fish on the boat. When we decided to turn back, we saw a storm heading our way. We thought we’d be able to outrun it, but it just came up too fast. The waves rolled over the side of the ship, trying to knock us over, and the wind howled like a freight train. Lightning flashed in the sky and thunder boomed like cannons as the rain tried to drown us from above.”
Sean’s eyes widened as he looked up at Mark with his mouth gaping. It was the first time Mark had seen the boy so engaged since he was taken. “Was it scary?”
Mark nodded. “Oh, it was terrifying. The seas were so rough that I could barely keep my feet under me. The boat rocked back and forth, almost tipping us over. I went down below to grab some life vests, but on the way a wave knocked me overboard. I wasn’t sure if your dad had seen me and I thought I was going to die right then and there. The waves toppled over my head and I could feel the salt water rush down my throat and fill my belly. But just when I thought it was done I felt a hand reach down and grab my arm. Your father lifted me out of the sea with one mighty pull.” He watched Sean smile and felt his own face mirror the expression. “After that I held on for dear life inside the cabin, wrapped in a blanket and shivering. But I knew your dad wasn’t going to let us sink; he was going to make sure we both made it home alive.” Mark pointed at Sean’s heart and gave it a light nudge. “That’s the type of man your father is. He saves people. He doesn’t hurt them.”
Sean looked back down at his feet, dangling off the edge of the bench. When he finally looked back up, he raised his eyebrows. “So my dad isn’t the bad guy?”
“No,” Mark answered. “He is definitely not the bad guy. Your dad is the best man I know, and he’s going to make it back to you. He always finds a way home.” Sean jumped into Mark’s lap and hugged him, burying his face in Mark’s shirt. Mark squeezed the boy back tight then finally let him down.