by C. G. Cooper
“It took you long enough,” Cal said, dropping guard number two to the ground, who thankfully was wearing body armor. His friend Daniel trotted up behind him, Liberty coming in close too.
“I didn’t want to make it too easy for you,” Daniel said. “He knows we’re coming now. He’s heard the gunshots.”
The rest of the neighborhood was secure. Djibouti commandos vetted by President Farah had seen to that. So here they were, about to visit the man who’d changed the world.
Cal and Daniel scanned the area as Liberty sniffed the air. The only person inside was General Hachi. The Marines had no doubt that he would put up a fight. Oh, how Cal wished, no he hoped, that Hachi would put up a fight.
+ + +
General Hachi had, in fact, been in the shower when he heard the gunfire. He slipped out, tying a towel around his waist, grabbing his favorite pistol from the sink. He made it halfway to the bed, where he had a heavier arsenal stashed underneath. A growling form stalked into the room.
It was a dog. Why was there a dog in the house? At first, he thought that maybe his stupid guards had been firing at the animal. It had to be a stray. Wild. The standing hairs on the back of its neck rippled. He hated animals, ever since that night so long ago when he had been attacked outside of his home. Feral dogs, they called them, but in General Hachi’s mind, vermin was a more accurate term. The attack had left him bedridden for over a year. He’d received a hundred stitches, and his leg never fully recovered.
His people had dogs, and that was what he had alluded to with Vice Premier Ling, but he never ventured near the animal’s compound. Just the sight of the place made him want to run and hide.
The dog was barking at him now. Hachi’s weapon came up, and a millisecond from shooting, the trigger already heavy on his finger, a suppressed gunshot rang out. It shattered the weapon in his hand. Casting it aside, Hachi fell back, grabbing his bleeding hand. Two white men stalked into the room, their weapons trained on him. One reached down to touch the dog, while the other moved to restrain him.
It wasn’t that Hachi was surprised. Far from it. The last twenty-four hours had been nothing like he’d planned. He had watched in glee as the Americans turned on themselves and leveled their ire on the dead president. Then they’d turned to him and offered their aide and assistance. He met with FBI officials, the CIA, and a shadowy group of characters he could only assume were Special Forces who’d summoned him as the president of Djibouti. He had been glad, not only because they had come to the throne, but also because it legitimized what he had claimed.
Then, in the most peculiar twist, a man he hardly knew about, and only then did he know because of the election in America, the man who was to challenge President Zimmer, a man named McKnight took to the airwaves and attacked General Hachi. He had the nerve to tell the world that Hachi had been behind it all, even while other members of McKnight’s own government courted Hachi’s favor. On and on he had railed. It seemed as though on every station to which General Hachi tuned, there was McKnight’s face, lashing out at him, demanding that the international community do something about this madman.
He was no madman; he was the future. He had been in control, and his country had cast aside the jackals of America, and forged a new partnership with a rising superpower. Unlike his predecessor, Hachi held no illusions that Djibouti would stand on the world stage with the likes of America, Russia, and China. But he had bet his life and career on the fact that China would prevail. When he made the call to Vice Premier Ling, he hoped that the man would help. But there was no answer; there was only silence. His once strongest ally had closed the door.
Yet, General Hachi would not give up hope. There was no proof that he had killed the American president, and wasn’t it proof that the world wanted? Gone were the days of indiscriminate revenge, at least in the civilized world. The civilized world had cast such perverse actions aside, all for the sake of being modern and civilized. They were back to gentlemen agreeing to only shoot at each other in the light of day, standing across from each other, like the duels from the old days.
Hachi had believed, even if this McKnight and his cohorts pressed their claim, that with friends like Wiley, he could survive. After all, wasn’t it proper for deposed dictators to be allowed to go into exile? That had been his plan if he was to be ousted.
Now, here were these two men and their dog, bursting into his house—his domain! The nerve!
“Do you know who I am?” Hachi asked. The man with brown hair cocked his head and grinned.
“Why don’t you tell us who you are?”
“I am General Hachi, president of—”
The shots caught him in the chest, two in rapid succession. He looked down and saw the pock marks, and then blood flowed freely from his torso and dripped down to his white towel. This was not how it was supposed to be!
He looked up at the men, and opened his mouth to speak, to demand that they get him medical assistance, but no words came. His chest seized. His eyes fell down to the dog, who was sitting now, looking at him curiously, with a silent question in those brown eyes, as if to say, “Will you just fall down already?”
But Hachi was a proud man. He had been cast aside his whole life, first by his good friend Farah, who’d gone off to university. He had been left behind, and it was only through begging and pleading with school officials that he’d been sent to the military academy in France. He’d worked hard and earned his place. Then he had maneuvered through the ranks, and indisputably been given the worst of assignments, but he took it stoically. He had always blamed it on Farah—always Farah. How could he have done it any differently? The world was what it was. He was who he was supposed to be, was he not?
Now, as he looked down at the inquisitive dog, he wondered what his life might have been like if he had taken another path so long ago. If only he had thrown hate aside, lived a simple life, and married a beautiful—
The thought disappeared into eternity, as the next bullets entered his brain, and the man who had been president of Djibouti for almost two days collapsed on the floor, dead.
The man with the blond hair walked over and checked for a pulse.
“He’s gone,” he said.
“Let’s go,” said his companion. “Liberty, come.”
The dog turned around, and went to her master. He reached down, rumpled the fur on her head and gave her a firm pat: “Good girl.”
Chapter 34
It had been a while since Vince stopped keeping track of how many times he got hit. His only focus now was to remain conscious to ensure he received the beatings in order to spare Karl. He was not even sure if Karl was alive anymore. The last time Vince had been able to lift his head and look to the left, he had thought he detected Karl breathing, yet he couldn't be sure.
Damn you, Karl, Vince thought.
His friend had successfully goaded their abuser by using every racial slur ever invented denigrating the Asian culture. Now he was either dead or just a bloody pulp because of his actions.
"Hit me," Vince said through broken lips. It began again. The initial incarceration had rivaled a spa visit, but then, like a flip of a switch, it had turned dark.
He'd been trained to absorb all manner of pain, to put it all aside and keep his focus. But something inside broke when the Asian man informed them that President Zimmer was dead. There'd been genuine shock on their captor's face as well. For a time, he'd just sat in the room, staring at his hands. It could have been minutes. It could have been hours in the subterranean room where they now sat. It was impossible for Vincent to keep track of time, but it had all changed with a single phone call.
The man had left the room and when he returned, his once blank face was now twisted with a hangman’s cruel sneer. Vince knew it was all over when the man finally introduced himself as Major Ling.
He began the renewed conversation by saying, "When I was a child, five, maybe six years old, my father enrolled me in a martial arts school. I was young but large for my
age. The first day a smaller boy sent me home with a black eye. My father gave me another. That night I went outside to where the peasant workers were doing some construction. I found a long two by four and propped it against the wall. Repeatedly, I hit that board until my hands bled. I did that for days. A week later, I returned to the martial arts school and beat the child who’d beaten me. I vowed then I would never lose again. I have always kept a two by four as a reminder of what weakness can lead to, of what defeat lurks just beyond the horizon if we allow it entry into our lives."
He'd shown Karl and Vince his knuckles. They were flat. He made a fist, but it looked more like a mallet than a human hand. Vince hadn't noticed it before, but he knew what it meant. After taking off his shirt and revealing his impressive physique, Major Ling slammed his fist into the metal door. He left an impressive dent for his effort. Then he held up his fist again. There was no pride there, just a silent, "See, it doesn't even hurt."
Vincent expected questions to come; he always had. Interrogation was inevitable. Even after the initial flurry of punches, he'd steeled himself for interrogation, but none came.
Karl must have figured it out first, because that's when he had started goading Ling. He spat blood at the man, hit him in the face, but there had been no bloodlust in Ling's eyes. He just waded in and levied the pain. Surgically, like he knew every pain point in the men’s legs, arms, and torsos, but he saved their faces for his most crushing blows.
Vincent only lost consciousness once. He came to sometime later after Ling splashed a plastic cup full of Coca Cola into his face. The carbonated beverage stung as it penetrated every cut, jolting him back to awareness. On and on Ling went. Sometimes he would sit and take a sip of a freshly opened can that he grabbed from a bucket of ice near the door. Sometimes he would just stand and watch Vince. The Delta colonel was clueless as to his reason.
At one point, Vince had just asked the man straight up, "Why don't you just kill us?" Not that he wanted to die but that there seemed to be no reason for Ling’s prolonged beatings of him and Karl. The only answer he'd received was a quiet, "It no longer matters.”
While that might have given Vincent some measure of hope, he was no fool. A human body could only take so much. Already his breaths were coming with labored effort. For sure there were more than a couple of ribs broken, and if his ribs punctured his lungs, which he had no doubt they could, it was game over and lights out for Vince.
It was highly unlikely that Ling would lift a finger to save his or Karl's lives. There was a look of inevitability about the man now, like he was somehow accepting his fate even though Vince didn't know what fate held in store for his captor.
So he took the beatings with stoicism. When they slowed, he sensed Ling shifting to his friend. That was when Vince would lift his head and murmur something through swollen lips, and Ling would return to start the beatings anew.
So this is how it ends, Vince thought, I’ll die as a human punching bag.
He always assumed that it would be a sniper's bullet or a miscast grenade that would take his life. He was very good at what he did. He loved what he did and lived with no regrets. The only regret wavering at the edge of his consciousness was that he hadn't been able to save Karl. But as Ling moved in for yet another one-way showdown, Vince focused on the image of the little red-roofed cabin atop some faraway hill.
+ + +
Vince thought he must be hearing things now. He figured it was probably his ears going out, like one set of senses finally giving way with a pop, pop, pop. His eardrums must’ve been destroyed.
With incredible effort, his eyes eased open. That's when he realized none of the blows had fallen above his nose. He could still see. Maybe that's what Ling had wanted, for Vince and Karl to see every punch coming.
Devious, Vince thought in silent admiration. Even though the guy didn't have the balls to fight him man-to-man, he still had to admire the approach, like a boxer respecting the way an opponent threw a punch.
When he looked up, Vince fully expected to see Major Ling coming at him again, but Major Ling was gone. There was just an open door, and he could just make out shadows. Vince blinked, trying to clear his vision. There was a man with a dark mask heading in his direction. Two more men were following closely, weapons scanning the room.
There was something familiar—No. It was his eyes. His mind was playing tricks on him. He had suffered too many hits. But then the lead man stepped closer, removed his mask, and Vince Sweeney knew he wasn't dreaming. Maybe he was dead. He had to be dead. There was no other way that he was seeing this.
The man reached out and touched Vince on the cheek.
"I'm sorry,” Vince croaked. Slowly, the other men were lowering their masks too. Vince felt the worst sorrow he'd ever experienced, like the devil had reached into his chest and pulled out his heart, squeezing out his soul. "No, you can't be dead, too," he said to the other men.
"Vince, it's okay. You're going to be okay,” the specter said.
Vince shook his head. "We're dead. We're all dead, and it's my fault." He was looking away now. He didn't want to see the images. He tried to push them away, but the man's hands stayed where they were before moving to his chin, lifting Vince’s head to look him in the eye.
"Vince, it's okay. We're all here. We're all alive."
Could it really be? Could it?
"Mr. President?" Vince said, tears coming to his eyes. He'd fully expected death to take him, and his addled mind still didn't know if this was real. But he wanted to believe.
"It's me, Vince,” President Zimmer said. "Let's get you out of this chair, okay?"
As soon as they released the straps, Vince's body fell limp. It wasn't the others in the room, Cal, Daniel, Gaucho or Trent, who was now holding him up. It was the president. Why was he there?
“Karl?" Vince asked.
"He's in rough shape, but we'll get him help."
Vince shook his head. He wanted to tell the president everything. He wanted to tell him that Karl was dying, and there was nothing they could do, that they were all helpless to save him. Then that special spark within him relit, the one that had sent him down to the recruiter's office, the one that had sent him through ranger training and into the most elite unit of all.
He was back in a flash. "Mr. President, I'm sorry. We should have been more careful."
The president looked at him with grave eyes and shook his head. "No Vince, I’m the one who should be sorry. It was my job. You and Karl were my responsibility.” He got a better grip around Vince’s waist as they headed out the door. “Now, how about we get you both home."
Epilogue
The place was more beautiful than Karl had described. The pictures Vince had seen didn't do the place justice. The little white cabin with the red tin roof was just the beginning of his amazement. The property spread over nearly 100 rolling acres. It used to be a boys’ summer camp but sat vacant for years. The existing amenities included a small lake surrounded by plenty of trails, a couple of bunkhouses, and even an old cafeteria. It would take some work, but Vince and Karl were excited about seeing the first step in their dreams come true.
Vince bought the place sight unseen. Then Cal and Jonah Layton, CEO of The Jefferson Group, stepped in and pieced together an additional 2,000 acres of land surrounding the property. Vince was amazed at what vast amounts of money could buy. He truly felt blessed.
It had taken a week to wrap up the closing on the cabin property and another three for the other properties to be placed under contract. Those would close in the coming months. And so he’d come with Karl to the cabin, and for the last five nights they’d finally gotten to call their dream property home.
Each morning shortly after rising, he made coffee for Karl and himself. He then carried it to Karl's bedroom where Karl lay with an IV bag stuck into his arm via long plastic tubes. He was alert; he’d even regained every bit of his fiery nature.
That morning, Vince had already delivered the morning coffee. H
e was just stepping outside to take a look at the bunkhouses. He wanted to make a guesstimate on how many months it would take to repair the buildings.
To his surprise, he saw a car coming up the drive. It was a blue sedan that he didn't recognize, a rental probably. Maybe the occupants were lost travelers or possibly campers revisiting the memories and the camp where they had stayed in the cabins when young.
Vince was curious, so he stood on the side of the porch, sipping his coffee, waiting for the blue sedan to arrive. It parked next to the big oak tree with a single rope dangling from an enormous limb that Karl assumed had at one time held a tire swing.
Two men stepped out. Instantly, Vince knew they were Secret Service.
"Mr. Sweeney?" one of them queried.
"That's me."