The Cleansing

by Shane Crosby

  WEN NEWS

  Election update

  With six months left before Americans cast their votes the candidates are making campaign stops in those swing states. The President wasn't hitting it as hard as his opponent some believe despite his hard line policies his re-election is almost guaranteed.

  Where he alienates one group he receives praises and accolades from two more. From his immigration policy overhaul to his eliminating the sales tax systems in favor of implementing a free tax this President is set on blazing his own trail. The real story plays out in six months when the American people go to the polls. One thing remains constant, this President is confident and is willing to do whatever it takes to bring America back to, as he puts it, its glory days. In getting back to the glory days, the President’s elimination of the welfare system he says, will make people realize there are no free handouts in life. You must work and take care of yourself and your family. Now as you know, this has been another hot button item that caused demonstrations to pop up all over the nation. Some still predict even with certain groups disliking him and his policies his re-election is certain. Stay tuned to WEN for updates.

  CHAPTER FIFTY - FIVE

  TIME FOR HEALING

  BERLIN

  Dub

  Since J had some time off work, he came back to Berlin with us to heal. It was the first time in a long while that we were all together in the same place. I know the circumstances for this reunion was horrible, but sometimes, good things come out of something bad and this was one of those times. None of us wanted it to end, so, we stayed up all night laughing, talking and just enjoying each other’s company. It felt like it did when we were kids and I, for one hated for us to separate again.

  “Dub, now you’re stateside or something like that. How do you feel?”

  “He’s not in a cave this election year.”

  “Are you going to vote?”

  “You haven’t been in a normal setting in like three decades.”

  “If I’m that old then you do realize you’re just a year behind me, right?”

  “Hmmm, I see your point. Maybe, I should rephrase that.”

  “Yeah, maybe you should.”

  The Doc comes into the room.

  “How’s our brother?

  “He’s recovering, but you are aware, it’s going to take months of recovery for him to get back to normal. And, that’s just the assessment on his body. We’re not talking about his mind. The mind maybe harder to repair.”

  “He’s strong. He’ll recover in record time.”

  “I don’t think you should bet on that. He went through hell and can live to tell about it. I don’t know how many people can say that. And, of those who can, would they? Tell you about it, I mean?”

  “Probably not.”

  “Definitely not, I would imagine.”

  “We’ll help him get through it.”

  “He’ll need it. But, I wouldn’t suggest you hover. I think it would be best to allow him to continue to help you with your case. I believe this will help with the recovery.”

  “No. He doesn’t need to keep thinking about what happened to him.”

  “Dub, get a grip on reality. Nothing you can do is going to keep him from thinking about it. All the Doc is saying is if we keep his mind busy, he won’t think about it so much and maybe it’ll help him to deal with what happened if he knows he’s working to find them.”

  “I agree, Dub. You baby him too much. He’s a grown man.”

  “I know he’s grown! I just want him to get better that’s it!”

  He gets up in a huff and leaves the room.

  “We all want that.”

  “He can stand face to face with an armed terrorist, but when it comes to his baby brother, he has to leave the room. Unbelievable.”

  “I second that.”

  “And, on and on.”

  CHAPTER FIFTY - SIX

  BEYOND THE GRAVE

  Jared

  Despite being in recovery mode, I was still able to use my mind. My body, now that was an entirely different story. My brothers were mulling over the events and revelations of the last several months. While they were brainstorming, I decided to check my emails. In four months, I know I have a million. I clicked the little Outlook icon and it starts to open. One by one the little envelopes notifying you of new mail popped up. Like students running out of the door on the last day of school, my inbox became flooded with emails. They were all work related and from friends wondering where I was and what’s happened to me. I continued to scan through them and prepared to delete what looked like spam. With my finger on the delete button, one swift push and my inbox is free of everything that’s not important. Boy I wish God gave us this feature in real life. I was ready to be bored reading through dated mail and catching up on work until one message stood out from the rest. I was apprehensive about opening it. It looked like junk mail and I thought I’d gotten rid of all those. Nevertheless, the curios cat in me couldn’t resist. I hope I don’t join the ranks of those who were killed by curiosity. In this business it could be a bomb. I lifted the stylus and touched the email. Instead of it revealing text, images or links, a video started. I was taken aback at what my screen revealed. A message from the grave. The attorney general alive; at least he was at the time this video was made. I put in my head phones and prepared to listen intensely. I pressed rewind to start from the beginning. As I listened, I could understand only a small amount of what he was saying. The video sounded like you scratched one of those old forty-five records. Darn! Just when I thought we were home free the doors are slammed right in our faces. What I could understand was this:

  Hi Jared Morgan. I’m sure you recognize my face, so I don’t need to introduce myself. I’m sorry we’re meeting like this, under these circumstances. If you’re seeing this I’m dead.

  It goes on.

  I don’t have much time. The method I had to use to get you this message is primitive CIA technology. You’ll figure it out. So, I can’t go into everything or anything for that matter in detail. I know about your brothers. Contact them to help you, because you’ll certainly need it. Just know that it’s going to get worse. My hope for you all is that afterwards, it will get better. No one in covert OPS is a friend, remember that and you’ll live longer than I did.

  Jared, you’re seeing this because someone has tried to destroy the thumb drive I gave them detailing what’s going on. My nephew, Private Morris encrypted the drive to automatically send this video to you if someone tried to destroy the drive or delete the information it contained. Everything you need is in the archives. We knew if you got this far you’d need help knowing who to trust. My nephew sent a copy of the drive to your brother and we made another copy for safe keeping. If your brother doesn’t have his, that means Morris and I are both dead. Go back and retrace your steps and remember you’re receiving this because someone we thought we could trust has tried to destroy the evidence we gave them to pass along to you and your brothers. You must get that thumb drive. Nothing is as it seems, trust no one. Find that drive it will explain everything.” He was still talking and then the video starts to cut out. “Tell my wife......I’m sorry my unwillingness to let things go resulted in us being separated by death sooner than either of us anticipated. I hope she’ll someday forgive me.

  The sound stopped and then started and stopped again. It continued to do this throughout the end of the video. I know he was telling us exactly what to do and what was going on, but I couldn’t catch it. Darn it!

  I can finally say someone spoke to me from beyond the grave, but they left more questions than answers.

  DECISIONS, DECISIONS

  BERLIN

  Mase

  Soon after Jared discovered the video, he gave a yell for us to come check it out.

  We were encouraged to think about tackling this mole hill turned Mt. Everest sized mountain once again. The first step was reassess what we had and from where we stood that wasn’t much.

&nbs
p; “What do we have?”

  “A bunch of broken bodies.”

  “I second that. They’ve won every battle.”

  “Winning a battle doesn’t matter in a fifty round match. They haven’t won the war and I guarantee they know that. To convince us we’re defeated is their job and they’re doing a great job thus far. We have to snap out of it.”

  “J was very near death and he still can’t function normally.”

  “Give it some time. He has to heal. It won’t happen overnight.”

  “True.”

  “Okay, so let’s decide right now if we’re going to use J as an excuse to quit.”

  One of my brothers starts to speak but Trevor quiets him.

  “Before you speak let’s take this vote now.”

  “I agree.”

  “Everyone in favor of using what happened to J as an excuse to quit raise your hand.”

  “Or would it be easier to punk out on paper? That way no one can see you’re a coward.”

  There were a few tense moments waiting for a reaction to Dub and Trevor’s position. Out of all of us, Dub had never been the best motivator. Always quick to call you out and ready to back it up. Forcing a vote without further discussion was akin to mutiny in our household. We discussed everything. I thought we were going to need police intervention to prevent the commotion that was over the horizon. But, after a lot of posturing and getting very close to a physical confrontation, it was clear no one really wanted to give up and most importantly J didn’t want us to. Just when I thought we were out, here we go again.

  CHAPTER FIFTY - SEVEN

  THREE DAYS LATER

  Six O’clock in the evening

  PICKING UP WHERE WE LEFT OFF

  FLORIDA

  Mase, Dub, Scott, Trevor, Don

  Mase

  When we landed in Florida, we were still nervous, but we were anxious to finally get the answers that have eluded us for the past two years. When we landed, we didn’t go check into a hotel, we looked up the addresses, divided them among us and begin our investigation. We were ready to put an end to this nightmare we’ve lived and it felt good.

  Today, after three days of beating on doors and almost resulting to begging for someone in the Hoffman family to say hello to us, we’re feeling defeated. It feels like we've visited every member of the Hoffman family down to the children still in preschool. And, left a note in a time capsule for the ones not born yet. We’re sitting here with nothing more than we had before we arrived. They all flat out refused to speak to us, except for one, he wasn't home. Despite the rejection we’ve received, we still held out hope and left him a note. With our time in Florida winding down at the speed of light and with no word from the last family member we visited, we were starting to realize that maybe we might have to accept that a happy ending wasn’t in the cards for us. We’d used two days trying to find all of the siblings and another day attempting to convince them to talk to us. We had one more day, maybe two to get this nailed down or we were done. Day turned into night and today turned into yesterday with the same result, nothing from the brother. We had to face it; we were out of options and time.

  “All right fellas looks like we're not going to win this one, at least not this way. We’ll have to settle for PPV Industries. At least I get to see that psychopath Popovich behind bars.”

  “That's not good enough. We’ve almost died every day since this began. J was tortured within an inch of his life. I don’t want to settle for being runner up.”

  “Besides, there’s no guarantee we’ll get Popovich. He wasn’t at any of the locations we visited. He’s kept himself away from everything. The only thing you could say is that he told you about the meetings. Now, how much jail time would that get him?”

  “None.”

  “Ever since we started down this pathway to hell, we’ve been a day late and a dollar short. I wish just for once we could get ahead on this case.”

  “I hear you, but what else can we do?”

  “Let’s start packing up. Get some sleep, if you can. Maybe something else will come down the pipeline.”

  “Man, I was hoping we didn’t have to go back to Germany winters.”

  “So, were we all.”

  We left Dub’s room feeling like losers. We’d done so much work on this to come out with nothing was depressing. If I didn’t think they would call the police, I would go back to each one of their houses and try to change their minds. With every step, it became more and more difficult to fight the compulsion to go back and try to talk to them. What were they afraid of? Gerhardt was dead. Or maybe, the public’s opinion when this came out from under the veil they’ve used as a shield for over half a century would be more damaging than living with the knowledge your father committed crimes against humanity.

  “See, you in the morning, Mase.”

  “Yeah, empty handed.”

  “Don’t let it get to you, we did our best.”

  “If that were true, we’d be celebrating now.”

  “Hey, let’s go back to that guy’s house and see if we can convince him to talk to us. At least we’ll be in a cell together.

  What do we have to lose?”

  “Our freedom, but I’m in.”

  “Let’s roll.”

  We got in the rental and drove to Mr. Hoffman’s house. I didn’t let Scott know I was close to hyperventilating. If we ended up in a jail cell, we’d be sitting ducks, easy to kill. We’d never make it to trial. I hope this is worth it.

  We pulled up to his house and parked. Scott and I sat out in front of his house for half an hour before we got the nerve to get out, go up to his door and knock. When the door opened, the man standing there didn’t match the picture I’ve held in my head for the past few days. He wasn’t very tall maybe five ten. His hair was gray but you could tell he had red hair. His eyebrows were red, with grey throughout. You could see from the way his skin looked he’s outside a lot. Not only was he tan, but his skin was wrinkled and looked tough. He was slim with green eyes, and a half grown in beard. He was dressed in jeans with holes in them and a wife beater. But, he seemed friendly so I was hopeful.

  “Hello, may I help you?”

  “Uh, we sure hope so, sir.”

  “Are you the gentlemen asking about my father?”

  “Yes. How did you know?”

  “You’re the young men my siblings called me about?”

  “Probably so sir, yes. We’re sorry to bother you and so late, but we were hoping we could get you to listen to us just for a few minutes.”

  “I think I have some time to listen, come on in. Can I interest you in some coffee?”

  “Yes, that would be great.”

  “Come on in gentlemen.”

  Reluctantly, we followed him into his home. Being face to face with what you wanted always leaves you speechless. You’re in disbelief; when it should be the opposite. We were both holding our breath, hoping we could finally put this portion of this case to bed.

  He came back with three cups of coffee and offered us a seat. We complied and silently waited for him to start the conversation.

  “From what my siblings told me, you’re interested in knowing about my father. What do you want to know about him? If you’re here, I assume you’ve done your research. Something lead you here, correct?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Well, boys, let’s hear it. Why are you here?”

  I took the picture of his father out of my jacket pocket and laid it on the table. He looked at it and confirmed this was his father and it was Gerhardt Richter. I removed the remaining pictures from my pocket. The pictures of Gerhardt with them as a family and another of the baby brother we can’t seem to locate. I placed those neatly beside the other one. He looked shocked that we had these and his mouth fell open with amazement.

  “Where did you get these?”

  “We have a contact within the CIA.”

  He started to tear up. He placed his hand over his mouth. He picked up the pi
ctures and then his hands started to shake as he traced the details of the images with his finger as if he was trying to touch them one more time.

  “Oh, my gosh. I didn’t realize these existed. Did you get these from the same person?”

  “Yes.”

  “This is when we came here. This is when my father started working for the CIA. They took pictures of us to keep records of the people who worked for them.”

  “Yes, that’s what we were told.”

  Tears started to fall from his eyes and run down his face. My mother; she was so beautiful. Funny, pictures; they’re so flawless and pretty on the one hand, but they never really tell the true story.

  “We’d like to hear it, if you have time to tell it.”

  “Our family was broken. These pictures bring back memories, not so good ones. Boys, you’re about to get the story of the century. It will change how you view this country and not for the better. It’s been a secret that’s been kept within our family for more than sixty years. Wait here, I have some pictures to show you.”

  Scott and I were eager, but a little apprehensive too. What could he have that will change how we view the country?

  Scott

  Being shot down behind enemy lines and held as a prisoner will force you to take stock of your life. If you survive, you’ll never be the same. While you’re a captive, you learn to hear everything that’s going on around you. You’re listening, assessing and strategizing on how, what’s the best time and when you can escape. Even when you’re rescued the need to keep everything around you in perspective goes with you onto that Helo and walks beside you every day. The door isn’t just something you walk through to hang out with friends and family; it’s a way to escape. The windows aren’t just a daydreaming tool. They’re a potential escape route. You’re looking at how high they are off the ground. How wide it is. Can you fit through it? If you jump can you survive the fall and escape? It changes you in ways you aren’t willing to admit to yourself so you don’t dare tell anyone else. I knew something was going on outside that wasn’t just normal night sounds in southern Florida. I kept quiet until I was sure. Then, I alerted my brother of my suspicions.