by David Horne
Far be it from Curtis to blow his own trumpet, but that was the kind of thing that he spent years upon years training for, the split-second decision that can sometimes and often be the difference between life and death. Saving someone and condemning them. It was incredibly satisfying, in a humble sort of way, to see the labors of training come to fruition in such a perfect way, and to act, independent of conscious thought, and simply do what was needed.
Just that little session there was an indication of who was going to dominate in this combat simulation and who was going to be dominated.
As soon as Curtis and the rest of Valiant Team left the Mess Hall, it was game on. Curtis’ blood was pumping, his head was pounding, his heart was racing, and he was only thirty percent sure that it wasn’t mostly due to the fact that he and Hartley had shared the most exhilarating kiss of their lives. At least it was the most exhilarating of Curtis’ life, he couldn’t speak for Hartley, but he knew what he felt. In fact, he was surprised at himself because of the fact that he even knew a fancy word like “exhilarating”.
But what about what Hartley had revealed in what had felt like a moment of weakness? But when Curtis used the word weakness to describe Hartley’s emotions in that frozen instant, he meant weakness in a good way, not a bad way. If you could have such a thing as a good weakness.
Curtis didn’t know how to make heads or tails of any of it! He wasn’t even one hundred percent sure he understood what it was that Hartley was trying to tell him. As he understood it, Hartley was saying that he wanted more. And by “more”, he meant a relationship of some sort. Well, they already had a relationship, and it was one that Curtis was definitely happy with, but Hartley, if Curtis knew his friend the way he thought he knew him, was talking about the kind of huggy, kissy, “going on dates”, “celebrating Valentine’s Day together” kind of relationship. He wanted Curtis to be his boyfriend.
Even while ranting at himself in his mind, Curtis almost choked on the word. It was foreign to his tongue. For what reason would a heterosexual male have to say the word “boyfriend”? I mean, sure, he’d said the word before, in passing, in reference to other peoples’ boyfriends, but he’d never, to this day, used that word to refer to himself in any way. Straight guys didn’t have boyfriends and that was that!
But Ah, a nasty, niggling voice said in the back of Curtis’ head. Are you a straight guy, though? Really? Are you actually, properly-being serious about that? That’s not a hilarious joke?
Curtis didn’t blame his self-accusing consciousness from laughing at the pathetic attempt at denial, or deception, or whatever it was. For years upon years, Curtis had avoided labeling himself because he was afraid - no, terrified about what that might mean for him! What if he came to the conclusion that he didn’t like girls anymore, he liked boys? What if he decided he liked both? To change one’s entire sexuality, that was just a level of stress and commitment that Curtis really just was not ready for, and he had neither the desire nor the intention to be ready for it.
But Hartley was here, now, and he was offering Curtis something really special. Curtis knew enough about their relationship to know that they got on like a house on fire. Not only were they both special, but they both had very similar personalities. They both came from religious and ethnic backgrounds if you take into account Curtis’ late mother, who was American.
They both loved watching the same programs on TV. The list was endless. It was one of the reasons that they had become such good friends so quickly. And clearly, they were both attracted to each other, although of late, Curtis had felt as though it was something completely different. Something much more powerful than mere attraction. You could resist the attraction, but Curtis found he could more easily sever off his own leg than resist Hartley.
He was gorgeous, and part of himself hated himself for saying it, even in his own head, but it was true. When they’d first met, they’d both been virgins, which shamed Curtis to say it, given that he’d been in his early twenties. Hartley had been struggling with his sexuality during that time, and sex was kind of off the table until he at least worked out which gender he wanted to do it with, Hartley had claimed that he owed himself that much, at least!
So, it was almost as though, Curtis had courted Hartley without even meaning to. He bought him things, without Hartley having to ask. Just little things, a cup of coffee, a new pen when his one had broken. But for Hartley, it was the little things that mattered. They always hung out together, because Hartley was the only person in basic training that Curtis really felt as though he clicked with.
There were others that he was friendly with, hell, there were even others who he liked and enjoyed the company of. That was pretty much a given, but there was nobody who could ever replace the Hartley-shaped hole in Curtis’ heart, not after he left. But before he left California for England the first time, Curtis and Hartley had shared something special, even though neither of them quite knew where they wanted it to lead. The something special being Curtis’ first time, he was awkward and awful, the way that everybody is on their first time. But neither boy would ever forget it, losing their virginities to each other. It would stay with them for as long as they would live, stronger when they were kept apart.
When Curtis got back to the UK, he had the strange idea that girls would fill the crevice in his heart where nothing else could. And ever since losing his virginity, Curtis had discovered a new sexual confidence that made his game all the easier. He’d never been a bad-looking guy, but his nerves were messing up his game before. With them removed, nothing stood in his way, and the girls kept coming ever since.
But the more girls that Curtis slept with, the more that he wined and dined, the more that he took out on expensive dates with the handsome wages that he was receiving from being an agent for Cicada, and one of the best agents at that, the less he felt like they were actually working anymore. For a while, the shallow girls that Curtis dated were able to provide him with some form of companionship, but in the end, it wasn’t enough, and pretty soon, Curtis stopped having sex completely. Except for the times where he saw Hartley, of course, be that by chance or by design.
When the two were together, they could never manage to keep their hands off of each other, no matter how hard they tried. Not that they had ever actually tried that hard, of course. Curtis couldn’t actually count how many times they’d had sex, which, incidentally, was strictly against Cicada protocol, to have adult relations with another agent while on a mission.
But at the end of the day, who was there to tell? There’d been times when they’d nearly been caught, times far closer than the harmless blowjob on the jet plane on the way out of Hong Kong, and Curtis had come very close to having mental breakdowns on those occasions. Coming out to his father and his siblings was something he didn’t even want to contemplate the possibility of, never mind actually do. And he knew that if his family discovered this secret in such a crude way, by actually seeing him doing it, that could very well open up a rift between his family and him that could never be repaired. Curtis couldn’t do that, he simply couldn’t.
Suddenly, Curtis was broken out of his daydream, by someone calling his name sharply. He opened his eyes; of course, it was Valon. They were standing in the middle of their barrack block again. Curtis frowned. When had they got here? He remembered leaving the Mess Hall, but not much else. Had he been in some sort of trance. Because if so, that was awesome.
“These look like briefings to me,” Valon was saying, flipping the lid of a laptop that had been left in the middle of the floor. “Everyone in a good place? We don’t know if we can play this again, so everybody needs to listen in.”
It was an excellent point. Curtis was starting to see what Valon meant about technical agents being worth their salt. He never would have thought of something like that; he must have infiltrated buildings and stolen sensitive data hundreds of times, but he never actually watched any of it! No, he just sent it back to the tech analysts and logistics agents.
>
Curtis took a knee beside Valon’s bed, ready to watch. The screen was that of a map. It took Curtis longer than he was proud of to realize that it was a map of Base Camp Pendleton. Little yellow x’s were crisscrossed all over the map, in seemingly random places.
“Those are stashes,” Curtis said knowledgeably. “Weapons, rations, technology. We will 100% need to stock up as soon as we can.”
“Hold up,” Valon said. “Look what it says here.”
Emblazoned at the top of the map, were words that spelled out the name of the game. CAPTURE THE FLAG. “I guess that that has something to do with it,” Curtis inclined his head toward the far end of the building. Somebody had balanced a large blue flag on a pole against the wall.
“You might be right,” Valon snorted. “Just maybe.”
Chapter Seven
The game was on!
Not that Hartley would ever actually admit this to anyone, but not only was he impressed from how quickly and instinctively Curtis reacted in the Mess Hall when grenades started flying. Ultimately, sure, it had been part of the simulation, but what if it hadn’t? Hartley, more likely than not, would have had his knees blown into his face. As they left the Mess, Hartley couldn’t stop blaming and chastising himself for his sloppy reactions.
Ten years of training as a field agent for one of the best, if not the best, intelligence agency in the world and here was the result. Hartley knew from experience that the worst thing you could do in these situations was to beat yourself up; all dwelling in the past did was take away some of your focus that could be on the present. And yet he couldn’t stop. Saying the words was one thing, but to break a habit as old as yourself, that took real mastery of oneself. It took more than the ten years that Hartley had given to the job, and it took patience, above all else. And Hartley was one of the most impatient people around, it was one of the catalysts that held him back in his martial arts training, according to his sensei.
If they were scoring this early in the combat simulation, then Hartley would not have felt that it was a gamble to assume that Curtis was ahead, if only by a slight lead. It definitely didn’t help the situation that Hartley couldn’t even concentrate on his own thoughts after that kiss. It’d made his head float, and his heart flutter and he’d just wanted to stay there, curled up in the smoke, forever. How could one person make another person feel all that?
Hartley knew deep down why he felt that way, he had known for the longest time but just tried to deny it at all counts, especially with Curtis around but it was harder to deny his true feelings as they started to come to the surface. It wasn’t just the sex he wanted, he wanted Curtis. He knew he could be asking too much, it wasn’t a secret that Curtis wasn’t yet ready to call himself what he actually is but for Hartley, he already knew that Curtis was in denial about it all.
One thing was for certain, Hartley’s concentration and his focus were both split in two, a dangerous place for a soldier, or a field agent to find himself, especially in the field of battle. Especially as a team leader! Hartley knew what he needed to do, he needed to find some way of pulling his team together and clearing his own head at the same time. It was almost as though Hartley were no longer in control of its own mind, thoughts and impulses ran free, imagination careened into overdrive, and he just sat there; no longer the driver but a passenger, along for the ride.
Hartley had been expecting a full-blown briefing, with mission points and guidelines to follow. All they’d found waiting for them inside their barracks building was a laptop with a picture of a map on it and a giant flag. Hartley didn’t even have to read the game name; upon evidence given, he took a wild stab in the dark and came up correct, landing on a proper footing.
The map was clearly the most important thing that they had been given, at least it was in Hartley’s estimation. And yet, fortune was with them also, and, as Hartley had learned, luck is never a bad thing to have on your side. Unless it’s bad luck, of course, in which case it’s a terrible thing to have on your team. Thanks to their good luck, not only was their bunker a bit closer to the Mess Hall than Valiant Team’s, meaning they would get there quicker, but they stumbled upon a hidden cache of items on their way to their bunker, without even needing the map.
True enough, the hidden cache only carried one time, a length of rope, but it was better than nothing! But once they’d located the map and set back out from the bunker, Hartley knew exactly what to do with the length of rope, and he had a theory that perhaps it was placed where it had been placed specifically for this task.
Only time would tell, and of course, if he was wrong, then there was an extremely high chance that he could die a horrific death, but then again what was that saying? Without sacrifice, there can be no victory? Something like that. Hartley was moved to wonder just how much victory was worth to him, especially to volunteer to do this, in his condition.
A little-known fact about the fearless Chief Agent Wisconsin, also known as Hartley James Erose, was that Hartley Erose was not as fearless as everyone thought. And two of his biggest fears included the dark, and heights. So exactly what possessed him to volunteer to bungee jump down a well with only a length of rope tied around his waist, he didn’t know.
As the team leader, Hartley felt like he should set an example, test his fear, push his limits, and perhaps his team would be inspired to do the same. It was a lovely thought, but he’d forgotten to factor in the very real possibility of “what if he just froze on the edge of the well, and then proceeded to pee his pants”? A leader who pees his pants is not a leader who inspires devotion or actually followers!”
But the die was cast, and the seeds were sown, and there Hartley stood, on the edge of an old, abandoned-looking well while two members of the team wound the rather thin-looking rope around his midriff. “Are you sure about this, Wisconsin?” one of his other team members, a Navy SEAL by the name of Karen McCullough, asked. She’d so far showed herself to be perhaps the most level-headed team member, and so she was now essentially serving as Hartley’s Number Two. He would much have preferred to have had Agent Milwaukee on his team, but the only Columbus agents on his team didn’t even have codenames. Hartley had Agent 77 and Agent 104, who were, so far, no help to anybody.
“Yes, McCullough, I’m sure,” Hartley said, taking a deep breath as he gave the rope a bit of a yank. “Now, remember, guys, do not let go of the rope. I’m serious!”
Hartley was very sure, call it 99% sure that something tasty was hidden at the bottom of an abandoned well. Firstly, it was exactly where he would hide something. He didn’t actually know what “it” was or would be, but he was fairly sure it wouldn’t be literally tasty, he’d meant that as a figure of speech, not actual food. Which moron would have food down a moist well where it could develop mold?”
“Okay, boss, you ready to take the plunge?” McCullough asked.
Hartley nodded with his back to her so that she wouldn’t see the obvious terror on his face. He would feel so much better about this situation if he had an actual bungee cord, a bunch of elastic strands woven together into a secure core and sheathed in polypropylene. Even just thinking about it made Hartley think about how safe he could have been, had he had the right equipment.
At this point, he’d even take a winch, even a rusty one, albeit if it worked. Hartley had been standing up there so long, he hadn’t noticed that McCullough had told him to jump like three times. Next second, he felt a hand on his back, giving him a rough shove. Hartley was ashamed to say he squealed like a little girl as he fell. Fortunately, he still had the presence of mind to tuck in his arms and legs, otherwise, they would’ve got broken on the way in and he’d have been in agonizing agony.
Hartley leaned forward, shifting his center of gravity, and extending his arms and legs out behind him, which made him fall quicker, as he was more streamlined. “Rope!” he screamed out, and the shape of the well made his voice echo, carrying all the way to the top of the well, as he’d planned. Suddenly, his descent was hal
ted.
Hartley did a silent prayer to whichever Gods happened to be listening that he didn’t just go splat on the bottom of the well because it was too shallow. If the floor of the well had been five feet in, he would have had no idea because of how dark it was. Screaming “rope” like a girl was really not how Hartley envisioned himself going out one day, which is the sad irony of the situation; nobody ever went out how they envisioned.
Hartley reached out below him with both hands, and it was a miracle, he felt his fingers scrape against something. Not ground, or wall, this felt man-made. Like it had been left down here for somebody to find, his theory was true!
Hartley decided to calm down until his plan had actually begun to bore any fruitful results.
“Boss!” McCullough shouted from the top of the well. “Do you see anything down there?”
“Is that a joke?” Hartley called back. “Because all I can see down here is you guys’ ugly faces looking down on me! I think I might feel something, but I can’t reach. I need more rope.”
“Copy that!” McCullough called. “Standby!”
Hartley felt himself drop a few inches, and his fingers fell upon what felt like a metal box, another stash crate! “Guys, I think we hit the jackpot! Pull me back up!”
After a lot of heaving, huffing, puffing, and panting, Hartley was being pulled by the scruff of his neck and by the seat of his combat trousers over the side of the well. He crushed down into the mud and grass, breathing deeply, with his fingers clutching the box.
McCullough crouched next to him. “Boss, do you have vertigo?”
Hartley made a face at this. “Are you crazy? Just open the box, see if I risked my neck for something good.”