Distressed: Enemy Of The State- Book 1 (3 page)

***

Dylan watched from the docks as the ship sank into the waters. The terrorists had done that with every vessel they’d used so far. They refused to leave any trace for the authorities to find, and having the ocean consume the evidence seemed to be the most efficient way to accomplish it.

As had become customary, Dylan was blindfolded and thrown into the back of a vehicle, where he was driven to another location that would have a car waiting for him so he could drive home. Once they’d reached their destination, Kasaika shoved Dylan out of the van, tore off the blindfold, then chucked the keys at him. “Red sedan.” He shut the door, and the van peeled off, leaving Dylan alone in the abandoned parking lot.

The drives back were usually quick, and Dylan spent the time listening to the news. The bombs he’d helped deliver were being detonated at ports, businesses, gas stations, power stations, and public transportation. Each new report made him cringe, but he needed to hear it.

Fathers lost sons, sons lost fathers, and families were being torn apart. One by one, these terrorists were slowly crippling the country. Fear now governed people’s actions, and the boarded-up windows and closed signs of businesses Dylan saw on the drive back to Boston only solidified that fear was winning.

It was nearly noon when Dylan pulled into the driveway of Mark’s small, one-bedroom house. The surrounding neighborhood was nothing more than a collection of sagging roofs and weed-infested lawns overgrowing and spilling onto the sidewalk. While the accommodations weren’t ideal, Dylan was thankful to have a friend.

When Dylan stepped inside, the heat was just as intense in the house as it was outside. Mark was sprawled out on the couch and drinking out of a gallon water jug with a straw fashioned from a cluster of other straws. “Looks like you’ve been busy.”

Mark shifted on the couch, clutching the bandages around his stomach. “Goddamn medicine keeps drying me out. It’s like I’ve got salt in my stomach.” His shirt was open, exposing the grey hairs on his chest and the bandages over the stitches on his gut. Mark had spent most of his time on the island that was the couch. When Dylan left, he was there, and when Dylan came home, he looked as though he’d never even moved.

“You change that bandage yet today?” Dylan pointed to the discolored white and set his bag next to his pile of things he’d brought over after Homeland Security had confiscated his house when Perry took his son.

“Not yet,” Mark answered, gingerly shifting himself to a sitting position, groaning the entire way. Dylan helped pull Mark up, and he fell against the back cushions with a grunt. “It was too hot to do anything.”

Even with the windows open, the heat inside the house was sweltering. It’d been almost three days without power and no sign of it coming back on anytime soon. Red Cross trucks roamed the neighborhoods with food rations, water, and medical supplies. Even if some people wanted to go to work, most couldn’t. Fuel was dwindling, and the attacks on transportation routes were clogging up what streets hadn’t been torn up. It wasn’t like anything Dylan had ever seen in his lifetime. “C’mon, let’s get you cleaned up.”

Mark snatched the battery-powered radio he kept by the couch. It was his one connection to the outside world. The two men leaned on each other, and once they made it into the bathroom, Dylan helped Mark sit on the edge of the bathtub. The radio channel was turned to the news, which spit a constant flow of information in a seamless fashion.

“Another attack just south of Washington, DC, has left over twenty thousand without power, as one of the substations was bombed last night. Authorities have frozen any and all devices and materials used to make such weapons, but the attacks still keep coming. It is believed by the president’s administration that the terrorists are using a stockpile of previously assembled weapons to continue their reign of destruction.”

Dylan peeled the bandage off and tossed it in the trash. The wound was wet with slime, and Dylan used gloved hands to clean around the stitches. Mark winced a few times, the bruising around the stomach still healing.

“Ports along the East Coast have been under the most scrutiny lately, as the transportation of these devices is believed to be accomplished by sea. The Navy, Coast Guard, and reserves have been called in full force to patrol the waterways, but the sheer number of square miles has made it difficult to capture the terrorists, and the increased security has left millions of imports from other countries to be backed up, affecting businesses all around the country. Bodies were recovered from a Coast Guard unit that was believed to have been attacked last night by the terrorist organization. Three bodies have been recovered, and the two missing are also believed to be dead.”

Mark glanced at Dylan, and the two made eye contact. “Christ.” Mark shook his head. His jaw was clenched, and his face scrunched in preparation of pain as Dylan gently applied the disinfectant over and around the stitches. “That you?”

Mark was the only one who knew the truth about what Dylan was doing and how Perry was blackmailing him with his own son. His daughter, his ex-wife, the authorities, everyone else was in the dark. “Yeah.” Dylan dumped the cleaning tools and applied the fresh bandage over the stitches, doing his best to keep the sweat off the area until it was sealed tight. He wiped his brow and sat on the closed toilet lid.

Mark rolled his T-shirt down and shifted uncomfortably on the narrow edge. “It’s for your boy, Dylan. Any good father who gave a damn about his family would do the same. But you need to start thinking of an exit strategy. This can’t go on forever.”

“I know.” Getting out had plagued Dylan’s mind since the moment they were first boarded, when Mark was shot by the very terrorists Dylan was now helping. He’d looked at it from every angle he could, but the only way he was going to get out of this was either in cuffs or in a box six feet under. Both would devastate his kids, and neither was preferable. “I didn’t ask for this.”

“Hey.” Mark’s words snapped him out of his daze. The old man had the same look in his eyes as they did when he was chewing out a greenhorn on his first trip out to sea. “You’re past asking, needing, or wanting, Captain. You’re in the storm now, and the swells are only going to get higher.”

Dylan knew he was right. Things were going to get worse before they got better. If he wanted to make it out alive and not end up in a jail cell, then he’d have to get something that both parties wanted. He knew the government wouldn’t pardon him for his involvement just because of his son. “They’re running with some high-tech gear on the boats. Radar jamming, cloaking. It looks like military grade. I might be able to—”

“Local authorities believe that the death of veteran harbormaster Dayton Clowdy was suicide, and no foul play is suspected.”

The news caught both Dylan and Mark by surprise. Dayton Clowdy had been the harbormaster at their docks for twenty years. When Dylan gave his report to the agent who was on scene, she had asked about him, told him that he hadn’t reported their trip the day they were boarded by the terrorists at sea. Cooper said she thought he was working with the terrorists, but what she didn’t know was who the terrorists were working for.
Perry.

Dylan shot up from his seat. His chest felt tight. He sprinted into the living room then out into the front yard. He hunched over, resting his palms just above his knees. A sour pit churned in his stomach, and he fought to keep it down. Was this his fate? Just waiting for Perry to finish him off whenever he didn’t need him anymore?
Maybe.
All he knew was if he didn’t do something soon, then his fate would be like that of Dayton Clowdy. Just another disguised suicide and a name in the obituaries.

Kasaika rose from his prayers and rolled up his mat and tucked it in the corner with his other belongings. The one window in his room bathed everything in orange as the sun showered its fading light into the sky outside. Looking out into the trees and wilderness of this country had caused him to long for home. He never thought he’d miss the rolling hills of sand, but here in the noisy warehouse where there was little rest, it was all he could think about.

The death of Amarah had hit him harder than he thought. Kasaika barely knew the boy, but he was still just that, a boy. His detestation for Perry had only grown since then, but the rest of the organization allowed Perry to keep his seat at the head of the table, so long as he was able to deliver. And even Kasaika had to concede that their operations had run efficiently smooth with the intelligence that Perry provided. In the end, Kasaika justified his relationship with the devil to help his kingdom of heaven. And every news feed that he saw, telling him of their crippling of this nation, only fueled his desires.

The warehouse was busy as usual, men rushing back and forth, loading rifles, guns, bombs, whatever was required for the next attack. The massive floor was broken down into units, each dealing with a section of the country and each group boasting to their neighbors how many they’d killed. It was a game Kasaika didn’t take part in. It didn’t matter the individual number, only the total. He’d watched thousands of his own people die at the hands of tyrant rulers, foreign armies, and skirmishes amongst themselves. All Kasaika cared about was paying back that number two-fold.

Kasaika picked up a ration meal and a bottle of water and made his way to the far corner of the warehouse. A large metal shipping container had been placed there in which Dylan’s son was kept. Kasaika pulled at the heavy door, and the metal cringed as it opened.

The fluorescent lights from the warehouse flooded the darkened tomb up until the last ten feet of the container, which was where Sean lay hidden. “Food, boy.” Kasaika tossed the box of rations, and it skidded across the rusted floor. The water bottle he tossed rolled a little farther. The waste bucket was already by the door, filled. Kasaika grabbed it and went to shut the door when the boy appeared from the shadows.

“My dad.” Sean stood half bathed in light and half in darkness. His hair was oily and messy, and his clothes were soiled. “Tell me.”

“He’s still alive, boy.” Kasaika had told the boy about his father, how they were using him. Sean took a few more steps into the light, his face twisted in the effort of relief and grief. “You want me to tell you how many people he helped kill today?” The boy’s fists clenched at his sides, and Kasaika smiled.

“My dad will come and get me. He’ll do whatever it takes.” Sean was as thin as a rail, no older than Kasaika’s own nephews and nieces.

Kasaika set the bucket of waste down and stepped inside the metal tomb, his heavy feet ringing through the container with each step. To the boy’s credit, he did not back down. “Your father will die by our hands or the hands of your government. Either way, you will not make it out alive.”

“Then why are you taking care of me?”

Kasaika knelt down to meet the boy at eye level. The smell stung his nostrils and eyes, and up close he could see the resemblance of the boy’s father in him. The look of wild fear in his eyes, held together with a quiet reserve. “Leverage. You’re alive so your father can die.”

Sean shoved Kasaika hard with both arms, but the boy’s weight and force weren’t enough to throw Kasaika off kilter. Kasaika palmed the side of the boy’s head and knocked him to the ground. “But remember that we don’t have to keep you in one piece to keep you alive.”

Kasaika shut the door, and once against sentenced the boy to darkness. He tossed the waste bucket outside and did not return it. He found his brother-in-law, Sefkh, and joined him in a meeting with Perry.

“Shut the door,” Perry said.

Sefkh locked the three of them in the room. Kasaika stood opposite Perry and glanced down at the papers under the glow of the lamp. He picked one of them up, his jaw dropping slightly in awe. “This is it?” He looked to both Perry and Sefkh.

Perry reached over and snatched the paper from Kasaika’s hands. “Yes.” Perry placed the paper back into the pile with the rest and adjusted the watch on his wrist. “Sefkh will fill you in on the details, but the shipment we need is coming in less than three days. There are no others. If we want to finish this strike, then we will need this device.”

“Tell the captain he will be needed,” Sefkh said. “We’ll be using the river as the main escape route.”

Perry meandered over to Kasaika, his hands running along the edges of the table. “You’ve been taking care of his boy?” Perry stopped once he reached the other side. His body leaned against the table, his arms and legs slanted at an angle that Kasaika would have believed would snap his bones in half.

“I have,” Kasaika answered.

Perry stepped around Kasaika, moving toward the front of the room. He shifted his head from side to side then abruptly turned. “I understand that you had a problem with the way I handled Amarah.”

“I may not agree with your methods, but I cannot argue with your results.”

Perry laughed and clutched his stomach, waving a finger at Kasaika. “It sounds like Western capitalism is growing on you. Thinking about buying some stocks, Kasaika? I can guarantee that right now everything is cheap. The financial markets are in ruin, and people are selling whatever they can just to make ends meet, and how long have we been at it? A week? And we haven’t even begun to show them what we are able to do.” Perry squeezed his fist so hard the large, lumpy knuckles on his hand cracked from the pressure. “This is our time. And I need men who are willing to do what needs to be done.”

Kasaika looked from Perry to Sefkh, his brow furrowed. “I don’t understand.”

“The boy will have to die eventually,” Sefkh said.

“And I want you to be the one who does it.”

Kasaika had killed men, dozens. His country had been so ravaged by war and conflict that it was the only thing he’d known for most of his life. When he was a boy, he watched soldiers, grown men, mow down women and children in villages. He hid under the ruins of an old building where his father had put him when the war factions came. But in all the wars he’d fought, in all his fights, he’d never killed a child. He wavered slightly, shifting uncomfortably with Perry so close to him, watching him with those eyes. Kasaika had never seen anything so alive and dead as Perry’s eyes. “What good will the boy’s death bring us?”

“There will come a time when I need the captain to lose all hope in his life, to break him. Right now he’s holding onto the belief that he can somehow get his son back. It’s his last shred of hope, a connection to a life he still thinks he can have. We need him to believe that. And one day soon, that same hope will strangle what life is left in him. He’s justifying everything he’s doing in the name of his family,” Perry said.

“Why don’t we just kill the captain?” Kasaika asked.

Perry cocked his head to the side then quickly rolled up the shirt sleeve of his left arm and thrust the scarred and disfigured flesh in front of Kasaika’s face. “Pain,” Perry said. “It’s what all of this is about. People don’t understand why we suffer, why we bleed, why we have spent our lives washing ourselves in the blood of revenge. It is pain, Kasaika. The same pain that you witnessed in your country, the same that I have in my own. It has controlled us, and we will control it!”

Both Perry and Sefkh smiled. Kasaika took a step back. “Control? The only control is with Allah. He decides who will suffer and who will be granted entry into his kingdom. Not us. This is folly, Sefkh. We may be winning the war, but we are losing our souls!” Kasaika’s body shook. His feet kept the pace of retreat until he backed into the wall, into the shadows of the room. Perry and Sefkh still remained in the light, their faces twisted in the yellow of the lamp above.

“Souls?” Perry asked, taking a step out of the light and joining Kasaika in the darkness. “Your soul, like that of every other man in this fight, is poisoned. Tainted by the very same men who proclaimed love for another god, and as such marked me as the claimer of souls.” Perry was covered in shadows and had pinned Kasaika against the wall. “And I will take your soul when it is time, just like the others.”

The moments when Kasaika was a boy, when soldiers had come to his village, when he first experienced the horrors of war, had always caused a chill to ripple down his back. It was a shaking that plagued him through most of his childhood, because his young mind saw nothing but the devil. As he grew older, he understood that the men he saw were only instruments of the devil, sent to do his work. But standing there in the hot dark, his back against the wall, staring into Perry’s face, the chills returned. This man was no instrument. Kasaika was present with the devil himself.