The man had kidnapped me while I was walking down an alley
in the afternoon, the sun had started to turn a bright yellowy orange. My
converse were quiet against the concrete, it had rained so there were small splashes
when I stepped. The air still smelled like rain. It felt good to breathe it in,
this town needed some rain. I was halfway between the brick buildings when I
felt someone watching me, he wasted no time in snatching me up and pulling me
back into the shadows. I tried to fight back, but my small body was no match. I
heard the clink if metal and turned my head enough to see his dog tags hanging
around his neck, army I thought
silently. I saved my breath and didn’t bother screaming, he had his large muscular
hand over the bottom portion of my face. At
least he’s letting me breathe. I fought his grip as much as I could for the
better part of what I assumed to be about 15 minutes, then I gave up.
“You killed my wife, I was in Afghanistan.” He said harshly
in a deep and angry voice. One of my clients had mentioned a target’s husband
being stationed in Afghanistan. They failed to mention that he could find me, I
should have been more careful. He continued, “My newborn is missing, you’re
going to tell me where he is.” Newborn? The
client never mentioned a newborn, and there wasn’t a newborn in the house when
I was fulfilling my client’s orders. “His mother was dead, and he was
alone.” I furrowed my brow, and he must have noticed. His face contorted with
anger. “That’s why you took him, and hid him somewhere. You’re a thief and a
murderer!” he tightened his grip on my shoulders, making me wince in pain. He
zip-tied my hands behind my back and pushed me along in front of him, forcing
me to walk. “Quiet or I’ll snap your neck.” I obeyed and he walked me to his
car. It was a beat up old Honda that I didn’t know the name of. He closed the
door and got into the driver’s seat, I wasn’t nervous until now. This guy knew
what he was doing and wasn’t afraid of the consequences. I started to sweat in
fear of what might happen to me, there was no escape.
We drove for a while, there were no clocks so I had no way
of telling time other than the sun on the road. The sunset was a bright red,
and the clouds were in a beautiful swirl pattern. I enjoyed the sunset as much
as possible, somehow I knew it was my last. We arrived at a metal warehouse in
the middle of the desert soon after. He got me out of the car and walked me
into the large metal building, the door was metal as well. The large metal
structure was dark, there weren’t any visible windows from where we walked in.
there was a large wall that divided the room into two, it only went to about
halfway in between the walls and the other half was open to the rest of the warehouse.
We walked in and behind the wall there was one small window next to a single
chair with rope and a green duffle bag on the floor, the window faced into the
forest that lay behind the warehouse. It was dark and a light breeze was making
the tall pine trees sway gently.
He pushed me into the chair and tied me to it so I couldn’t move.
“Look,” I paused as he looked over to me while unzipping the duffle. “I don’t have
your son, he wasn’t even in the house when I was there… there weren’t any
things for a baby either, no crib, no toys or a room for him. He was gone before
I got there.” I waited for an answer but he was silent as he pulled a large
object out of the bag, I couldn’t see what it was because of the immense
darkness engulfing the rest of the warehouse. His phone rang and he stood up,
he walked back out the door and I heard muffled speech. I couldn’t make out
what he was saying and pulled on the rope that held me in my chair. It was no
use, I was going to die here. He walked back in the door and I decided to try
again. “Please let me help you find him, I know how to find people. Please let
me go so that I can help!” I pleaded, my eyes widened as he turned to me with
the mysterious object in hand. “ I know you don’t have him, my buddy got him
out of there before you could get to him. But that still leaves us with one
more problem. You killed my wife.”
He walked behind me and started to attach the mechanism to
my chair and I heard quiet beeps. He stood up and walked to the duffle bag, he
zipped it and picked it up and turned to me. “I just strapped a bomb to your
chair, I made it myself. It’s a pretty nasty one, you won’t survive I made sure
of that. And you should feel the shrapnel pierce your skin and organs before
you die. It will go off soon so I’m going to get out of here.” Then he turned
and started walking toward the door. “ Wait, please! I can help! I’ll tell you
who payed me to kill her! Please let me go!” he payed no attention to me and
left. I struggled against the rope for the next few minutes, it didn’t budge. I
started crying, this was the end. After all this fighting I was going to die.
A few more minutes passed by and the beeping stopped… I froze,
I didn’t move or breathe. The beeping was fast and then it was over. The bomb
was loud, and he was right. I felt the shrapnel pierce through my skull and
into my brain. Then I was scattered across the floor in a charred bloody mess,
the warehouse was exploded as well. He chose his location well, nobody heard. No
one drove by, in fact nobody ever found my body, or what was left of it. My story
wasn’t particularly interesting, but for some it might be. I died so young. I was
soon forgotten by everyone who ever knew me, and with that I didn’t exist
anymore. Well, at least I went out with a bang, right?
Original Work by P.H.
