NationStates Jolt Archive

Anders was twelve when he fired his first gun.

It had been a cool autumn day, fog thick and heavy, frost on the leaves casting patterns of light across the red checker of his father's heavy flannel shirt. He lay face down in the dirt, cradling the rifle, both exhilirated and very, very frightened.

So despite the fact he was crouched behing an empty oil barrel in the dingy confines of an abandoned foundry, he wasn't suprised to catch a whiff of rotting leaves as he loaded his pistol, cautiously and with great care to leave the silence unbroken. He could smell the gunpowder in the air, and it too reminded him of that die, when he'd ended his first life.

The rabbit, mottled brown and white, nibbled at a desperate-looking blade of grass, unaware of the would-be hunter only a dozen feet away. It trembled slightly, as if it could sense Ander's finger slowly tightening, squeezing ever harder.

Pistol reloaded, he wiped the sweat and grime from his brow, peering around the barrel at the hallway which stretched ahead of him. He crept forward, pistol outstretched steady before him, his suit now tattered and dragging with a low hiss on the concrete floor. His heart pounded, but his mind was calm; he'd been hunting this one for months now, and he felt sure his quarry would not escape.

The rabbit certainly hadn't. The report of the rifle had cut through the still day with a furious crack, nearly defeaning ears that had strained for the slightest sound. He'd been both triumphant and nauseous as the rabbit lay still, soft fur soaked in blood. He'd also had a vague sense of distate- it had been so careful, so cautious, yet to no avail. He remembered the thought that had flashed through his mind: Sometimes it doesn't matter what you do; sometimes no matter how hard you try, the hunter still gets you.

As he peered down the hallway, eyes sore in the flickering neon of stark industrial lighting, he realized the irony of the thought just a little too late. He spun around just in time to take the bullet in the chest rather than the back.

As he sank rapidly into oblivion, he thought of nothing but the smell of dead leaves.

ooc- a new nation pour moi!

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The ventiliator pump hissed and wheezed like a tired chainsmoker, uneven gusts of wind punctuated by the stacatto beeps of arcane monitors. The jaundiced cieling was cracked and moldering, laminate panelling dating back to at least the sixties. His head hurt, his chest hurt; the taste of blood was thick and acrid, coating his tongue with a sick taint of plastic and camphor.

Footsteps approached; a face hovered perhaps a foot, perhaps a mile above him, wavering in and out of obscurity.

"Anders."

The voice was hoarse and cracked, familiar and somewhat comforting.

"Anders... I don't know if you call hear me..."

It was soft, deadly serious.

"They tell me... they tell me you're not going to make it..."

The words are incomprehensible, some foreign language drumming into his skull without meaning or substance.

"I told them you're a hero, you're a patriot. I told them I won't let you die."

The face was as old and cracked as the cieling, thin and hard. The eyes, liquid and blue... Anders remembered them stern and judging... but now they watered, downcast and red-rimmed.

"I told them I won't let you die, and I swear to God I won't."

A heavy pause fills the air, and he closes his eyes, nearly sinking back into the warm bath of unconciousness. A last drawn out phrase before he returns from the blissful depths of sleep.

"Anders... They can't fix you. But I'm sending you to someone who can..."

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The air was heavy with moisture, hot and close, smelling faintly of urine and blood. Eyes opening slowly to a dim roon, cast a dusty grey in the oscillating lighting cast about by an archaic fan. It was almost totally empty, watermarks clearly visible on sagging wallpaper and exposed crumbling plaster. He turned his head slightly, and in a gasping cough began dry heaving. The contractions sent bolts of pain into his side, he wavered, and collapsed.

Some hours later, he opened his eyes again, this time level with bare rotting floor boards. His head was sore, sticky with dried blood. Cautiously, he pulled up his soiled nondescript smock, revealing a lump of scar tissue, still oozing, where the agent's bullet had entered. He was shocked he was alive; the man's gun had been massive, a bulk of fierce metal nearly twice the size of his standard issue Glock.

Clutching the reusted bed post, he pulled himself to his feet; agonizingly slow and deliberta, he mamged to seat himself up right against the wall. Ignoring the tearing in his side, he took a deep breath, and began to scream.

'Mr. Anders. I see you've finally awakened. How do you feel?'

The room was mahogany and velevet, smeeling strongly of sweet cigar smoke and spilled scotch. Despite the lush upholstering and rich hardwoods, it was underpinned by a distinctive sense of decay, a vague sense of transience and despair. Though the light cast by the fireplace was bright, cheerfully flickering, it too had an unsettling pallor, and failed to warm his aching guts. He shifted selfconciously on the worn leather chair, comfortable despite its leaking stuffing, focusing on the speaker.

This man, introduced simply as Mister Jones, sat stolidly behing a massive oak desk; this piece of furniture possessed a stark reality absent from the surroundings. He was very pale, with short bristling hear, corpulence poured into a suit that looked to have been in style decades ago. His face was soft and saggy, and on the whole he looked something like a slowly melting candle. His voice was halting, monotone, with an unnatural emphasis on certain syllables; it was very disorienting and somewhat hypnotic.

'Mr. Anders... it's a pleasure to have you here. We can always use a few good men. Then enemy never sleeps...'

Jones looked down at the open filed, stuffed with snapshots, certificates and arcane forms that mapped out the whole of Ander's life.

'Yes... you're experienced... 5 years in the Marines, 10 with the FBI, and then another 10 with the Major... you'll do nicely.'

Anders found himself unable to speak, unable to move, as Jones droned on.

'Mr. Anders... you'll be leaving within the hour. We'll get you cleaned up in a moment. First, though...'

Behind Jones and his monolithic desk, a screen slowly descended, torn and shabby as the man himself. With a press of a button, a picture was displayed, wavering slightly in grainy black and white.
http://www.crimelibrary.com/graphics/photos/terrorists_spies/spies/fuchs/1b.jpg

'You will kill this man, Mr. Anders. You will not ask why. You will not ask who. Your training will be more than sufficient.'

Jones turned slightly towards the projector screen.
http://www.hotels-hoteles.com/Argentina/Ar056.jpg

'This building will be 50 yards from your LZ. Upon arrival, you will have 5 minutes to enter, go into room 134 and terminate the subject. You will then return to the LZ for extraction. Good luck, Mr. Anders.'

With that, the projector shut off, casting the room back into the pallid glow of the dying fire.

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(I am reading this, just to let you know...)

(Claps at quality of post for a new person, unless it is someone experianced making a new nation :D )

He was wrapped in total darkness, a heady smell of dust and mothballs filling his nostrils, bring back memories of grandparents and overflowing attics, old furs and yellow photographs. He struggled, fumbeled his gun then managed to jam the closet door open; sunlighting blinding him as clear golden rays soaked over his sickly skin. He crouched, retrieving the weapon, and taking in his surounding: a plain single room, most likely a hotel room judging from the abhorrent paintings. Most likely a woman's room: brasseries, looking to be made of silk and whalebone, were draped over the back of a plain chair. He could here someone singing softly in a high voice, moving around in the bathroom. Bent almost double, clutching his side, he burst out the door, down the sunny hallway, and out the door.

He found himself on a street in an unknown tropical town' the smell of fresh fruit and flowers minging into a heady bouquet, the sound of spanish voices and classical music filling his ears. Directly across from him was the hotel from the picture; unremarkable and plain. Shielding his eyes, gun thrust deep into the pocket of his old-fashioned 50s era blazer, he crossed the street, lined with the outdated vehicles found so often in latin America, and entered into the dim lobby.

A heavyset man at the lobby desk jabbered at him, but Anders had long since forgotten the little spanish he'd ever learned. Ignoring the clerk's angry voice, he pushed aside a bead curtain, walked down an unlit corridor, stopping in from of room 134.

Breath bated, he knocked firmly on the thin oak door. From within, a sound of muffled movement, and the grating of a deadbolt slowly been drawn back. The door opened a crack, and a thin reedy voice whipsered:

'Wer dort ist?'

Ignoring the raging pain, Anders rushed the door, snapping the weak chain with the impact of his shoulder. THe man inside, clearly his quarry, was knocked back over the bed, head hitting a bedside table with a loud crack. He screamed, stood up hand clutched to head, blood pouring out between fingers:

'Helfen sie mir! Helfen sie mir!'

Anders drew his weapon, took aim, and in the brief span of a moment had silenced the rabbit. As the smell of burned powder filled the room, he thought of blood, fur, and dead leaves.

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