The white glare was similar to a camera flash at point blank range. When my vision finally cleared, I was sitting at a gray table, in a gray room, with two people in gray suits staring at me. One was white, one black, both very trim. The white one spoke, "Agent Riggs, would you say this suspect is being uncooperative?"
Whoa. Agents? Suspect? I'm in an interrogation room. Holy hell.
The black one nodded, obviously named Riggs, and said, "Yep, Miller, I'd say he's very uncooperative. I haven't seen someone this uncooperative, but then again, there's always the phone book." The white one, Miller, smiled at me, and reached under the table, retrieving a massive phone book that had been wrapped together with duct tape.
Miller said to me, "This here is the most abundant source of names and numbers in the local area. Maybe if I slam it into your face a couple of times, one of those names will jump into your head where you can then relay it to us, huh?"
Miller took a batting stance. His intent was clear. He really was going to stand there and swing that book at me. Riggs stood with his arms folded and kept on smiling. The time to speak was now.
"Whoa wait, ok guys, agents, seriously. I need to know what I'm doing here. I want to help."
Miller stopped in his tracks. He looked at me with curious regard, and his makeshift club lowered, as did Riggs' arms.
Riggs stepped forward to the table and leaned down to place both hands on it, "You mean to tell me you don't know what you're doing here?"
"Guys I don't even know who I am!"
"Well that's easy enough," said Miller. He walked to a back table in the small room and picked up a manila folder. He began to read from it, "Trent Culpepper, born 1976. After high school, you did a quick stint in the marines before you got lured to cross branches and join the Delta Force. Your record becomes blurry after that, but luckily you left a calling card. You dropped a single hair onto the face of each person you killed. Luckily for you, they are all black-ops kills, and every time we try to peg you for the death of an american citizen, it conveniently goes away, but my memories do not."
I swallowed hard. I began to remember. The memories came in sudden flashes.
Miller continued, "The question here, Mr. Culpepper, is why you are sitting in front of us."
"That's my question, too! What am I doing here??" I spoke with a frantic desperation, "I don't completely remember the things I did, but if it's like you said, then this should all go away right?"
Riggs spoke up, "That's true! We would almost prefer to let it go away. The case closes neatly and disappears without any effort whatsoever. My partner and I can go home to our wives without working any late shifts, or the thoughts of a cold open case burning in her minds. However, there's one death that really drives the nail. There's one killing that no one is backing you up on. There's one person that was killed, and we saw dead and buried with full honors, in a ceremony that gripped this entire town, interred into his grave in front of the eyes of hundreds, that no one seems to be talking about and we would love to have answers for."
I paused, but finally said, "Who would that be?"
"You... Mr. Culpepper."
"I'm sorry?"
"We want to know why the medical examiner looked over your body, why we watched you get buried, only to find you here in our station 48 hours later, with a giant hole where your cemetery plot used to be?"
For the first time, I looked down at my hands and arms. I was covered in dirt. Looking further, I was in half of a cheap black suit. The pants were nowhere in the room. Opening the suit jacket, I found 3 holes in my chest, one over my heart, that had been neatly stitched shut.
My concern turned to panic, "Whoa wait a minute. I have no idea what's going on here!!"
Miller slammed his hand on the table, "Neither do we, my man! All we know is, there's a fucking kid out there with four hundred and fifty thousand dollars, payable on your death, and now your death is a lie! Was it a fantastic ploy for life insurance? Did you think no one would see you escape? TELL ME!"
I could not stop looking at my chest. Unlike when they read my file, no images came back as to what put these holes in me. Out of some instinct, I knew they were bullet holes.
Another question arose. If I had been buried in a coffin, how did I get through the seal of the box itself?
Riggs continued to remain trained on me with his hands on the table. He said, "Look, Trent, we're not here to bust you if you did nothing wrong, we just need to know that something besides a crime is happening here, and you're free to leave."
They wanted answers I didn't have.
I swallowed again and said, "Look, guys, I really want to help any way I can, but I don't remember anything, and the way I see it, I'm really fucked. I woke up here with no recollection, I have three holes in me, I'm covered in dirt, and if that means I crawled out of a grave, then alright. However, I don't have any more information for you. I want to know what's going on as much as you do, but you're the ones with the file, and that makes you more in tune than I am."
Both men just looked at me. I guess they could tell I was sincere, but I just wasn't satisfying them. I spoke again, "Look, seriously guys, obviously someone wants to kill me, and by all physical realms of explanations, they succeeded, but I'm here now and even more confused than you are. I don't need interrogation. I need help understanding."
Their facial expressions changed. They went from anger to a stern intrigue. Riggs leaned forward, as did Miller, and Riggs said, "You honestly don't know, do you?"
"No! Damnit I've been trying to say that!"
Miller stepped away from the table and went for the back table again. He came back with another folder and slapped it in front of me, "Have a look for yourself."
I eyed him cautiously, but then I looked down at the folder and opened it. It was a complete dossier on a man named only in the file as "Stewart." I realized I said that out loud.
Riggs perked, "You know who he is?"
I replied, "No! I have no idea who he is!"
Miller leaned forward, "Oh you're going to tell us." I was eyeing his gun for some reason.
Miller kept speaking, "You're going to tell us and you're going to spill all of the information you have on his connections. You're going to tell us how you managed to talk him into this scheme. You're going to tell us how you did such a bang up job on the bullet wounds. You're going to TELL US HOW YOU STAYED DEAD FOR TWO DAYS, BUT MOSTLY YOU'RE GOING TO--"
He cut himself off as I leaped from the chair and grabbed his gun. "Don't move!" I yelled to Agent Riggs, holding Miller by the neck in one arm, and pointing the gun to his head in the other. Riggs immediately put his hands up, but then corrected to move slowly for his gun, draw it from the holster, and drop it on the floor. It was then that Miller became limp in my arms. I had no idea that I had been strangling him. I thought I was just holding his neck, not choking him. I continued to hold him there. He was only unconscious for now, but it felt necessary to make sure he was dead. Eventually, the strains in his neck tightened under my arm, and I dropped him to the floor.
It was that very moment that Riggs made an eye for his own gun on the floor.
I pointed the gun at him with both hands. "Don't move," I repeated. Riggs looked back at me and said, "Culpepper... Trent... look, you still have options. You fire that gun and kill me and there will be a hundred local cops in here. They've had nothing to do in five years and they're a bit mad about us taking jurisdiction. They'll kill you on the spot and argue over who fired the fatal shot."
"SHUT UP!!" I yelled.
"Listen to me Trent! We can work this out... just give me the gun, and I'll do whatever I can with the local courts. I'll say you cooperated--"
"I WILL SHOOT YOUR ASS!" I yelled. I was never very tough. I can't speak with strength or conviction.
No cops had come in yet, despite all the noise.
"Trent, listen to me. Just put the gun down... we can talk about your options. You have to make a choice right now. One choice is you put that gun down and I can still help you. The other option is that you shoot me and die."
I had not even noticed the sweat on my hands. It had made the gun slippery and loose in my fingers, the sights twitching everywhere as my nerves shook. I didn't notice... until it had started to cease.
My mind became calm again. I'm not sure, but I think I even smiled. I straightened my gaze and said, "So as long as I don't shoot you with this gun... I have options?"
"Yes Trent... that's what I am saying."
"Then I guess I'll just have to kill you without it."
With that, I threw the gun at him and dove across the table. The gun missed and hit the wall, as Riggs was already diving for his own gun. I hit the table with speed and force and slid to the point that I could grab Riggs by the back of his neck. As I pulled him up, I realized that he had retrieved his gun. I caught his hand at the wrist as it swung to point at me. Pulling him to the table where I lay, it became a forceful struggle over the gun itself. I moved my hand from his wrist to the gun and together we matched strength, trying to point the gun at each other. His face turned to anger.
I swung my body and threw a kick at his back. The impact of my leg jarred him forward with enough sudden surprise that he lost his grip on the gun. He was still right though, I couldn't shoot him. I swung the gun at his head and felt the strangely satisfying impact of metal to bone. Riggs fell to the ground, holding one hand to the side of his skull.
He was already getting up. Reflexively, I fired a round into the top of his head. Sparing the details, let's just say he fell dead on the spot. His body lay crumpled to the floor. The acoustics in this room were overwhelming. That gunshot had sounded as if ten guns had been fired in the same small closet. I aimed the gun at the door and prepared myself for a hell of a firefight.
No one came.
I waited, longer and longer, for someone to charge through the door. I waited for handfuls of the local finest to kick the door in... or even peek in to see what the noise was all about. No one did.
Slowly, gun aimed at the door, I walked towards it and opened it slowly. Peeking through a small crack in the opening, I saw... nothing. I opened the door fully, and all I saw was a long and concrete corridor. It seemed to go on forever. Regardless of its length, there was no one in it from how far I could see.
The killing of the two men felt invigorating. I wasn't sure how to explain it to myself, but I felt like there was more to be done.
I knew one for sure.
I walked back to the table and grabbed the file on Stewart. I looked it over again and grabbed his photo and his last known home address. I crumpled them into my pocket. I began to walk for the door.
Whoever it was, God or the Devil, that had seen through to give me a second chance, and who I was doing work for, was completely irrelevant. The men I had killed spoke of a life insurance policy on me to a girl of some sort. That was irrelevant, too. I had a job to do, and answers may or may not be involved. I didn't necessarily need to understand. I only had to act. Even the fire that burned in my hands went unnoticed for the moment.
As I exited the room, I thought of the wadded sheets in my pocket. I had a face, and I had a name.
It was time to find Stewart.
