The White Feather- A story of infinite worlds

The Devil Stays Inside The Walls

“You did good today, Ehsaan. I knew we could trust you with an important task like this.” Gabriel said, putting his arm on the sweating receptionist’s shoulder.

“You guys crazy stupid. That man Jamal kill whole families, and I don’t even have family.” Ehsaan said while trembling.

"Then you don't have anything to worry about, you have no family to get killed." Olivia said and laughed.

Gabriel didn’t try to calm Ehsaan down. Instead, he let the cash in his pockets do that job. Ehsaan’s mouth was sewn shut as soon as he saw the bills coming out of Gabriel’s pant. It was more than he could make in a year from the hotel. And he was paid this fortune just to talk on the phone for two minutes.

"Crazy f*****g stupid people." Ehsaan said and snatched the money.

He took the money, stuffed it in his coat pouch, and ran off into his room to celebrate alone. He stole a glance at Tony, who was still playing the tough guy. But Tony had decided to cut the man some slack, and passed a smile as a token of appreciation for the work he had done for them. I don’t know if the smile was too sinister or it was just Ehsaan’s paranoia, but the smile was misinterpreted in Ehsaan’s mind like he had just fallen for a miserable trick. And you know how fragile human mind is. All it takes is a wrong look, and it starts to build up an alternate universe of its own. His mind ran in all directions. What if he was a pawn in their game, doomed to be sacrificed as soon as his part was done? What if they were giving him all this money just to kill him and take it all back?

Not that Ehsaan’s suspicion was wrong, but he shouldn’t have had a doubt about his friends’ intentions. Side characters are not supposed to be that smart, especially when the protagonist himself is a rookie.

So, to keep the suspense hidden for now, I’ll just say that Ehsaan went to his room and drank until he fell asleep. He knew he was just being paranoid and didn’t think much of it.

In the evening, the four teammates got into the receptionist’s car, followed by the owner, and drove to the designated meeting spot. Tony instructed Emma to get off sooner and set up camp on a roof from where she could watch the entrance of the building they were entering. Gabriel will stay outside the alley and watch if there was any ‘inconvenient’ improvement in situation.

The building was an old bank. It seemed to be abandoned for years now, and for obvious reasons. Who would put their money in a bank which could be bombed or looted anytime? And to be honest, it was actually looted a few times back in the day. Olivia and Thomas went into the strong room and locked the door from inside. They sat on the chairs and waited.

“So that heat treatment, it wasn’t just a way to sleep next to me?” Anthony asked hesitantly after five minutes of staring at the walls.

“Hell no, do you think I would even have waste a thought about trying to sleep with my boss?” Olivia said, seemingly disrespected by Anthony’s question.

Anthony didn’t reply. Olivia expected him to be surprised at her sudden angry reaction. But unfortunately for her, Anthony was too understanding of a person. His innocent mind just interpreted that he was wrong. And there are no apologies for wrong interpretations. Silence is enough, at least for Tony.

Not to say he wasn’t hurt. I mean, he had spent nights dreaming about her. He had tried to break protocol just to be with her. And now she was saying that she just used him. It was hard, but he could take it. “Oh my god, look at your face.” Olivia said and started laughing hysterically.

“Wh…What? I don’t get it.” Tony said. This time, he was surprised.

“I was kidding, you i***t. Oh good lord, you're so dumb. You really believed what I said, how adorable.” Olivia said and grazed Tony’s hair.

“So that means you wanted to sleep with me?” Tony asked and smiled.

“Come on, don’t get ahead of yourself. I didn’t say I wanted to sleep with you.” Olivia said and looked away. Tony was quite sure that she blushed.

But then again, Tony was an i***t in these sort of things, so let’s just say that she looked away. Tony was about to ask something, but he heard the tires screeching outside.

“The van is here, check to see if the intercom is working.” Tony ordered Olivia and walked to the door. He made sure it was locked, and then came back to speak on the phone.

“We are here!” Someone yelled from outside the door.

“Leave the man on the opposite side of the door, and go back.” Tony said over the intercom.

Now this was no common intercom. This was a voice translator, which translated Thomas’ words into Arabic and also changed his accent to match the Afghanis'. This way, no one could ever know that the kidnappings were masterminded by Americans. Also, whatever the kidnappers said on the other side of the door was translated to English, so that the agents could understand. Pretty cool, huh?

“You can trust us. If you have been living in this city for a while, you must have heard about the loyalty of the Hunters.” One of the men said from the other end.

“I have no doubt about your honor; I just don’t want to take any risks. Your payment for now is placed in the room on your left. Take it and leave us alone, we have a lot of business to discuss.” Tony said in a mixture of warmness and sternness.

The Hunters didn’t say anything for five minutes, but then Tony heard the sound of tires screeching. They were gone, and now there was just Jamal on the other side of the room.

“What the hell do you want me to do? I have been running in circles for so long now.” Jamal yelled.

“I’m sorry for the inconvenience, captain Jamal. But we had to make the plan fool-proof, so that no one would know anything about our little joint operation.” Tony said calmly.

Jamal didn’t reply, but Tony could clearly hear the gasps of frustration and the pacing through the intercom.

“Now sit on the chair in front of you. I will tell you what we have to do to get your family’s freedom. Don’t waste time now, every second counts.” Tony said and sat on a chair himself.   "Now, captain Jamal, we need you to do a very important task for us. Tomorrow, you will go into your army's base like usual, and you will tell everyone that your wife is at her mother's house, and continue your work. But while you do, whatever it is you people do over there, you will notice and memorize the security patterns of the guards outside your general's headquarters.

That includes how many guards are positioned where, and how often do they change their posts. At what time does the switch take place and where do the substitutes come from, for how much time is the post vacant before the other guard comes in, every small detail. I want to know the kind of weapons they carry, and the number of reserved guards that will respond in case the alarm goes off for some reason.

So this is your task. Do it successfully, and we will let your wife go. By the way, your elder daughter's body is inside the black bag which is kept in the dustbin outside. I wonder how many young girls you have killed on and off-duty. Well, karma is a b***h, isn't it captain?" Tony said in a cold voice.

"You fucking..." Jamal fired up but Tony thundered down on him before he could say anything.

"Do your f*****g job or you will be collecting two more body bags from the same place. And if you piss me off, I'll make sure you get a bag of your own too." Tony shouted, suppressing the poor man's rage.

"They were right, the devil lives inside the walls......" Jamal said and went to the dumpster, hardly being able to walk with his trembling legs. He opened the dustbin and stared at the pieces of his daughter.