The Army of Minds

Prologue

Is this real?, he thought.

So he rose his shaky hand from the hole in his chest.

Red... Red... Red...

So it was blood. His blood. He merely began to wonder if this was really happening when the most excruciating pain tore at his chest yet again.

Not a dream nor a hallucination, it was reality, simple and painfully evident. It wasn't the first time he'd been shot, but it was certainly a first to be shot and pierced in several vital organs, all conveniently at the most crucial moment of his career. Unfortunately he wouldn't live long enough to know that. So to the man lying on the cold floor, in the basement of an unknown location, he believes that his death will be in vain.

His task was simple. Skich and his partner were to extract information from a human source in Alexandria, Egypt. During the flight they were briefed, the possibility of the need for forceful action was a 0, hence casualties also were a 0. The task was more for leisure, but also to thank Skich and his partner, for their continuous loyalty and sacrifice to the organisation over the many years.

The main purpose of the organisation is mainly to dig into very dark cases - dark meaning, cases with specific information held from the public - that have extremely peculiar loose ends, such as the John F. Kennedy assassination, the death of Michael Jackson and even strange occurrences such as the Dorath.

The Union of Undisclosed Affairs and Research (UUAR) - the organisation - had been monitoring the story of an anomalous incident that had occured in a hidden research facility in São Tomè and Prìncipe, off the coast of Gabon roughly a decade ago. Currently, only bits and pieces of the story have been uncovered, but fortunately, the Egyptian branch of the UUAR had uncovered some vital information.

They obtained this from an anonymous source. The mere fact that the source was able to make contact with the very secretive organisation posed a threat. Nonetheless the source gave a fair amount of resourceful information. After the information was given, they claimed to have even more. The catch was that, more would be given in person and only to a higher up of the Union of Undisclosed Affairs and Research.

Of course it was suspicious, the UUAR was reluctant to heed the decision, but as if it couldn't get any better, the information checked out and answered questions the organisation needed answering. So after a few days of some intense speculation, the UUAR came to a conclusion.

Non-Lethal.

That was the name given to the source and to the name of the mission. The mission that was a miracle for the organisation, and what better people to send than their two best field agents who were about to retire. Fast forward two weeks later, Skich is lying on the floor of a building he has no idea where, with a hole in his chest and a few moments to live.

Turns out the name, "Non-Lethal" was eerily ironic.

So as Skich lay there in indescribable pain, slipping in and out of consciousness, he wearily managed to pull out a phone from his inner blazer pocket. He brought the phone closer to his face to unlock it and squinted as he fumbled through the apps on the newly broken screen. He clicked on the phone app, swiped through his recent calls with a bloody thumb until he got to the name "Jenediah", which he clicked on.

Brrrrr

Brrrrr

Brrrrr

Brr-

"Hello?", said Jenediah.

"Jen! I don't have much time, you need to listen closely.", Skich replied in a low hasty tone.

"Skich this isn't a secure call... why didn't yo-"

"I know but this was urg-", he was quickly cut off by another intense wave of pain that made him scream in pain.

"Skich?! What's going on, why are you yelling, what was that?!", Jenediah replied with panic clearly rising in his voice.

"Brigh...", managed Skich, "isn't... who you think... he is."

"Skich... you have to give me more than that!"

"I'm... Sorry... I can't... But the Dorath...", Skich was barely holding onto his consciousness at this point.

"Yes! Skich come on, what's going on! What are you trying to say?"

For what felt like a million years, there was silence mixed with Skich's raspy dying breathes.

"Where... the land... of the sea...", he said, his tone getting lower and lower, "meets... the desert."

There was a muffled disturbance from Skich's side of the call as he allowed the phone to fall from his hands. Jenediah kept yelling his name from the other end, until eventually Skich had parted and Jenediah was yelling at a corpse.