Adventures In The Far Reaches

Chapter 8

I GRABBED THE phone from him in light of Judd's latest call, the series of which during this assignment did nothing but make this already pain-in-the-ass assignment into a vain of my existence. David Price has been killed. "What the hell happened to him?" I said, turning on the loudspeaker. Chris pointed the camera at me.

"He was found dead by police in his home yesterday," Judd said. "He was hanged upside down and his belly was cut open. They have no idea who did it, but a neighbor who reported it to the police said at least three dark men and one fair- skinned emerged out of the house." His horrendous death brought back images in me of that old guy being eaten by dogs in the middle of the road. I felt my guts rising up again but my deep breathing suppressed any potential barf explosion.

"Jesus Christ. Does he have any relatives?"

"I don't think so. He's already on the morgue, and no one's telling me he's been claimed yet."

"But... how did they know? Who killed him?"

"I don't know," he said, "but I think it has something to do with the map. It could only be it."

"You think?" Of course, nuclear bombs, the most powerful and destructive weapon yet created by man that can grant limitless power to its owners, was something anyone would unsurprisingly slaughter for. It could give nobodies a chance to be the most powerful person on earth, and with the map to that very thing in our hands, we just became a very prized bounty. The onset of panic started to manifest into me. "Jesus, they're hunting us down. They're coming to us!"

"Just relax, Holly. No one else knows we have the map."

"How the hell can you be so fucking sure? What if Price told those men that he gave the map to us?!" Price's killers must've been working too for that military contracting corporation he said he got the map from, which must have technological capabilities beyond my comprehension that they were able to pinpoint his location and that he stole from them in the first place. That could also mean they must be tracing our location this very moment, and any moment then, someone's about to crash through the door and cut open our bellies like medieval criminals.

"There's no way they're gonna find you," said Judd. "Look, you should blend in to the people there, dress up like them. Throw that vest away. You still have the map?"

"It's safe with me," I said.

"You should get the footages now. I'll keep you posted with new developments. Just stay safe okay?"

"Fuck you, Judd. Why do you have to put me through this shit?"

"It's our job, and besides you said yes," he said. He just reminded me of the worst decision of my life.

"You fucking made me to say yes!" I said. "Just make sure our goddamn ride home is ready."

"I've paid them double. They'll come for you."

"Wait... did my parents or my sisters call you?"

"No, they didn't call. Is there something you want me to tell them–?"

"No, no, no! Just... tell them I'm okay, alright?" I turned the call off. Bringing down the phone, I tensed up and felt my head get heavy again from a surge of fear and doubt. Chris following me with the camera, I sat in the sofas as I tried to wrap my head around what were we gonna do, which came down to only two choices. We could go to the locations in our intel, in which case we would be subjected to a huge probability of becoming casualties ourselves, but then we would get the things we came here for in the first place – were we survive of course, which was as possible as me getting a Pulitzer next year, with the war, those killers and every Iranian hunting our asses. Or, we could stay and wait until Monday, in which case we would live to report for another day, but then this whole trip would've been a huge waste of time – but then again, we could just obtain material from the internet and make a documentary from that. From the looks of it, it seemed the best thing to do was to get the fuck out of the country, but the crave to make a quality report for our fans proved to be a strong deterrent.