Rick Mofina - They Disappeared

They don’t kill you, they kill what you love, which is far worse than death, he thought.

From the mountainside, among the dead, he saw the distant bomb flashes and the tracer fire of the Russian onslaught across the region. Bulat had no time to mourn. He fought the enemy as the war raged for months. Thousands of Mykrekistanis died before Russian forces had regained control of the republic.

“They invade our country, murder our children, our families, and the United Nations does nothing,” Bulat told his men. “We must plunge our sword deep into Russia.”

In the months after the war, Bulat led a number of strategic strikes against Russian institutions in Moscow and Saint Petersburg. However, the FSB, Russia’s security service, paid informants to lead them to most of the rebels. They were captured and their families were located, arrested, then tortured before their eyes.

Then they were all executed.

Bulat and his surviving loyalists had escaped.

Soon, the Kremlin declared an end to hostilities and installed a puppet regime whose new president proclaimed victory.

“They have won nothing but a death sentence. We will never surrender,” Bulat told his men.

Bulat’s struggle had been crippled but his mission still burned. He would honor the dead with a free Mykrekistan by forcing the world to drink the blood of injustice.

“They can only understand once they feel what we feel. We will exchange pain for pain on the largest stage possible.”

Bulat drew upon all of his resources and global connections and began planning a mission that would guarantee world attention to Mykrekistan’s plight.

He would bring his struggle to the United States.

Everything had gone smoothly until Zama fucked up.

Zama was part of the advance team. Bulat had just arrived from Paris, where his forged passport had been produced.

Bulat shook with anger.

This operation had been painstakingly planned for more than a year and now it was in jeopardy. It did not involve hostages, car chases and news conferences with the FBI. All Zama had to do was to oversee the pickup of the component from LaGuardia, bring it here and help set up.

That was it.

The expensive component was rare and critical because it was undetectable by any means of security.

Without it the operation could not happen.

Everything was at risk because of Zama.

Bulat stared at his corpse burning in the furnace in the grim, lower bowels of the old casket factory.

Zama’s incompetence was unforgivable.

The furnace flames reflected the determination burning in Bulat’s eyes. He had shown the others that failure was not tolerated.

“Scatter his ashes over the East River. We leave no traces, just like you did with Hans Beck, or whatever that idiot’s name was,” Bulat instructed his men before he returned to the upper level operation planning table.

He glanced at his watch.

Less than thirty-six hours to go.

“Yannov,” Bulat called to one of the men. “We will not dispose of the woman and boy. Not yet. Is that understood?”

“Yes, Commander.”

“We are changing the operation in order to save it. I have a new plan that will include the woman and the boy. With them we’ll get even closer than we first thought. Did you enact the backup?”

“Yes, Commander, a second device. It is en route from Amsterdam.”

Bulat scanned the maps, photos, monitors, the muted news channels.

“Good, we will salvage the mission. All is not lost. This operation will seize the world’s attention.” Bulat turned to the direction of the factory where Sarah and Cole were being held. “We need the woman and boy. They’re going to be a big part of it.”

Manhattan, New York City

What am I missing?

Jeff drew his face to within inches of the flat-screen TV in his hotel room. He examined the millions of tiny pixels that formed the three pictures of Sarah in torment as he’d fought to free her from her captors.

But he no longer saw his wife, himself or the kidnappers.

He saw nothing but liquid crystals rotating polarized light.

It had been more than three hours since he’d started working with Detective Lucy Chu, the forensic artist, and some thirty-four hours since Sarah and Cole were stolen. Events bled into one another, with this morning’s call from the kidnappers leading to his failed rescue bid, the hospital, the press conference and now his work with Chu.

In all that time, he’d barely slept.

Jeff blinked several times and rubbed his face.

Chu and Ortiz traded glances.

“Maybe you should knock off for a bit?” Ortiz said.

“I had her in my arms,” Jeff said to the TV. “I had the door open.”

“Jeff,” Chu said. “You should take a break while I work on images.”

“I was so close to getting her back.”

“Let’s get out of the hotel,” Ortiz said. “So you can clear your head.”

“We have to find a detail, a lead,” Jeff told the TV.

“Come on, Jeff, let’s go out for a bit.” Ortiz took his arm gently but he shook her off.

“No! Did you hear me? I can’t! I don’t even know if Cole’s alive!”

In the tense silence he saw the two detectives looking at him with pity and concern, the way sane people look at someone who is losing their hold on reality. Through his anguished exhaustion Jeff recognized this and after a long moment said, “All right, I’ll go out by myself.”

“I have to go with you,” Ortiz said.

“No.” He collected his cell phone and room key. “I’ll go alone.”

“That’s not possible,” Ortiz said.

“Am I under arrest?”

“Of course not.” Ortiz handed him a Yankees cap and dark glasses. “Here, people might recognize you after the press coverage. Your face is out there.”

Jeff stared at her.

“You guys are pissed at me. You don’t trust me.”

“Jeff, it’s for your safety, in case contact is made again,” Ortiz said.

He glanced around the room.

Cordelli had left after his call. Brewer and Klaver were following leads.

“All right,” Jeff said, “there’s a place I need to go.”

Over twenty city, state and federal police agencies were working on the case, Ortiz told Jeff on the way to her unmarked car.

“There was a case meeting at the FBI’s office downtown. People from D.C. were on the call.”

Jeff looked at her.

“Washington? Do they know what the toy airplane has to do with all this, can you tell me?”

“No, because I don’t know. All I can tell you is that everyone’s looking at all angles of the murder case and the abductions-” she nodded to a helicopter and a passing motorcade “-because of the UN meeting going on in town right now. And, at last count, we’re following sixty tips called in since the press conference.”

“Sixty?”

“A handful could be credible leads. Everyone’s going flat out, Jeff.” They’d reached the car parked near the hotel entrance. “Where did you want to go?”

“Central Park.”

“That’s not far, which entrance?”

“South.”

“What’s in Central Park?”

“Hope.”

As they drove across midtown, Jeff scoured vehicles and faces in the street for Sarah, for Cole, for the kidnappers.

“You know, anyone would have done what I did, Juanita. They would’ve gone out on their own if it meant getting their family back.”

She looked at him, at his face laced with cuts, scrapes. He looked as if he’d been at the losing end of a brawl. He was beat up physically, emotionally, but he was not defeated and she admired that about him.

“I know, Jeff.”

“I remember seeing a picture of a little girl on your desk,” he said. “You have kids?”