NaNoWriMo Day 21

Angry Gary and Angry Larry the Leopard Slugs
Confession

The log came into view and Larry felt the hunger pains hit again making him increase his speed a little bit more. He made it to the end of the log and immediately began devouring the white tendrils of the fungus growing from the decomposing wood. The prior experience taught him to keep one eye on a swivel to make sure nothing sneaks up on him. Despite the snake incident the log held too large of a wealth of food for him to stay away, he now just needed to exercise a bit more caution.
His mind floated as he took bite after bite. He thought about the prior night and the sight of Gary in the midst of the mass of cockroaches and ants. It all seemed so surreal now, almost like it was a dream. He floated with his thoughts and found himself lost in them so he did not see the movement in the grass behind him.
Out of the grass crawled a small blue bellied lizard, not much longer than Larry, and it walked towards the log looking between Larry and the slight opening between the log and grasses. As it got closer the movement popped Larry back to attention and both of his eyes swiveled to stare at the lizard, his mouth stopping mid chew. The lizard stopped and they stared at each other for a few moments, neither moving but both trying to assess the other. Slowly the lizard continued walking towards the opening with one eye on Larry.
He watched the lizard disappear into the space on the side of the log, the tip of its tail twitching as it went out of sight. As it vanished he slowly began to chew again but kept his eyes trained on the opening. Finishing his mouthful he sat and stared at the opening some more waiting for something to happen. He felt like something more was there but couldn’t determine what, it was a feeling of uncertainty that was washing over him and he felt the sudden chill of fear slide over him.
Larry looked around him at the grasses and all the dark shadows around and he felt the fear rising.
“What the hell is wrong with you,” his thoughts admonished himself, “just calm down.”
He felt his blood rushing and the sudden urge to go washed over him. He found himself moving towards the house and he had no clue why the direction, it felt like he was along for the ride. The viewing bush soon loomed in front of him and he stopped at the base to rest before the climb. His body was tired and his foot was beginning to ache after the prior day of action.
As he sat resting he watched a spider drop down from the bush on a single thread of silk and as it landed on the ground it used its two hind legs to disconnect the thread from it’s body and then it wrapped the ends on a small piece of root sticking out from the ground. It climbed back up the thread into the bush and out of his sight before dropping again in a different spot near the first thread, again hooking it to a branch on the ground. He watched for a while then figured he had rested long enough and began to climb the branches of the bush.
He steadily climbed the bush to the viewing spot and as he got near he could hear Vivian and the man talking inside through the seemingly always open window in the living room. He slugged onto their spot and found a place to sit next to a nice pile of bird droppings. He nibbled the droppings while he listened.
“So tell me again about raid. You’ve gone over the basics but I need to know everything that happened. How many people, names, what was said, what was done. Anything you can remember could help us figure out who ordered this and why,” Vivian said.
“There’s not much I can tell you. I was watching tv when a helicopter landed out front and the house was surrounded by swat or something. The door got broken open and they came streaming in screaming and yelling, guns pointed at me. They handcuffed me and dragged me out to a car and threw me inside. I couldn’t see how many there were or any names, it all happened so fast,” the man replied.
“That sounds rather usual for these situations. They like to do smash and grabs as a form of intimidation but I’ve not really seen the house be destroyed like this. Did anyone say anything about what they were looking for? Anything at all?” she asked.
“They just kept demanding any electronics that I have. I told them I don’t have a computer or anything, just a phone and tv. I don’t know what they think I have,” he answered.
“Hmm, interesting. I presume that’s why they shredded everything in here but that still isn’t getting to why you,” she said contemplatively with her brow furrowing and eyes narrowing as she stared at him. “You’re service, anything special that might have lead to this?” she asked.
He sat staring down at his hands without replying for a long pause before saying, “I don’t know. Maybe? I’m not sure as there are some blank spots, especially after the blast.”
Vivian cocked her head in question and he looked up her pausing before saying, “IED blast hit us and I got hit pretty good. I was pulled out of the Humvee with a lot of shrapnel. I got a piece beneath my helmet and it hit my head.”
“What was you job?” she asked.
“I was with OSI,” he replied simply.
“Really? What did you do for them?” she asked suddenly more curious.
He looked back down at his hands and sat silently in thought. He was clearly conflicted and trying to decide how best to word things.
“I was an investigator…” he trailed off.
“I assume that given you were with OSI, but what department?” she pushed.
“Uhm…” he hesitated.
Vivian stared at him as he stared at his hands in his lap. She waited patiently as she watched him fidget in his chair before he slightly looked up at her and said, “ICET”.
“ICET? Like Immigrations ICE?” she asked confused.
“No,” he said slowly, “ICET is the department that investigates corruption. It stands for Internal Corruption Evaluation Team. We were the ones to investigate our own.”
She sat listening then after a pause asked, “so you would investigate military officials? Can you give me an example?”
“Just think of a battalion captain who is selling military weapons to insurgents and pocketing the money or the general who is taking bribes from the local governments,” he replied.
“I’m sure you investigated worse things than that?” she asked.
“Yeah,” he said slowly as memories flooded his brain. His eyes lost focus as he dove back into them, staring at the wall opposite him.
“Anything that might be connected to why your house was raided? Did you have to investigate any powerful people?”
“Plenty,” he said quickly as he turned and looked at her again.
Vivian stared back at him her eyes opening wide and her head cocked a bit to the side waiting. He stared back at her for a moment then realizing she was waiting for him to continue he said, “there were a lot of them. It could be any one of a number of people. We had all the private contractor security teams running wild and the owner of the company was investigated.”
“I don’t think I ever heard about that,” she said.
“You wouldn’t, most OSI operations are classified for a number of reasons. This one wasn’t pretty and I was taken off of it part way through, I couldn’t handle it,” he said as he shook his head.
“Oh? What was so bad about it?” she asked.
The man sat still as he tried to figure out wording until he took a deep breath and then a long sigh and said, “he was running a human trafficking operation throughout the middle east. We determined that they were shipping them across southeast and central Asia to China where most of them were used for organ harvesting.”
Vivian’s mouth fell open and her eyes widened again as she sat in stunned silence.
“Not a very nice thing to have the knowledge of tumbling around my brain. I’m surprised I remember that since so many things are gone still. They got the piece out of my head but it did enough damage I still don’t remember about a year of deployment,” he said.
After a long silent pause Vivian relaxed her face and her thoughts began racing before she said, “you might have just figured this out. What was his name?”
“Pince,” he replied.
“THAT’S right,” she yelled as she pulled a tablet from her bag and began to tap and scroll on the screen. She finally turned the tablet to him saying, “here, look, he’s in the Bollinger emails”.
He leaned over and looked at the tablet and on it was a long list of names. He looked back up at her and asked, “what’s this?”
“This is the Bollinger leak. Haven’t you seen all the news?” she asked.
“Oh yea, that was going on before they raided me. I kind of forgot with being in a cell. Can I?” he asked as he reached for the tablet and Vivian handed it to him.
He scrolled through the list of names and there was Pince on the list. He scrolled more and found more names that he recognized, generals and other high ranking officers, and as he read he suddenly stopped and his eyes widened. There was the name of the head of OSI in the list. He lowered the tablet and handed it back to Vivian.
“Wow. I recognize a lot of names in there,” he said.
“I think we might have figured out why you were raided,” she said as she set the tablet back into her bag.
“Yeah, but why me, why now? I’ve been out of OSI for over 6 years now and I don’t use computers anymore. I recognize a lot of those names from investigations but that was a long time ago. I have nothing to do with that data leak.”
“I don’t know but for now let’s work on getting you some furniture to replace all… this,” she said as she waved her hand around her at the mess of a house.
Larry had finished the pile of bird droppings and had moved on to a nearby leaf, nibbling along the edge he had nearly finished the leaf. He had listened to their conversation and he couldn’t help but begin to feel a little guilty knowing that his slimer post was what began this whole ordeal. He was surprised to hear the man talk of his connection to the names in the report and it made him begin to wonder just how connected the man was to the emails.
“Was he in the list?” he thought to himself as he finished chewing a mouthful of leaf.
Lost in his thoughts he had not heard the conversation finish in the house but the sudden sound of their voices on the patio popped him back to.
“Alright, I’ll call you later when I have a time for the delivery of the furniture. You can use the voucher I gave you at the stores listed on the back and get some new clothes. You sure you don’t want a food card?” she asked.
“I’m good, they didn’t wipe my bank account so I still have money for food. Thanks,” he said.
“Okay. If you need anything give me a call. My number is in the contacts list,” she said then turned and walked off the patio and to her car.
The man watched her walk away and waited until she drove off before turning and walking back in the house.
Larry Could hear the man kicking things on the floor around as he climbed down the branches of the bush. He worked his way back through the shade of the grasses and to Gary’s hole where he went inside without a word. He saw Gary lying beneath a large piece of lichen draped over the top of him and his tentacles limply raised to look at him.
“How you doing?” he asked.
A moan breathed out of Gary and his tentacles drooped back onto his head. His body lay relaxed now and he no longer was a tensed ball, still seeming to ooze slime from beneath the lichen it seemed to have slowed dramatically.
“It looks like Tendra has been to see you,” he said, “hopefully it helps you heal fast. I was just up on the bush and found out some wild information about the man. He might be connected to the leak after all,” Larry said.
Gary sat motionless and silent as Larry continued, “I’m going to have to do some digging and see if he is any where in the emails. I don’t remember seeing him in there but that doesn’t mean I couldn’t have missed him.”
Larry stopped and stared at Gary for a while waiting for more movement but saw nothing. “Gary?” he said, again waiting for any response. Seeing none he turned and began to exit the hole. From behind him he heard another moan escape from Gary and then silence. He paused then after a moment of silence continued to leave.
He turned and began to slug towards his nook when Tendra emerged from behind a clump of grass heading towards Gary’s hole. She had a green tube of plant stalk in her mouth and she was dragging it along beside her. The stalk was oozing a clear fluid which ran down the sides in little thick streams. She saw Larry and went up to him, dropping the stalk as she stopped.
“Hi Larry, how’s it going?” she asked.
“Hey Tendra. Okay just was up on the bush listening to them talk in the house and just checked on Gary. I’m beat and need sleep. What are you up to? What’s that?” he asked as he looked at the oozing stalk.
“It’s aloe, it’s for Gary,” she replied.
“I saw the lichen, I hope it helps. He still looks rough,” Larry said.
“Yeah he does but this should help. You go get some sleep, I’m going to get this on him before it oozes out all over the place,” she said then picked the stalk back up and slugged into Gary’s hole. Larry watched her disappear then turned and slugged into his nook, quickly falling asleep against the wall.