6 October 2022
Near Behayeen Bridge, Bingol, Packilvania
“I can do this! I can do this!” Drakhnam said as he drove the vehicle into a checkpoint.
The officers at the checkpoint circled the vehicle with dogs. The dogs were silent at first, but at some point one began barking. Drakhnam showed them the papers he had identifying his vehicle.
“May you please step outside?” One of the officers asked him, “We just need to check your vehicle and your papers”.
Drakhnam remained calm. After years of military services and being an assassin, he had trained his body to show no outward signs of distress when faced with adverse situations (although dealing with an angry Packilvanian mom after eating all the pudding at a family gathering was likely to instill the same self-control).
The officer was taking unusually long. One of the dogs started barking more intensely as it approached the back of the vehicle.
He heard one of the officers say, “I think we should open the back and have a look”.
Drakhnam immediately started looking for potential exits and sizing up these officers for a potential fight. He slowly and surreptitiously moved his hands to the holster around his belt where his revolver sat snuggly waiting to be used. He began to count to ten where if at 10, the officer had not returned with his papers, he would shoot them all and run like hell.
One.
Two.
Three.
Four.
Five. Still nothing.
Six. The dogs get louder.
Seven. The officers start shaking their heads and gathering at the door to the back of his vehicle.
Eight. Drakhnam puts his hands on the handle of his gun.
Nine. One of the officers flings the rear doors open.
Te-
The officer comes back and loudly declares, “Okay boys! All looks good. We can let the man pass through”.
One of the officers comes towards, him and they whisper to each other.
“Oh no!” the first one says, “It’s all fine. The paperwork checks out. Headquarters says that the material is sensitive and is likely to trigger dogs. False alarm”.
Turning to Drakhnam, he says, “You’re free to go, sir”.
The other officers look unconvinced and begin to approach Drakhnam. One of them orders him to lift his hands for inspection. They begin padding him up and down and the dogs bare their teeth him. He’s not out of the woods yet.
An officer finds the bizzare device that he was supposed to use to trigger the detonation and asks, “What the hell is this?”
The other officers surround him, showing him the holsters of the revolvers while another one casually cleans his rifle with a microfiber cloth while looking at him menacingly.
Drakhnam replies, “It’s a device to track my blood pressure”.
“Hmm”, the man says, “These kinds of devices are not authorised for use on military installations outside of regulations and this does not meet the regulation criteria”.
“I didn’t realise”, Drakhnam said.
“You didn’t realise?” The officer asks sarcastically, “I’m gonna ask you again. What is this device for?”
“It’s for measuring my blood pressure”, Drakhnam said.
The man pointed the gun at him and said calmly, “I am not going to repeat myself”.
Drakhnam lifted his hands up and said, “I am Drakhnam Yahad, registration number 2T39R01, rank Captain, of the special operations: special materials division. I have been assigned to administer the safe transportation of the vehicle. I reiterate my stance that the device of which the officer before me is questioning is in indeed a blood pressure monitoring device authorised by my doctor as per the Regulations for Medical Treatments under section 10 subsection 98. I formally state my protest at the unlawful seizure of my medical device and demand to speak to your commanding officer. Furthermore, I demand to know what your officer number is, and assignment”.
The man was surprised by Drakhmam’s eloquence and his invocation of a formal military procedure. The man stepped back and consulted with his colleagues and came back and stated.
“My officer number is 1S78K10 and my name is Umadin Axoriad, rank Lieutenant. My commanding officer is Major Shameel Ubrahan and my assignment is the 789th Regiment. I recognise your challenge in terms of the military regulations”, he laughed and said, “I will confer with my commanding officer and get back to you”.
“You cannot do that”, Drakhnam declared firmly, “Military law states that I am entitled to levy a complaint invoked under a violation of my status, rank and right directly to your commanding officer”.
The man began to weigh his options. He could either risk being accused of an unlawful threat of force on an authorised officer of the military and an unlawful and disproportionate obstruction of his work, or avert a potential crisis.
The man turned back to Drakham and said, “I will let you go through. But as the officer posted to this checkpoint, I reserve the right to commandeer your blood pressure measuring device until your return from depositing the goods which you have been assigned, sir”.
“Fine, but note”, Drakhnam said, “Your behaviour will make it’s way to a military tribunal if you don’t hand me my device”.
“You’re welcome to take your complaint to my commanding officer”, the man said smugly, “Oi! Get me on the line with Major Ubrahan”.
“It’s fine”, Drakhnam said annoyed, “We can leave this here”.
The man nodded and replied, “You’re free to go, sir”.
There was an arrogant attitude with which he said what he said that Drakhnam would have reported him, had he actually been an active serving member of the armed forces. He entered his vehicle and got moving. He kept the vehicle moving towards the Behayeen Bridge. Before he could let out a sigh of relief, he had to figure out how to trigger the bomb manually while allowing himself enough time to escape from its blast radius when it exploded.
The plan they had drawn up, had never deeply considered what would happen if he needed to trigger the bomb’s detonation sequence without the device. They’d briefly touched on it, but not to the extent that Drakhnam could summon it easily. He would have to take a risk and fill in the blanks using information from a lesson he had had in officer training over 7 years ago on detonating mines.
However, this device was more complex. The Behayeen Bridge was an extremely strong bridge and so a mediocre bomb that low tier terrorists tended to use was not going to do much damage. The warhead he had with him was immensely powerful and the extent of the danger was so great that these device were extremely rare. They were so rare that one was more likely to win the lottery than to find one outside of a military facility and yet here it was.
Realising this, Drakhnam said to himself, “Our client must be powerful, really powerful. And all of this bullshit had better be worth it”.
He parked his vehicle within view of the bridge with a clear path to it. He got to the back and proceeded with the risky job of figuring out how to trigger the bomb. He began going through the steps that Thyfos had laid out. He was flipping switches and crossing wires. In his mind he asked himself, “Was it the blue or red?!”
As he pondered his decision, the officers back at the checkpoint were getting restless. The expected time of completion for a simple delivery had lapsed. Even if Drakhnam had added a sit-down stop to the water closet on his itinerary, his detour would not have waylaid him for as long as he had been gone. The lieutenant from the check point said, “He should have been back by now”, and instructed one of his colleagues to go and look at the situation.
Drakhnam heard a vehicle approach him from behind. He saw the military markings and knew that this was the officers coming to see him. With his bomb uncovered and his hands tinkering with the trigger mechanism, he had basically been caught red handed. Cognisant of this, he knew his only option was a first strike, so he shot the tyre of the incomer’s wheel. He got out his submachine gun as the vehicle skidded of the path and opened fire. The officers inside were able to send out a call for distress in time.
Drakhnam had managed to impale the officer with a bullet in the right arm but he saw from the beaping of a small red button on the dashboard that the other officers had already been alerted and were on their way.
Drakhnam quickly and temporarily relieved the officer of his consciousness and returned to the vehicle. He desperately tried to figure out the trigger mechanism. In the background, he heard the roar of vehicles approach him. The vehicles skidded along the road as they came to a screeching halt. One officer ran to their fallen comrade while the rest approach Drakhnam.
Suddenly the bomb began to beep. Drakhnam was relieved but only for a moment as he realised that he had triggered the bomb to override the time-based detonation sequence and had set it to explode immediately. He simply closed his eyes and said to himself, “I’m sor…”
Before he could finish the word, the bomb exploded in an incredible boom. Light and heat came from it like a star being born from nothing, contorting the matter around it, turning it from its expected stable form to small pieces violently burning. Debris from the explosion was scattered in all directions and Drakhnam… Well. One can guess the rest.
[hr]
Palace of the Parliament
President Sudjawardia’s speech had gone swimmingly and the members of the Legislative Council gave him a standing ovation. The Chairperson called the session to a close and the men made their way to their cars and the procession back to the Bingol Royal Palace was under way.
Abuyin and Thumim were seated in the same car.
“That went well”, Abuyin said.
“I agree”, Thumim said. “I don’t know why you seemed nervous. Did you expect him to transform into some creature and dance on the podium? There was very little that could have gone wrong”.
“I supp…”, before Abuyin could finish his sentence, the car turned violently.
The driver lowered the partition and the body guarding riding shotgun in the car turned around and said, “Sir, we are changing the route. There has been an attack near Behayeen Bridge”.
“Alert President Sudjawardia’s bodyguard immediately”, Prince Thumim commanded.
“Already on it, sir”, the bodyguard said.
“I hope they get the message in time”, Abuyin whispered.
[hr]
