The year: 2050. And me? I’m just a guy living on the streets. I’m twenty-one and my brother Johnny just turned nineteen. I’ve lived on the streets for seven years, and it’s tough. One day my brother, Johnny, was yelling at me, and for once, I listened. “Why can’t you get a job, Danny? Why do we have to live like this? Why’d you mess up everything?” questioned Johnny. I knew he was right, but I didn’t want to accept it. I was a rogue of sorts; I knew how to sneak around and get stuff done. I used to work for the government, but our group was disbanded after I shot a friend on the job. I won’t go into further detail, beyond the fact that after the shooting my life completely changed. If Allen hadn’t blabbed, my life would be so much better. If only there was a time machine. Then I could go back to 2043, and change my life.
I decided that Johnny was right. I wasn’t doing anything and we needed money. So I tried reforming our old group, and only some were in the same condition as me. Unfortunately, some of them were whacked. So, on the team we had Sarah, Josh, Johnny, and me. I didn’t want Johnny to come, but he knew what he was doing and he was good at it. I knew what had to be done. We had to infiltrate the mafia and capture their leader, so Johnny and I could get the money that we needed, fast.
Sarah was our tech. Her job was to get past their codes and to shut down their main base of operations. Josh was our supplier. He was going to give us the equipment required to do the job. Then, Johnny and I were going to do the infiltration. Of course, I was going to do the dangerous stuff. I couldn’t just let my little brother go in there without a clue.
So that was our plan, and all of us were ready. Yet, you know that when you make a plan it always goes wrong. So I didn’t make a big descriptive plan. I made a vague plan. I knew that defenses would be down and the power would be off at the mafia’s headquarters’ because Sarah does her job right. I also knew our equipment and how to use it. So from this I was able to write up the necessities. We needed to infiltrate and capture the mafia’s leader without mistakes. I knew that somehow this plan wasn’t even going to go according to plan, but I didn’t know what was going to happen so I just had to accept reality as it hit us.
As we prepped for our departure outside of Sarah and Josh’s place, we checked the guns and all of the stuff to make sure that it was still fully operational. Sarah was helping us by checking the guns, but right then something scared her, and she pulled the trigger. “Ahhhhhhh!” yelled Sarah. Everyone was screaming, and I didn’t know what to do. Then, I just couldn’t take it. “SHUT UP!” I exclaimed. We couldn’t continue so we left for the nearest hospital. She had badly shot herself straight through the foot.
I knew that they would ask questions, but I couldn’t seem to care. At the last minute we all decided to give her a story. She was shot in the foot because of a drive-by-shooting. After that, we also decided that we needed to continue without Sarah. So we went back to the same place (the parking lot five blocks away from the mafia’s hideout). When we returned, we checked everything again. It was tedious, but it needed to be done. Except this time, we pointed the guns up. Everything was in check, so Johnny and I were ready to infiltrate the building.
As we headed up the side of the building something happened. I wasn’t sure what, but all of a sudden we heard gunshots! We thought we had been caught, but I told Johnny that we had to keep moving or else we were going to be dead for sure. After the shots stopped, we were still going as fast as we could up the side. Then I saw something terrible. It was a group of armed men protecting the side of the building. As we tried to swing around to the back of the building we saw more armed men. I panicked on what to do, and I wasn’t really sure if we should try to leave or if we should try to go up the front of the building. I didn’t have much of a choice so we went up the front side of the building.
Half way up we saw more people so we were forced to go inside the building. We were only on the fifth floor out of nine floors, so we weren’t too far off. We turned, went up the stairs, and there were more people. We didn’t have a choice anymore, so we had to attack. I turned to Johnny and told him to ready his gun, and then with inspirational words I said, “Let’s let the mafia know that we’re here.” We shot up the stairs until we couldn’t see anyone standing. Of course, like good spies, we had silencers on our weapons. So they were still deadly, but they could no longer be heard.
As body after body hit the floor, Johnny lost it. I knew that this would probably happen because it usually does for first time agents. He had a breakdown and so we sat down and just took a minute to breathe. Then we were ready to get going again. Nobody detected us, not even the guys on the sixth floor with the heat goggles.
It was truly amazing, not even Johnny was detected, and he was an amateur. Somehow it seemed that this might go right, but of course the universe just had to prove me wrong. I knew that this was going to happen, but I didn’t want to think about it. We were detected, and it put our whole mission in jeopardy. One guy just had to shout, “Intruders, shoot ‘til they’re dead.” My heart sank, but of course I pulled the trigger on him.
We knew had to run up the eighth and ninth floor, only to find out that the leader of the Mafia was on the twelfth floor, near the top of the building, which didn’t make any sense. Some dying guy said that and put Johnny and me in confusion. This was a nine-story building, so either he was wrong or the boss wasn’t even there. We got to the supposed office, and he had already left out of a side passage. We were now in a lot of trouble, we didn’t find the mafia leader and we were being assaulted by all of the mafia people that we didn’t kill.
Johnny was forced out the escape passage and I attempted to follow. Yet, my big brother instincts took over me and I found myself fighting them off. I was overwhelmed, but I couldn’t let them get to Johnny. I phoned Josh our equip guy. I asked if he could send me the GPS signal from Johnny’s stuff and with comforting words he said, “Yes.” I was happy that I could find him, but I was also too preoccupied to get tied up with my emotion of happiness. One after another I saw the Mafia members hit the ground, dead.
I ran back to where Johnny was supposed to be and thankfully I found him. We had to sprint back to the van to avoid cops coming from all sides. Luckily, Josh saw the cops coming and moved the van to a safer location. We hopped in and sped away, heading to the other suspected location. The mafia had two main hideouts and we just happened to pick the wrong one. The mafia leader already knew that we were coming and was prepared. He had double the men on surveillance in this building. It was going to be hard, but we had to do it. I realized now that if we stopped, went home and just called it a day then we would be dead within a week. It makes me wonder why I even got into this whole mess in the first place.
We sped around the next corner to try and lose the mafia thugs, but I knew that the car chase wasn’t over yet. They were the mafia. They came here to get a job done and it was a do-or-die situation for them. Most people didn’t see this, but the mafia doesn’t accept a failure. They would rather kill someone who failed a mission rather than give them a second chance at it. So, knowing this, they were going to come back before we got there.
We were half way to the other hideout when we all heard a loud screeching noise. It was the van! We were swerving everywhere. I looked through the back window and I saw the Mafia’s underdogs, the guys that do all of the grunt work. They had just managed to shoot out one of our tires and Josh couldn’t control where we were going. So, as this looked like our death approaching us, all of a sudden, their car blew up. It didn’t make any sense! How could that have happened? I called Sarah quickly to ask her if she was doing anything to help us and she simply replied, “You didn’t think that I was going to leave you guys alone to die, did you? Oh, and by the way, you might want to put the bulletproof tires on.” I couldn’t even speak, but thankfully, I didn’t have to, because she hung up. We pulled over on the side of the road and put on the new bulletproof tires. I knew more would come, but this time, we would be ready with bulletproof everything. Thank god we had Sarah, because apparently she planted a bomb in their car.
We pulled up to the building from a dark alley three blocks away. This time there couldn’t be any mistakes. Since they already knew that we were coming, we waited. We waited in an apartment until we thought that their surveillance was weak enough, and then we struck. Luckily for Johnny and I, Josh was also a master marksman (he knew how to shoot a gun, especially a sniper rifle). So he took out the lookouts. None of them knew what had happened and none of them ever detected us. Now it was an unfair match, because now we had a better chance of success than they did. For once, on a mission, the odds weren’t against us.
We headed up the building, same as last time. The only difference was, we were serious. Before we had seriousness, and we trying but we didn’t have the intensity that we needed for success. Now, we were ready for this mission. Now, we could do the job. And we could do it without failure; we had a chance to start again. That’s not a chance that you get very often when on a mission, but I guess we lucked out.
As Johnny and I hid behind a wall we stopped for a minute and I could hear his heart racing. Then I knew that Johnny was being serious. You don’t usually expect that from first time agents, spies, whatever you want to call us. But, you can’t expect that because then they fail, and I came into this mission having no expectations for him. Yet, he seems to always be able to prove me wrong. It’s usually a bad thing, but this time it was incredibly good.
We quickly maneuvered through the hall and up the stairs to the tenth floor. We were almost home free, one floor away I was…thinking. I don’t usually do this when I’m on a mission because I can’t. There’s always so much to do, but now I was actually thinking. As I thought to myself I was just wondering how capturing this guy for ransom would play out for me. For once, I didn’t know.
It seemed like I was just rushed into all of this. Just thinking that this whole mess started with me shooting Allen and then him blabbing on me made me so angry. It was only my second mission, but I had already mastered the art of stealth and my accuracy with guns was amazing. I wasn’t trying that hard either, and I didn’t say those things about myself, the team I was with did. One day, I was on a mission with a guy named Allen. He was inexperienced, and it was so annoying. He was at a higher rank than me, had been there a shorter amount of time than me, and he was a suck-up. He was one of those people that are just in the business to make it to the top by sucking up cause they know how to. I was so angry I just couldn’t contain my anger and so I shot him.
I’m not going to sit here and say that I’m proud of it because I’m not. That day was the beginning of the rest of my homeless life. Out on the streets, barely any food, and it was because of him and because of me. I’m also not going to sit here and say that it’s his entire fault because it’s not. I know that I messed up, but he messed me up even worse. He killed my three other brothers and their wives. That was Allen’s attempt at killing me, but I wasn’t at the wedding reception for Michael and Julie. Neither was Johnny, so we lived. I think that maybe that’s why Johnny is so mad at me. Yet, I knew I would find him, and that’s why I picked to attack the mafia leader for ransom. It’s because that’s what Allen is. He became the leader of the mafia after the shooting. It was unthinkable. Me the experienced hit man became a person on the streets and mister book smart became the leader of the mafia.
As Johnny and I headed up the last floor I knew that it had to be done. Johnny didn’t know that the mafia leader was Allen, and I wasn’t going to tell him. I knew that with his emotions, he would run up there and just end up getting himself killed. His emotions are strong and he is a very passionate person, but I couldn’t bring myself to tell him. Yet, somehow he was going to know, probably in some last minute adrenaline rush or something.
Again it was the same scene, body after body hit the floor. We got closer and closer to Allen’s office but I just couldn’t take it, and my emotions took over. I was screaming, running down the hall killing anything in my sight. I turned back to see if Johnny was okay in one of those “I hope to god that my brother’s okay” moments. He was on the ground staring at me…crying. Just looking into his eyes was tearing me apart. I could see in his eyes that he couldn’t handle this. He had the sympathetic eyes of a hard workingman, not the cold-blooded eyes of a killer. So, I calmed myself. We had a very small talk. We didn’t have much time though, as people were trying to shoot us.
I knew that it would tear him apart, but I needed him right now and he couldn’t wimp out on me. So I told him about Allen and the whole Mafia thing. Within a minute of hearing it, he stood and ran into the office shooting. I came after him and shot the guards, and then I stopped him. All I told him was that we needed Allen alive for the ransom money and then we would kill him.
Allen finally got up from behind his desk and said, “Listen, I’ve already called the police. What more do you have to do?”
Luckily I saw that he was without a gun and therefore didn’t have any option but to listen. “ We’re going to hold you ransom, and then kill you, just like you did to my three other brothers and their wives.”
“Oh, so this is the fourth one. Well I’ve got news for you Johnny. I easily took out Patrick, Francis, Michael, Mallorie, Samantha and Julie. What makes you think that I can’t take out you too? You’re just another slimy, filthy, person from the same dirt poor, nasty, ugly family,” yelled Allen.
All I heard was a SMACK! I looked over and Allen was on the ground with the imprint of the backside of a rifle on the side of his face.
“You little…”quietly said Allen.
“You little what? Kid? Jerk? I have the upper hand because I have a gun, so I suggest that you shut up and give us an apology,” yelled Johnny.
“For what? I don’t owe you an apology for nothing, and I’m never going to give you one. The only reason that I’m not fighting back is because you have guns and I’m not an idiot,” replied Allen.
“For what? Is that really what you have to say? You owe us an apology for a hell of a lot. For starters, you need to apologize for killing our brothers, then apologize for killing their wives, and apologize for making us live off of the streets,” violently replied Johnny.
“Stop! Johnny, calm down. I’m mad about their deaths too but you need to calm yourself down. Look, what we need right now is money. What we don’t need is you freaking out. This is my war, and I’m going to finish it. I was the one who shot him, which made him come after our brothers. I’m sorry, calmingly,” I said.
“I know, I’ve known for awhile now,” said Johnny.
“But how? I don’t understand,” I stated.
“A member of your old team told me. That’s why I was so mad that one day,” explained Johnny. “The whole reason that I went crazy back there is because I had forgotten, but you reminded me.”
“Well, thanks for dealing with it. Now, we need to take care of you, Allen. You’ve been the cause of our problems and so we need the money,” I said.
“Just take it all. Look here’s, uh…here’s 100 grand. If you need anymore you’ll have to get it from the ransom money that you’ll get from whoever,” yelped Allen.
“That’s not enough; we need more than that. Johnny go and stand guard at the door. I’m worried that the cops are going to try and infiltrate the building. Allen, you’re coming with me to the roof. This is how were going to get the ransom money,” I said confidently.
As Allen and I went to the roof, cops began to infiltrate the building. Johnny was in trouble until a miracle happened: Sarah and Josh came back to assist. Josh helped with the guarding, and Sarah helped me with the transaction of the money for the ransom. Sarah opened an account, which the money was put into. Everything was going according to plan and the account was filling up with money, but Danny knew something was going to happen to them soon and it was going to be bad. Josh and Sarah left earlier but thank god they came back to help. Even though they were gone for 3 hours during the fighting, at least they were here now.
As soon as the money was put into the account, they all heard gunfire from the inside of the building. I knew this was going to happen because it always does. With every mission you have to have at least one fault or you’re lucky for that one mission. But, after that you have to mess up somehow. Sarah and I ran down to the twelfth floor from the roof to find cops shooting everywhere and Josh was dead. Sarah hit the floor screaming and crying, and then I told Johnny to hit the floor because I knew what was coming next. Sarah and Josh were engaged, but this was Sarah’s life and working with her fiancé made her happy, so Josh went on the mission with her. Of course, like always, the widow loses her cool and she started shooting everywhere. She killed every cop there from just pure rage. This was a pretty big improvement from the person who shot herself.
After this, Sarah jumped off the building with Allen and killed both of them. It’s sad when someone feels so sad from a death that they take their own life, but it’s happened before. So we know that it’s possible. I look at the world like this: if it has happened, it’s likely to happen again. Yes, I was sad to lose Sarah and Josh, but I wasn’t attached.
Finally, Johnny and I headed home. We didn’t even want the money now; we just wanted our piece of sidewalk that we called home. All we wanted to do was to enjoy the simple things and leave that behind us. To tell you the truth, we never even used the money. After the whole incident, the money was practically non-existent. Yet, for once we had peace on our street. We wanted happiness and we got happiness.