The Irregular

The invasion had been surreal for the Sullivan family. It had been surreal for all the families of the eastern seaboard.

Howard “Howie” Sullivan, the youngest-and before the invasion the jolliest- of the Sullivan children was the only one of his siblings to survive.

His brother, Franklin James Sullivan, Jr., had just moved to Northern Virginia, which was leveled during the initial bombings of the District of Columbia. Frank had told his brother just a month before how there was no way such a thing would happen. There had been talk of a full scale invasion on the news, with men in suits threatening the American people with their subtitles, but and invasion of the United States? Who would do that?

Howie’s sister was detained for reasons unclear, save for she was a very vocal protester of all things government. Turned out it wasn’t just the American government she would protest, but any damned government that dare call itself in charge.

She died in one of the ramshackle detainment camps the invaders maintained in the shipyards south of Baltimore.

Howie had come back to Baltimore from Philadelphia; since he didn’t want leave his father alone in an apartment less than a mile from a combat zone, amongst other things.

Howie was qualified to defy the provisional government of Maryland, but because he had been living in another state for decade, there was no record of him. After breaking both wrists in military training, Howie had accepted a medical discharge and moved to Philly to work as a bouncer for a friend, and worked other menial jobs for seven years.

“What are we going to do?” Howie’s father asked him when it became clear his daughter, Howie’s sister, wasn’t coming back.

“Huh?” Howie asked.

“Aren’t you going to do something?” Howie’s father asked, a little furious at his youngest.

“Yeah, pop, I’m going make sure you’re okay.” Howie said.

“That’s it?” Frankie Sr. had been aghast.

Howie pointed vigorously toward the ceiling with one hand and made a throat slitting motion with other “Yeah, dad, what did you think I was going do?”

“I guess nothing more than that,” Howie’s dad had said, while nodding like he was suddenly the member of a vast conspiracy.

Two weeks later, Howie had found his father and his dogs on the last remnants of a bombed out bridge that dropped off into nowhere just west of Charles Street.

He found the body staring, with a horrified expression at the older hound’s body, its head sagging over the back of the seat into, the left side of its skull missing and its right eye put out.

Howie realized something sad about the scene: his father had seen at least one of his beloved dogs die less than a foot from him, and then he had been executed from an obscure point. . . up high. Some where.

About ten yards from the truck, his father’s other hound lay, a body shot that had caught the beast in mid-step from the patterns the blood made. Running. Perhaps toward the truck.

Sullivan senior’s dogs had loved him, and Howie could almost picture the pup running towards the truck, shouting “Frank? Frank?! Say something, Frank!?” in the guttural language of dogs.

Howie felt tears welling up in his eyes as he wondered, quite irrationally, if the dog used his people-given name or his secret dog name when he called out to Howie’s father for the last time.

“It’s Duke! Frank?!” A rifle crack, and then nothing, no matter what name Duke had been using.

It wasn’t very far to the nearest highpoint. Surely they’d be gone by now, but Howie would check.

The initial stages of the war had made a new concrete wilderness out of midtown Baltimore, so as to make regular access by American and pro-American forces more difficult. Penn Station, a main hub for rail transport, had been heavily bombed, but the disused train station that was now as part of a university still stood. As did its tower. Howie stared grimly at the structure.

That’s where I’d go. Howie thought, If was a cowardly sonovabitch looking to kill a one legged man and his two dogs. Right there.

Charles Street, the main street of the city and home to some of its highest buildings, had become a canyon between the east and west sides of Baltimore. The street itself had been punched through in many places, down into the sewer system, and then filled with rubble, choking the flow of human waste and spilling it east and west along the entire length of the road up to Northern Parkway. Howie sloshed through the foul smelling water and over the uneven pavement.

The pavement evened out a little near the opera house and the street then gave way to a hill, still with some live grass around the old train station. The parking lot at the bottom of the hill was filled with water, and Howie moved down the hill at and angle, so as not to make noise stepping the water. He made his way toward the left side of the building, staying in the shadows thrown by the last remaining street light.

He hopped from the hillside to the barely-above-water sidewalk and pressed himself up against the building, then rolled his body to his shoulder and moved quietly toward the entrance. He pulled out a small flashlight when he reached the smashed-in doors and shined it in. There were foot prints in the dust that fallen on the floor from the bombings. Howie placed his feet into each of them, in case they were as meticulous and paranoid as he.

He followed the prints up two flights of stairs and then around a corner and to a third flight.

He paused and listened for anything. They might still be up there, he thought with a jolt. They might have watched him loping like a fool over the destroyed city from the place of his father’s death. Maybe they’d run out of ammo. Maybe they had pistols at the ready. Maybe they’d set trip-wire bombs.

Howie took a deep breath and crept up the stairs.

In the top of the tower, the room had been cleaned up. Garbage and debris had been pushed into a corner. A small stove had been setup. There was a platform with wheels, and on top of it was a ladder that reached to the windows about twelve feet about the floor.

In the center of the room were four sleeping bags with sub-machine guns next three of them, and long rifle with a bi-pod stand attached to its barrel. That was the weapon that killed Howie’s father and his dogs.

Howie was like a ghost as he moved into the room. He barely breathed and moved so slowly that the only way to tell he was moving at all was to look away and then look back. He made his away around the rifle and stood there, looking down at it like it was a dog’s corpse.

How can men sleep so soundly after taking lives? Howie mused as he looked at the face of the soldier who had probably killed his father. He was very young, probably a talented sniper judging from his position coupled with the precision of the shots.

Howie looked at him a long time. As he was already asleep, Howie imagined his face wouldn’t be much different when he was dead. Howie actually felt a little bad about thinking the soldier, the kid, was a cowardly sonovabitch earlier. The soldier was really just a kid. His mother back wherever he came from was probably worried sick about him. Even as now Howie had no one to worry about him, he didn’t like the idea of this boy’s parents attending a funeral.

Still, no reason to just let them be.

Howie shook his head and made his decision.

With that same painful slowness, Howie opened the sniper rifle and pulled out the bolt and closed it back up again, making no more noise than a mouse folding its underwear.

He breathed very gently and looked at the sub-machine guns. Mean little weapons compared to the rifle that would cough accurate little bursts of fire up close.

Howie would make sure they knew the tower wasn’t safe anymore. He could pull the bolts from the other weapons as well. It would serve them right for not having anyone on watch.

Howie had heard there were some Green Berets, and other guerrilla fighters, throughout the eastern seaboard, maybe he would alert them to the location. Worst case they killed the four soldiers for their carelessness, and the forces left in the area would crack down on the citizens. Best case, they blew up the tower and made it known that they were watching. If they were watching.

Howie went around to the other weapons and sabotaged them as well with the same mouse-like quiet.

He looked around the room. If there was anything else he might sabotage. He thought better of it as he had already pushed his luck with the weapons, and crept back the door he came him. He shined the light down into the vague footprints and saw the nails on either side of the each stair and underneath the stairs, the screws that held them in place on the stair stringer.

I’m a fucker. Howie thought as he pulled out his pocket knife and unfolded the screw driver head. As quietly as he had removed the bolts from the weapons, he removed the screws from three stairs. Then the next three he left alone, and he removed the screws from three more. He moved slightly down the landing and then down the next set of stairs.

Howie thought about the mines in Afghanistan as he descended the stairs. The briefs and papers and images he had seen said the mines were designed to wound more than kill as that would remove more people for battlefield. One wounded, more to take care of them. If the stairs did what they supposed to do, it would be about as bad as a mine, but had a chance to heal better, Howie reasoned. Fractured bones from falling and wrenching. Deep muscles bruises that would remain stiff for months. No shrapnel, no bleeding.

Howie heard a radio chirp and a foreign language crackled through it. His heart raced, but he kept his pace. First they’d have to wake up, tighten their boots back on, grab their newly useless weapons and rub the sleep from their eyes. He had time.

Howie was on the ground floor when heard vague noises of movement echo from two floors up. He trotted faster towards the door, ducking low to get out the hole in the doors. He heard a crash on the stairs and then a shout. There was another crash and howl of pain.

Howie got out the door and went to hill on the right side of building, scrambling up it quick as fast as he could. He got to the street and paused. Let his panting stop. Let himself slow down. Only guilty people ran. He then started walking slowly up the street and away from the tower.

Howie made three blocks south of the tower before a vehicle pulled up and a light shown on him after he had barely moved a block. “Against wall!” a bull-horn bellowed in accented English. “Speak English? Against Wall, Fuck!”

Someone got out of the vehicle and pointed something at him, but in the glare he couldn’t tell much more that it was a shadow. He turned and put his hands on the wall. “You are fuck! Out late, fuck?” the shadow man shouted as he patted Howie down. He pulled things from Howie’s pockets and dropped them on the sidewalk. Howie listened to rumbling engine and wished he killed those other soldiers, just in case these guys killed him. The man spun Howie around and jammed what was obviously a handgun into his cheek.

“You kill soldier, fuck?” the angry shadow hissed. “You kill soldier mine? Kill your sunshine, fuck.”

Howie was both terrified by the weapon and about the laugh at the turns of phrase. The shadow was much larger than Howie, with thick arms and barrel-like torso. He was holding Howie against the wall with a knee between Howie’s legs and an arm now across his chest. His face was an inch from Howie’s and he could smell grapes and meat on the shadows’ breath.

There was radio crackle from the vehicle, and someone shouted at the burly shadow man who was breathing hot hatred in Howie’s face. He shouted something back and someone else got out of the vehicle and pulled the heavy shadow away from Howie. They looked like were about to fight and the unarmed one shoved the one who had been accosting Howie. He gestured and pointed back down the street to where Howie had just come from.

The angry shadow pushed into Howie again, put the gun against his temple and grabbed his groin hard. Howie gritted his teeth and bore the pain. “See you, you die, tough fuck.” The shadow said. Then he released Howie’s balls and punched him hard in the gut. Howie folded in half like a hinged mannequin and fell to his knees, nearly hitting his head as he gave into gravity.

Howie coughed as the doors to the vehicle closed, and the driver did a three point turn to go back down the street towards the tower. Howie took what felt like an hour to get seated against the building.

“Hsst.” He heard. “Hey. Hey you.” Distant and tinny. He closed his eyes and saw spots from the lack of air.

“Hey!” a pebble struck the wall of the ruined building where Howie was seated. He looked to where it came from and stared hard. Near some garbage cans there was a little movement, then a pale hand pealed darkness away from a pale face, and the hand gestured to come over.

Howie got up slowly and moved across the street calmly. He went to the garbage cans and pretended to be going through them looking for something.

“That was your old man in the truck, huh?” asked the friendlier shadow, who had covered his pale skin again. Howie smelled blood on the new shadow man.

“It was,” Howie said.

“Did you kill the sniper?” the new shadow asked.

“No, I just sabotaged their weapons,” Howie admitted.

“Good. I need a favor from you,” and the shadow produced an old Nokia cell phone. “Press the call button.”

Howie took the device and pressed a green button with a “C” on it. The phone said “Calling” on its screen. Then was a thunderous noise from down the street, and Howie looked to see the Tower falling into view and then out again as it was obscured by the hill.

“You’ve just committed a military action against an invading force,” said the new shadow, which suddenly seemed a great deal less friendly, “You should probably join a military unit if you want to survive now.”

Howie watched the dust and smoke as a billowed out into the street some distance away down the street. He thought about all the decisions he’d made up until that point, and how it hadn’t stopped the nasty shadow from before from out and out assaulting him. Perhaps if there was not incident at the tower, he wouldn’t even been free, or even alive in a few hours. Finally, Howie sighed and told the other shadow. “I don’t have anything to loose.”

“And everything to gain. Follow me” The shadow purred.

Howie followed the shadow, unsure where he was going, only knowing he would have to miss his entire family now and more than a little angry he fell for the "push this button" trick.