A Break from Reality

The first pangs of guilt had struck him months ago, and he had done his best to ignore them as they came in waves. Certain moments - a particularly affectionate exchange, a show of love, triggered this guilt he was burdened with. Most of the time he wouldn’t acknowledge it, store it in his conscience for a later date, but as the date grew closer these feelings kept him up at night. He lay awake, pondering the future and regretting the past. 

All of these memories flooded back in a flurry of thoughts as the car slowed and made its way toward the station. Suitcase in hand, he stepped out of the car and turned in the direction of the building. It wasn’t his first time here, but it would be his last, and most odd time there. Usually he was surrounded by the people he called his family, but now he was alone, looking for the agents for his extraction. 

He had gone deep undercover for several years, posing as the best friend of a family suspected of having dangerous agendas. His name was Tom, and his friendship with the boy was genuine - he was the agent’s only friend, and he was one of the only people who understood him. Their time spent together was the single reason why the agent had demanded more time, for what he labeled it is as “research”. Jack (the agent’s assumed name) was such an integral part of the family that they had given him a house key. It was not something that a group would do if they had something to hide, he had argued to the organization, but they ignored him and ordered his removal from the mission. He had gotten too close, they had said. 

It was quite easy to get close to a family so loving and accepting as the Millers. They were all incredible listeners, able to pluck and remember important details that made it seem as if they already knew you. It quickly became apparent that they did not possess the capabilities, nor moral stomach, to do any of the things they had been accused of. Being a loyal servant, he still fed his handlers information about their whereabouts and hoped they would call him off. Even so he did set the foundation for several escape routes in case of an emergency, but whether it was a threat posed by the organization or the Millers he did not know.  

With these thoughts squarely in his mind, he took the final steps into the station. He spotted a large man with a fedora covering his enormous head. To an onlooker,  he was a normal citizen, but the agent knew better and started in the direction of the man. He checked his tail to determine if anyone was following him, then walked up to the strange figure. 

Without saying a word the man handed him a piece of paper and walked away. The agent shoved the note in his pocket and went into the bathroom to read it. 

The note was short in length, but got to the point:

Extraction tomorrow. Go to the front of the house at 11:30. Eliminate any evidence of your existence. 

This surprised him. The messages he received previously hinted that today would be the last of his mission, and he hadn’t bothered to clean his room or say goodbye. Any questions neighbors or friends had would be met with a swift silencing, and whether it was through physical or verbal means did not matter to the agents.  

Once he returned home and explained his reappearence, it took him less than 5 minutes to complete the task.  He tucked all of his clothes into his suitcase, grabbed his toothbrush and toothpaste, and cleaned his room. This time, however, he was thankful for the extension. It could mean he could ponder the incoming hours, say goodbye to Tom and the rest of his lovable family.  

Using the rest of the night to think for himself, he decided once and for all what his fate would be. His entire life was dictated by the wishes of the agency, from his birth until now. His parents were agents - he went to agency school, slept in their dorms, ate their food. He never truly understood the magnitude of this until he got older and saw how controlled his parents’ lives were. They spent very little time together; all of this free time was restricted and watched by the all-seeing cameras in their rooms, making private time nonexistent. Any freedoms Jack had went down the drain the minute he stepped into the large schools of the organization. 

His final decision was driven by his desire for normalcy, to live a life where he could do anything he desired. He saw how his parents were deprived of free time, placed and moved without their consent. Any connection to their son had gone with them - being on missions so often, they never had the opportunity to show the love a parent should. He wanted to have kids and raise them with freedom, not hand them to his employers and forget about them. This is what pushed him to escape the agency and go off the grid, leaving the life he had dreadfully lived for 18 years. 

The first, and most difficult, obstacle was dodging the agency itself. Fearing situations just like the one brewing unbeknownst to them, they had placed trackers inside all of their agents as soon as they were 10. For missions, it was a life-saver - several times throughout his short career he had been discovered and ran until scooped up by one of the getaway drivers. Most of the children who readily accepted the devices at such a young age never considered the ramifications of their decision - that they had 24/7 knowledge of the whereabouts of all personnel, and could track down any of these people at the snap of a finger. 

He remembered something his mother told him, during one of the few times they had been together. Thinking back on it, it occurred to him that she was trying to send a message, an important sentence hidden beneath the small talk aimed at the cameras. She had told him to make sure no one ever touched his neck - she had shown him the exact spot on her neck - because it contained something “very important”, as she put it. He had forgotten about it since then, but he realized she had told him something of monumental importance, possibly hoping for him to do what she had wanted to do years before. It made leaving his mother and father less daunting. 

This removal would be the first step of his plan, as there would be very little time between its removal and his reconnecting with the agency. He had one advantage, however - they were in Europe, meaning that the presence of potential dangers was lower. Europe was the place that the service placed the least importance upon; less money, and therefore cameras and agents, were dispatched. Jack would use this to hide as long as he can until his permanent escape arrived. 

It would start with his detachment of the tracker, and end with his escape on a subway. Everything was meticulously mapped out, every checkpoint and possibility thought out. By the time he was finished, it was well past midnight and he was far too stressed to sleep. He mapped out the entire route in his head again, then spent a sleepless night dreaming of every tragic outcome.

The morning started out like all others - the agent walked downstairs and ate breakfast. This was short lived when it became clear he had no appetite for food and threw it in the garbage. He told his family (still unknowing of the plot) that he was going to Jack’s house, and walked towards the door. 

This is where any normalcy ended. He squeezed and pushed the exact point on his neck where his mother had shown him, and the tracker popped out, covered in blood. He threw it in the corner of the room, took one last glance at the map, then shred it to pieces. The rebellion had begun.