Twenty-Four

Final Chapter

‘The flash drive’ Oscar said simply. Holding his gun at his waist. Not aiming it toward Lee but allowing it to be seen. The detective looked up at Oscar, the sound of his pained breathing making Oscar want to wince. Lee didn’t respond to the statement. Instead Oscar simply reached down into Lee’s inner pockets and started feeling around. Latching onto something the right size he began to pull it out. As his hand escaped Lee’s jacket, the man’s blood soaked hand gripped onto Oscar’s wrist.

‘Name?’, Lee managed between somewhat gurgled breaths. Oscar looked at him and decided to do the man a service.

‘Oscar’, he replied.

‘Oscar…’ Lee started, ‘You seem like a good guy’, Oscar replied to this statement with a confused look, but Lee continued, ‘You tried to save me, remember?’. Oscar did, he remembered the conversation they’d had in the interview. ‘Well now you can save everyone else.’ Lee looked at the flash drive and up to Oscar. ‘I wasn’t trying to take it. I was trying to destroy it. But now you have to’, Lee’s hand slipped from Oscar’s wrist and fell to the floor, his arm void of strength.

‘Why would I do that?’ Oscar asked. Lee replied smiling.

‘Good…guy’. With that Lee let his head fall to his chest. As he felt the blackness surround him he could only hope that with his last breaths, he might have just achieved something. Oscar stared down at Lee before he turned around and walked back to his car. He opened the door slowly and maneuvered into the driver’s seat. He placed the flash drive on the dashboard and closed the door. Oscar sat in that seat for a number of minutes. He sat staring at the flash drive, and occasionally looking out to the smoking car on the other side of the road. As the street lights reflected off the gleaming crimson, which stained the small black object in a number of places, Oscar thought to himself. Now what?