The Truth

Two old friends share a secret for many years.

 

The old General crushed out a cigarette, the light brown filter bent and crumbled inside the plain black plastic ashtray that sat off to the side upon his cluttered desk.  His hard grey eyes looked over at the man that sat across from him. “Forty years.” He grumbled as he spoke. “Forty friggin years…” His aged fist wrapped upon the wooden surface of his desk. “For forty goddamed years we have kept this under wraps!”

The man could easily see that the General was upset. “General…” He tried to explain. “You didn’t really expect this to continue did you? A lie as massive as this was…with so many people involved…” He tossed his hands into the air. “Hell, sir, I am surprised that this hadn’t gotten out sooner!”

The General stood and began to pace. The man watched him like a nervous cat watches a stray dog that passes by. The General stopped in front of the office window and looked out across the airfield.

“We paid large amounts of money to those people….every damned one of them…hell their families are set for life…where do you think that $30 billion went to?” He grumbled. “And the ones we couldn’t pay off we assassinated….Freeman, Gus, Ed White and all the others.”  The old General held up his aged hands. “There is so much blood on these hands because of this friggin lie.” His voice was distant almost remorseful.

“I know sir.” Was all the man said.

The General turned around to face his visitor again. “Okay, so there’s a leak…big friggin deal! We have had leaks before….friggin Kaysing tried in ’73…remember that?” He stepped closer toward his visitor. “The American people…the world will not believe it.”

The old man took in a deep breath. “Sir, I turn 68 in two months….I was just a kid then…I have carried this on my conscience for far too long.”

The General’s eyes narrowed. “You’re the leak?”

His old friend looked up at him with pleading eyes. “The world has to know Carl.”

The General wiped his arm out across his desk sending debris flying about the room. “The world has to know?” He repeated. “The world has to know? ...has to know what? ... That NASA lied? ... That the greatest country on this friggin planet pulled off the greatest hoax known to mankind since Jesus rose from the grave?” He leaned in close to his visitor. “Do you have any idea what that would do to the U. S of A?, you want those goddamned commie b******s to know that we lied, that we failed?”

The man leaned away from the General’s hawk like gaze. “Sir, times have changed, the Cold War is over, and the Soviet Union doesn’t exist anymore.”

 The General laughed. “Yeah and we actually did land on the moon now didn’t we?” The man shook his head realizing that he would never get through to the old General. He rose to his feet. “Okay Carl, Okay…I see that this is going to get us no where.” He turned to leave.

The General reached into the upper left drawer of his desk. “Ben…”

The man stopped, he didn’t turn around, he didn’t need to, he knew what would happen next, in a perverse way he had hoped that this conversation would end this way. He was tired of lying to everyone. “Carl, you were always a good friend to me.”

The General pulled the trigger of the .45 Glock. His nostrils filled with the scent of gun powder and sulfur., his ears screamed in protest of the deafening explosion, his hand stung from the slight recoil. His friend fell to the floor before him.

The General stood over the man, now dead. “You were always a good friend to me as well Ben, I am really going to miss you.”

 

The End

 

((Happy 40th Birthday NASA Moon Landing 1969-2009.))

Author's Note

Just thought I would throw this up today.

Reviews

[Legion]

That was pretty good. Got caught up in it. Did you ever see a movie called "Capricorn One"? It came out in 1978 I believe and had Sam Watterson in it and a few others. Check it out sometime if you haven't. Pretty interesting story line. Keep up the good work. Oh, and thanks for the review on that werewolf piece. Glad you and your friends found humor in my misfortune. Damn werewolf. ;)

[LaDonnaMarie]

intresting concept