The Only One

by Jeremy Nham

Ring, buzz, thump, he reached over, the phone fell on the floor. Its three in the morning as he got up, looked around for his phone, to see who interrupted his sleep with such head aching sounds. He saw it was her, as he checked the phone, she couldn’t sleep and needed some comforting, he called. As the phone rang twice she finally picked up, "Hey" she said with a soft calm voice trying not to wake anyone in her house. " Hey baby, you called?" he asked trying to seem as if he was not sleeping.

"Yeah, I had a bad dream, I can't go to sleep, can you talk to me until I fall asleep? I have a lot of things on my mind".

"What do you mean? What’s going on?" he said as his brain was fading off.

"Well I don't really want to talk about it now. Can you just talk or sing me to sleep, please baby?" she asked.

He could tell that the conversation was going nowhere, so he began to sing All My Life by K-ci and Jojo, the song they heard on their first date. As she fell into a calm sleep, he started wondering what is going on in her head, little by little he dozed off.

The next day he got up turned on his computer and blasted his music so he would have something to listen to as he takes his morning showers. While in his lovely shower scrubbing his body with soap and brushing his teeth he looked at his shower clock ticking away. "Oh shit I’m late! Why didn’t my phone wake me up?" As he rushed out the shower. He put on some clothes that his girl friend Serina gave him, dug around his room for his phone and keys, and ran out the door. He got into his car and started to head towards his job at FedEx. While he drove, his phone started to ring with three spurs of vibration. "You are late" said his boss.

"I know, I know, I had to take care of business last night. Which you made me in charge of! How do you expect me to always be on time? You know that she’s the one", he snapped back

"Just hurry up and get here, we will be handing out your next assignment"

"Alright, I'll be there in a few",

Just upon arriving at FedEx he got another phone call, it was Serina. He ignored the call. Serina then called her friend Ace. She knew that Lance didn’t like it when she talked to him because of some jealousy issues, but she needed someone to talk to and Lance wasn’t always there for her. Ace and Serina have been talking for about a month and has been helping Serina with her emotions towards Lance and how to cope with the situation.

...

"I don’t know if he is cheating on me or not, but I just have this weird feeling every time we look at each other", Serina explained

"It's okay, I'm sure it will turn out fine. He is a busy person from what I hear and sounds like a great guy", Ace tried to cheer her up.

"Thanks, but I just don’t want to keep on hurting like this," she started to tear up.

"Well I have a suggestion. Break up with him, that way you don’t have to deal with anything and you can set your mind strait for things. Or you could just take a break, don’t see him talk to him or even think about him, so you can have time for yourself and feel if you really need him",

"Thank you Ace", she said sniffing up her last tear.

"No problem, just feel better okay", Ace hung up the phone.

...

Lance ran in to receive his next assignment as he walked in, to his right he had to secretly scan his hand by pressing his palm on a hand that was on the counter which had a child waving from the Make a Wish foundation. He had to do this to confirm his identity before he went into the back room which had a lever to lead to the basement. As he got to the basement, he had to go though many security features like, x- rays, metal detectors, and an eye sensor. As he passed through, he went up to his boss.

"Your late Lance, you of all people should know we run on a tight schedule" He said.

"I know, it wouldn’t be a problem if I could sleep properly at night", Lance squealed.

"Yes well we know what you are going though, but you must stick with her. We don’t know what will happen to her if she were to be captured."

"Why cant we just tell her the truth of who she really is? It certainly will make her never leave my side," Lance snickered

"We can do that, but if we do how will she know that the 'Love'" you two have is really true? She will think you are lying and leave you. And possibly end up in terrorist hands,"

"If you wont tell her, then tell me. Why is she so important? Why must I deal with her?"

"She is the key to many things. The only one which can solve puzzles and mazes within seconds of just glancing at it. She holds the power that can solve formulas, and new technology"

"Well yea she loves puzzles, and she does finish them fast, but what does this have to do with technology? When we school, she didn’t really how to solve formulas, I mean she sucks at chemistry. Aren’t we ten years ahead of the most dangerous terrorists already?" Lance fired back.

"Lance, you are getting out of hand, you must keep watch over her. She doesn’t know these things yet, but terrorist will do anything to get into her head and make her create whatever the hell they want. Bottom line, you must stick with her, Understood" the boss laid down the rules.

"Yes sir" Lance answered

"Now the assignment, you are to answer her phone calls at all times, and try to make her tell you about these "Dreams" and what is on her mind. You must also protect her when you two go on your trip to the beach, we hear that there might be a terrorist attempt to capture one of the most hidden factories in the world. They might also go after her to".

"Yes, but how do you know about that, and our trip to the beach?" Lance questioned

"Lance, you know we are an advanced mercenary group right?" the boss said sarcastically with a smirk

"Yes sir, I will head out immediately"

"Oh, and Serina is waiting for you up stairs"

"Crap, hope she doesn’t give me any shit for not picking up"

"Just hurry up"

As Lance returned to the surface, he was getting ready for a good lecture from Serina. He walked up to her. "Hey baby, sorry I didn’t pick up I was in a meeting" he said with his head down.

"Lance, I have to talk to you about something, can you take your break now?" she said worried.

They went to an empty park together.

"So, what’s wrong?" Lance asked

"I don’t know for sure, and it hurts me for sure but, are you cheating on me" she asked in a soft voice.

"What? Never! You know your my only one, why would you think of such a thing?" Lance defended.

"Well you never pick up my calls, and you always call me late. When you do pick up, its usually loud and we don’t talk for long. I just feel like we aren’t what we used to be anymore. My heart is hurting and I don’t think I can handle this anymore. I'm sorry Lance, but this may have to be over" Serina started to tear up.

"What!? Why!? I'm not cheating on you, I swear! I just have so many things to do and I’m more busy. Look I'm sorry, I'll try to be there for you more, just don’t break up with me please" Lance fought back.

"Lance, I'm sorry but for now at this point I need to figure things out. Good bye Lance, I hope I can get things straight and we can be together again, but at this time, I don’t know if I love you" Serina got up and left.

Thick clouds started to form, and within seconds heavy rain started to pour down. As Lance stood there, he called in to FedEx and said that he needed the day off. He looked over to a squirrel. "This assignment just got a whole lot harder, and I think I'm going crazy 'cause I'm talking to a squirrel" Lance joked.

The squirrel ran to a nearby tree, crawled in, came out with another squirrel and shared a pinecone. After a bit while the squirrels were enjoying their delicious meal, a child walked by eating his only joy in life, ice cream, kicked the pinecone and chuckled. One of the squirrels ran away and the other went to fetch the pinecone. The squirrel came back, to the one that ran, and brought the pinecone back where the two can share. Lance looked up into the rain, saw some lighting, rain pouring on his face, tears started to form, slowly but surely, he began to cry. Lance walked back to work grabbed his stuff and headed for his car to a long ride home. The phone rang. "Its Lance" he answered.

"We heard what happened, you better hope nothing happens, and fix this mess" the boss said bluntly.

"Yes sir, I'll get on it right away" Lance then hung up the phone.

He took the long way home, and stopped by their favorite sushi restaurant to get a bite to eat. The waitress approached him. "Should you take your seat before your lady comes in" she asked.

"Oh no, I'm alone today" Lance answered.

"Oh, okay right this way" she said.

Lance walked toward his table, ordered a roll of unagi, and sat patiently. He glanced at the window and saw Serina tied up, being kidnapped and thrown into a van. Like an amateur, Lance got up and rushed towards Serina. Lance took action and pulled out his pistol from his waist, loaded it, and took aim at the van. He took three shots towards the van and managed to blow a tire. The van's side door opened up and a large man pulled out an automatic machine gun and started to unload on Lance. A couple of people got hit by stray bullets, but they were only minor wounds and scratches. Suddenly the van turned sideways, so that you can see the side door open completely, the man took aim and shot Lance in the leg while he was running towards them. Lance collapsed onto the floor and the man shot another three bullets into his back. The van then sped off.

...

"Lance, Lance!.... Damn it Lance answer me now!"

"Se.. Serina" Lance answered back trying to get a hold of himself.

"Lance, you have failed this mission. You have been in our rejuvenation facility for about 3 months now" the Boss scolded.

"Sir what happened to Serina" Lance questioned.

"She is still in custody of our enemies and has been taken to a navel base just north of the Philippines. Since you failed to protect her, everyone thinks you are dead, you will now be working in the command center with me. You have done good work in the past Lance, now is your chance to do great" the Boss praised him.

"I said happened to Serina! Is what I asked!" Lance shouted.

"Yes, well we have another agent on the mission, you don’t need to worry about her anymore it is being taken care of as we speak, although it is much harder to infiltrate the navel base now that they have Serina in captivity, They used her and have found a way to track invisibility suits as well as invisibility in general. They now have armored suits run on nuclear energy. We have those suits, which you will learn to pilot just in case we all are about to die, but they are not run on nuclear energy" the Boss explained.

"Who is this new agent? Let be back in on my mission, Serina has to know. She has to know that I am still alive!"

"Foolish! That is only something an amateur would do, after he falls gets up and runs without thinking only to end up in a harder fall. You might be surprised about the new agent, he is infiltrating the base as a spy, he is quite good, handsome and about your age. His name is Ace."

"What Ace is in this organization" Lance questioned quite fast.

"Yes he is, he has been in this organization for about a month after you have your assignment with Serina. So I thought he would be the perfect candidate for it"

"No! Not that guy! I' am the only one meant for Serina. Man he is always ruining my life, first Serina, now this!" Lance said with fury.

A doctor from the organization came in and announced the okay for Lance to leave his room.

"Good now we can start your training in the command center"

"Sir, I refuse, until I get Serina back safe, no one can stop me, not even you"

"Don’t you talk to your superiors in that manner" the Boss whipped out a gun.

"What? Do you plan to kill me?"

"I had originally intended to, but found better use for you, now come this way and listen to my orders"

Lance followed obediently, and with a greater plan in mind he sought after the training to use the armored suit to his advantage. He had two weeks to learn how to pilot it.

...

Three weeks had past. Lance in the command center, with the Boss, monitoring air currents for any unknown air ships or missiles. Suddenly a report was received from Ace.

"Put it on the monitor" the Boss said.

"Sir reporting in, I' am fully trusted by these men and have found the location of where she is being captive. I have not yet made contact with her, I may need a back up in case my plan fails. Please send someone with skills that are exceptional as soon as possible. I got to go over and out."

Lance jumped and asked the Boss if he could take it. The Boss sighed and agreed to Lance's will and had him shipped off to the navel base at once.

"Lance getting in is easy, but getting out is hard. We have this thing cloth that is sort of like invisibility but it’s untraceable. You shall use this to get into the base and find Ace. You will listen to his orders there. Here these are a knife and a gun equipped with a silencer. The knife has a button to activate its electric shock which is like a taser so that when you get them they fall without a work. Lance this is an infiltration mission. As you are now, failure is not an option. Radio in if you need backup, good luck." The Boss gave his speech.

Upon arrival at the navel base, Lance was getting ready to go on the mission, jumped and started to swim aboard the navel base. Infiltration complete he thought in his mind. He ran towards the base unnoticed and was able to get past the first guards and my air ships. Lance looked at his radar on his arm to track Ace's whereabouts, the radar makes a loud noise and the guard in front of him and saw him. Quickly Lance pulled out his knife and put the guard to a halt. Quietly he snuck the guard behind the pipes in the base, and went to find Ace. Lance makes his way down to level B4 ran past some guards and managed to get a glance at Ace talking to one of the guards. He starts to follow Ace until they were both alone.

"Ace, where is Serina being held" Lance questioned

"Woah, you came faster then expected" Ace said shocked

"Yes, we must go quickly"

"Yeah, she’s not to far from here although we might have to rough up the place a bit, no guard knows that I know where she is. They seem to trust me but not quite enough"

"Who are you talking to" the guard caught Ace.

"Let’s do this" Ace said with a smile

Lance took out his knife and went strait for the guard, the guard heard something behind him, avoided it and grabbed his gun, just in that instant Ace grabbed and twisted his neck and the guard fell on the floor.

"Yeah that knife is too loud, only use it when multiple people are around that way they cant hear it as much" Ace explained as they made their way through.

As they got to the door Ace explained that there should be four cameras that can detect anything that moves from dust to air, so that Lance would have to copy the same foot steps as Ace. As they walked through Lance tripped over his shoe lace and the alarm went off.

"Damn it how could you make a mistake like that" Ace shouted.

They both ran for it down the hall taking out twenty guards on they way. They managed to get to Serina's room and Lance broke down the door, an even larger alarm went off.

"Serina" Lance yelled.

"Lance!?" Both Serina and Ace answered.

"I thought you were the Boss, only he knows the names of the agents. Well that explained why you triggered the first alarm" Ace said causally

"Lance, I thought you were...."

"I know, and I came here for you" Lance interrupted.

"Truth is I've been staying with you because I'm a secret agent for this organization. But when you broke up with me, I had feelings for you, not because of the mission, but because I actually care for you.."

"Yeah, sorry for interrupting but we need to get out of here before we all die" Ace announced.

"Right, I've got a plan to get out" Lance radioed the command center for an emergency evacuation. They begin running toward the bases exit.

Twelve battle ships came forth and seven airships to attack on the navel base. All ships fired at the base, but the base was protected by some kind of shield. Three armored suits came out of the navel base and started to fire towards the ships. "Lance this isn’t gonna work, they are using the armored suits, we are gonna send you our prototype. Be careful of it, it is a very expensive" the Boss radioed in.

"This is our last chance" said the Boss

"Yes sir"

"We will provide air support"

Lance with Serina and Ace ran towards the outside and found the machine that was generating the shield, Deactivated it and waited for his prototype suit.

"Serina, we will get through this together, not because of my mission, but because.."

"Oh just kiss already" Ace said pushing their heads together.

The prototype suit landed about four hundred yards away from them.

"Lance go, I'll provide back up"

Lance ran towards the suit got in and activated it. He got up and ran towards the other three suits. He kicked a suit and stabbed it on the neck with sword that the suit came with and took out the first armored suit. He then jetted towards the second and third, they used their guns and started to fire at him. Lance quickly took cover.

"Its happening, it’s happening again! Ahhhhhhhhhh~" Serina yelled seeing things in her head, hearing voices.

"What’s wrong Ace tried to help"

"Give me the radio I need to tell him how to use the suit, I don’t know why but I understand how it works" she yelled

Ace gave her the radio.

"Lance!, use your anger to control the suit. The suit reacts to how you control your anger, it uses your mind to attack the enemy. The enemy knows how to use their suit very well so they won’t let you get near them. Use your anger and attack the lower groin area, then quickly retreat. That is where they get the energy to power the suit" she explained

"How do I..." Lance questioned.

"Baby, lets go back together"

Lance closed his eyes, smiled and exploded with energy and power towards the enemy. The enemy shot towards Lance, but he was able to avoid the bullets and was able to hit another suit in the groin. The last one pulled out a sword and started to attack Lance with it. Lance grabbed the enemy's sword and broke off the enemy's hand, pulled his sword out and cut off the head. Just as that happened the leader of terrorist came out with seven other suits and started to fire at Lance.

"Lance you must self detonate yourself, that is the only way to destroy this navel base and rescue Serina" the Boss radioed in.

"But I cant, we are suppose to go back together" Lance shouted.

"You cant go back together at this point, we have picked up both Ace and Serina, we only have three more air ships giving us cover to retreat. Lance you must do it now!"

Self detonate in five seconds. The leader of the terrorist ran towards Lance to try to kill him before he detonates. Three more seconds left terrorist is closing in. one second left the sword is above Lances head. "Baby, I love you" Lance said as the explosion took place. The Blast wiped out the entire navel base and two of the air ships giving cover. Mission Complete.

...

Two years later, Serina walked up, one hand holding flowers, the other around on her purse. She leaned over and kneeled down placing flowers onto the patched ground next to him.

"It's been two years, and I still come here to place these down every week, I feel at fault for him" she said with a soft voice.

"It's okay, what he's done wasn’t just for you, it was for all of us. Your not the one to have the blame on. It was his duty, and I bet he did it on a smile on his face " Ace said walking towards Serina to give a soft hug.

"Even though we are like this now, I still miss him. He knew how I was, but I guess he just"

"Don't even say that, he's a great man"

"He never liked you"

"Well I bet, but I’m sure he'd rather have me then anyone else be there for you"

"Yeah, your right" she said

"Lets pray for him, for good health and good fortune in the next like".

As they prayed, birds started to fly, and shook off a pinecone which landed on his tombstone. Lance R.I.P, the squirrels went up and

started to take the pinecone away.