Nemesis Chapter 12

Nemesis Chapter 12

"What'll it be?"  asked the bartender as Jim walked up and sat down on one of the barstools.

"Whiskey," Jim replied gruffly.

The bartender prepared his drink and set it in front of him.  "You look like you lost your best friend," he observed.

"Something like that," Jim answered, in a tone that clearly indicated he was in no mood to elaborate.

In fact, Jim felt like he had lost his four best friends.  As he sipped his whiskey, he couldn't help but think about what each of them had meant to him.

He'd known Grant since he was a child.  Grant's father was both Jim's IMF co-worker and his best friend.  Jim had been so proud of him when he'd graduated from MIT at sixteen; even prouder when he'd found out that Grant had followed in his father's footsteps and joined the IMF.

Grant had such a genius technological mind, and without his many inventions the missions they'd run over the years wouldn't have been successful.  But almost as much as his intellect, Jim would miss Grant's dry sense of humor and the way he was always so cool under pressure.

Nicholas was the team's chameleon; a master of disguises, voices, accents, and makeup.  He'd been a hell of an actor, who could literally be anyone the team needed him to be.

Out of all of his teammates, it was Nicholas whom Jim had always thought would manage his own team one day.  But it wasn't just because he was intelligent and had leadership skills, though that was certainly true. It was because beneath whatever outward facade he was putting forward, Nicholas had genuinely cared about each of his teammates and was typically the one checking up on everyone's well-being.

Max had always been the tough, strong one, but his contribution to the team had been much more versatile than just a handyman.  He could also play any role convincingly if needed, and the same dogged determination that he'd developed when he'd rescued his brother from Vietnam had served him well in the IMF.

From their very first mission, Max had been protective of his fellow team members.  Everybody had slept easier while on a mission, knowing that their unofficial bodyguard had their backs. Jim also respected Max's sense of humor as well as his love of quips, which Jim shared.  The IMF wouldn't be the same without him.

And, finally, there was Shannon.  First selected as a supplemental agent during the mission where they'd lost Casey, she'd quickly proven herself to be much more than just a pretty  "replacement."  If given the chance, Jim would hand-pick her for the team all over again.

She wasn't Casey, but she was smart in her own right and could handle herself in any situation.  But besides that, she had been like a daughter to him and a sister to the others.  She brought an element of family to the team dynamic; if possible, she had brought them all even closer together.

Jim downed the rest of his whiskey with a gulp and realized he'd been thinking about his team members in the past tense.  But what if they weren't gone, after all?  Jim had made up his mind; tomorrow, he would try to find the crash site as well as the blown-up farmhouse.  If there was any chance that someone could have survived, he would know.

Suddenly, Jim realized that the television in the bar was tuned to the evening news, and something caught his eye.

"Turn it up!"  he commanded.

The bartender complied, just as the news story was beginning.

"...en route from Italy to the eastern United States has crashed somewhere in the Atlantic Ocean.  The chopper was owned by Kyle Garcia, who oversees a local rice farm.  Garcia reports that there were four men on board.  All are presumed dead, and no search for survivors will be conducted."

The newscaster kept talking, but Jim couldn't hear her anymore.  He was only aware of crushing pain which began in the left center of his chest and shot down his left arm.  He quickly slipped out of consciousness and slid off his barstool into the floor.

A middle-aged woman and her companion were watching. 

"Drunk old man," the male companion chuckled.

But the woman, who was a nurse, noticed Jim's lips turning blue and grew alarmed.  She plopped off her barstool and crouched at Jim's side.

"This man's not drunk!"  she exclaimed as she checked his pulse.  "He's having a heart attack!  Call an ambulance!"

Then she began to administer first aid as a small crowd gathered and the bartender called emergency services.