Mystery Island- First place winner

Word Count 2470

Mystery Island

          At first Jack was unsure if he had heard the words right. Staring at his cell phone he placed it back to his ear, hearing a wheezy breathe, waiting for his answer. He hated jobs like this, but the pay was good, and he hoped this time he didn’t have to kill anyone.

          “Jack? Jack, are you there? Did you hear what I just said?”

          Jack heard, but he was unsure how to answer. Pinching the bridge of his nose, he sighed into the phone. “Yes, I heard you. What is the locker number?”

          “It’s at the airport, locker number 221. You’ll find the key in the normal place. The first half of your fee is there as well. You’ll receive the rest when you return. Don’t fail me Jack. I’m counting on you,” the raspy voice said over the phone.

          “You need to stop smoking Mouse. It’ll kill you one of these days.”

          With that, Jack hung his phone up. Stepping back into the shower, he finished rinsing off, hearing a soft mellow voice saying, “Jack? Come back to bed.”

          “In just a moment love,” Jack chuckled. “I’ll be there in just a moment.”

          After drying off and seeing his date off, he dressed and headed down stairs.

          “Good day Mister Kelly,” the door man called out, tipping his hat to him. “Call you a cab?”

          “Thanks Bill,” Jack replied, shaking the man’s hand while slipping him a twenty. Normally he took his own car, but the short ride to the airport called for a cab. That and he needed time to think. The cab pulled up, and he stepped in, closing the door before another patron tried to hog his way in.

          “Better luck next time,” Jack called through the open window as the cab sped off. “To the airport, and take your time.”

          The cab driver smiled, tuning the radio to a new channel. The voice all but drowned out the noise of the outside world. But there were words that caught his attention, and the world suddenly came back into existence.

          “The survivor was found some thirty miles out, on a make shift raft,” the reporter said, “sun burnt and dehydrated, he was sent to Saint Mary Hospital. Found clutched in the man’s hand was a bag of uncut gems. The whereabouts of the man’s craft, or where the gems came from are still a mystery. The man’s only words were, Beware the red flowers.”

          "Turn that off please," Jack said. Rubbing his chin he wondered is that was the job Mouse wanted him to look into. But he would not know until he found the key. Being a thief had its advantages, and disadvantages. But he never looked for things like that. To him they were unimportant.

          Finding the key was easy. It was placed in the coin return of the nearest phone, which was marked ‘out of order’. One dip of his finger and he was heading toward the locker. Glancing around, checking to see if he was being followed, he found the locker, inserted the key and turned. He heard the twin coins fall. He opened the door slowly, finding only a thick yellow envelope inside. Taking it, he left the door ajar and left.

****

          Finding the man was not hard, what with all of the reporters hanging about in the hallway. Flashing a badge got him as far as the man’s room. He waited until the man stirred, then stood and smiled.

          “Good afternoon. I’m Jack Steele, from the FBI. Would you care to explain the gems we found on you, when you were picked up by the coast guard.”

          “Y…You’ll believe me won’t you?” the man asked, his eyes darting around the room. “You’ll tell everyone of the danger, won’t you?”

          Jack nodded. Taking his seat, he pulled it nearer to the bed. Opening up a small notepad that he pilfered from the gift shop downstairs, he took his pen out and waited. “We’ll take care of you. You needn’t worry about a thing. Now then, if you’ll start at the beginning.”

          The man told his tale to Jack. Every detail, from the time the man left the big island, all the way to when he was picked up. He gave Jack the longitude and latitudes of some Mysterious Island that was clouded by a bank of fog. Rising overhead was a tall peak, with a halo of clouds circling it. He even went as far to tell him what to look for in way of land marks, right down to the cave, where he found the gems.

          “Now you’ve not told another soul about this, have you?”

          The man shook his head and Jack smiled. “Now the nurse will be here in a moment to check on you. In the meantime I’ll just give you a shot to make you sleep. You need your rest.”

          While Jack administered the fatal doze that would slowly stop the man’s heart, he heard the man whispering as the drug took affect.
“Beware the red flowers.” Then he was gone. Records would show that he died of a simple heart attack. They would not be able to find the drug in his system. Taking his notes, he left, knowing that Mouse would have his gems in a few days.

          The plane was built to carry only one passenger. Built for smuggling, it carried an oversized gas tank, and the engine was revamped to run silent. The plane’s fuselage was made from the same material as the Stealth bombers, a bit costly, but worth its weight in gold. Strapping in, Jack went down the check list, making sure he carried enough weapons, gear and rations, in case there was some truth to the warning. The words still rang in his ears, causing him to think twice, but one hundred thousand dollars still looked good in his off shore bank accounts.

          “Beware the red flowers. I’ll have to remember that.”

          The plane took off from the private airport with hardly a sound. With a twist of the stick and a flip of one button the cockpit lights came on, giving the cockpit its errie purplish glow. Setting the radio, he listened in to the reports, so that he wouldn’t run into one of the Boing 747’s that flew near by. Banking left, he set his course, looking at the maps he had purchased earlier that day. Finding no island marked anywhere on the map, he set the plane on auto pilot and took a short, but needed nap.

          It was just before dawn the next morning when he awoke, checking his compass, he saw he was still on the correct path. There ahead he spotted it, a formation, a halo of clouds. Dropping down below the cloud cover as he drew nearer he pulled on the stick hard to the right, giving the throttle all it had, when a wall of stone suddenly came into view. Cursing his luck he banked hard once again and circled the small island that shouldn’t have been there, feathering the throttle so the engine would not stall out. Looking out, he learned why. There was a thick fog bank that circled the island, at least five miles wide. Any passing ship would steer clear of the bank, thinking it might be hiding a hidden reef of stone.

          “Anyone that did find this Mystery Island may have been eaten by the red flowers,” Jack chuckled before finding a nice cove in which to land. The plane was equipped with wheels, but it was also equipped with buoyancy devices, for water landings. A quick throw of another switch and he sailed softly into the cove.

          It didn’t take long to unload the plane, after beaching it he found an empty sea cave near a litter of palm trees. Donning his survival suit, that consisted of a Kevlar suit, twin 9mm Glocks with quick release clips, a hunting knife that was razor sharp, and an automatic shotgun with shredders, a shell that would rip an elephant to shreds. With a backpack full of rations, he started his hunt for the gems.

          Taking his notes out, he was able to follow the same path that the man took, his eyes watching for any red flower. Thinking the man simply stared at the sun for far too long, while floating out in the middle of the ocean, Jack walked on until dusk, before setting up camp.

          Night fell like any other night on the island, the sunset was spectacular, what with its rays of orange and red, mixed with blue on the horizon. Building a fire, Jack broke out his rations, setting them up in order before lifting his canteen up to his lips. Suddenly, out of the corner of his eye he saw movement, just out of the fires light. Pulling his 9mm Glock, he didn’t bother to aim. He just fired, in hopes of scaring whatever, or whoever was out there away. An ear piercing scream ripped the air around him, and he jumped up.

          “What on earth was that,” he asked, but silence was his only reply. Reaching down, he pulled a pocket flashlight out, and turned it on. The bright beam of light caught movement in the brush, a flash of red, and then it was gone. Stepping over to where he shot, he found an oily green substance on the ground, what looked to be blood. Reaching down, he started to touch it, but pulled his hand back quickly.

          The rest of the night he stood watch, his flashlight striking things that were there, but were not. “Fast little buggers, aren’t you,” Jack whispered. Dawn came, and the shuffling of sand stopped and quickly faded away. Looking down at his still un-open meal at last, he found that he no longer had an appetite. Gathering his things back up, he kicked sand over the fire and stepped away.

          “Take out what you brought in, that’s what my father always told me.”

          Whistling a soft tune, he walked on until he found the cave the man spoke about. There, just on the edge of the cave he saw them, gems of every color, shape and size, all littering the wall and floor of the cave. Surprised that the pickings were so easy, he emptied his pack. Pulling and prying the gems from the wall with his knife, he filled his packs, until he could no longer stuff another gem into them.

          “Mouse will be happy to see these, but not all of them. I’ll just tell him that the survivor took most of the gems, losing them to the sea,” as he pocketed a nice looking gem for himself.

          With that thought in mind, Jack made his way back to the beach, just as night fell once again. He heard the shuffling of sand as he started to board the plane, turning, he brought his flashlight out, turning the beam wide. There, walking across the sand were hundreds of small red flowers. And they were shooting what looked to be poisonous darts at him. A few stuck the Kevlar suit and bounced off, allowing him to pull his twin 9mm and start shooting. Some of the darts stuck to the skin of the plane, causing the thin metal to warp and bend.

          “Damn things are tough,” Jack whispered as one plant was tore in two, only to re-bloom into two more plants. Pulling his shotgun, he shot a clear path about ten feet across, allowing him to jump into the cockpit before the flowers were able to regroup. Turning the engine on he watched the small flowers trying to stall the engine out, but the prop took each and every one of them out, ripping them to shreds. Backing away from the beach, he gave the small craft full throttle, causing it to skip across the surface. Soon he was up in the air, enjoying his ill gotten gain. Turning the radio on, he expected to hear the air traffic controller, but the air waved was silent, full of static. Finding that a bit strange, he quickly turned the dial to a country station, hearing the same thing. Static!

          Looking up, he noticed that the antenna wasn’t hit, which did not explain why he wasn’t able to get a good station. Flying higher, hoping that a more powerful station would be able to cut in, he turned the radio dial until he heard a voice.

          “This is station WKXV, reporting live. We are telling everyone to remain indoors, do not go out. Lock your doors, cover your windows. They’re everywhere. Nothing seems to stop them. The army and national guards has been called out to try to stop this menace. The reports are still coming into this station of downed power lines and fires. Please remain calm. Do not go near the red flowers. I repeat, do not go near the red flowers.”

          Jack’s blood went cold. Could these flowers somehow been carried over to the islands by the survivor? How, and why were they trying to kill him? He was only there for…

          “The gems!”

          He didn’t hear the gems shattering until he was making his approach back to the landing strip. By the time he managed to escape, the small plants were already escaping from the cockpit, running after him while he made his way to the shiny black limo that was waiting for him. Running past, he threw a single unbroken gem from his vest in the windows as it rolled down.

          “Don’t say I never gave you anything free Mouse,” Jack called out over his shoulder. He made it to the only structure he could see, a small tool shed, closing and locking the door behind him. Scrambling to the a small window, he watched the red flowers attacking the limo, as it tried to speed off, only to strike his plane, with both blowing up. The flowers screamed, withered and died, leaving behind more gems in their wake.

          “Stones of the Phoenix,” they would be called, by those that survived the night. Jack knew he would survive, but once the flowers hit the mainland, there might not be anyplace that would be safe.

          “I’ve always wanted a private island all to myself, with all the amenities of home.”

          Morning came and Jack found himself on another single engine plane, heading to the mainland.

          “Isn’t science wonderful,” Jack whispered while patting a scorched, but still intact silver, bomb proof case that he had placed in the back seat, chocked full of cash. He made sure that the island remained a secret, until he, or the government found a way to eradicate the red flowers.

          “A rose by any other name, is still a rose.”