The Good Life - Writing contest entry

The following story is for Zel's writing contest, the story had to involve 30th century baghdad, and secret identities.
...May have gone a little over 800 words, sue me.

Enjoy!


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"You need to go to bed now kiddo, we have to wake up before dawn to pray at the Mosque."

"I'm not tired though papa, I want a story first!"

"Ok, ok get in bed, and i'll be in, in just one second." The young boy ran off into bed, and promptly got under the warm, and secure comfort of his sheets. The boys grandfather walked over to a door in the wall with no handle, as he approached the door it slid open into the wall, and the elderly man walked in. He looked himself up, and down in the mirror, his dark, and tanned face was filled with wrinkles he smiled, and stroked the white hairs of his chin his lips cracked and blistered as his lips formed the curves of his smile.

The old man made his way to his grandsons bedroom, and sat down on the bed where the child was waiting patiently for his return. The old man smiled at his son.

The boy blurted out in excitement "I want to hear a story about dinosaurs!" He lifted both of his hands high in the air, and gave his grandfather the largest smile he'd ever seen.

The old man laughed and scratched the skin on top of his bare head "...Boy that sure was a long time ago, I'm not sure if I could tell a story about that long ago, what about something a little, closer to home, and a little more recent?"

"Sure." The boy replied, he wiggled further into the bed getting himself comfortable for the coming tale.

"This...Is a story about how the world became one."



A frantic intern bolts into a room filled with computer monitors on all sides, large flashing lights are going off from every side of the room, and men and women dressed in sleek digital camouflage suits are busy typing by their monitors. The intern rushes in with coffee in both hands he nearly runs into the table in the center of the room where a prominent man dressed in blue suit and tie dominates the room, his suit jacket his weighted down by the medals that adorn it.

"You're late son." The man gives the young intern a dirty look.

The young lad shivers nearly spilling the coffee he is holding, looking behind the man he notices to armed soldiers with black glass visors covering their faces. "Yes sir, sorry sir...Here's your coffee sir." The man takes the coffee from the young man, and begins to sip it. "Everything alright sir?"

The man frowns, and then spits the coffee back into the cup. "I hate coffee, take it back."

The intern stutters for a moment, and then retorts. "But-But...you told me to get coffee?"

The man slams his hands down on the table, and then yells "Get the hell out of here!"

The frantic intern bolts out of the rooms as fast as his scrawny legs could possibly take him, the man laughed a bit to himself, and then whispers under his breath "I haven't seen a sorry sack of crap since they disbanded NASA, and kicked all of those scientists out.", he was suddenly interrupted by a homely women walking into the room, she's wearing a pants suit, and is followed by a pale skinned man.

The women begins to speak calmly to the man. "Sir, per your request, I have brought your man." The women motioned towards the pale man, his hair short, black, and incredibly curly, but the most prominent feature is his lengthy, bulbous nose. She began to speak again "This marine is lieutenant Amos Notinyoohoo, He's the best there is on this side of the hemisphere."

Amos cleared his throat, and then spoke at the women. "Um...Ma'am? It's actually Netanyahu."

The women stared him down, and then spoke "Be quiet lieutenant, This here is General Wallace, he is the most decorated general in all of the territories, and you will treat him with respect."

Amos shook his head. "I really wasn't trying to be disrespectful, its just that my name Netanyahu."

Before the women could silence him the general spoke up. "Shut up lieutenant, I didn't become the most decorated general in all of The UTNA, just to be sassed by some skinny little prick."

Amos held his hand up, his mouth hung open as he tried to think of what he wanted to say, he dropped his hand, and then looked down at the ground, after a moment he looked back up, at the general, and then began to speak. "What exactly did you call me here for?"

The general began pacing back and forth, pausing every few words "You son...Have been chosen by your proud nation... To save the planet." The general stopped pacing, and looked back over at the man.

Amos laughed a little to himself, and then asked a clarifying question. "-To save the planet?" he laughed more at how ridiculous the notion was.

"Yes son, the planet."

"As in...earth? Like right here?" Amos pointed at his feet, and danced around in the place he was standing.

"That's right son...Earth."

Amos shook his head, he couldn't believe what he was hearing. "What? How? I don't even...I can't possibly do that by myself...sir."

"Of course you can't."

The general lifted his hand to his mouth, and then yelled. "Abdi!"

"Abdi?" Amos questioned.

A dark skinned man bolted into the room wearing tactical black...well everything. He ran to the side of the general, and then saluted "Lieutenant, Abdi Alexander."

The general smiled, and then spoke. "Amos...This is the finest soldier on the base, he'll be accompanying you on your mission."

"And what is that again?" Amos asked.

"The mission is very simple!" The general began. "As both of you know our proud country, The United Territories of North America, have been fighting terrorism ever since we were just the United States, and Canada, and now it is time...Time that it is finally wiped out, we've driven it out of the United States of Africa, out of the European Union, and out of our own backyards, and now it is finally time that we destroy it, at its origins, in the middle east."

Amos was rubbing his chin while the general was talking, and once he appeared to be finished, Amos spoke up. "Well aside from dropping a WMD on that side of the planet, how do you plan we eradicate it?"

"We've been planning this mission for a very long time." The general began pacing back and forth once again, and he pointed to the large monitor above him, two images flashed onto the screen, two Arabic men with severe  injuries, and trauma. "These two men, have a powerful history, but from all fairly recent events, they are the were both recently leading a battle against agents from the European Union...And won. Fairly soon they'll be commemorated by the leader of the largest...and onlyiest terrorist organization on the planet." The monitor flashed a new picture onto the screen, a blurry picture, partially obstructed by branches. At the center of the image is an Arabic man in black robes, and a tall hat. "This my friends...Is Yusuf Habeeb Mahmood....Currently the most terrifying man on the planet, your job is to assume the identities of the two generals, Yusuf will be commemorating the two later this week, and you will need to get close enough to kill him."

During the generals brief, Abdi walked over to Amos, and stood next to him, shock could be seen on Abdi's face. "Wait a minute...Thats what we're doing!"

The general spoke proudly "You're doing it for your country gentlemen."

Abdi spoke again in retort. "That's impossible! Look at us! We don't look like those guys!" 

The general paused for a moment. "You don't have to, Yusuf has never seen those generals, this will be his first time."

Abdi spoke again. "But still, we're not Muslim, we're not Arabic, look at us! I'm pitch black... He's pitch white! They will know something is up."

"Yusuf is not prejudice, Abdi, he recruits from all corners of the globe, you two will fit in just fine."



Before the two soldiers knew it they were on a jet plane, dressed in long robe garments typical of the people from this area.

Abdi broke the silence. "So uh, who'd you get."

Amos grabbed his ID, and looked at it closely. "Let's see...Um, I got Abdul Khaliq, Who did you get?"

Abdi grabbed the ID he was given, and then paused to read it. "I got...Najair Firman."

Amos laughed, and then extended his hand to shake. "Nice to meet you Najair."

Abdi grabbed Amos' hand, and pulled him in to hug him. "It's good to meet you Abdul"

The were laughing, and pulled away from each other, Abdi was the first to speak up after the silence. "So where you from, Amos?"

"I'm from the European Union."

Abdi spoke back "Oh, huh I was under the impression you were from North America, which state?"

Amos grabbed a slim silenced pistol as they began to talk, and began cleaning it. "Israel."

Abdi smiled, he had a hunch the large nosed man was from Israel "Oooh, you guys are lucky joining the EU, and pretty smart to just join, I can't believe what they did to Switzerland when they refused to join."

Anger could be detected in Amos' voice as he spoke to Abdi. "What do you mean what happened to them? The EU just eventually got them to join."

Abdi leaned back in his seat. "Oh, that's not what I heard, sounds like they held the Swiss at gun point, until they finally got them to join."

Amos' eyebrows formed a 'V' as he spoke "That's not true, and you know it!"

Abdi stayed calm, as he spoke "You know Amos for the most part I think we've been blessed in this age, yep the 30th century brought us allot of good things, but I'm not so sure about the enormous countries, I mean how can placed like the UTNA, the USA (United States of Africa), and the European union, claim to represent their citizens when they're so massive."

Amos laughed at this statement, he'd never heard anyone try to make the claim before. "Sure, maybe they can't represent everybody, but people are safer aren't they? They have more rights...Right?"

Concern could be felt in Abdi's next words "I don't know Amos..I don't know."

The two remained silent until one of the pilots walked back into the room they were sitting in, and he began to speak. "We'll be in Baghdad within the hour, get your gear ready, we're dropping you two in."

The pilot walked away, and then Amos, and Abdi looked at each other, they both said the same thing together. "Dropped?"



The two friends stood at the back of the plane the gate was open, and they could see out over the ground, below them was the outskirts of Baghdad.

Abdi had to yell for Amos to hear him over the quick moving air whizzing past the planes open hatch"Hey Amos, now may be a bad time to say, but uh...I'm kind of afraid of heights."

"Me too!" Amos retorted to Abdi

Abdi laughed through his tears. "If you're a religious man, now might be the time to pray!"

"I'm an Orthodox Jew from the holy land, of course I'm a religious man." Amos laughed in retort

"Oh yeah? Well I'm an Ethiopian Christian." Abdi was still crying through heavy wet tears at this point.

Amos laughed to himself, and then shouted back at Abdi. "Then I guess we both have God on our side!"

Amos grabbed Abdi, and the two jumped out of the plane together, both screaming on the way down.

They landed at the outskirts of downtown Baghdad, quickly they stripped off their parachutes, and ran into the town.



A short stubby indian man rushes into the palace he has a small clay cup, Yusuf is sitting at his throne, and smiles as the indian man comes in.

Yusuf begins to speak to the man. "Oh, thank you very much...oh, I'm afraid I don't know your name, sir."

The indian man spoke up. "Me? I'm Haji."

Yusuf puts his hand on Haji's shoulder, and smiles again "That's a brilliant name Haji, Thank you for the coco." Yusuf waves a soldier in long robes over to him, and then begins to speak. "Friend, this is Haji, I want you to make sure that he is as comfortable as possible tonight, give him the nice chamber behind the palace."

The soldier salutes Yusuf, and then walks out of the palace, as he does two more soldiers walk in, directly behind them are Amos, and Abdi. One of the soldiers speaks up "Sir these are the two generals you requested to see." The soldiers stop the two, and begin searching them. Amos', and Abdi's eyes light up. They put they're hands on they're pistols afraid that they will find it.

Yusuf runs up to the two guards with a furious look on his face, he grabs the two gaurds, and then begins to speak calmly, yet sternly.

"Now cut that out you too. These men are honored guests, I trust them completely." Yusuf motions for Amos, and Abdi to follow him. "Come, come, sit you to. We have allot to talk about."

The three went to sit down in the middle of the palace, Amos looked around their were doors at the front of the room, four on either side of the building, and 3 large windows at the back, each door was being watched by two guards each, armed with beat up weapons that looked several hundred years old.

Yusuf began to speak interrupting the silence. "Najair, and Abdul correct? It's a pleasure to meet you both. As you know we are terribly underfunded here, but you two managed to beat the odds! And eviscerate those armies from the EU, probably one of the most over funded countries on the planet, this act will not go unrewarded, I'm commending you two as top generals." Yusuf looked the two up, and down he laughed a little and then began to speak embarrassed. "I must say you to are...well... not exactly what I was expecting."

Amos Spoke up. "Is-is that a bad thing?

Yusuf waved his hands back, and forth. "No, no of course not, actually it's good, think of what the other countries will think...They picture us as oppressive military dictators, who keep the people down."

Adbi smiled as he heard these words, almost fascinated by them. "Go on, Yusuf"

Yusuf smiled, and nodded at Abdi "We believe-No! We are certain that we are the last entity on this planet that speaks for true freedom."

Amos grew disgusted at Yusufs words. "How can you say that? Don't you force people to perform suicide bombings?"

Yusuf shook his head. "No, no you don't understand we allow people to express themselves politically however they want, some of these men believe that these bombings are acts of protest against the harsh regimes of enemy countries."

Amos clutched his side, he felt his pistol in its holster hidden under the robe, he clutched it, and was nearly ready to draw, but at the last second was cut off, by a booming explosion, a chunk of the building they were standing in was reduced to rubble, and with it went two guards crushed by the impact of the building, a tall pillar fell down atop the head of another guard, the soldier standing next to that guard couldn't believe what he had saw, he knelt beside the stone pillar, and grabbed his partners hand that was sticking out from under the pillar, he began shouting in Arabic as blood dripped down the hand.

Amos saw his opportunity, he turned around to kill the guard helping his friend, and then the other remaining guards he was swift in his movements, and spared no second, the guards all seemed to fall at the same time, as they were shot in the temple.

Amos turned to Yusuf, and pushed the guns barrel against his head. "You are under arrest, and will be for trial by the people of the United Territories of North America."

Amos felt a cold small circle on his forehead he looked up, and saw Abdi holding his pistol.

Amos spoke: "What-Abdi! What are you doing?"

Abdi frowned. "I'm sorry man...This is the way the world needs to be...We weren't meant to be shackled."

"What the hell are you talking abo-"

"Shut up! I'm taking Yusuf somewhere safe."

Another man ran in threw the large palace doors, he was bleeding horribly, and shouted something loudly in Arabic. The mans body was torn apart by the explosive the front doors of the palace became mangled, pillars from the front buckled, and then fell under their own weight erasing any evidence of the bomber.

Amos took his opportunity, he struck Abdi on the nose, The disgruntled Abdi stumbled backwards, and fell onto the hard concrete.

Amos grabbed Yusuf, but he quickly broke his grasp, Yusuf shouted "You will not be taking me from here!" The leader pulled out a small pocket pistol, and lifted his arm to aim, at Amos. before he had the opportunity, Amos lifted his pistol, and shot the leader in the head. Abdi picked himself up form the floor, and screamed, shocked by the leaders death, he held up his pistol, and began firing sporadically. Amos composed himself, and then ran behind the throne to avoid being hit.

Within seconds, he poked his head back out form the throne, and with it came his pistol, he pulled hard on the trigger, and a single shot flew into the brain of Abdi, his body went limp, and collapsed to the floor.

Amos wiped a tear from his eye, and then began limping out of the building, he was exhausted, and stumbled to where the exit used to stand, he climbed up the rubble, as he did large portions of the building began to fall behind him. He made his way out, and looked around, people were in a serious panic men, and women alike running in all directions. Amos was confused, tired, injured, and was ready to get the hell out of Baghdad, but something drew his attention, the cries of a boy could be heard from where he was standing, he wondered around looking for the source of the noise, he found his way to a car that had been overturned amid the chaos, screams were coming from inside.

Amos hunched over to look inside of the car, a young boy, no older than 10 was inside crying. Amos snatched the boy from in the car, and carried him out of the city.



The young boy snuggled in his bead was a little shocked from all that had happened in the story, he shouted nearing the end. "Papa!"

"Yes grandson?"

"What-Well, What happened to that boy?"

The grandfather scratched his chin, and smiled. "Him, oh I don't know...He probably went on to live his life I assume, marry a beautiful girl, likely he had a couple kids, and maybe those children gave him some lovable grandchildren." The old man smiled again, and rubbed the child's head.

The child smiled as he did so. "I hope so...That sounds like a good life."

"It sure is...It sure is." The grandfather hugged his grandson, and then spoke again. "Now go to sleep Amos...We have allot to do tomorrow."