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I twisted the knob of the vintage style radio receiver, scanning for channels playing anything but static. No luck. It started a few miles up the road, but now every last station was replaced with the garbled death rattle of civilization. I flicked it off and immediately regretted it. The noise let me tune out my thoughts, and now I was alone with my nerves. As I continued onward in my rental sedan, I spotted the checkpoint emerge in the distance. Several armed men dressed in tan camo stood by a hummer on the right side of the road. One of them broke from the pack and flagged me down, prompting me to bring the car to a stop in front of the motorized barrier. He walked up to the driver side and tapped on the glass. I rolled down the window and he leaned in to speak.
"Turn around and head back," he recited lazily, "All roads have been closed off. Only authorized personnel are allowed access into the New Orleans Exclusion Zone."
I tried to recall the code my contact, a reedy Haitian guy named Toussaint, gave me. After two weeks of chatting over the deep web, we finally connected at a dingy dive bar in a town just outside Baton Rouge. He informed me of every step and precaution I would have to take to get in, painting a grim picture and filling in the margins with outlandish anecdotes. When I asked how I'd get out once I got in, he simply shrugged. "Beats the fuck out of me, baz." We split ways not long after.
"No, no–wait. I'm expected," I blurted out, "I–uh, I've got a hot date with Major Houlihan."
My heart dropped to my stomach. Time seemed to stop as I swallowed down hard, but I sensed a glimmer of recognition in his eyes. They lit up, and he cracked a slight smirk.
"Uh huh," he responded, amused, "Can I see some ID first?"
I retrieved it from the glove box, my wrist brushing against the cold steel of the loaded Beretta handgun clear as day in the soldier's view. He ignored it, instead greedily snatching up the passport. Cracking it open, he whistled as he drew a stack of crisp dollar bills totaling a thousand and five hundred, making extra sure to count them twice.
"Alright, you're free to go," he said, flipping back to the front and adding playfully, <span class="mu-i">"Have a nice trip..."</span>
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