Cards in the Cloak

By Jeremy Bursey

How hard should we strive to fulfill the mission of a dead stranger? Somewhat hard? With minimal effort? Not at all? What if that mission is to provide a cure for a deadly epidemic? Somewhat hard? With maximum effort? Until it basically kills us?

Norman Jensen is sent to fight at the front lines of World War I during the waning days of the Meuse-Argonne Offensive when a fellow soldier, Maxie McWalter, shows him the discovery of the ages, a cure for the murderer of many, influenza, and offers for him to try it out. Reluctantly, Norman takes the "cure." His headache immediately disappears, and he’s convinced that Maxie has made an awesome discovery. So, when Maxie shares his plan to sell the “cure” and stop the flu epidemic in its tracks, Norman wishes him luck. Then Maxie dies, right before Norman’s eyes.

Norman has no idea what the ingredients are that make up this cure, nor does he know how to duplicate them, but because he knows that it works, he’s dead set on getting the formula out to the public on Maxie’s behalf. However, when he finally has the opportunity to recover the ingredients, after having stashed them during the war for safekeeping, he discovers that they are decaying, and if he doesn’t identify them soon, the rest of the world may lose out on the most important medicinal discovery of the 20th century.

Unfortunately, life happens, and so does death, and death is kind of greedy, and punctual, and death has a plan for Norman, whether Norman fulfills his mission or not. Can Norman reason with death, or even fight it? And what's with death's stack of playing cards?

"Cards in the Cloak" is the adventurous coming-of-age story about one man's mission to complete the plans of another while juggling work, family, and, of course, the occasional parry against a scythe-wielding spectre, and making every effort not to lose what's most valuable to him along the way. Pick it up today.

2017 Edition includes new scenes and a set of Readers' Group Discussion Questions for those who enjoy that sort of thing.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Jeremy Bursey
• Release date: Nov 29, 2015
• ISBN: 9781310640353

Jeremy Bursey

Jeremy Bursey is the author of many short stories, essays, and poems, along with a modest number of novels and screenplays, each covering topics and genres that differ from what he had written previously. He hopes to bring many of these into the ebook generation over the course of the next few years. He holds a bachelor’s degree in English from the University of Central Florida and currently works at a local college as a writing tutor. He appreciates feedback for anything he offers to the public.

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Edition Notes

Thank you for purchasing (or, if you’re previewing, considering a purchase of) Cards in the Cloak. Before you read, I want to inform you about the differences between this edition and earlier editions of the story (in case that matters to you, or in case you have a copy of an earlier edition). A more detailed author’s note regarding details about the story’s development will follow the final chapter.

This 2017 e-book edition of Cards in the Cloak makes a few changes to the narrative, including adding an important scene at the start of Chapter 6, which officially turns the story in a new direction (this turn was previously off camera), as well as changing the presentation of other major scenes to keep the story moving at a steady pace and ensuring a stable structure. This edition also fixes some style problems present in earlier versions as well as adds a new Readers’ Group Discussion Questions section for those who like to discuss books.

The previous 2015 e-book edition of Cards in the Cloak changes the main character’s core motivation from living through three centuries to fulfilling a quest to find the cure for the flu, thus changing the story’s entire engine. It also adds a new nine-chapter front half that does not exist in earlier editions. It was released as a free standalone to attract new readers. This edition is still part of my e-book and print collection, Zippywings 2015: A Short Story Collection.

The original version of Cards in the Cloak (quotation marks intended) appears in the 2005 print publication, Life Under Construction: The Collection of Junk, Volume 2 (no longer available), as a short story covering the events that happen to the main character during his time at the nursing home. This version is based on a story I wrote at the end of 1999 to round out a collection of short stories I wanted to give to my mom as a Christmas present.

I plan to produce Cards in the Cloak as a standalone print book in 2018. Join my mailing list to receive news about this and other upcoming releases if you prefer print or if you just want more content from me. (More info about my mailing list appears after the readers’ group discussion questions.)

Cards in the Cloak

Part One

The Fast Journey of Life

Chapter 1

Into the Game

Norman Jenson was just shy of nineteen the first time he looked death in the eyes. Fortunately, he didn’t have to stare at it for long. Gave it more of a fleeting glance. If he had blinked, he might’ve missed it. The connection still gave him the chills. If he hadn’t been running so hot with sweat, he might’ve shivered.

It happened not long after he’d gone through the forest. Much like the journey Little Red Riding Hood takes on her way to Grandma’s house, he was trekking down a narrow path through a dense wood, barreling down on an enemy that he didn’t know he was about to face—well, a different kind of enemy than the one he knew he was facing—when reality about struck him between the eyes. But that reality wasn’t clear to him here in these parts, not yet. It was obvious only according to what the crazy guy at the front of the pack was yelling over his shoulder:

This is it, boys! Welcome to hell!

But clarity was coming.

His introduction to death, which he had sensed only vaguely was approaching, began with a snag in his basic assumption about human behavior. He figured people are essentially predictable, doing what they’re told to do, adhering strictly to established rules, putting on one face while hiding another, even if both faces are staring into a black hole. And, he assumed, they did each out of duty. For example, his platoon’s section leader, the guy shouting from the head of the pack, wasn’t the motivating type, though he probably thought he was, as he was constantly yelling at the rest of the platoon slogans that were designed to keep them moving forward. But, he had such a knack for picking the wrong set of words, if inspiration was his goal, that Norman couldn’t translate them into the excitement and adventure he was looking for, and his motivation often hit the reverse button prior to reaching its destined emotion. As a result, the platoon leader’s predictable behavior—letting his adrenaline overcome his rational thinking—yielded the predictable result that Norman would put on the face of courage while moving deeper into the bowels of fear, and hiding the face that reflected it, because they would court martial him if he didn’t.

Norman didn’t want to see hell. And, he didn’t really want to die, either. He had plans for his life, and he wanted to see them unfold. He had rather the guy shouted something like Welcome to fun! or It’s time for a gun party! Really, anything with celebration in mind. After all, they were about to kick the tar out of the German Army, or part of it at any rate, and he thought the battle cry should’ve reflected that. But he didn’t get that, or even get the hope that tomorrow would come. In war, even friendlies were unkind.

But he had known that fact going into battle because people, like his platoon leader, are creatures of habit. Everyone around him acted like a bunch of badasses, even though they smelled as if they didn’t understand how to use a toilet. They were essentially cheaters of their real selves, playing a hand they didn’t have, a hand that claimed they could win this battle when in fact they had no assurances beyond their current ability to breathe. Norman knew his platoon leader would still inspire raw action from this group of soldiers who didn’t comprehend the terrifying gravity of his words because they were too scared by their overwhelming rush of endorphins to figure out they were lying to themselves about this mad dash through the forest having a happy ending.

But, he also didn’t have the choice to debate them about it. Uncle Sam had essentially told him to take the war pill and like it.

Here in these woods, he was trying to figure out how to like it. So far, he had done a lot of running and a lot of thinking, but he still had no vision of the nightmare he knew was coming. Even if people were predictable, he couldn’t say the same thing about death. So, the first time he looked death in the eyes, really saw it, it had caught him by surprise.

After spending a few weeks in September going through basic training, he was sent out to France to join the Thirty-third Division to fight against the German Army. He joined the battle just east of the Argonne Forest as part of its infantry division. By mid-October, his company had arrived. And now he was feeling the butterflies of stress moving from his head to his gut. Every step he took along that forested path was a step he feared would lead to vomiting on his pants. Prior to deployment, the Army had told him that anything that happened in the field would remain that way until the war was over. That included any superficial injury, any decay of hygiene, and most certainly any change in the cleanliness of one’s pants. They’d given the warning to liberate the soldiers into fighting like beasts rather than to demand that they sustain the immaculate condition of their uniforms, which was more important during basic training days. Nonetheless, Norman didn’t want to be that guy who was known companywide for fighting the German Army with vomit on his trousers. It suggested too much of a dichotomy of courage. So, he held his stomach as he ran.

Norman’s company was moving fast, but he fought to keep up with it. Basic training had taught him the maneuvers to stay alive, but not those required to keep up with the athletic warriors in the lead. They wasted no time bounding over boulders and brooks, down through craters and up over hills, around concrete walls and past tangles of barbed wire, to reach the front line where the rest of the First Army was gathered. They were promised a brutal fight. They were promised blood. And they were looking forward to it. Norman was, too. Sort of.

Growing up in the Northeast, he had his share of forest adventures, but none that came bundled with this much adrenaline. Sure, he had to fight off the occasional snake. They’d get pretty nasty in the creeks near his childhood home. But he was never much in danger of getting bitten by one. He had always just assumed he could outwit the poisonous ones. Death was only an idea. Not really applicable to him.

As a fourteen-year-old, when he’d first heard about the assassinations of Franz Ferdinand, the archduke of Austria, and his wife, Sophie, Norman had finally realized that death was something that could come around the corner and take him by surprise. But more importantly, as the world had begun to hedge its infantry and start its march against the nation responsible for declaring the war, he had realized that with death also came a sense of vengeance, and loyalty. That was when he had realized that fighting was more exciting than dodging snakes down at the creek.

It had taken almost three years for the United States to enter what was now called the Great War and another year and a half for Norman to enlist. His friends had been urging him to go since his eighteenth birthday, in spite of his great reluctance to engage in intense gunfire and almost certain death, but when he had brought up the question with his parents whether this was a good idea, they kept telling him he was too young, and every effort he had made to cave in to peer pressure and sign his name on the line anyway, his father was standing at the front door with a whip in hand to stop him. It wasn’t until two months before his nineteenth birthday that the country had drafted him, and his parents, due to national obligation, had finally given up on keeping him home. His father, who was not yet forty, had decided he would go, too, just so he wouldn’t look like a coward to his own son.

Now Norman, who wanted to prove to his father that fighting in the war was a good idea, was on a northeastward march through the Argonne Forest, struggling to keep up with the front of the platoon section, wondering if this was, in fact, a good idea. The soldiers were in a hurry to reach the front line. Rumor had it that the companies before them were getting slaughtered. Those rumors fueled his immediate regret for ever coming here, whether by choice or by requirement. He was certain, then, that this whole thing was a bad idea.

The thought of dying here in this forest made him want to vomit.

Keep it moving, you maggots, the sergeant shouted from the front of the line. He hopped over a log and ducked a fallen tree along the jagged path that cut through a bloodstained forest. Death waits for no man!

You don’t have to keep calling us maggots, sir, the combatant behind him said. We’re right here. We’re moving.

Right you are, you slug, the sergeant yelled. Keep it moving anyway!

Sometimes the insults spurred the soldiers on, sometimes not. The sergeant was fairly new to the Army himself, having been a struggling farmer who worked alone prior to America’s involvement, and didn’t always have a handle on how to push his company to greatness. In fact, much of the company was made up of soldiers who, less than two months earlier, were running businesses, or working as hired hands, or attending college. No one really knew what they were doing. But they were clueless together!

Norman wasn’t the slowest in the platoon, but he was pretty far back compared to the sergeant and the five leads, who were all so loud that he could hear them arguing no matter how far away he was. The guys closest to his position were quieter. For them, they were disengaged from the conversation completely. They were too busy listening to the trees, waiting for that moment when the enemy might spring up out of nowhere and come descending on their heads.

Never know which krauts be hiding in them branches, a boy close to him said. Gotta keep an eye open.

Amen, said another. Can’t wait to go knocking them out of them trees like they be squirrels or sum’such.

These exchanges were common among the men. It was all part of what they called a brotherhood.

Norman regretted joining the Army. He never really understood the conversations between soldiers, or knew quite how to join them in unity. The idea of brotherhood hadn’t sunk in during basic training, and it certainly didn’t sink in here. It didn’t help that he had yet to see active battle. He’d heard about it plenty, of course, and soon he would see it up close. And he had no idea what he was getting into. The news he’d heard prior to deployment kept saying that this was so far the bloodiest war in the history of the world. He didn’t love that he was a part of it. The fact that the idea of brotherhood was missing on him didn’t help.

As he pressed on, he could hear the war closing in.

How much farther? another boy asked. I want to see heads explode.

The head you’ll see explode is your own if you ain’t quieter, said yet another.

Everyone in the company had spoken like a badass that day. But none were feeling particularly brave. The louder the distant gunshots had gotten, the heavier that Norman’s heart pounded, and, he was certain, the louder he could hear the boys in his squad’s hearts pounding. It was beginning to sound like a tribal drum march—the theme song to their march.

This thing called death, what he had first considered on the day the archduke was assassinated, manifested in that forest in the form of a cold October wind. For a moment, he was sure he had seen a series of shadows pass through the trees to either side of him. The sounds of his platoon were muffled under the weight of death’s air pressing down on him. For whatever reason he was looking forward to this, he no longer knew. He became acutely aware of his knuckles straining under the grip of his weapon, and vaguely aware of everything else. He wondered if the shadows were watching him.

When the bloody trees parted, Norman could finally see the battle up close. A mass of warriors that appeared to number in the hundreds of thousands, perhaps of the entire First Army, was climbing in and out of the concentric rows of bunkers ahead. Each soldier was trying to edge closer to the enemy, forcing it back. But the motions were so slow it seemed as if no one was moving forward at all.

Down here, you maggots, the sergeant yelled, when Norman and the backend of the platoon had finally cleared the Argonne Forest.

Norman saw the sergeant waving them in, as if he were a schoolmarm calling them in from recess to start their next lesson.

The rest of the company climbed down into the bunker with him, where medics were racing around tending to the wounded, and rats were racing around the medics trying to get a nibble for lunch, and the living were loading up their rounds for the next volley of gunfire. The smells that wafted up from the guts of the trenches—too awful to synthesize, but they all combined to replicate an old sewer—caused Norman to vomit in his mouth. He swallowed it before he could spill it on his pants or add to the mixture of nauseating horror that engulfed him.

You, soldier, he heard the sergeant say.

He noticed the sergeant waving him in. Norman squeezed past a group of Frenchmen who were sharing a slice of bread and nearly tripped over another soldier who was on his knees urinating against the trench wall. He kept telling himself not to vomit on his pants as he pushed closer to the sergeant.

When he reached the rest of his company, the sergeant passed them each a single playing card. Sixteen men were holding cards when he was finished.

"The game is Black