Not a word was spoken as the successful hand-off transferred between the two men, an exchange unknown to the security team pursuing the criminal whose feet trampled into a narrow alley between two brick, high-rise apartment buildings, where he soon realized his entrapment. Only a few rotten-smelling trash cans and a half-filled garbage dumpster were available to hide in, but as he took the time to consider his options, he realized it was a worthless endeavor. His time was finished.

All he could think about was the safe delivery of the package, an opaque-plastic valise which contained the secret of the world, which he greedily protected from the tyranny of government. Trapped in the alley, he realized he would never discover its mystery, but perhaps it would be known to his friends, the secret underground community which refused to surrender to the political leaders of this generation.

As soon as the first officer rounded the corner into the alley where the man had been unsuccessfully hiding, a gunshot flared from the policeman�s weapon. "I�m okay," thought the criminal. But a tight sting in his upper thigh threw him immediately to the grooved pavement, tearing his jeans. A thick purplish fluid slowly dribbled down his leg through the rip in the loose denim fabric. Looking up at the sky, toward the officer, he saw a light. At first, he thought it was the sun, but he realized it was not. "What is it?" he uttered.

By the time the officer had turned his head, the light was gone. The officer turned back to the crippled felon and cocked his pistol once again. "Ha," he taunted. "You�ve seen those hallucinations again, haven�t you? They tell me that you have seen images of a new world." Mockingly, he emphasized those two last words to quaver the fallen man�s spirit whose blood all seemed to abandon his heart at once, stripping his soul. After the short, reflective pause, the officer resumed his mockery. "They say that you�ve been telling the people rumors of some kind of better civilization."

Again the man was uneasy. He looked up at the soldier. By this time, six or seven others had arrived and more continued to round the corner into the small alley. "And so I ask you." The first officer, who seemed to be their leader, continued to speak to the criminal. "What right have you to spread these lies to my people?"

"With all due respects," the man spoke plainly, as if he were calm. "These lies that you speak of are the truth. And I have broken no laws. Now let me be."

"What a bold statement you make, Mr. Cramer. But, now I have to ask you, �Which laws are you referring to, sir? This nation�s or your own?�"

A chorus of laughter arose from the officers, perhaps now over a dozen who had arrived, each with a gun cocked and ready to penetrate the heart of their wounded victim. "Enough!" barked the leader, turning around toward his men. Then, veering back in rage at his prisoner, he demanded, "Where have you heard such things? Don�t you realize that our world has evolved to this present perfection and the only thing keeping our civilization from greatness is your pitiful band of scattered apostates who refuse to conform to our society? You will not believe in our perfect world? Well, look around you." The officer beamed at the felon and continued. "We have eliminated all poverty from our planet. No one. Do you hear me? No one runs around on the streets without a home! No one starves to death! We have eliminated all diseases. Our superior science research laboratories have managed to stay one mutation ahead of the deadly viruses once threatening our miserable world. We have earned the respect of our residents, and for this crime on the planet has ceased! No murders! No stealing! No violence of any kind! What else does it take for you to conform to the ways of our obviously superior society."

Suddenly enraged by nothing in particular, the officer stepped toward his crippled captive and kicked him crisply in the abdomen, near his wounded leg. The injured man cried out. The pain from his gunshot wound pierced him once again and he wanted it to stop, but it would not. Circling his prey, the head officer turned to view his deadly squad of pikemen, each posed with a pistol, now completely blocking the entrance to the otherwise placid alley. With an evil snarl, he finished rounding the wounded man bending to stare at the one whose blood now thoroughly covered his leg.

"But you, my friend," the officer continued his speech, "you are not a resident here but an outcast, not because our society has rejected you but because you have rejected our society. We have offered you peace here, in a world where we have even eliminated all the pollution which used to plague our oceans and our atmosphere. Toxic waste, my good friend, is now a thing of the past. Our new scientific breakthroughs have virtually made it possible to live forever. Do you hear me? In just a short time we will not have to face death again! Don�t you understand? You don�t have to die! And you reject this technology which permits such a high world order, this science advancing the civilization of mankind? You are not a part of the mythical new world you prophesy but a remnant of the old which has tortured our planet since the creation of time! You are a disease! a pest! Franz Kafka could not have created a more delicious insect! Therefore, like all vermin, you must be extinguished!"

The prisoner coughed and muttered to himself quietly. No one understood his words because they were too quiet and muffled by the pavement.

"Ha!" scoffed the speaker. "You have something to say to that? I�m sorry. I could not understand you. Why don�t you just say it so that we can all hear you?"

The convicted man tried to speak again but could not. The kick to his stomach had knocked the breath from him, and he still lacked adequate control of his lungs. The chorus of mockery was spontaneously supplemented with vulgar comments, jeering at their bloodied prisoner. Their leader only smiled as he watched his army�s courteous behavior. He had won their respect, and he knew they would do anything for him, pledging their whole allegiance, even giving their lives if it came to it.

As this laugher persisted, the wounded man found strength in his arms to rise erect, leaning most of his weight upon the garbage dumpster behind him. The official, having returned to his band, spun back toward the man, curious about his actions. Seeing a man, who had lost all his strength, struggling with this last effort of endurance to stand upright interested the general greatly, as though Dante required one final ejaculation before Virgil guided him through the seven circles. Who could this man possibly be to find such importance in his own life that he was willing to lose it for such vanity?

Snickering silently, he ceased his army�s derision. "Enough!" he finally blared, almost laughing aloud. "Let�s hear what the pathetic man wants to say to us!" The alley became deadly silent. Then, glaring at his victim, he slowly and clearly pronounced, "Now! What right have you to defy me?"

The victim took a hoarse breath. "I believe," he gasped one more breath of air. Since the jolt to his belly, his breathing had modulated into an aberrant torture, but ignoring the oppressive suffering, he forged articulation of his last three syllables:

"in. . .the. . .light."

All was quiet.

The young officer snarled. With death in his voice and murder in his eyes, he plainly dispensed the verbal command. "Kill him." Twenty-two of the thirty-one bullets fired upon the defeated prisoner penetrated his chest; four hit his skull, but he heard not a single one.