The old brown wooden door, crackled and smudgy from years of neglect and abuse, let out a brief creak as it swung open and two men moved noiselessly inside the apartment complex, shutting it quickly behind them. It would be easy to assume that they were simply janitors or perhaps utility workers based on the solid, gray jumpsuits that they both wore. Of course, public works personnel rarely wear outfits with golden epaulets on the shoulders or silver badges on their chests that read, “ARTF,” nor do they carry Heckler & Koch MP5 sub-machine guns or restraining cuffs. These men were there to clean up, but not in a domestic way.

The man in front, Agent Damian Malchus, signaled to his junior partner, Ashton Blake, to move forward, paralleling him down the hall as they moved toward the target. Damian was a fifteen-year veteran in the force, with too many successful raids combating fanaticism and cultural contamination to count. Ashton had been assigned to him earlier the week before, and Damian was trying to get him up-to-speed in the ways of the Anti-Religion Task Force methodology, which cadet training knew little about. Damian liked Ashton for his zeal and enthusiasm for the job, but knew the rookie had not yet been “baptized” with a tough assignment. Somewhat paternally, he was worried Ashton would get hurt or killed by some crazy religious nut if he didn’t keep his eye on him.

His last partner, Finch, was ironically murdered—not in the line of work—but getting milk from Freddy’s on the way home. He walked into the grocery store just in time to get blown up by a pipe bomb left a few minutes earlier by a member of the “Claws of the Black Hand,” a quasi-military Christian Korean group pissed off because weren’t put on the Federally “safe” list of religious organizations. Gee. Wonder why? Damian mused.

A former Unitarian himself, he had seen religious society in socialist America take a very dark turn when the religious groups apparently forgot about love and brotherhood and settled on justice, vengeance, and retaliation. In a matter of a few years, Damian had seen the tensions between Christianity and Islam turn into a blood battle between all religion (it seemed) and normal society. When he first began working for the ARTF, he and others had tried talking sense to the wild men and women shouting about sinfulness and judgment with C4 strapped to their chests, but it only ever ended up bad. On his third case, he barely escaped with his life when a young, dark-haired girl ran toward him screaming, “Shiva!” shooting him in the legs with her AK47. He was in the hospital for six months. When he got out, he decided that from then on, the best negotiator was his machine gun.

The two men stopped a few feet from the last apartment on the right, and then began to slowly creep up to the door. They had been briefed earlier that day by Foster, the ARTF director, that religious terrorists had set up camp in apartment seven, and were actively planning and implementing illegal activities, ignoring strict religious quarantine laws set up when President Ulolovich took control of the U.S.S.A. Moving ever closer, Damian could hear voices inside the apartment, singing a strange song. The tune was unusual; the words were prohibited.

Fools! Damian thought to himself. These walls of this old building are so thin—how could they expect to go undetected?

ARTF protocol usually required that the pair have backup in situations like this. Foster said two other officers—Wiggins and Trent—would be there. Where the hell are they? Damian wondered. Probably stuck in traffic or showed up at the wrong complex. From the reconnaissance gathered, this was not a power religious terrorist group; the ARTF was not expecting much resistance—if any. Ashton shrugged his shoulders, questioningly. Then, he jerked his head toward the apartment and nodded, excitedly. This was Ashton’s first case and Damian remembered the thrill of his first one, too.

Nodding in acquiescence, Damian signaled again to Ashton; they waited five seconds, and then Ashton stood up and kicked in the door; Damian charged in with his sub-machine gun locked and loaded to fire. Two of the women screamed when they saw the agents burst into the room, but no one else moved. The room became eerily silent; they could almost hear the echoes of their hymn lingering in the air.

Damian quickly scanned the room, counted three men, two women, and a handful of half-dressed toddlers and children surrounding what looked like a crude pulpit. Standing behind the pulpit was an elderly bearded man wearing a black shirt and pants, a huge crucifix hanging around his neck. Damian aimed his weapon at the group to the left; Ashton had his sights set on the preacher.

“Private religious meetings are illegal, old man.” Ashton growled at the old man, his voice trembling. “You’ll get life for this or banishment to the uncivilized half of the planet.” He lowered his weapon briefly, pulled out his handcuffs, and started toward the preacher.

Before he took two steps, a third woman unexpectedly lunged at them from the kitchen to their left with a gleaming knife and, shrieking, plunged it into the young officer’s back. Ashton let out a scream of his own and collapsed to the ground. Damian yelled out, “You damned crazy bitch!” and released a spray of bullets at the woman, and then quickly turned his gun toward the others in the room.

Moving warily in front of the pulpit, the old man held out trembling hands and rasped, “Please, son, don’t…” Damian raised his gun and the preacher stopped. “You’ve damned yourselves,” Damian coldly replied and squeezed the trigger. The force of the bullets threw the pastor back, shattering the pulpit as he fell to the ground.

Damian heard screams again from the women and others in the group and spun around, turning his fury indiscriminately on the others in the room. A violent lust for killing blinded him to who and what he was shooting at. The room became filled with smoke and dust and blood as Damian fired his sub-machine gun again and again. No more. No more. No more. Soon, the screaming stopped. Eventually, all Damian could hear was the pounding of his blood in his ears.

He called out to his partner, “Ashton! Son! Ashton!” as he frantically searched the other rooms in the apartment, lest another religious zealot attack them. When his hurried search turned up no other terrorists, Damian rushed to his partner’s side, dropped his gun, and knelt beside him. Carefully, he rolled Ashton over, and was relieved to hear the young man let out a groan.

“Bro, you are going to be okay,” he said, madly trying to stop the bleeding coming from beneath his partner’s protective vest. “I got the bastards. You don’t have to worry, Ash. I got them.”

Ashton grabbed Damian’s arm and said, with labored breathing, “Why…did she…God. Oh, God…” Then, the young agent’s body contorted with pain, and he let out a loud, anguished moan, and lay motionless. Damian felt furious anger toward the terrorists and all such social perverts. He thought to himself, What the hell is wrong with these people? It is good that we exterminate them. Every one of them should be blown away. We should…

Damian froze when he heard the ominous sound of a sub-machine gun being cocked behind him. Another one? Christ. He fearfully turned around and saw a teenager, a twelve or thirteen year old boy, standing with his gun in his hands, pointed at his head. The gun looked bigger than the boy to Damian, but in the boy’s eyes, Damian saw hatred and vengeance and determination. The blood that had been pounding in his ears earlier felt like it had just drained out of his toes. He heard himself exclaim, “Oh, shit…” Where had the boy had been hiding?

The teenager, skinny and gawkish, was crying and his tears had left black trails down his dusty, pimply face. He looked straight into Damian’s eyes and said, “You killed my mom. You killed my dad. You killed them all, you bastard.” Damian instinctively raised his arms and pleaded, “Come on, kid. Don’t do it. Don’t.” The boy advanced toward him slowly, with certainty in his eyes. Damian had felt intense fear before; bullets whizzing around you does that, but this felt different—it felt final. Damian knew that his life was about to end.

The boy moved threateningly closer and pushed the muzzle of the sub-machine gun against the back of Damian’s head. Damian winced. “You deserve to die. We did nothing to you. All we were doing was praying and singing. Praying and singing.” The boy hit the muzzle against Damian’s head with the words, “praying” and “singing.” “You didn’t have to shoot the pastor. He would’ve gone with you. He was willing to go to jail for his faith. We all were.”

Damian contemplated his situation and he knew the outcome, completely. He had killed this boy’s family and friends; people in this predicament have a dismal future, at best. He had seen it happen to other misfortunate agents, himself; now, it was his turn. He looked down at Ashton, eyes glazed over and open in death. He was supposed to protect him but he failed. How did I let this happen again? Damian now had tears rolling down his dusty, wrinkly face, too. He muttered, “I’m sorry, Ash. So sorry.”

The boy looked shocked and suddenly confused.

“What?” the boy asked. “What did you say?

Damian looked up at his young executioner and said, “I said I’m sorry for this.”

The boy shook his head and said, “You killed my parents, you ass. You should die.” He pushed the gun against the side of Damian’s head again so hard that blood flowed from his temple.

“I know,” Damian confessed, accepting his fate. “I’ve killed lots of parents.”

“And children, damn you. Children!”

“Yes, children, too.” Damian bowed his head. “It’s not good.”

The boy looked at Damian, then at his parents, then to the lifeless pastor, and emitted a guttural sound of frustration and sorrow. He pushed the muzzle deep into Damian’s temple. Damian closed his eyes and waited for the darkness to envelop him. Here it comes.

Damian heard no gun shot, but did see a blinding light with the loud thunk! and overwhelming pain in his head. When he awoke, he heard yelling and footsteps outside the apartment. He struggled to get up, and two ARTF agents helped him to his feet. Massaging the back of his neck, he went unsteadily out into the hallway. There, on the floor, in a pool of his own blood, was the teenager, his body riddled with bullets. Damian looked for his sub-machine gun, but it was not in the hallway.

He saw the director, Foster, and went to him and asked, “What happened?”

Foster put his arm around Damian’s shoulders and said, “Well, you lucky son-of-a-bitch, neighbors heard the shooting and shouting and called it in. You were supposed to wait for back up, but I know you. We got here as that damn kid was running out. We yelled for him to stop, but he turned to go back into the apartment, so we shot him. Religious fanatics are such brainless morons.”

“Did he have my gun?”

“What gun?”

“My MP5! Was he holding it as he came out?”

“Look, friend.” Foster said with a slightly more serious, managerial tone. “It happened so fast, and I figured you wouldn’t have let him go if you were okay. I know how you operate after a decade.”

“Yeah, but…”

“Look! Was he a religious nut or what?”

Damian looked at the lifeless body of the teenager and said, “I guess.”

Foster slapped him on the shoulder and said, “Then, we did what was best for our country. We have removed one more cuckoo bird from the nest. Soon, it will be like President Ulolovich says—“Peace Without Religion” because history shows us that all hatred comes from religion and belief in God—it’s basic elementary school teaching.”

The two agents who had helped Damian up brought Ashton’s dead body out on a stretcher. “Excuse us, Agent,” they stated as they brought his partner by.

“See?” Foster said pointing a thumb at the corpse. “Ashton knows the truth better than we do.”

Another agent came out and reported to the Director, “All told, Agents Malchus and Blake took out ten religious terrorists, sir—a good day’s work.” The agent handed Damian his sub-machine gun. “I found this by the pulpit, sir.”

Damian took the gun in his hands and looked at it. It felt cold and alien to him.

Foster said to the other agent, “Alright, better begin the clean up. Call in the sweepers and body collection unit.” Turning to Damian, he said, “Damian—I expect a full report in the morning, but good job, brother.” Foster offered his hand out to Damian who hesitated briefly before shaking it.

Damian walked slowly back into the room. He could smell the blood of the dead—his victims. He walked over to the pulpit and looked down on the body of the pastor he had killed so easily. Despite the blood covering his body and his hands, the old man looked peaceful. Even his face seemed to be at ease. It was then that Damian noticed that the crucifix he remembered hanging around the pastor’s neck was missing. He kicked through the debris around the old man for a few moments, but didn’t see the religious artifact anywhere.

Feeling incredibly tired and slightly nauseous, Damian made his way out of the room, but couldn’t bring himself to look at the teenager’s body. For the first time in fifteen years, he felt ashamed at what he did for a living. As silently as he had entered the building earlier, he moved briskly out of the apartment complex and onto the street. It was evening now—had it really taken six hours? How long was I out? It seemed surreal to him. He walked the two blocks and down the darkened, unlit alley and tried to make sense of what had happened to him and his partner. Why didn’t the kid kill me? God, my head hurts. I need to rest.

Arriving at ARTF Hummer, he reached into his pockets for his keys, but instead felt a cold, metal object in his hand. He knew instantly what it was, and slowly pulled it out of his pocket. The darkness prevented him from seeing its full form, but looking closely, he could see still shimmering lights reflecting on the crucifix that the boy had slipped into his pocket. As he stood there, gazing at the bloody cross, he thought he could hear singing in the distance, and he wondered how to reach them.