LB Sedlacek - Issue 36

LB Sedlacek is the author of several poetry collections including "Unresponsive Sky" (Purple Unicorn Press), "Words and Bones" (Finishing Line Press), "The Architect of French Fries" (Presa Press), "Swim" (Alien Buddha Press), and "The Poet Next Door" (Cyberwit Press). She has been nominated two times for the Pushcart Prize in Poetry and has also been nominated for Best of the Net in poetry. Her short stories books include “The Jackalope Committee and Other Tales” and “Four Thieves of Vinegar and Other Short Stories” both published by Alien Buddha Press. She also enjoys swimming and reading.

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Word Search

The squares blurred together in his head. Pete Webb kept his head down. He roamed around the giant cage. He was locked inside with red padlocks and a set of lasers in the wires.

He stood in the middle. His feet rested in piles of bird food and horse feed. Better for insulation, he’d learned in some training or other.

The insulation, though, had nothing to do with temperature. He glared at the ticking red numbers on the wall.

They were counting down. He had 29 minutes left to crack the codes.

Pete gulped. He was their last stop safety measure. It was all up to him. 

Pete was the backup plan. The codes were need to know and only to be used in an emergency. The nation was on the brink of war. Peace talks had stalled.

It was now a matter of who would pull the trigger first. It was fire upon or be fired on. He knew, though, that using the codes would end it all, period.

A bead of sweat rolled down his neck. He wiped it with a tissue and leaned over the book.

Letters on one side. Boxes of letters on the other.

He had to decipher the code. He had to choose the right letters to find the right words. Each word contained one code letter. The first letter of the word was the one they needed.

Pete stared at the puzzle plastered onto the wall. He stooped over to retrieve the cell phone in the corner.

The screen read 26 minutes. His hands trembled. The puzzle loomed in his vision like an eye chart. He read the clues out loud.

1) What can you sit in and float in at the same time?

2) What is green and yellow and also a man’s name?

3) Who and What can beam?

4) What is used for writing and flying?

5) What is like snow but isn’t?

6) What can be imprinted and mailed?

Each question had an answer. Each question had a word answer. Each word to each question was a key.

He squinted at the scrambled letters. He pulled out a set of colored pencils. He laid out the different colors in a row. Pink, purple, orange, green, red and blue.

The screen read 18 minutes when he had a rainbow legend of colors on the paper. And he had the answers.

Hammock, John Deere, Space figure, sun, feather, white sand, stamp.

H, J, D, S, F, S, F, W, S, S. 10 letters. 10 letters for the code.

7 minutes on the screen. Sweat dripped from his forehead. It seeped into his fingers.

He sat at the desk. Pulled up the screen. The red numbers ticked off another minute. His cell phone rang. He found it in the corner of the cell.

“Do you have the codes?” A tin voice barked through the speaker.

He gulped. “Yes.”

“Enter them now.”

“Are you sure?” He whimpered wiping his brow with his sleeve.

“Yes. First strike.”

“First strike” he mumbled. He paced the cell kicking up feed dust. He returned to the word search puzzle. “First strike.”

The red number glared. 4 minutes.

His face flushed. His cage was underneath the earth surrounded by cement. He would be safe, alone, but safe!

He poured over the letters once more. The clock ticked to 3 minutes.

The phone rang. His thumb hovered over the Answer button. He pressed it. “Enter the codes” the tin voice demanded.

He slammed the phone down. He shook his head and blinked. There it was. First strike, diagonal letters and backwards, in the word search puzzle.

He circled First strike in yellow. Hotel, Juliet, Delta, Sierra, Fox trot, Sierra, Foxtrot, Whiskey, Sierra, Sierra.

One minute. Foxtrot, India, Romeo, Sierra, Tango, Sierra, Tango, Romeo, India, Kilo, Echo.

He stopped and stared at the words. The letters criss cross in his head. The code forms.

45 seconds. He races to the keypad cemented into the wall.

30 seconds. One by one he presses the keys.

20 seconds. He takes a deep breath.

10 seconds. The red clock ticks 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1.

And then it stops.