He Fought The ‘Cold’ War For Decades, Then Strep Throat Got Him
The enemy was within the gate
By: Ace Parker
CASINO BOOGIE (CBE)—West Berlin, Germany. 1988. Agent Henry “Hank” Kurcheef is huddled in a dark, windowless room, covertly fighting the Cold War. He’s been in the CIA's counter-infection division for over two decades. From Central America to Afghanistan and beyond, he’s blocked viral pathogens from polluting the white blood cells' way of life all over the globe. To the Americans back home, the Cold War might cause a low-grade fever or mild fatigue. But for those on the front lines, like Hankie, it was nothing to blow your nose over.
Agent Hankie began his career in the late ’50s after fighting the red (blood cell) scare in Korea as an enlisted man. Somewhere beyond the 38th parallel, Hank narrowly avoided the rhinovirus during the dead of winter. Thanks to his mom’s famous chicken noodle soup recipe, he cured several soldiers before the virus could take hold. His heroism was rewarded when he returned home and joined the CIA as a field operative. Quickly regarded as one of the most effective agents, Kurcheef was sent to Vietnam, and then Nicaragua to be the Contras' communist contraceptive.
Even though Korea still has a red head cold to this day, split between the phlegmy and the free, and Vietnam has red runny noses well after the American war effort failed, Hankie didn’t let that break his stride. By 1980, he was a senior member of the counter-infection department and tasked with combating cold communism in West Germany. After nine years, he regained his taste of success when democracy deviated the Berlin septum. His life’s work was now complete. The Cold War was all but finished. Hank Kurcheef could hang up his coat, his scarf, and take a big, fresh breath through his nose.
He retired in 1992, after the Soviet Union officially collapsed, a Cold War hero. Thanks to his actions, America was never infiltrated by the communist scare. America’s academic institutions didn’t breed three consecutive generations of Cultural Marxists, democratic institutions such as free speech were completely intact, voting still mattered, and the corporate media wasn’t a Soviet-style, fear-based propaganda machine. Now, Americans never have to worry about foreign forever wars.
For his efforts, Hank was going to be rewarded with a Medal of Freedom by then-President and former CIA head George H.W. Bush. But one frigid December day, during flu season, Hank woke up with a sore, scratchy throat, and he had trouble swallowing the fact that the America he fought for no longer existed. As he debated what his life's work was actually all about, his joints began to ache, and chills ran up and down his feverish spine. Being a hardened veteran of espionage, Hank tried to fight through it, knowing he had fought worse infections before. But his condition continued to deteriorate, so he consulted a doctor.
The doctor, named Igor Stalenin, told him the terrible news: he had strep throat. Decades of fighting one foreign pathogen had left him susceptible to another domestic disease. He was prescribed an antibiotic, and as he made his way to the local pharmacy, he choked on his own phlegm and crashed his car into a telephone pole before being charred like a good old-fashioned American BBQ. Luckily, an autopsy determined that he was already dead from asphyxiation before the fire began.
He had spent his whole life fighting the enemy abroad. But he did not know another enemy was already within his gates. Special Agent Hank Kurcheef was an American hero who fought the 'Cold' War head-on, but in the end, something homegrown got him.
Let this all be a lesson to you Americans. You can spend your whole life fighting the enemy abroad, but you never know what enemies you are ignoring on your own soil.
Ace Parker
Casino Boogie Entertainment
Comments