I wanted to be able to send you these messages with greater frequency, but as I get closer to the mountains and further from any kind of discernable civilization, the opportunity to link up to a satellite becomes increasingly difficult.

Also, my resolve waxes and wanes and sometimes I fear there is no point to any of this. I should return to America, rebuild my life. Or I should end everything here in the otherworldly desolation of the Pankisi Gorge....

When I awoke in the Pennsylvania woods, I was wearing my work clothes - a custom tailored suit, a Maurice-Lacroix chronograph that was an anniversary present from my wife, and $700 Cole-Haan's that were fairly well tattered during my all-night walk from Manhattan. I also had my briefcase with me. I never was without it in my previous life, as it contained more than merely the reams of paperwork the administration of my business required, but also all the documents of my alternate life, including a passport, drivers license, bank account numbers, ATM cards, cash and safe deposit keys for boxes in various banks throughout the country. All under a different name than the one I was given at birth.

I had spent nearly a decade constructing this shadow life, an entirely different identity for a purpose I could scarcely imagine. Then, it was merely to hide the women and drugs and toys. I was truly two men. A family man in Long Island who worked hard in the city; and a playboy of the Western World who exercised no restraint wherever he wished. How could I have known there would be a greater purpose to it all? If a ‘greater purpose’ is what we’re going to call this…

I’d kept a loft in San Francisco for years. Our firm had a branch there, and I had three mistresses there, so both the suburban husband and reckless playboy required some kind of home base. There would be no flying for me on September 12th, but I had enough cash in the briefcase to buy a small car (renting was out of the question, as the quiet skies told me air traffic would be frozen for a few days, at least, and the major car rental outlets would be completely out of vehicles). I walked another 10 miles to a smallish town with a smallish used car dealership, its flag at half-staff, its owner suspicious of a well-dressed drifter paying cash for a five year old Toyota. When I explained I was stranded by the attack and needed to get home to my pregnant wife in Ohio at any cost, he shook my hand, barely holding back the tears his pink swollen eyes had been crying for two days. He whispered, “God Bless you, sir. God Bless America!” After my night in the woods, I’d missed the instant patriotism and worldwide outpouring of support the attacks inspired. I understood his fervor to be what the small-towners did in those parts. It wasn’t till I drove through Columbus that I realized my country was a vastly different place than I’d ever known it to be.

He handed me the keys and tearfully waved me off the lot. Four days later I arrived in San Francisco ready to begin. Ready to surrender.

So this was the plan: I left the city after 9/11 - actually walked to Pennsylvania until I collapsed in the woods. When I awoke it was clear to me what had to be done. I needed to let my family believe I was dead. In spite of a yearning for them like I'd never had before, I knew it was time to take the worst punishment I could imagine. I could never see them again. So many years not giving a shit about them, resenting my wife, fearing my own children. So many years in the arms of prostitutes and girls, hiding from the life I'd built, building another one entirely for God knows what reason...

Then the towers fell and I woke up a day and a half later in the woods realizing my loved ones were sure I'd been killed. I was supposed to be in my office that morning - left the house early, explaining to my wife and the boys that I'd be home that much earlier that night if I could get some work done on the front end of the day... In reality, I was screwing one of two mistresses in a studio apartment I'd rented under my alias two blocks from the World Trade Center. The apartment had a phenomenal view of the Towers - a selling point for me, as I could look at those massive phallic symbols and all the so-called power they represented while feeling like the most powerful man in the world, living my little lie.

On the morning of 9/11, I watched the first plane hit, and was so numbed out on coke, I pulled Adriana back into bed and fucked her again, sure I wouldn't be missed at work with the pandemonium of a plane crash in the other tower. Then the second plane hit my tower, 15 floors below our offices, and I couldn't hold on to my high no matter how hard I tried. We just sat on the edge of the bed (there was no other furniture in the apartment) and stared at the burning buildings, not moving, not speaking. As my tower began to collapse, Adriana raced out of the apartment, screaming. I didn't move. I knew Roger and Kyle and Suzanne would be trapped on our floor, or on the roof. Maybe one of them jumped. I liked Kyle. He had a son my age. He was always the first one in - opened the office for the rest of us. Suzanne's daughter was born a month after the twins. They were probably pissed at me for missing the morning staff meeting again.

The top part of the building leaned, then dropped onto the rest of it and the dark gray cloud that grew from the wreckage swallowed the massive antenna, then hit the windows of my apartment with the deafening pelting sound of a billion grains of sand, darkening the studio completely as I sat numb, paralyzed, exhilirated.

In the Pennsylvania woods I started to formulate my plan. I was going to do what no army could do, I knew. I was going to go there and get him. I was going to go there and avenge the deaths of thousands. I was going to have to prepare, physically, mentally and - how could such a thing be possible? - spiritually. And then I was going to go to him and erase him from existence.

But first, I would have to erase myself from existence.

Has it been another year? So much time in these mountains. It passes indifferently. I should be discouraged I've not yet found him after so much time. After his taunting audio tapes and the murder of so many more people... I should have disappeared again, the way I did after the towers fell, after my name was read at countless memorials, my wife and children weeping with so many others. I shouldn't still have this rage, this focus, this drive - should I? Is this insanity?

I don't care. I don't exist, anyway, so why should the definitions of sanity and insanity apply? I watched them bury my 'remains', put up a headstone, say their goodbyes. It's what I wanted. I wanted them to think I was dead. There was no life prior to September 11th worth living afterwards. I'd stolen and betrayed and consumed without regard for anyone but myself. I'd created shadow accounts, stashed away millions that no one missed, while maintaining a restricted, conservative suburban life most people would have been pretty happy with. I miss my sons. I miss my yard. I imagine my wife has met someone else by now. I hope she has. The secrets I've kept from her are too numerous to count. I wish there was another way. But in death I gave them so much more than I was willing to in life.

I've spent nearly three years trying to redeem my betrayals. I live in the truth, day to day. There is no other way to live up here. Perhaps that's why he found the caves and craggs of these mountains so perfect: He can live his truth to its full extent.

My truth requires that I kill him.

And I'm closer than I've ever been...

The war has begun and I've been here a year without finding him. This is what I was trying to avoid. Perhaps he's already dead. Perhaps it doesn't matter. I will keep searching. It's entirely possible I'm going insane. But in a mad world, the mad are merely normal. Is what I'm doing, then, in fact, an act of sanity?

You can do what you want with these emails - I don't care. My goal prevents me from much human contact, and requires absolute anonymity. Hence your address. A name in the void from a voice in the void. I don't know what I'm doing...