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Inside of the bar tiny flecks of iron oxide, sand, and dust hung in the air. No matter where you were there was a constant haze of particles waiting to attach itself to your skin and clothes. It settled on every horizontal surface imaginable, and much like sand at the beach, found its way into every possible crack and crevice. Nothing was safe.
The top of the bar had a layer of grime and filth caked on top of it. No matter how many times it was wiped down, it seemed to remain, a stubborn reminder of the futility of it all. A large stout man lay face down against the filth. His muscled body was covered in a layer of fat that suggested a steady diet of beer and whiskey. It sat, propped up on a stool, precariously balancing above the cesspool of a floor. His face was plastered against the bar. Strings of spit and vomit dangled from his lips, coagulating in the dust and creating pools of regurgitated pudding.
The air inside was stale, fetid and foul, filled with smoke, sweat, and an assortment of waste and fluids. The place was a veritable shithole, but it was the only shithole in Utopia, at least the only one that hadn’t banned Griff, and likely wouldn’t given his current status. Griff was what passed for law in Utopia, and when he was sober he actually performed his duties quite well. Even inebriated he still managed to perform them to an acceptable standard, but just barely. And at this point in his life he spent almost as much time drunk as he had sober.
The rest of the bar was barren, save for a couple of men performing the ritual of removing the refuse that stuck around from the previous night’s binging. There was a third man, and he stood behind the bar wiping down glasses. He couldn’t keep the counter clean, but he’d be god-damned if he served someone with a dirty glass. He eyed Griff curiously, looking down at him with arched eyebrows. He brought one hand from his task to scratch at his grimey beard, then rubbed it against his apron covered paunch, a slight heaviness setting in due to inactivity.
“Rough night, eh?” The barkeep asked in his weird accent. He wasn’t a colonist, like Griff was. He was born here, or at the very least had spent the bulk of his youth here and grown into a man here. Those that were born on Mars had the strangest of dialects. A disgusting pigeon language that slammed Irish, English, Chinese, and various other languages together into a putrid bowl of alphabet soup. His words to Griff were mostly English, but old timers like Griff had a hard time understanding it. Their ears spent a good portion of their lives dealing with a single language, not the melting pot of many languages into one.
The large man grumbled, and he pushed his tongue out of his mouth. It licked his cracked chapped lips, pushing at the rancid streams of vomit that clung to his face and slight beard.
“Water,” Griff said, straining to push the words out of his mouth.
“Aye. And a bath. Nasty fella. You stink.” The barkeep’s words were loose and sloppy. They were a soup sandwich inside of Griff’s ears.
“Fuck… Off…” The only wods Griff could muster, he was too tired, and his brain was in too deep of a haze.
“Hey, man. Maybe slow down a bit. Most of the old timers. Most of them are dead, you know? Maybe. I don’t know, man. Maybe take it easy?” The barrkeep’s voice was a cocktail of sarcasm and concern. There was some genuine care on display here.
“Old timer?” Griff asked, as he peeled his dried and crusted face from the dingy surface of the bar.
I’m only 45, he thought to himself. But as he did he remembered that most of the people his age didn’t make it out of the war. So many times he should have died. So many times he should have joined them. And now he is one of the few people left that can both read and write.
He let his head sag back down, and rested his forehead against the bar.
“Okay, Griff. Time to wake up.” A small splash of icy water hit him in the back of the head. He reflexively jolted upright.
“Christ!” Griff protested. He turned his head left and right, waiting for the haze to clear from his head and his vision.
“Never know what that means, nor why you say it, old man. But I laugh every time.” The bartender went back to washing his glass as he spoke, a wry smile visible beneath his beard.
Griff rubbed his eyes and fell from the stool. It was a controlled fall that found him standing upright, more or less. He looked at himself to assess the amount of damage he had done to himself and his filth-stained clothes.
Fuck. He thought to himself.
“I need a shirt. And pants,” Griff said to the barkeep.
“Not your maid, Pops,” He responded, picking up another glass.
Griff then went about removing his leather vest and shirt from his heavy body. He tossed it at the barkeep. His hands went for his belt and pants when the other man interrupted him.
“All right, man, all right. I’ll put it together. The washroom. We will get it in the washroom for you. Already got the heater going for water. And…” His voice trailed off. His eyes were fixed on Griff. On his left arm. He had seen it before, but only rarely, and every time he did it was the same.
Griff’s left arm, and his leg, also, were much like Griff. A relic of a bygone era. Some sort of metal was grafted to the skin. There was a type of connection that allowed his brain to interface with it. For all Griff knew, it was his real arm, only it was stronger and more rugged. Griff didn’t know the details of how or why it worked, he didn’t care. All he knew was that it was a daily reminder of what he had been through, and all of the things he had lost. There were a couple of old timers still around that knew a bit about his arm and leg, like Old Tom, and that’s who Griff relied on to make sure it all stayed repaired and functional.
“Take a picture. It lasts longer, prick.” Griff grumbled, as he stumbled away towards the washroom.
Griff stumbled from the washroom, but in a much more controlled manner. He was clean, with fresh clothes. He had the look of someone that had just woken up, which was a big improvement.
“Whiskey.” Griff said, sitting at the bar.
“Man. you really think that’s a great idea?”
“All right. Water. And whiskey. Take the edge off, get rid of the headache. Christ Mickey, just give me a drink.”
“Just stop,” Was the barkeep’s only response, though he was pouring a shot and a glass of water as he spoke.
“Cutting an alcoholic off cold turkey can kill him.”
Mickey stared at Griff. He understood the phrase cold turkey, but only through context. He also doubted there was any truth to it, but he passed the shot and the water to Griff. He knocked down the shot then gulped the water down greedily.
“One more.” Griff said
“Hey, Griff. You. You said.”
“The water. One more water.” Griff responded. He spun on his stool, turning towards the doors of the bar. He looked out through the cracked glass panes in the door. Out there was a great big world. Mars. And all of the wonder and hope it had once promised, but it came with all of the horror and terror it delivered. There was no life on Mars, at least that was the briefing he had received upon arriving at Mars.
But that was a joke. The biggest fucking joke. And we were about to be the worst god damn punchline. Not only was there intelligent life on Mars, there were two different species of it. What a surprise. The Death Eaters, that’s what the people of Mars had come to know them as, weren’t the biggest shock. The biggest shock was the Squatters. Humanity already had an inkling about the existence of the Death-Eaters, and their appearance on Mars made a lot more sense as the big-brain types unraveled the mystery of the Squatters. Those were indigenous. Except they weren’t. Time and research had shown that almost every structure we had discovered on Mars was built by them, but what really fucked everything up is that they were simply human. They looked a little different. Life on a low-gravity planet will do that, and Griff never bothered to learn how they lived in the Mars atmosphere, or any of that history. He wasn’t a researcher, he was a soldier. Shoot, move, and communicate.
Griff continued staring thoughtfully through the door, his memory hazily recalling the rooftop firefight he was in so long ago, and his initial encounter with Squatters. They coordinated that attack on the rooftop, Jones had died, the first of so many. Griff’s eyes closed as he tried to push the vision of Jones’ twisted face out of his head. He reached for his glass and slammed its contents down his throat.
Fuck. Water. He thought.
The Orbisun’s blinding light spilled into the room briefly, and a loud creak hailed the opening of the saloon door. Griff kept his eyes shut, not wanting to see the bright light. A heavy footstep announced the entrance of something large, followed by another, the dull thuds prompted Griff to open his eyes.
A large bipedal being stood before him. It was tall, so much so that it had to have ducked to get into the door. Griff looked up at it, and he guessed it was easily close to two feet taller than him. It wore a sort of woven poncho pulled over its head, its ocean-hued skin needed as much protection from the Orbisun as any human’s, maybe even more. Griff knew there were specialty shops that provided protective clothing to them, though none of them would openly admit it.
It wore a round brimmed hat pulled low to hide its face, the brim was flat and low, also for keeping the sun out of its eyes.
It’s eyes. That’s what Griff had always hated the most. Their God-damned eyes. They were large white discs that seemed to glow in low light. The worst part was that they never fucking closed. Maybe the damn things never slept. It would go a long way into explaining why they were so hard to ambush.
Griff eyed it, venom and hatred burned in his eyes. 25 years worth of contempt and suppressed memories bubbled just below the surface, and slowly Griff rested his hand on the old revolver slung to his hip.
“What you want, Death Eater?” He spat the words out, hating that they even had to pass his lips.
It stared at him, lifting the brim of its hat a little bit. Those hideous white disks stared back at Griff, stabbing at him, piercing him. All Griff could think about was grabbing one of the tarnished and pitted spoons that lay behind the bar and prying them out of the monster’s god-damned head one at a time.
They hated the term Death Eater. Not because the words bothered them, but they understood the context. The derogatory hate that came with the term was not lost on them. After the war ended, and some form of integration and reconstruction happened, most had stopped using the term. They were just called people by those that post-dated the war. The few old-timers, those like Griff, they still harbored enough hate and disdain that the words fell from their lips like a river flows.
Those eyes stayed fixed, motionless, seemingly lifeless, “I need your help,” it said.
They didn’t speak, they had some kind of telekinetic power and they simply pierced your mind with their thoughts. Once you’d been around them enough you understood how to block it, how to protect yourself, but communication with them was as discomforting as staring into their empty fucking eyes.
“I got your help. Right. Here.” Griff responded, his fingers tapping the grip of his revolver. “It will solve every fuckin’ problem you’ve got.”
No response. No piercing echoes screaming through his head, no hollow whispers skulking through the recesses of his mind. Griff waited, his fingers still tapped the grip, his eyes locked on those hideous white disks. The alien shifted its weight slightly, its back-bending legs flexing slightly underneath the poncho it wore. Its long arms flexed and relaxed, and its three thick fingers curled into a fist with its thumb, then relaxed. First one hand, then the other, then both. The forearms on them were huge, though the upper arms were much smaller by comparison.
Horrible looking things, Griff thought.
“I know you, cattle.” The words penetrated straight into Griff’s brain, a hoarse whisper that echoed deep in the recesses of his mind. Hearing the word cattle gave Griff a shudder. Fucking vultures, Griff thought, and gripped his pistol.
Both of them moved with a surprising speed and grace, given the sheer size and bulk each one was carrying. The Death eater lunged forward, its three-fingered hand easily palmed Griff’s head like a ball. Griff grunted and muffled in the creature’s grip, but had also swiftly removed the pistol from its holster, cocked it and jammed the barrel against the alien’s chest.
Damn it. I gotta quit drinking, too slow, Griff thought.
The alien pulled the man’s head close to its, those harsh disks staring deep into Griff.
The room around Griff swam until the bar, floor, and Death Eater all became a vibrant swirl of colors. He tried to scream but his throat was cotton. He tried to think, but his head was fog. The world around him faded to nothing, before he was brought back, like an old movie slowly coming into focus.
The small concrete building served as a temporary base. Another bombed out shithole for the soldiers to live in while they claimed inch after inch. The squatters had long ago revealed their presence, and the war had progressed to the point where they were fighting with anger and desperation. Humans had invaded, though it felt weird, because they were humans too. Just different.
No one had figured out why they were so desperate. Those big brains weren’t sure if they were on the verge of extinction, or if they were that eager to defend their home. Any time a Squatter was captured they refused to talk, and the linguist types and science types worked together diligently to comprehend their language, but soon enough none of it mattered. The people on Mars found what had caused the indigenous people to fight so brutally and violently.
Buried below the surface of Mars a labyrinth of caves tied together multiple massive chambers. Those chambers were giant fungal pods, a storage place for Death Eaters, ready to spread their spores and sprout upon disturbance. Turns out the constant fighting and warfare was enough of a disturbance to wake them up. The Squatters had battled the Death Eaters once, and from what Griff and the other soldiers could tell, it just didn’t go well for them. It got bad enough that the Squatters scorched the shit out of the surface of the planet, fucked the atmosphere, and found ways to hide and go into stasis.
Just like Earth, thought Griff, staring thoughtfully at his cards.
“Your play, Griff,” Dobner’s voice cut through the silence of the building, and blew Griff’s thoughts up like a giant bomb.
He looked to Dobner, an athletic man a few years Griff’s senior, then back to his cards. Griff tossed one down, his mind only half on the game.
“Where do you think they came from?” Griff asked. He stared at his cards, then looked to the other three men at the table.
“Does it matter? Federation says they gotta go, so they gotta go. Plus they struck first. Fuck ‘em,” Gamble answered. He was a bear of a man, and his wide ass barely fit on the small stool it was perched upon. He looked like he could have been 12, if it weren’t for the massive bulk and height of his body. He and Griff went to boot together, and then ended up stuck on fucking Mars together.
Back to silence as a few more cards were tossed on the table. The game continued for a few more minutes, no one saying anything, but hands tossing and picking up cards. Even on Mars, even in the future, cards were a perfect time-killer.
Anything to fight the fucking boredom, Griff thought.
“You think they’ll send someone to look for this one?” Griff asked, nodding toward a thick steel door off to his left. The building was just a large cube, with an entrance and a storage closet. Not the best place for a squad to hole-up, but it wasn’t the worst. The four men sat inside playing cards, while four more were positioned on guard duty. Twelve on, twelve off. Worst rotations ever.
“Maybe. Who cares. At least we figured out the comms situation. Having that god damn voice in your head is the worst. I’m more worried about the Squatters than the fucking death eaters. Those bastards figure out we got a death eater alive, they’ll come straight for us. And they won’t be taking prisoners.” Dobner spat towards the door containing the prisoner, “Kill em all.”
“Squatters are people, though, Sergeant.” Griff said.
“Not my people. Bastards. Barely look human any more. You know, you seen ‘em. Griff here survived the very first attack, ain’t it right, Griff?” Dobner tossed his cards down and leaned back in his chair. He had a crooked smile and a look of malice gleamed in his eye.
Before Griff could do or say anything shouts interrupted the conversation. The words couldn’t be understood, but they could be heard through the thick martian concrete. Dobner immediately hopped up and reflexively grabbed his radio and rifle. The rest of the men dropped their cards, knocking stools over as they rushed for their weapons as well.
“Sergeant. Got a couple Squatters coming towards the building. The don’t appear to be armed, but they aren’t halting.” A voice on the radio said. Benson’s voice.
Dobner screamed obscenities for a second, his rage almost instant.
“If they get within fifty feet of the building fuck ‘em up!” Dobner yelled into his radio.
The rest of the soldiers were gearing up, locking and loading magazines, and preparing for the worst.
“Fuckin’ told you, Griff. They must have found out.” Dobner said, the weird smile coming back to his face.
Griff slapped the magazine into the well on his rifle. And he considered that this could be an attack. Killing Death Eaters was easy. They didn’t look human. Hell, they barely looked sentient. They were hideous, terrifying, and they looked like something that deserved to die. The Squatters, though. They were different. They looked like humans. Their faces were close, their bodies were similar. For all intents and purposes they WERE people.
It didn’t take the Squatters long to learn that humans viewed children, and even some women, as Non-Coms, or non-combatants. Armed with that knowledge the Squatters started wiring up anything they could with explosives. Pets, kids, women, anything that would elicit an emotional response that wasn’t rage, with explosives and send it right into Federation bases. Everywhere soldiers went was threatening, and the hyper-vigilance could strip a person of their humanity.
Dobner was slipping. Shreds of his humanity oozing out of him like water from a fist, and Griff saw that the darkness was closing in.
“Too late, Sarge,” the words clicked through the radio, but they also arrived too late. Dobner had pulled the door open, rifle in hand and at the ready, only to have found himself staring into the eyes of two teenage girls, both of them Squatters.
Dobner reflexively raised his rifle and screamed. He barked orders at his men, and at the girls. He screamed for them to get back. They knew the girls couldn’t understand the words, but surely they could understand the context. The soldiers were scrambling frantically. Most of them were wearing half a suit of armor at this point, some of them were still strapping on their helmets. Griff had knocked over the card table as he scrambled to get the rest of his gear on.
Christ.. They can’t be older than 15, he thought.
He looked to them briefly while he fastened his helmet. They looked just like people, but they were stretched and thin. The lighter gravity really distorted them, but Griff swore they were simply people. He went back to fixing his armor, and securing his rifle.
Two shots barked out, Pop. Pop. The sound echoed through the empty concrete room. The sound of a body hitting the floor followed. Griff looked up in time to see the flash from the muzzle, followed by a spray of blood erupting from the back of one of the girls. As she fell Dobner’s voice screamed above the commotion and confusion.
“Little Bitch!” he screamed, shoving the other girl with his rifle and stomping at the corpse with booted feet.
He continued kicking at the corpse of the girl. The corpse of a sister, a daughter, the corpse of a young woman that had so much more life to live. Griff watched in horror as his squad leader seemed to lose control. He held on to what humanity was left in him as he watched his sergeant crush bits of the dead girl beneath his boot. He struggled to remind himself that no matter what, they were just protecting their home. They were people. From what Griff had seen, war ended two ways. Either you die, or you live long enough to become Dobner.
Hope I fucking die, thought griff. He raised his rifle and yelled at the other girl to stop, and get on her knees. Griff could see genuine fear in her young eyes. They looked like oceans, blue and wet.
“Fucking shoot her!” yelled Dobner, The rest of the soldiers moving towards the door that contained the death eater.
“She’s a kid! She’s terrified!” Griff responded, fear and confusion settling in. It would have been easy to pull the trigger. He remembered the rooftop firefight, and so many other attacks, but he tried so hard to see them as people.
“You’re going to get us all killed, you fuck! She’s scared because she knows! She fucking knows this is a one-way mission! Blow her god damned brains out!”
Griff knew he was probably right. He knew that Dobner had every right to suspect that the girl was a suicide bomber, but he couldn’t bring himself to shoot someone so young.
“I fucking can’t!” Griff yelled. His eyes were moist with tears, and he slowly lowered the barrel of his rifle.
Another round exploded through the silence, echoing off of the walls. Griff glanced over his shoulder to see Gamble was towering next to him with his rifle at the ready. The barrel had a small trace of smoke coming from it.
“Jesus. What have I done?” Gamble asked, as he watched the girl slump towards the ground. Slowly blood seeped from her wound and stained her clothes.
“Saved our fucking lives!” Dobner responded, “You sexy bastard!”
The soldiers calmed themselves, realizing that there were no more targets. A moist sucking noise started to echo through the room, a wet sucking slurping that discomforted everyone. It was Jello sucked through a straw, it was soup slurping from a spoon. It was her wet heavy breathing through the hole in her chest.
“What is that fucking noise?” Gamble asked. His voice was frantic and childlike, “Sergeant. Why is she making that fucking noise?!”
His eyes were wide, and tears were clinging to them, waiting for the weight of what had happened to cause them to drop down his cheeks.
“Why did I kill a little girl, Sergeant? Why did I do that?” Gamble’s breathing became rapid. He was uncomfortable in his armor. He wanted to rip it off, his helmet came first, and flew across the room. It wasn’t enough. He started ripping at the Kevlar and the vest that held it. Unable to find purchase, he flung his rifle across the room to free up his other hand and started tearing at the vest with both hands.
“Why is she making that noise?” he asked, “Why is she making that God-damned noise?”
The armor came off, and was slung to the side of the room. The other men stood there watching, no one knowing what to say or do. The armor wasn’t enough. Gambled would have pulled his fucking skin off if he could. He slumped down, cradling his head in his hands, tears finally falling down his face.
“Why did I kill that little girl, and why the hell is she making that noise?”
Two of the other soldiers moved over to Gamble, checking on him, asking him basic aid questions, but Griff stared in silence. He watched Gamble, the sucking chest-wound, and the crazed Dobner. He wasn’t sure what to do.
Dobner leaned in over the girl, bringing his face close to hers. He watched her labored breathing, and watched as bubbles of blood formed and popped with her every breath. Slowly the blood pooled around her, oozing from the hole in her chest.
He pulled her robe, pushed her around, and began feeling her for weapons, traps, and intel. Griff had moved closer to offer security, though he was visibly uncomfortable with everything that had happened. He watched as Dobner frantically patted and re-patted areas. He watched while his squad leader searched and searched again.
“Sarge. She doesn’t have anything,” Griff said. His own eyes were starting to get wet, and the crying from Gamble made the situation that much worse.
“What?!” sobbed Gamble at this. The guilt of what he had done had taken a far darker turn. “I killed her for nothing?”
The squad all started to move, leaving Gamble to sob in solitude, watching Dobner continuously search the dying girl.
“I’m calling the medic,” Griff said, turning toward the man-pack.
A hand grabbed his elbow, pulling him back as he moved. Griff turned, Dobner was staring at him, his eyes wide with hate, “The hell you are.”
Griff pushed him back, just enough to break the contact. Dobner let go immediately, but followed up by drawing down on Griff. He had his rifle in hand and pointed at Griff faster than Griff’s mind could register what was happening. Griff wondered how Dobner was up and moving so fast, he wondered what was going through his squad leader’s mind, he wondered if he was going to become another casualty. Griff stared down the barrel of Dobner’s rifle, no longer able to see the world around them. He could only see Dobner and the shooter.
Christ, Thought Griff. His heart wouldn’t slow down. He stopped all movement. He wasn’t sure if Dobner would friendly fire him, but given the situation he felt it best to err on the side of caution.
“What the hell are you doing?” Griff asked. It was a genuine question. He was confused, and simply wanted some clarification.
“I’ll watch her die!” Dobner yelled.
“She. She hasn’t done… Anything!” Griff yelled. His voice was loud, frantic. His nerves were shot and he couldn’t slow down his heart rate. It was a machine gun in his chest, pumping rounds at such a rate it would overheat soon. The rest of the squad stood around the men, a tense and awkward silence settled over them, and no one said a word. None of them knew what words to say in this situation. It was never covered in any of their training.
“Not yet. She will. You go get that medic. You go. And when she’s healed. When. When she’s back to normal. You think? You think she’s going to remember this? She doesn’t give a shit! She is here to kill us. To. Kill. Us. And I’m killing her first! So. Go. Get the god-damned medic. But by the time the medic gets here, there won’t be enough.” Dobner stopped a second to breathe. His words were fast and staccato, and he barely breathed while he barked at Griff.
“There won’t be enough to put on the stretcher, and you’ll need the fucking medic, got it?” He finished, breathing heavily.
Finally one of the others broke the tension and silence that hung in the air.
“Sarge. She’s. She’s got something!” A voice yelled, its owner immediately raised a rifle and pointed it at her.
Everyone stopped. Everything stopped. The world ceased to spin on its axis for this one brief moment in time. Every eye in the small concrete room was now fixed on the vision of a dying young girl, bubbles of blood forming and popping on her chest with each and every shallow breath that labored into her body. Her skin was pallid and washed out, the blood loss was taking its toll on her, but her eyes. Her eyes had the look of deadly determination.
In her feeble looking hands she held a little black box. It was small. It fit in her palm. On one side was an orange button. It looked like an old handheld radio. Griff had wanted to scream. He wanted to ask Dobner how he had missed that in his frantic searching. He wanted to yell, grab Dobner with his fists, and beat the brakes off him. He had wanted to say so much in this moment, but there simply wasn’t enough time.
A gurgling bubbling breath wheezed through her chest cavity, and a pale sickly finger pressed the orange button. The flash was blinding. There was no delay between it and the deafening roar of the concussive blast that followed. The force flung bodies back in all directions, lifting grown men from their feet and flinging them effortlessly into the concrete walls that made up the room. Bits of shrapnel blasted outward, bouncing like pinballs off of the concrete, the force of the blast chipping bits of the walls and sending it outward, multiplying the amount of shrapnel contained in the tiny area. Bones cracked and skin rent from the destructive forces unleashed in the room. Bits of the girl, and some of the soldiers, scattered in all directions. The front half of the building folded in on itself from the sheer power of the explosion. Dust formed a dense cloud, and the remnants of the building were filled with air and smoke.
Am I dead? Griff thought.
He couldn’t move. He couldn’t see. And once again he couldn’t hear. The concussive force wreaked havoc on his equilibrium, and he couldn’t tell where he was. He looked all around him, nausea bubbling in him, like a volcano ready to erupt. The fog that the bomb had created was impenetrable, though Griff couldn’t see right now anyway. His vision was blurry swirls of those purple and green lines. It was his smell that came back first, and as soon as his brain was able process them, he was assaulted by a thick stew of smells. The air burned with the smells of smoke and dust, but the worst parts were the burning flesh and hair. It stunk so bad. He hated the smell, and hoped he would never endure it again. The volcano erupted, and Griff turned his head instinctively, puking out of the side of his mouth.
Slowly his hearing was restored. Maybe it wasn’t so slow. Time was meaningless in this moment. The high-pitched whining calmed a little, and soon he could hear some background noises, though they weren’t what he expected. As the whining made way for the ambient sounds of the world around him, he realized that there were no ambient sounds. It was just his heartbeat, the constant whine in his ears, and nothing. No movement, no walking footsteps, no angry yelling. Just. Silence.
“Sarge?” Griff Yelled. There was no reply. The vomit stuck to his lips and dragged in strings through the Martian mud. As he yelled for his squad leader he realized that he was lying on his back, his cheek resting on the dirt.
“Sarge? Gamble?” He called again. Again there was no answer. Even the high pitched whining was beginning to leave, and soon the world would be in silence. Terror replaced the nausea, and a different volcano was ready to erupt. He frantically tossed his head to either side, but his eyes wouldn’t focus, the swirling colors wouldn’t stop. He tried to move, but found he couldn’t. The world felt so heavy.
Greens and Purples swirled together slowly until they formed a solid cohesive picture. Finally Griff’s vision had returned, though he almost immediately wished it hadn’t. The air was heavy, dust and smoke still hung in a thick cloud all around him, and he found he could only see a few feet in any direction.
“Sarge? Dobner?!” He called again. Desperation was setting in. Every time he called out and received no answer, the fear slowly changed to reality.
He couldn’t move his left side. It didn’t occur to him immediately, but slowly as he got his bearings and called out he had tried to shift and change positions. Over the brief period of time he had been there he realized that his whole left side was immobile. He pulled his right hand to his face. The gloved hand stared back at him, and all of his digits were there. Nearby his rifle lay, just within reach, though he doubted he would need it.
Deep breath in. Deep breath out.
Griff told himself this as he did just that. He was preparing himself for the worst possible scenario. He shut his eyes briefly and slowly counted to ten as he breathed. He turned his head to the left and opened his eyes.
“OH GOD!” He immediately shut them again. He swallowed a massive lump of panic.
“Sarge!” He cried out again, fighting back the terror and panic that was clawing at him.
“Doc? Fuck! Someone! Help! Help me!” Tears of desperation formed in his eyes. His mind was racing as fast as his heart.
“I’m okay. I’m. Okay.” He said out loud. Breaking the silence seemed to help. “I’m going to open my eyes and assess the situation.”
His words had brought a level of calm to him. And with a deep breath he opened his eyes to better assess what had happened.
Large chunks of the wall had blown out and fallen. Massive slabs of concrete had pinned his left side, smashing his arm and leg. He attempted to move it, but quickly realized that he was unable to. It was far too heavy, and he couldn’t feel those extremities anyway. He would need at least two arms to move any of this, but he only had one.
“Dobner,” He said. Tears flowed freely at this point. The fear of reality had completely set in. Griff was alone, and he realized that there would be no one there to help. No one there to rescue him. The most gut-wrenching part of it was realizing that Dobner was right all along.
“I’m so sorry! Sergeant!” Pain and solitude flowed from his eyes, though the panic had largely gone. Griff had accepted his fate, and let the flood of emotions wash over him. He took a deep breath in, and accepted the inevitable.
My radio! He thought.
He began to frantically search the portions of his body that he could. He allowed himself to hope briefly while he patted the myriad pouches that clung to his vest. If he could find his radio he could maybe live. Maybe not. But at least if he died he wouldn’t be alone. His fingers found his radio pouch, flipped it open and reached in. He felt for the hard plastic that was the antenna and wrapped his fingertips around it, and yanked it out as soon as he could. Bits of shattered plastic came out with the antenna, and Griff held a string of circuit board bits in his hand.
“FUCK!” He yelled. He cursed himself for allowing hope to creep into his brain.
The dust was settling at this point, and his visibility increased. He wished it hadn’t. Being trapped was so much easier when he thought he was alone. Off to one side Gamble sat, much as he did before the explosion. Shrapnel had torn chunks of his face away, and a piece of iron bar that was used to reinforce the concrete and found itself lodged into his neck. Blood pooled from his face down into streams that flowed from his neck until it formed a lake of blood in his lap.
He looked around to find the other soldiers littered about the room. Some of them in more pieces than others.
Dead. They’re all dead.
He reached for his rifle, his outstretched arm grabbing it by the sling. He pulled it to him slowly. He couldn’t stop crying. Why couldn’t he stop crying? The fear and sadness wouldn’t leave no matter how many tears came out. He looked around as best he could, trapped beneath the slabs of concrete. He turned his head back to the rifle and stared at it. It felt like eternity.
I could do this. He thought
He kept staring down the barrel. It would be quick. Painless. Easy. There wouldn’t be any prolonged suffering. He stared at the gun and thought about how easily he could end the solitude and torment by simply pulling the trigger. He could end it all. Like Cockner, and so many others.
Oh fuck. He thought, Cockner. What if it doesn’t kill me? At least not the first time. What if it just passes through, and takes half of my fucking face off? What if I’m left here with permanent brain damage and pain? Jesus!
The thought process brought up memories he had been trying to suppress. He had buried them deeply, but his brain decided now was the best time to process it. He immediately thought back to how Cockner was Failure to Report for three straight days. It wasn’t until the third day that the unit decided to finally go check on him. When they got there they arrived to see the aftermath of a seventy-two hour bender. Alcohol bottles were littered about his room, empty pill bottles scattered between them. He remembered Sergeant Lars opening the door, Griff right behind him, and the two stepping into the filth. In the center of it all sat Cockner, .45 in hand, barrel in mouth. Before anything could be said or done the flash-bang of the trigger pull registered, and blood sprayed up towards the ceiling.
Why was his brain bringing this up right now?
A rustling noise broke the unsettling silence that had swallowed the area and pulled Griff from his memory. He immediately rolled as much of his body as he could so that he could prop himself up on his elbow.
“Sarge?” he asked, he knew better, but he allowed hope to crawl back into his brain.
The only answer was heavy lumbering footsteps. Griff’s hope didn’t crawl away, it ran. Heavy blue-skinned legs stepped towards him, back-bending strides moved easily past Griff, its head constantly moving back and forth. It was also assessing the situation. It stopped moving and turned to face Griff, bending down and looking at him.
The large circular eyes shone white, even in the dust and haze. Pupiless plates of white that peered into Griff. It had stopped with one foot resting on the slab that pinned Griff to the ground, though it didn’t shift much weight onto it. Griff clumsily tried to raise his rifle, and shouted as he did it. The creature simply batted the rifle down, scattering it away with its massive forearms. Its weight began to shift to the slab and a stabbing pain shot through Griff’s entire body.
Griff screamed, pain searing into his body. He swung wildly with his free arm, not with any real purpose or intent, just blind flailing. The creature shifted more weight to the slab, leaning closer and pinning the flailing arm down with one of its. Its head was inches from Griff’s, its blue skin glowed in the hazy light of the Orbisun. Its upper jaw hinged open revealing endless rows of sharp rigid teeth and strings of spittle that dangled from its upper jaw. The air now stunk of decaying flesh. God damned death eaters.
“I’m not fucking dead yet,” Griff snarled, unable to move.
Suddenly the creature leapt from him, and with amazing grace darted to one of the corpses.
“Don’t you fucking do it! Don’t you eat him!” Griff shouted.
The creature ignored him, picking up the corpse and rummaging through the pouches. It tossed contents aside until it came across a radio. It eyed the radio briefly, then moved back towards Griff, the radio in one hand, corpse in the other.
A whole new wave of hope flooded into Griff as he watched the creature stand over him.
“Please… Please,” He stammered, staring at the radio. Griff needed it. It was the only thing that could keep him alive.
The Death Eater stared down at him, those record-shaped eyes burning white against its blue skin. It held the small radio up, eyeing it curiously.
“I know you can hear me. I know you understand me! You. You Bastard!” Griff yelled.
Is it fucking with me? Griff thought.
It didn’t respond. It simply stood there staring at the small radio, its gaze occasionally jumping to Griff, then back to the radio. Suddenly a noise pierced Griff’s head. It was at this moment that Griff learned to hate the way they communicated. His head was already swimming, waves of adrenaline and pain had already washed over his brain, but this creature had pierced all of that and a hoarse whisper drowned it out briefly.
“Thank you.” It whispered, tossing the radio down.
“What?” Was Griff’s initial response, but he shrugged the question off as soon as his brain realized the radio was on the ground next to him.
“You convinced capture instead of kill. Had you not, I’d be dead.” It responded.
Its erected its posture, pulling the corpse up as it stood. Its upper jaw unhinged again, and this time it sank down into the corpse. The rows of tiny teeth tore flesh from the body, and it swallowed down bits of Griff’s friend. After a few quick bites the alien bound off, leaving Griff by himself with the radio. He used it. He called his platoon to his location, and called in his own medivac. He frantically radioed everyone he could think of that would get him out of this situation, but the one thing he never mentioned was the Death Eater.
The fog around Griff cleared, and he found himself in the dingy filth-stained bar once again. Micky stood nearby, simply holding the glass, not even pretending to wipe it. Griff’s eyes focused on the blue skin of the palm that held his head and a scowl formed on his face. He went to squeeze the trigger on his revolver, but found that at some point during the memory the creature had seized it with its other hand.
It pushed Griff back gently, keeping the revolver in its hand as he slumped into the stool behind him.
“Water, Mickey.” Was all he could say, and Mickey obliged, filling the half-washed glass in his hand and setting it down on the bar behind Griff.
“That you?” Griff asked as he swallowed a drink of water from his glass, ignoring the debris and filth caked to it.
It nodded, an oddly human gesture that was discomforting when done by this creature.
“Like what you saw in there?” Griff asked angrily.
“No. Not at all.” It whispered.
It eyed him with those large disks.
The alien reached out, offering Griff’s Revolver back to him. Griff took it, eyeing it suspiciously as he holstered his weapon.
“What the fuck do you want, Death Eater?” Griff asked angrily
“I want you to catch an outlaw,” It whispered to him
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