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PREVIOUS CHAPTER INDEX NEXT CHAPTER Dark Crimson By Nick P. At first I thought they had handed me the wrong dossier. I couldn’t believe they wanted this man dead. Second generation, full marks on everything, ComSec HQ in London and subdivisions in Washington D.C…. Korea, Somalia, and all the good stuff. Inspector, evaluation officer, and so on… I’d heard his voice on tape back in the general’s quarters and it really hooked me. But for some reason, I couldn’t take that voice and match it up with the man on paper before me. They had said he had an impressive career… Anything but a far cry from perfection. He was being readied for a top career in the corporation. He could’ve had it all: General, Chief of Staff, just about anything. But he went and threw it all away. In 2152 he returned to Earth from an evaluation tour of the KCP where I had just been. He wrote a detailed report that was soon censored. He told them something that they didn’t like, something that they didn’t think others should read. He then wanted to transfer out of the London HQ to Roland AF Base, situated by the Washington D.C. subdivision. Airborne. He was thirty-eight years old. Why the hell did he even apply for airborne? Towards the end of that year, he joined the Coalition Special Forces and was soon ferried back to Stroggos… The unmistakable rumble of an explosion broke in the distance. “What’s that?” Chef asked. I thought for a second. “Coalition C-40s, bombing run, no doubt. Arc to the right,” I said to Chief Phillips. “We don’t want any trouble from our own boys.” “Shit, I hate hearing that.” “Why? It means we’re bombing the hell out of some Strogg shithole. What’s not to like about that?” Clean looked at Chef questioningly, whose moustache was twitching. “Something terrible’s going to happen.” All of the sudden, in the near distance, behind some hill, smoke started to rise up where there had been a horrible explosion. The smoke rose high and black, darker in the orange light. One of the bombers had been taken down, met its fate to a Strogg missile. A missile that was smuggled in design from us. “We’ve got burning!” To our right slowly grew a village. It was one of those villages from the very first human inhabitants from the planet. They were composed of exiles and people seeking a new refuge. Many were just human trash sent here in hopes of feeding the Stroggs. They hoped that this way, they wouldn’t attack Earth. But of course, in evil hearts burns greed, and it did little. Now there were small villages of humans living on Stroggos, primitive groups with simple language and no modern technology. Their houses were built of metallic panels from what were once spacecrafts, while other parts served other purposes. And many of these human outcasts had joined Kurt… “Let’s take a look, Chief.” The buggy started to turn as Phillips rounded the wheel. And as the rocks between which our passage winded gave way, the village came into full view. It was situated around a central hub of sorts, what had once perhaps been a power generator left by the people’s ancestors. However, through time, the cylindrical and intricately covered building gathered rust from the oxygen concentration in the air. As the rust gathered, generations branched outwards and things were forgotten. Now they knew little of electric power and looked towards people like us with reverence but fear and dislike at the same time. They saw our similarities physically and were left confused just as to their own origins, and it is this confusion that angered their primitive minds. Around the central power generator were four squares, each lined with houses and a single greenhouse that harboured Earth plants in an Earth-like environment. Along the dusty red road and between the houses were metallic beams and pieces and panels, scattered about, remnants of what had once been. Pieces of thin aluminium blew in the wind while pistons and tubes were buried under the gathering dust. It was an undoubtedly depressing scene to watch, especially with the rising fire and explosions and the Coalition military men running around, trying to keep peace. It was the AeroCavalry, a self-titled division in a series of nine groups, the people that were supposed to escort us to a checkpoint East of Karoggon. They were supposed to be a good thirty kilometres ahead. Well, this surprised me little. These boys just wouldn’t stay put. They were an old Cavalry division that cashed in their horses for troop carriers and went around tearing ass on Stroggos. They were quick in their actions and quick in their mistakes, but even quicker in covering them up. What they were mopping up now hadn’t even happened an hour ago. “Don’t look at the cameras,” said the director of a TV Crew that was filming the fighting and chaos. “Don’t look at the cameras, just go on through… Don’t look at the cameras… Just drift by like you’re fighting…” I looked away from the heavily armoured civilian while I felt the digital camera’s lens follow me as our buggy drove by. Soon, the civilian buggy, marked with a big white circle that meant that it was civilian and shouldn’t be attacked, was left behind. Not that the Stroggs gave a shit. To them, meat is meat, and civilian meat is no different. I could see that innocent face of the director hanging limply down while its body was tugged upwards at the base of the neck my the meathook… We drove on. Explosions went off, some devouring the human housings. People ran around, some in rags and weathered expressions, others in clean military uniforms, the cleanliness signifying the lack of experience, the lack of war. It was the men with the clean uniforms that went first. It was chaos, utter chaos to the point that we found it unnecessary to stop. We drove through the town, not bothering to pause and find the Cavalry that was supposed to guide us northeastward. The dust in the air and explosions in the background slowly faded away as the buggy rumbled further down the road. Lance was sitting on the edge, one leg dangling downwards, chewing thoughtfully on a toothpick. Chef looked on in silence. And I hoped that we wouldn’t suffer because we proceeded onwards alone because all that lay ahead was danger in the form of barren cliffs and rocks. I sighed in the late evening sun. Someday this war’s gonna end. That would be fine with the boys on the patrol buggy. Their naïve eyes weren’t looking for anything more than a ticket home. Trouble is, I’ve been back there and I knew that it didn’t exist anymore. It was a rubble of shit and civilisation was crumbling, only held by politicians and military that hysterically ran around, trying to compose plans that might save the Earth. Yes, they would win. The Stroggs would lose. But then, what have we been fighting for? What would we win? What would these soldiers alongside me return to see? Everything back home was rubble and blood. Many soldiers didn’t care anymore; they fought simply because they were standing there, holding a weapon, and being shot at. They didn’t want it, didn’t like it, but there they were, gun at hand, and they had no choice. There is no choice in the war, whatever they might say. It is simply murder, plain as that. And so I wondered just what they really had against Kurt. It couldn’t be insanity and murder because, in the war, there was plenty of that to go around for everyone. |
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