Travesty (SolarSide Book 1)

by Austin Aragon

  The Herculeans eyes stare back. Peter loses himself momentarily in the alien’s mystifying gaze. It has crystal blue eyes, and their pupils are a never ending cycle of black circles that come closer together till they collide into a small dark spot in the middle—in fact, they are beautiful.

  Peter shakes his head. Snap out of it! Waste the evil fucker.

  It extends an arm behind its back to reach for something.

  “There it goes. I left it alive too long that now it’s reaching for a weapon.” Peter raises the XM, and fires the remaining rounds of his magazine into the torso of the Herculean. The alien fully collapses howling in such delightful pain.

  Peter leaps off the bunker and reloads once more, looking around at his kills with satisfaction. Something catches in his peripheral, on the right of the street a collapsed store reveals a large strange alien machine farther down in a clearing. It has smooth cylinder shaped cannons aimed upwards at the sky.

  That must be their AA turret. He looks at his AT rocket, there’s still one round left. Some Herculeans near the turret start moving towards his direction. Peter lifts the rocket to his shoulder, and takes cover against the rubble of a building before the clearing. He rest the AT tip on a collapsed support beam and pulls the trigger. The missile jumps out violently, speeding at the turret leaving behind a swirly exhaust trail. The rocket hits the turret exploding it into a scene of wonderful bright electrical flares and hisses.

  He turns around to relocate back with the convoy. The Leader however, is already near the bunker with the two remaining paratroopers. “You’re a hero yank!” says the Leader. “I saw you crawl up and take out this whole bunker. A complete wildcat you are.”

  “Thanks sir, but I think we have more after us.” Peter directs their vision to the destroyed turret and rallying Herculeans. “I just used the rocket to take out their AA.”

  “That’s what that whole last bit was about?” The Leader looks over at the wreckage of the turret. “You bloody hell did take out their AA battery! Amazing lad!” Herculean plasma slams against the bunker. “Take cover!” says the Leader.

  They move behind the bunker and fire back. “Call my Captain and tell him the enemy AA is down sir,” says Peter. “My earpiece isn’t picking up.”

  “Are you sure that was the AA?”

  “I’m positive. We need those Hogs to take out the remaining Herc’s. Who knows if the Rangers are even alive still.”

  “Alright,” the Leader lifts his radio. “Captain! Your boy here has just saved the day, he neutralized the enemy AA, I repeat the AA is down, call back our wings!”

  “Are you sure?” says Tarnus through the radio.

  “That’s what I asked too. He says yes, he also cleared the Herc bunker!”

  “Copy that, I hope you’re right.”

  The A-10’s return and annihilate the remaining Herculeans without any resistance. The Herculeans firing at their position withdraw under missile fire from the aircraft.

  “Well yank, great job today, you almost single handedly took them all out yourself,” says the Leader. “I think we can go now.”

  They walk back down the lane to grab the injured paratrooper and meet up with the convoy. Blake confirms that they have also secured the surviving rangers.

  Mission success. Then Peter remembers the last Herculean he killed.

  Peter runs back towards its corpse. “Where are you going?” the Leader calls after him.

  “I forgot something,” says Peter, “I’ll catch up.”

  “Hurry up then, I want to get the fuck out of this ghost town.”

  He comes to the Herculean that captivated him for a moment. Its arm is crushed underneath its back that it leaned for earlier. Peter pushes the alien over to its side, a dark pool of blood remains underneath from the multiple bullet hits. In its clasped hand is an object. He leans down to grab the chain dangling from the Herculean’s two pronged hand. The hand releases its grasp as its strange gloved appendages open for him. He pulls the chain and connected object away from it. The object looks like a piece of jewelry. Made out of fire smoothed stone with strange etchings on it. Under closer examination it actually looks like some sort of alien animal, maybe native to their planet.

  “Why was it grabbing this? Did it want to show me it, thinking it would save its life?”

  This is why it died. It was weak. War only respects the strong.

  He wraps the necklace up and places it inside his pocket, excited to show the others.

  His first loot of war.

  The convoy picks them up on its way to leave the town. The Leader continuously talks of Peter’s exploits to Love. “Captain, your private here is a real wildcat. I am going to nominate him for a medal.”

  Tarnus tabs his control pad.

  I am mellow and relaxed.

  Everyone turns towards the Leader and me in interest. “Did you really take out the whole alien bunker by yourself?” says Tommy.

  Before I can talk the Leader replies, “He sure did, he’s one hell of a warrior you got here.”

  “And the anti-aircraft guns?” says Tarnus.

  I answer this time, “Yes, sir.”

  One of the rangers from a nearby Patria yells over, “It must have been their jammer too! It explains why we couldn’t communicate with you till it was taken out.”

  “As I said Captain,” the Leader folds his ruined beret and neatly places it into his backpack, “your boy here saved the day.” He begins to move with his men back towards the Kiowa’s. “We’re off anyhow yanks. Take good care of our man,” he nods to the injured paratrooper being placed inside a Patria. “It was an honor fighting with you all today.”

  “You too, sir,” I say.

  “Remember lad,” says the Leader looking back at me, “you’re the hero of today, a true wildcat.”

  Proud of my accomplishments, I feel light as I lift myself up onto a carrier.

  Isaac mimics the Brit in a poor English voice, “A true wildcat lad, I’ll tell the Queen of your bravery myself.”

  I grab the netting by him and nudge him, “Shut up.”

  “It’s true,” says Blake with a serious tone. “You did a good job today, Private. You saved one of our men and successfully freed the skies for air support to finish the mission.”

  “Yeah man.” Alex pats me on the back.

  Isaac hands me his tin box of ancients. “All aside, you really were the hero of today, thanks for saving our asses.”

  I grab an ancient and hand the box back to Isaac. “Is this going to become a tradition?” I lift the ancient to my mouth as Isaac lights it, “Smoking ourselves to death after escaping it every time?”

  “Yeah,” Isaac hands the box to Alex as well so he can pass it around, “it’s kinda poetic, huh?” He takes a drag. “Flirting a bit more with death after it failed to get us today.”

  “Our dreams on fire.”

  He looks at the lighter, rubbing his thumb over it. “Orphans.”

  The Patria’s start up and we ride them out of town. I play with the Herculean necklace in my pocket.

  Maybe I am some sorta hero of war.

  I take a drag, the nicotine and cannabis combines with my DT high. I guess I did pretty well today. It feels damn good being praised. Oh yeah, I take it out the paper of the poem game Isaac and I were playing. Let’s see, the last word was Soul. Then I write.

  Soldiers overcome, unleashing legends,

  I hand the paper to Isaac. He looks at me confused for a moment, till he unfolds it and smiles. He takes a long drag from his ancient as he taps the pen against the paper.

  The loss of Julian, and all the others I’ve seen die today, brood in the well of my mind, my heart of hearts, but it is not with despair anymore, but resolve. There is good to be done here. Fellow brothers to save—like today. The greater tragedy would be to let Julian’s death rest in vain while I tried to run away or give up, than if I were to hold my ground and fight for the ca
use he laid his life down for. I must fight now, for this planet, for him. For Creon. For Earth. I should have never doubted the Party.

  The sun sets, casting a barrage of orange beams onto the gold wheat stalks of the war perished countryside. They look strangely beautiful under this high. All I can do is accept it for what it is, this world—life.

  A pretty existence in a fucked up reality.

  XV

  First night of guard duty on the outskirts of Tionem.

  I sit on top of a pillbox made out of sandbags and wood slabs, the town’s suburbs behind me but under blackout to avoid bombing. Small red flashes the size of a fingernail pop up in the distance ahead of me from the front, followed by a feint echoing boom. I squish my hands inside my crotch to keep them warm, my XM resting underneath my right armpit.

  It suites me fine. I’ve hardly slept anyway. Lying awake at night and being the only one up you hear things that no one else does. You see things in the dark that confuse the realms between real and dreaming. You learn little truths about people you couldn’t any other way.

  Early in the morning on our second night, I flop and fidget to try and get comfortable so I can fall asleep again. Isaac walks into our circle of sleeping bags back from guard duty. He goes to Blake’s bag to wake him for his shift. “Sergeant,” whispers Isaac. “Sir, it’s time to rotate.” Then I hear Isaac yelp. I peer over the front folds of my bag to look. Isaac is kneeling over Blake’s face, his hands holding tightly around an arm. “Sir, it’s Isaac, let go,” he says in a growl.

  “Don’t let her see me,” says Blake.

  “What, you’re sleep talking—I promise I won’t,” says Isaac.

  “I don’t want to fight anymore,” mutters Blake. Isaac tries to remove his arm. “Did you hear me?” says Blake, his arm stiffening in resistance and his hand still clenching Isaac’s vest.

  “Sir?”

  “I don’t want to fight, you take over.”

  “Are you awake—“

  “Why wouldn’t she take her? It’s not mine, but I have it. Will you keep her away?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Blake’s hand reclines and it pats the air before Isaac. “Sir?” Isaac waits for a few minutes by his side, then shakes his shoulder. “Sergeant, your shift.”

  Blake snorts then leans up to his waist. A light emits from his control panel illuminating them both. Isaac’s face is pale and drenched in sweat. “You just finish jogging? Never mind, thanks Private. You get some rest now.”

  Isaac rises alongside Blake. “Sir.”

  Blake grabs his XM then turns around facing Isaac. “Yes?”

  They stare at each other for a few moments. “Good night.”

  Blake grunts, “Same.”

  Isaac enters his bag and pats his sleeve over his face. Blake walks away towards the parameter to guard.

  Thomas wraps a scarf around his face to fall asleep, the same one I always see him bite on before combat. One night it slides off his face from the wind. I crawl out to retrieve it. It’s hard to make out in the dark, so I shine a light on it underneath my sleeping bag. It’s a brown scarf with a white border. Two tawny horses rear on each side, and in the center it says Boy Scouts of America Georgia Ridding Summer Camp. On the right end, stained with his saliva where he sucks on it, is a faded badge: Horsemanship achievement. I crawl back out and place the scarf neatly on his chest. His large hands come up to feel it, where they mold the scarf into a neat ball and then they disappear under his blanket.

  Vance is always jotting down stuff in his red notebook. I open his sack to grab it on the third night. I return to my field house and turn on the lights. I flip through the pages, most of it hard to read—he has worse penmanship than me. I get to an entry that says Jericho, and read.

  Peter took the death of Julian hard. Crying and puking everywhere. At first I couldn’t understand why. Thought he was weak. Did he not get his dose? Then the buzz ended and I cried into my pillow like a bitch. Why don’t they trust us? Keep our emotions hidden. That little girl, it could have been Lana. Lana how are you? Lana, what’s it like over there? Why didn’t she get rid of it when we could have? It was only the second month. Why didn’t she? Why did she try and fuck things up more. Why won’t she let me see you? Lana, Lana, do you even know you have a dad? Do you know he wishes you weren’t born, and that he hates himself? Do you know he won’t fuck another girl ever again. That I love and hate you. Lana, I can’t ever have a kid now. Lana I love you.

  I fold his notebook up and place it back into his sack. I feel wrong, but for some reason now, I know I can trust these guys with my life.

  “Everyone up!” says Blake.

  I was already up. Not willingly. I haven’t slept well since Tionem—my mind won’t leave me alone. Our unit crawls out of their sleeping bags, and gathers around a makeshift outdoor kitchen of a few gas stoves and crates of supplies for breakfast.

  “Eat and pack,” says Blake. “We’re moving out today, back to Jericho.”

  I extend my hand grabbing the pot of oatmeal being passed around and add some to my plastic bowl. It’s the fifth day of guard duty out on the outskirts of Jericho, but now we’re pulling back as the Army pushes up the front line, removing the need for a reserve in our area. Will we be deployed again? Shit, on the front?

  “Wonder what we’re doing back in the city,” says Vick to no one in particular.

  “Will be more stuff to do there than here, that’s for sure,” says Vance.

  “If we aren’t just shipped back out,” says Tommy.

  The unit is quiet. So I wasn’t the only one worried.

  “Well,” says Isaac, “I’m gonna go find some coffee at HQ for the last time.”

  “That guy from Bravo can sure make a cup,” says Alex. We mutter in agreement, and most leave to follow Isaac.

  I crumble up my sleeping bag into an ad hoc pillow, and rest my head against it as it becomes quiet once more. Yet I can’t sleep, but I am still exhausted. I used to hate sleeping, it’s a waste of time in our tiny finite lives. But here, it’s an escape. But even here, I am even denied that little solace. What the hell is keeping me up then? Anxiety? Sure, I have some, but my weariness far outweighs it. What else can it be?

  I feel like I am residing inside a corpse for my body has shut down, surrendered, from the lack of rest. Stuck to sink here inside the mud till I become it. But my mind has taken this collapse, this surrender, instead as an opportunity to suck the last remnants of my tangible energy to further supply its abstract angst, giving this corpse a zombiefied conciseness: I. How does one’s physical energy become converted into metaphysical processes? Where is the switch, the transmitter, that permits the real recourses of my body: calories, bone, muscle, flesh, to be consumed by the transcendental? Where can I point and say, there, that’s the source, so that I can turn it off. So that my mind can stop keeping me awake and sucking dry what’s left of me. So that I can be left alone and just sleep.

  “You gonna eat that?”

  “Huh?”

  “Your food,” I look over, it’s Tommy. “I got clean up today. Like to finish fast so I can get some coffee too.”

  “Oh, yeah, take it.”

  My eyes close again, but my mind stubbornly stays on full alert. Just let me get some sleep goddamn it.

  “What a babe,” says Vance.

  I guess he stayed back too. He’s holding a picture. “What’s that?”

  “Her, she’s cute.”

  “Gimmie that.” I snatch the photo. “How did you get this?”

  “Woah, calm down. Found it by your bag just now.” He takes his little red notebook, going through the pages smiling. “I got some pictures of a few girls back home too.” I fold and pocket the photo. He persists, “She’s not even indecent or anything, it’s a good picture of her is all. You never told me.”

  “Told us what?” says Isaac. He and Alex return with Styrofoam cups of steaming coffee. They sit down against th
e sandbag wall with us, and Isaac hands me a cup.

  I take a long sip, the coffee burns my throat but I don’t care for I can already feel it fight off my weariness. “Nothing,” I say.

  “His hot babe back at home,” says Vance.

  “Serena?” says Isaac.

  “Ah, that’s her name?” says Vance.

  “Yeah, sure.”

  “How long you dated?”

  Isaac starts. “Well they—”

  “A year now,” I blurt.

  Isaac glances at me. Vance, oblivious, goes back to his red notebook writing, “Well that’s great for you. Hope you get to see her again.”

  “Thanks.”

  I give up on sleep and get up. “Gonna go piss before we’re ordered out.”

  I leave, and after walking a little, hear additional footsteps. I turn around to Isaac tailing me. “What’s up?” he says.

  “Nothing, gonna piss.”

  “You’re not dating Serena anymore.”

  “I know. Don’t bring it up, rather leave it as is.”

  “There’s nothing wrong with still having a picture of her, you know,” he spanks my side, “with lack of other materials out here.”

  “Shut up. It’s not—never mind.”

  “It’s not?” I turn to look at him, he grins. Fuck, he figured it out. “It’s not Serena? Who is it, charmer?”

  “Doesn’t matter, man.”

  “And what did Vance say? She was all dressed up. Now I am really perplexed here. Can’t be your mom, unless, Vance is into that.”

  “My god.”

  We reach the outhouse in the center of our camp, a plastic porta-potty. I grab the door handle but Isaac holds it from completely opening. “Let me see it.”

  “No…why?”

  “C’mon. We never hid anything from each other. Is it a recent girl you were eyeing before the war?”

  “Yeah, I guess.”

  “C’mon then.”

  I sigh, there’s no point with Isaac. I retrieve the photo and hold it out for him to look and he grabs it. “Hey!”