by C. P. Boyko
“Fuck all you fucking guys!” cried Solzi.
“Conserve your ammunition,” said Laskantan, in a chiding singsong. —“Where’s the lieutenant?” asked Osini. —“Over and out,” said Gijalfur, gesturing towards a child-sized mass of torn flesh in an adult’s torn tunic, lying like trash against the wall of the blockhouse. —“Shit,” said Kellek. “Where’s Montazo?” —“Hurt pretty bad,” said Yumi. The blockhouse they’d been inside had taken a direct hit. The concussion had knocked them both to the ground, dazing Yumi, but rupturing something inside Sergeant Montazo. Currently she lay unconscious or dead, bleeding from the ears and mouth. “Radio’s busted too,” said Yumi; this was her way of asking for orders. —“Congratulations, Sarge,” said Laskantan. “I guess that leaves you in command.” —“First of all,” said Gijalfur, “Costitch was sergeant before I ever was, and second of all, never the fuck mind who is in command right now, just keep your eyes up and tongue the fuck in, this attack is about to get imminent any fucking second now, and third of all, stuff your fucking tuft, Solzi! You’re not the only one hurt!”
“Fuck you, Sarge! I’m in fucking excruciation here! I’m fucking dying!”
In fact, Solzi felt pain more hurtingly than most people. She couldn’t know this, but she suspected it, and felt bitterly sorry for herself. The conviction that her present suffering was worse than anything her comrades would ever know filled her with contempt and absolved her of all modesty. Screaming with hatred made the pain a little more tolerable, too.
H section, on the opposite side of the outpost, paused in their withdrawal, and even The Colonel, leading I section back to the fight, hesitated in her step at the sound of Solzi’s caterwauls. Farther away, Parade-Ground hugged her knees, vibrating in sympathetic agony.
“Dammit, Solzi,” shouted Costitch, “shut your face! That’s an order!” —When this had no effect, Gijalfur threatened her with a court-martial—also to no effect.
—Others began to threaten, cajole, or advise Solzi. “Can’t you give yourself a shot of morphine?” —“I can’t find my hands, let alone my first-aid kit!” —“Goddammit,” said Gijalfur, “would someone help give her a shot of morphine.” —“Can’t reach her, Sarge,” said Osini. “She’s on the other side of the parapet.” —“Solzi! What the fuck are you doing outside the OP?” —Solzi didn’t know or care, and again told them to hurry up.
Klipton made a decision. She felt only disgust for Solzi’s suffering; she dared not soften so far as to pity in others what she must not allow in herself. But she believed superstitiously that she had only survived till now by helping her comrades, especially when at her own risk. She asked Sergeant Gijalfur for permission to leave her post long enough to find Solzi and give her a shot of morphine.
—Gijalfur grumbled. “Goddammit. Ask Costitch. She’s in command.” —Costitch’s own superstition was that she must kill as many enemy as possible to stay alive, and she was afraid that accepting command of the platoon would hamper her in this pursuit. Her flamethrower, too, was almost empty, and she thought that she could do more damage outside the walls, in close combat. “Come on,” she said to Klipton. “I’ll help.” —“I’ll come too, Sarge,” said Sunachs, brandishing the flare gun sarcastically. —“Sure. With one more, we can bring her back inside.” —Aiersbax raised her hand. —“Don’t be stupid,” hissed Elzby. —Laskantan whistled, grimaced, and wagged her head. “Shit mountain without a Sherpa,” she said. “I guess I don’t want to be left out of all the fun.” Her own belief was that the safest place to be was the one that seemed most dangerous, and the most dangerous place the one that seemed safest.
They climbed over the wall and dropped out of sight. Moments later, rifle fire began to be heard on all sides. —“Spread out and fill those gaps!” cried Gijalfur. “Here they come!” The de facto platoon commander fired a few shots, then retreated from the firing slit, the better to direct and exhort her troops. She shouted and stamped and waved her arms in rage. “This is it! No more conserving ammunition! Kill the filthy bitches!”
Meck reloaded her rifle, whimpering. At least she would die honorably.
Twenty minutes later, what remained of First/Fourth Platoon succeeded in taking possession of Strongpoint E15, known informally at MAC command as The Nipple. Corporal Cobweb, breathless, exhilarated, and bleeding, contacted Staff Sergeant Ciborsck by radio to tell him of their feat.
He cut her off. “Pull yourself together, Corporal, then call me back.” —Cobweb was stunned. She thought she had been relating the facts calmly, in a succinct and orderly way. She closed her eyes, and for the first time in two hours turned her attention inwards; glimpsing there a clamorous chaos of anxiety, pain, and remorse, she quickly opened her eyes.
“Here,” said Jaywalk, offering her a canteen. “But take it easy. Looks like they’re out of water, too.” —Longpork confirmed this. “They were using piss to cool the machine gun. You can smell it.” Her face was stiff and unfamiliar, her voice flat; she had shot in the face at close range one of the women operating the gun. —Cobweb poured some water in her mouth and held it there without swallowing; nevertheless, it was somehow gone in a minute, leaving her feeling drier and thirstier.
Upsize came in to say that a third survivor had been found among the carnage in the other blockhouse, where the defenders had made their last, useless stand. —“Okay,” said Cobweb. “Thanks.” —“What do you want us to do with her?” —“Does she speak any suprapodean?” —“I don’t know. Since coming to,” Upsize snickered, “she just cries over her dead buddy. I thought these bitches were all supposed to be so tough.” —“And smart,” said Longpork.
—Cobweb shrugged. —“So what should we do with her?” The battle was over now; even five minutes earlier, Upsize would not have asked this question. —“She hurt?” —“Pretty bad, I guess.” —“If she lives, she lives,” said Cobweb. “We’ll need all our first-aid gear for ourselves.” Then she ordered everyone out, so that she could be frank with Ciborsck.
“. . . And fifteen unaccounted for, presumed wounded or dead. We don’t have enough uninjured troops to send out rescue parties.” —Ciborsck sounded pleased. “You’ve done excellent work, Corporal. This is going to change the face of the war in E grid. Just hold on till noon for those reinforcements. In the meantime, use your stretcher-bearers to round up your casualties. That’s what they’re there for!”
The Professor lay balanced upon a rock, looking up unseeing at the stars, and concentrating on her breath. If she shifted her position or inhaled too quickly, she choked on salty blood. The pain was tremendous, but it imposed focus. She felt no resentment or fear, but rather a bemused and contingent joy. She inspected this feeling gingerly, with the occasional spare drop of attention, and realized that she was happy because she was alone. She had not experienced solitude for many months, and had forgotten how precious it had been to her. —When the stretcher-bearers arrived, she scowled and hid her pale face behind her arm. “Leave her,” said one of them. “She doesn’t want to be looked at now.”
Private Privates tossed and twisted her body incredulously. She could not find the wound, and she did not seem to be bleeding, but the pain in her chest, at the very pinpoint core of her, could not be alleviated. How could you let this happen? she asked God. How could you let it hurt this much? I did everything you told me to! —But God was silent. His silence was contemptuous, and she withered beneath it.
Shitjob lay sprawled in a ditch, cursing and shivering. She was not hurt, but did not know where any of her comrades were. She dared not call out or raise her head.
“Does it hurt?” asked Triple-Time, binding the gory, shattered shin. She was disgusted by the anxiety in her voice. —“Nah,” said T.P. In fact, it hurt like hell, but she realized that crying or complaining would make no difference; the pain would come whether she took it or not.
Jimjam was pleased almost to pride by her wound. It had stopped bleeding
, but was painful enough to prevent her from walking. Perhaps she would be sent home! She snuggled into herself, and waited luxuriously for the stretcher-bearers and the medics to do their jobs.
In a shell crater at the base of the outpost, Laskantan murmured soothingly to Solzi. Solzi, with two shots of morphine in her, had mellowed from screaming rage to hissing disdain. “Fuck you, Laskantan. I’d like to see how you’d fucking bear it if you were in my place. I’m fucking dying.” —“Maybe so, but you’ll die a whole lot faster if they hear you out here.” —“Fuck them.” She lifted her head an inch in defiance. “Let them come and put me out of my fucking misery, the fucking bitches!”
Laskantan breathed deeply to deflate a rising bubble of hilarity. “What if I gave you something to chew on, would that help?” —“I’ll chew your fucking eyeballs, you fuck.” —Laskantan laughed out loud a little.
“Laskantan,” said Solzi, her eyes focusing with seriousness. “Give me a grenade.” —“Can’t. I’m all out.” —“Then give me your trench knife.” —“What’s wrong with yours?” —“All right, give me my fucking trench knife. Put it in my hand.” —Laskantan did. “All right, hero, now what?”
—Solzi held the flat of the blade briefly to her neck, then let out a feeble sob. “Fuck you, you fuck. I’ll fucking stab your fucking guts out and see how you fucking like it.”
Laskantan patted Solzi’s cheek. “I guess I wouldn’t like it any more than you do, sweetheart. Now, do you think you can zip it for ten minutes while I go find someone to help me carry you out of here?” —“I’m dying!” cried Solzi. “I don’t fucking want to live anymore!”
A burst of automatic rifle fire from the parapet churned up the dirt around them.
Grinning, Laskantan pressed her face into the icy earth.
Parade-Ground found that she could walk only if she let walking happen by itself. Her body, formerly solid and uniform, had crumbled into a congeries of ill-fitting parts, a disorderly stack of overlapping maps. There were maps of touch and friction, of heat and cold, of the position of her limbs, of the loosening and tightening of her muscles, and of the aches in her bones and the burbling turmoil in her guts. To collate all this data and deploy all these systems for movement would have required a staff of intent geniuses; but there was only her, and her mind was as thronged with fragmented ideas as her body was with sensations.
The river of her thoughts flowed wide and wordless, except for occasional phrases that broke like spray from the wave, became crystallized, and finally melted into meaninglessness beneath the spotlight of her fascinated attention.
Sometimes she sank to the cold ground and marveled at the symphony of light and noise crashing across the valley and sky. Even lying flat on the earth, she felt precarious and unstill, as if she might at any moment roll out of the trough of her body.
Soon, without having decided to, she was on her feet and walking again, clanking and stumbling over herself like a battalion retreating in disarray. She did not know if she was moving backward or forward. She only knew that she must not stop; there was something she was trying to catch up to, or stay ahead of. She looked behind her, became disoriented, and struck out again—and again—till she did not know if she was chasing or fleeing. “Desultory vexation,” she muttered—the term for untargeted shelling of an area presumed to be occupied by the enemy. She could taste her teeth. When she swallowed, there was an echo. Colors leaked out of the backs of her eyes. Emotions poured through her, stirred by some music too rapid or refined for hearing. “Dildo vagina.” She’d better hurry. Ten minutes. H section. Desultory vagina. Scrunch your tits. Uproot those feet, soldier. No lily-dipping. Her name was Lily. “Lily.” They’d named her Parade-Ground because she brushed her teeth. Not anymore. Toothbrushes were for cleaning rifles. Teethbresh. They told me not to binge drink. I bange drank. I’m bunge drunk! She giggled, smitten with vice. What would her mother say? But the thought of her mother was one of the things she was trying to stay ahead of. Onward.
“Lily. Li-lee.” What a foolish name! Her parents might as well have called her Flip Flop or Gewgaw, or Pell-Mell or Nitwit, or Pish-posh or Hubbub or Ragbag or Flimflam or Claptrap or Knick Knack or Mishmash or Hodgepodge! Or Jimjam. Why had they called Jimjam Jimjam? Because she was anxious? What was her real name? She was reminded, for some felt but inexplicit reason, of her childhood friend Dulie, with whom she had built the Mantrap—a kind of caltrop made by nails driven through a board and camouflaged with mud. Their parents had been livid, their victim amused. She could see his wry face.
A score of forgotten faces and playgrounds of her childhood flashed within her. She felt a bittersweet nostalgia; and the conviction that she had forgotten or failed to do something was intensified.
Her bowels were as squeaky as wet plastic. Was she hungry? Digestion seemed obscene, as exploitative as the invaders’ colonialism.
She became mesmerized by a frozen moonlit puddle, rough and smooth in arabesque variegation.
When she fixed her gaze, her peripheral vision congealed into a tactile ring of marching, sliding patterns that faded to an all-encompassing obscurity; she became a watchfire in a little clearing around which danced serried hordes, citizens of a vast civilization of emotion and sensation. She laughed out loud to discover that this whole world could be laid to waste and a new one built with a flick of her eyes.
She unearthed the wisdom in every hackneyed proverb, discovered the calcified poetry in every idiom and cliché. You can’t have both the bottle of wine and the wife drunk. Children grow looking at their parents’ backs. Old crabs tell young crabs to walk straight. It takes less time to drench the boot than to dry it. The sinner makes the better saint. You could use her shit for toothpaste. Teethpawst.
Every returned thought gave her a delight of synthesis. Everything suggested everything else, and her associations and intuitions seemed the more profound for remaining vague.
She saw the interdependence of all opposites, how every ostensibly separable thing formed the ground of some other thing’s figure.
Humility was a form of vanity. Charity was selfish.
Dissonance accentuated harmony—was in fact harmony, in the same way that sound was only structured silence.
Her shoulders supported the sky. The moon was within arm’s reach; closer.
Twelve months, but thirteen moons in a year?
Empty space did not exist. The universe was gelid ether, all its gravities balanced.
Sparks spat fresh sparks before falling to cinders.
No drop could fall out of the ocean.
The large wave swallowed the little wave and was forever changed.
The prerequisite for this little fingernail? All that ever was!
She cringed reflexively at the demented screech of howitzer shells, a sound which could not have been made more terrible by design, and which filled her more with awe than fright. The war too was a contingent miracle, every bomb a triumph of technology. Near this thought, however, there lay in wait something unpleasant, and she shied from it.
She shivered extensively, every fiber within her stamping its feet and rubbing its hands for warmth. Her body too was a triumph, even when poisoned. Indeed, every thought, however trivial—even this one!—represented the culmination of millennia of evolution.
She felt in touch with every jagged, tattered part of herself. Every cell and nerve was hollering for attention. She could feel her feet in her boots, and the weight of her rifle—no longer a part of her—in her hands. Tides swished and soughed in her empty ears. This was her true self. Reality was fevered, good health a smooth, dissembling coat of varnish. But habituation provided leverage. Otherwise one would flounder about, steeped in stimuli all day long. Nothing would get done. And something needed to be done. She tripped over a soldier’s corpse—
And was flooded at once with all the discomfort and guilty thoughts that she had been skirting
: She had a duty to her mother to stay alive; but she also had a duty to the memory of her father, a good soldier, to be a good soldier, and a duty to her brother, a good officer, not to embarrass him. She had a duty to Lance Corporal Jaywalk and to her section; she had a duty to Corp Cobweb and the rest of the platoon—but she had abandoned them, and ignored her orders. She had a duty to Fourth Company; she had a duty to her battalion, her brigade, her division, and to Generals Roseberry, Elrust, and Abgrusck—but had she done one heroic thing to help win the war? She was guilty of having killed, and guilty of not having killed enough. She owed allegiance to her homeland, but she owed allegiance to her home, too. She had responsibilities to her person, and she had irreconcilable responsibilities to the planet; she had duties to the cells and nerves of her, and she had duties to God. Above all, she had a duty to her fellow soldier—and she had shirked her duty. She remembered that on the night of the long march out of Burzgao she had stumbled over such a soldier as this, lying wounded, wan and resentful, on the lip of a shell crater. She had given the woman a sip of water and had promised to send a medic for her. But she had forgotten to send anyone.
How could she forgive herself? Why, when the time came, should anyone help her?
What had she made of her miraculous life? What good had she done with her inheritance, those millennia of evolution? How had she earned a mother’s love and worry? This corpse too, its face buried in frozen mud, had a mother, who was perhaps still anxiously writing it letters and baking it cakes. The acid nausea, the gob of phlegm in her throat, and the bloat in her bowels racked her like recriminations. Nearby shouts and rifle fire could add nothing to her shrinking horror, and she fled into an unbombed grove more to escape herself than to save herself.