Lurranus 2 (Part 2/4)

(Continued from Part 1)

 

"To what? Piles of rubbish... and bomb craters... and empty cities?" Chris said. Liam looked up at him. "You know what scares me more than Oaktrus?"

"What?" Liam asked his friend.

"It's what happens when we're finished with them. For decades, we've been fighting these guys. It's pretty much all I know. What do we even do when it's over? Go back to an empty house, in an empty city, in an empty country. A place we... we barely ever knew?"

He paused, before continuing.

"Look, I'm not gonna lie to you, this war sucks. It's screwing us all over, and I'm as pissed at the world as anyone else. But I'm scared about what happens when this war is over, and when we look at the lifeless, desolate wasteland that surrounds us, and realise that this is our home. That this is where we're gonna have to live here, for the rest of our purposeless life's. We've got no resources, they ran out a long time ago. There's next to no people, no electricity and no end of fucking bomb craters and unexploded mines everywhere, which really doesn't help anyone. My question is, what happens when we go home to this? That's what I want to know."

His tone was angry, confused. Slightly scared, even. Chris and Liam were always open with each other, always told each other the truth. They had agreed to always do that. But Liam had never seen his side of him before. But now, with the defeat of Oaktrus finally in sight, he guessed that was why he had raised the issue. Liam knew that Oaktrus wasn't finished yet, and that as long as they had a single gun left they would keep on fighting. But after recent battles, fought two or so months ago, Oaktrus were on the retreat, falling back to their main base of operations somewhere in Spain. Their resources were being steadily depleted, and the U7U's Squad 213's current objective was to seize all the weapons at an Oaktrus storage facility, which they had found out about due to intercepted transmissions. Liam and Chris's unit was to launch a covert attack on the facility. Their briefing had stated the area had only a dozen guards, and was not well defended. Their aim was to kill all the personnel guarding the facility, take all the weapons they could and find any information they could. Specially that regarding the location of Oaktrus's main base. Them them would set up their explosives in the building, arm them, and then get out of there.

And when they did eventually find the main Oaktrus's base, the aim was, best he could tell, to "bomb the shit out of it", to quote his commander. If they had enough explosives left, anyway.

And then, once they'd done that, the war would end.

And suddenly he found himself asking Chris's question:

What next?

For a while, Liam was quiet as he thought in silence.

"We'll rebuild, I guess." Liam finally said. Chris thought this reply over, his face creasing as he did so.

"Well, lets just take it one step at a time for now," he eventually said, in a more relaxed, gentle tone.

"Amen to that." Liam said, thinking over his friends point.

Chris patted Liam gently on the shoulder, and he watched as Chris walked over to the other remaining members of the squad, to offer them support and comfort.

All in all there were five on them. Him, Chris, David South, Ross "Root" Teller and some guy who was known only as "Vee". A month ago there had been seventy of them. A month of intense, bloody combat later, that number had been whittled down to a mere five. Back in October, Liam and his brother James had signed up, after passing a hurried, basic training course. After that, there were given a near empty rifle, a pistol, a ration pack for one day that would have to last them the week, and a suicide pill, should it come to the worst, as well as their officer number. He had originally been officer 57 but this title was little used. After all, there were so few of them left.

The aircraft jolted again. Liam's mind strayed back to a week ago. When there had been thirty of them. Before twenty-five of them were all killed. Two had been shot just as they came out of the craft. Their blood still covered the floor towards the exit ramp. The rest were cut apart by bullets, ripped into pieces by grenades and were stabbed by aged weapons, in the darkness and the ash of explosives, by either their enemies or by their fellow soldier who could not see if it was a friend or foe in front of them.

He had made few friends beyond Chris. Only one or two others. One of them had been called Sabre. Or so he said, but he probably wasn't. It was probably a nickname he had once been given, presumably associated to some skill with swords or something, but the U7U didn't cared what their soldiers were called. So long as they could handle a gun well enough not to kill one of their own, they didn't give a damn about anything else. They didn't care if their recruits had a stupid name. They'd probably be dead in a couple of weeks anyway. He said his name was Sabre and that was fine. They didn't ask what his real name was. They wrote down "Sabre", followed by "Approved" a line down. And he was in.

And Liam killed him. In their first battle. The two had been separated by a wall of smoke. They could see each other's outlines through the mist, but didn't know who it was on the other side. Friend or foe. It could've been either. They didn't have the luxury of waiting to find out. All they knew was, if they didn't put a hole through the figure on the other side, the figure would put a hole in them. And Liam was the first to fire.

And he never even knew who killed him. That he himself had murdered his friend. He didn't even know he was dead until he heard the casualty list.

That had been the end of Sabre.

And then there was his brother James. He had stayed in one of the hover-jets, during the most recent battle. Metres from the conflict, from the flying bullets, the grenades, the chaos. Sitting still, frozen with fear, as men and women were blown to bits just metres from him.

And somehow, a single man had managed to get past Liam, Chris and everyone else. He had ran into the jet, his whole body wired with explosives. A trigger in his right hand, the button pressed down. One of the crazies. With a mad grin on his face, from some drug that made you crazy. Made you ignore common sense. Made you completely insane.

He laughed as he ran up the ramp. Liam heard the crazy behind him and turned around. His brother saw him, raised his weapon and hesitated on seeing the explosives. James didn't want to shoot, to risk the crazy letting go of the trigger, risk killing himself. He sat alone, scared, while the madman ran closer. Stood above him, his standing figure towering above James sitting one. Liam knew he should act, but found himself only able to watch. The madman looked down at James, laughing, and smiled at him.

His last memory of his brother was him sitting, tears flowing down his face, cowering under the gaze of the crazy.

Then the crazy let go of the trigger.

The hover-jet erupted in harsh orange flames, ripping the jet into tiny pieces and coughing out the debris of the vehicle. The two of them were dead in any instant. Swallowed by the flames, ripped apart by the raging fire.

And so James died, alone, while his brother sat only metres away and did nothing to help him.

A buzzer somewhere above him let out a series of on-off whines. They were coming in to land.

"One hundred metres!" Chris called out

They stood all stood up, as the aircraft roughly set down.

"Alright boys," Chris said. "Lets kill these bastards."

"Beers on me when we get home!" A voice shouted behind Liam. A deep voice, so probably Vee. Nervous laughter filled the room. Everyone set there weapon's safety off, and raised them above their chest.

Chris looked Liam in the eye. Patting his shoulder, he told him, with as much reassurance as he could muster, "We're gonna make it."

And then the entry ramp opened.

And the bullets rushed in to meet them.

 

SYSTEM RECORD FOR 18/11/2182 / OPERATION TERASTION STAGE 6 MISSION REPORT:-

 

Vee was the first to fall. 

An innocent, nice gentle guy. An artist and a war poet. At night, he would always have his signature black book out. Either drawing something or writing something, maybe a bit of both. The book was well worn and he had evidently had it for a long time, maybe even since he was a boy, and was unwilling to let it out of his sight. He seemed to care for it with his life. He took it everyone he went. Including on missions. It sat in his left shoulder pocket. It was with him through countless battles, through parties, victories, losses, and everything in between. And it was with him at the end.

He didn't ever get to let off a shot. An aged sniper bullet made its new home in his left shoulder. It shot thought his notebook, ripping through countless pages, countless memories. Tearing through his life story. And then through Vee himself.

He gasped out in pain and fell over, the force of the shot forcing him back. A second bullet struck him in the chest as he fell. It punched straight through his heart. He was dead before he hit the floor.

The door hadn't even finished opening.

 

[12:44:33] OFFICER 48 SIGNAL LOST

 

Then it was Root. He was born Ross, but people had been calling him Root since a long time ago, and his real name was never used. In another life, he would have been a loving father, a loving husband, a great friend. He was one of the nicest people Liam knew. He was, arguably, one of his few friends. He had helped him with fire practice while the instructors were too busy with the other seventy recruits, and had been kind enough to give Liam a small piece of one of his chocolates. A rare delicacy, chocolate. Liam had politely refused, but Root had insisted, and Liam had had a tiny piece. It was the best food he'd had in a long time. Far better than the mush that passed as "Ration Packs" and the flavourless Cubes that the U7U gave them to eat.

Root had said he'd wanted to be a gardener. Liam guessed that was were his name came from. He said that, when the War finished, he wanted to plant a tree, and watch it grow as he got old, and that he wanted to raise a family, and get the chance to be a father. Root would've been a great father. Caring, thoughtful, fun, and with a love for life.

Root deserved better than he got. He deserved to plant his tree, and spend his days raising a family, loving them, caring for them. He was a great person and he deserved a great life.

But he never got that.

Instead, he got a bullet straight through his left eye. It punctured his eye, ripped through his skull and tore out bits of his brain, splattering all the pieces on the floor in a horrid concoction. His destroyed brain shut down, he slumped onto the floor, and he was dead. In an instant.

He deserved much better.

So much better than what he got.

 

[12:45:56] OFFICER 41 SIGNAL LOST

 

Then it was David. David Christopher South. A man with a rugged face and out of control facial hair, but with a boyish smile and a sense for adventure.

David was, to be honest, an adrenaline junkie. They was no other way to put it. He loved nothing more than to have the fate of his life in the balance, to being holding onto the edge of the building with a single hand, and braving the winds that tried to bring him down. He loved free climbing, parachuting, bungee jumping. Liam often saw him sneak away from base at nights, to go scaling huge high rises, downed aircraft carriers, old monuments. Trying to enjoy brief, fleeting moments of pure joy. Trying to feel alive in a world were everyone was either dead or dying inside.

He didn't like combat. Didn't like war, or violence. He lost his father in a riot. He didn't see the point. It only ever made things worse. He didn't want to fight, to join the U7U, but his so-called friends had pressured him into it. Called him a traitor, a coward. He gave in eventually, for one reason. A small one year old child named Finlay South. His son, from some women whose fate he didn't know. A boy he could barely care for. He had little money, no parenting experience or tolerance for inpatient children. He was always the kind of person he scoffed at people going Awww... to babies. Didn't like them then. And he didn't like them anymore now.

But he couldn't just abandon the boy.

So he left him with the U7U child care unit, at a discounted price in exchange for his continued service. As long as he served for them in the war, they would take care of his son. And so he left him and went of to fight. In a room full of other screaming children, doomed to live his life without his father to guide him through it.

This was twelve years ago. Finlay was now thirteen. He had been cast out onto the street, along with many other older kids, who were to expensive to keep caring for. He fell in with the wrong crowd, with a street gang. Became a bully, a thug. One day, him and another boy had found a bag full of powder. White powder. Drugs. They emptied the whole bag in a single night, snorting it, each hit making them feel more alive, until they were bursting with energy. Started doing crazy things.

The others found them, the next morning, lying a bloody mess of mangled flesh at the bottom of an old office building. Guessed they had got high, starting doing daredevil stunts. Guessed it had all gone wrong.

Maybe if his dad had been around, it would've gone differently.

But his dad wasn't there, and so his fate was to become a pile of twisted, bloody flesh at the bottom of a building.

His dad, who had somehow survived twelve years of conflict, serving in fourteen different units, and had worked his way up to the rank of Commander, never knew what had happened to Finlay. He didn't know he died. He couldn't even remember what he looked like. He liked to think that he'd grown up to be a son any father would be proud of. Smart, intelligent, confident. He had no idea he'd turned into a bully, an addict.

In his final moments, David's thoughts turned to his son. A boy he barely knew. A boy that he was supposed to grew up with, to watch grow from a naive, inquisitive child to a confident, intelligent young man.

But he never got to see his boy up. Or see him seen him again after he left him, twelve years ago, in a cold, rank building with flickering lights and far too many screaming babies and whining children, and far too few workers to take good care of them all. Maybe, if he had been around his son, then Finlay would've become a better person. Under his guidance.

But instead he hadn't. And he had abandoned him instead, and gone of to fight. And now he would never see him again. That was the last thing he thought before the end.

l should've known my son. Cared for him. Loved him.

And then he was ripped to shreds by bullets.

 

[12:59:12] OFFICER 43 SIGNAL LOST

 

Liam didn't know David well, or Vee. But they both seemed like good guys. And he watched, in horror, as in mere seconds they, along with Root, were destroyed by gunfire. They all dropped down dead.

Less than five seconds and over half the team was dead.

That was war. It was a cruel creature. It would make it so that these people would survive years of combat, against all odds, long enough to feel the lull of a better life, and then would die. Pointlessly. They would be shot, and they would die. And that was it. No last words. They would die, thinking of the things they wish they'd done, of their regrets in life. All else thoughts racing through their head. And then they dropped down, dead. And that was it. No poetical endings, no heroic deaths. No final, heroic deaths, holding of the enemy until their last breath while the rest of their team performed the most important mission of all. Nothing cliched like that. That was the  Hollywood of a bygone age.

Instead their deaths were ugly. They weren't glossy, clean. They didn't gently fall down. They slumped down like a lifeless sack of dead bones. Which was all they were now.

And in a second, they, and everything they ever were, disappeared. Gone.

The end of their all their hopes and dreams. Root would never plant his tree. Vee would never write in his book again. David would never see his son again.

This was supposed to be a covert mission. In and out. No one was meant to know they were there. Sure, they expected some resistance on the way out, when the alarms went off, but the journey in was meant to be clean and quiet.

But judging by the blood that was sprayed around them, and the dead bodies, that wasn't the case. Oaktrus must have intercepted transmissions about the details of the plan, or had someone on the inside, a double agent, working for them. Both of the options had happened many times before, and would probably happen several more times before the war was over.

 

 

(Continued in Part 3)