Perkins drove through the olive-tinted desert, his unkempt hair and beard flapping crazily around him in the hot air stream. Making out a narrow mesa on the horizon, he steered the jeep toward the rocky outcropping. The scorched-leather of his face cracked into a wry smile as the mesa resolved into the ruined remnants of the upper storeys of some sand-swept structure. Perkins rasped a dry tongue over his blistered lip in silent anticipation of the pickings awaiting him within the building.

Swerving the jeep in a spray of the dark greenish sand-dust he drew to a stop alongside a row of half-buried, shattered windows. Ducking down, he scrambled into the building, dragging an empty sack behind him and quickly ascertained he was in what had once been a hotel room. Half-crawling, half-running over the sands, he made his way to the open doorway and into the corridor beyond.

Waiting for his eyes to adjust to the only occasionally broken gloom, Perkins made his way to the stairs and breathlessly climbed two flights before beginning to explore that floor’s corridor. Kicking in a door he shielded his eyes from the piercing intensity of the reflected desert sun outside. He tore open the cupboards and inert mini-bar in search of anything he could use, Perkins stashed bottles and snacks into his sack. He opened a plastic water bottle and poured the contents into his parched mouth. Then he ripped open a chocolate bar and bit off a mouthful, beginning to chew hungrily. But then he doubled over in agony and spat out the chocolate, coughing and retching and spitting out blood and black phlegm. Scowling, he threw the remnants of the chocolate bar aside and glanced down at his watch. It had stopped working. He ripped it off and tossed it alongside the half-chewed snack. Swilling his mouth out with water from the bottle he spat out the residue from his teeth.

Perkins slumped down on the bed and groaned. So, it had begun. They called it the walking ghost phase. You seem fit and healthy, but then, the symptoms return. Next would come the diarrhea and bleeding, then delirium, hallucinations, coma and...

He’d seen it so many times in others. Idly he leafed through the brochures and leaflets on the bedside table. He cocked an eyebrow at “Ocean View” peering out the window at the endless dunes. Gingerly, he sipped a little more water.

Perkins lay down on the bed and closed his eyes. Even though he did not seem to sleep, he dreamt. He dreamt of a time before the war. Not so long ago, just a couple of months. He dreamt of a visit to the dentist, and how the dentist had started to treat a minor problem with his teeth. He dreamt of the drill boring into one of his teeth, but that it had erupted with yellow pus. The dentist struggling to conceal his surprise treated the infection and proceeded with the treatment, only to find another infected area. His concern growing, the dentist applied more antiseptic before drilling into more of the disease riddled jaw and finally realising that the whole of the inside of his head was filled with infectious pus.

Perkins woke. Feeling groggy and disorientated he drank down the rest of the water and staggered out of the room, his sack of loot left lying on the floor. Descending just one flight of stairs this time, he broke into another room and opened the window. The hot, steady wind rushed in with a billow of the dark green sands. Leaning out the window, he saw the sands some two metres or so below. He clambered out the window and lowered himself most of the way before dropping down to the sand. He fell over and rolled a short way before coming to a stop. Scrambling to his feet he regained his bearings and trudged off to the jeep.

Grasping the rear of the vehicle, he pulled back a canvas cover to reveal his previous lootings. Tossing aside flasks, boxes, crates, and bags stuffed with clothes he eventually pulled out the loose pages he’d torn from a medical handbook he’d taken from the dying fingers of a hospital porter a few days before. Running his dusty index finger over the well-worn pages Perkins confirmed his prognosis. In less than twenty four hours he would lose consciousness for the last time. Before sunset tomorrow the human race would at last know peace.

The deluded cheers of a long-oppressed world broke in from all five televisions, filling my ears with a hateful buzzing. Drunk with peace and the many opportunities for unsurpassed enrichment and folly it provided, the people of Earth were making bigger fools of themselves than I’d ever before seen. Why couldn’t they see what was good for them? Stagnation and sedentary, sodden self-satisfaction would be their only reward for eternally abolishing the greatest stimulus the universe had ever produced: war.

Scowling, I pushed my wicker chair back from the old pinewood table I’d been gifted with twenty years back from my Master, on that blessed day he’d brought me to headquarters to serve as his chief strategic advisor. Ignoring the high winds that blew all around me at this height, I walked slowly to the edge of the roof and looked down at the city beneath me. Fireworks were exploding hundreds of feet below, delighting the idiots who comprised most of the population of New York City these days. Sighing, I turned away in disgust. Now they would never learn.

The sound of heavy boots beneath me jolted me from my sour thoughts. Hurrying over to a trapdoor that lay, bolted, next to my woolen cot, I slipped off the lock and threw back the door, revealing a set of glistening steel stairs, and backed away respectfully. A few moments later, a wide-brimmed green and red Conquistador hat appeared on my rooftop, followed by a grizzled, unshaven face and a severe black military outfit. Lowering my eyes humbly, I bared my head and bowed before Colonel George Bailey, my longtime officer and friend.

“Enough,” Colonel Bailey said, aiming an angry kick at my nearest titanium-alloy TV set. It was sturdy enough to withstand a Korean rocket explosion, but his heavily muscled leg still packed enough power to knock it backwards onto the steel roof. The loud crash momentarily disrupted the infuriating sound of the rejoicing in streets all over the planet, from this very city to Juneau, Alaska; from the main road of Baghdad to the docks of Beijing, to the “liberated” child barracks in Sydney Harbor. Then it was back, in all its supposed glory.

“Enough,” my leader repeated, turning to me, an angry scowl on his face. “Gestures of military discipline are useless from now on. As you must have heard by this point in the proceedings, those pathetic French scientists have managed to manufacture a mind-control serum that, when ingested, dispels all desire or tolerance for war from a man or woman’s mind. Despite my best efforts, all the major world leaders have now taken a long draught, and now, their brain enslaved to inhuman chemicals, they have taken a vow to continue the use of this blasted drug on all future world leaders, as far as time will stretch. Your system has failed.”

“Sir,” I said, making a bizarre twitch as I remembered just in time that a salute now would be meaningless, “it wasn’t my fault by any stretch of the imagination. The operatives managed to eliminate over ninety percent of the offending scientists. How was I to know that the drug had already been distributed?”

“So it was your intelligence-gatherers that failed, then!” shouted Colonel Bailey, taking my pillow and hurling it off the side of the building. He looked quite deranged; there was a line of drool halfway down his chin and his eyes were red, the kind of red that you only see from a man who has recently done a great deal of crying and neglected to bathe or wash since. “Why didn’t you give them the pay raise I suggested? Then at least they might have been willing to work harder!”

“Look, sir… it wasn’t my fault,” I said flatly, staring into the night sky blankly. He couldn’t rationally blame me, no matter how angry he became. “It would have happened sooner or later anyway. Ever since they found a cure for a cancer in the post-World War Six years, it was only a matter of time. The medical technology is just a titanic industry. If only that maniac Obama hadn’t scrapped half the military budget and threw most of it into genetics, we might have had a fighting chance… but Wal-Mart is just too powerful to kill. Even if we’d destroyed the drug in time, it’d have had all its lawyers on our backs for disrupting the market. We’d never have seen the end of it.”

Nothing but silence greeted my words, and I looked back at the Colonel in surprise. Or rather, I looked at where he had been. He wasn’t standing there anymore. Surprised, I looked around the roof, and scarcely two yards away I spotted him, lying on my simple wooden cot and weeping softly to himself, hopelessly, pitifully.

My face instantly resolved itself into a militarily stern expression, but inside my heart was breaking. I went over to the unfortunate man and put my hands on his shoulder tentatively, hoping for either some mutual comfort or an explosion of anger that would replace his fear with something I was much more accustomed to. This day of absolute, utter, remorselessly solid peace had disoriented me almost to my breaking point. As I sat there, the voices of “liberated” child soldiers in Australia rose up in a mind-bogglingly stupid hymn of thanksgiving, filling my ears with wretchedness. Tears welled up in my eyes as I stroked my officer’s shoulder. What had the world come to, that the entirety of this new generation would be deprived forever of the glories of war?

Slowly my friend’s soft, broken sobbing subsided, resolving into a steady snore. I spread the cushions from my old sofa out over him to keep him sheltered from the cold wind at these great heights, and then tugged a sheet off from the pile of bedclothes lying by his side and stretched my old body out on it. Much of New York City was starless, the light pollution of the past centuries wiping out any traces of the great constellations of the second millennium AD, Golden Age of Battle. However, the Bailey Armory was one of the tallest buildings in the city, at nearly two thousand feet high, its top story far away from any other rooftop, and tonight all its lights were dimmed in mourning of the millennia-long tradition of war, all snuffed out like one last shining candle within the space of a single terrible weekend.

Before I’d signed up for the United States Marines way back in 2147, I’d been an avid stargazer, and during the rare moments since when I’d been able to catch the time to watch the sky from my rooftop office, unimpeded by work responsibilities and strategic plans to clutter my brain, every moment had been precious. Now I had every moment in the world…. I sighed deeply, watching the Big Dipper hover above me, an infinitesimally small amount closer to the Colonel and me than any other human being in New York City, tonight.

As I lay there with my friend beside me, at the end of all life as I knew it, one single star out of all those that I could see shone the brightest: the greatest star in the constellation of Orion the Hunter, Rigel. And I remembered my favorite passage in my favorite novel of all time, The Return of the King, by J.R.R. Tolkien ― still an amazing masterpiece over two hundred years after its publication. (A great passage indeed, better even than the epic war in the first half of the novel, which my Literature teacher had taught me was a political allegory of the battle between America and its Middle Eastern enemies, before they were all eliminated in World War Four.)

Smitten by despair, Sam Gamgee lies in the wastes of Mordor, seemingly surrounded by despair and faced with an alien future like nothing he has ever experienced before. Just like me, he lies by his master, who is worn out by misery and his many burdens. And then he sees a single star sparkling high, cold above the world, reminding him that no matter what transpires upon the earth, things are still right in the heavens.

“They cannot conquer forever!” I cried to myself softly, quoting Sam, defying the dark power of the French that threatened humanity with the Shadow of Peace, whether humanity truly desired it or not. No matter what happened to us down on Earth, somewhere up in the sky there would still be eternal strife and turmoil, with awesome nuclear explosions tearing apart an enormous core of burning hydrogen and blazing fire.

It is done...

The smoke was starting to clear away, as though time itself slowed down it felt like we were standing there for an eternity. What is to happen now? Where do we go from here? I finally let my joints give way as I sat down on the warm earth. A hundred other soldiers were with me, exhausted from what my memory tells me was nothing more than a slaughter. The smoke finally cleared, I swore under my own breath as I saw what this was all worth. Something inside me was wishing the smoke stayed just a little longer.

I could not bear to continue to look at the view. I settled my head on my knees and I went into my own vigil, thanking which divine being is watching over us that everything was quiet. I looked back at the landscape, all my other brothers were staring at the same landscape. I had no reaction, something inside me was banging on the walls of my chest. I wanted more than ever to shout out to the world, to let whatever this thing is inside me scream at the top of its voice.

Whatever was holding me back suddenly disappeared and I broke down and wept. I didn’t care about where I was any more. I am a soldier, and am currently with a hundred others, but even that didn’t stop me from breaking down. Many of my brothers seemed to follow. Some, from the sound of it, started breaking down almost exactly at the right time. It just didn’t matter any more, everything I had rising inside me suddenly flooded out, and I was happy about it. I didn’t care about the tears, or anything else, I just need this to be released, vented out.

Cars have come from behind us, the wheels and brakes broke our vigil. Some of the men stopped from weeping, including me. Others didn’t care, they continued even when people got out. Something in my neck is stopping me from looking at the newcomers. One of my brothers said “journalists” out loud for us, it was good, I hated journalists. Hate... is this human?

Years I’ve been in this life, I never stated I hated my enemy, I’m pretty sure at some point I did hate them, but I was never sure. I was sure I hated some of my brothers for atrocities we’re never going to report, but the enemy... What is wrong with me? I can admit to having hated my brothers, and yet I can’t admit to having hated the enemy? The enemy that has been trying to kill me all these years, something isn’t right with me. I don’t even know if it’s the current moment, or it’s because I’m a soldier. Years doing all this, you come to terms with many things, death being the foremost of it.

I’ve seen people die from a hundred different things. I’ve seen a hundred people die by suicide, usually taking some of my brothers with them to whatever deity they wish. Death was never new to us; we were expendable, even if our country denied it that way. Whenever a hundred of our brothers died, a thousand would be sent to take their place. We were expendable assets, that’s all we were and that’s all we will ever be.

Why did I even come here? I wasn’t a conscript, I wasn’t like the millions of teenagers who were forced out of their home into a war they didn’t know how to fight. I remember wanting to serve my country, I remember wanting to fight for what my country lives for. And yet, the first time I went out there that all vanished. It took me a while to figure out, but I knew that all their propaganda was for nothing when we stepped foot on that foreign soil, and the bullets started to fly.

Flashes of light were coming from behind us, the journalists were now talking amongst themselves. The video cameras were rolling, and the journalists were now speaking of the stereotype of the true soldier. What do they know of soldiery? Those damn journalists must really love their job if they’re willing to travel a thousand miles in the middle of a war-torn country just to get this one perfect shot of a soldier’s true humanity.

Wait, what humanity? There is no humanity in this place. It took me years to figure out that there’s nothing close to humanity in this place. We’re fighting for nothing more than the brother next to us. The only humanity in this is to question whether or not you should shoot the next thing that moves in between you and your target. There is no humanity in our lives, there never was and there never will be. All the humanity that actually exists is the love between me and my brothers.

Love, that’s another thing we barely have here. The Son of a carpenter said to love not just your brothers, but your enemies as well. I never believed it, I’m not sure if I hated my enemy or not, but I was damn sure love is nowhere near what I feel for them. I’ve laughed and smiled when I watched some of my enemies bleed to death, I’ve also shown mercy to the child soldiers they’ve been conscripting, but I never know why. They’re children, sure, but they’ve been shooting and killing my brothers, but to show them mercy? Mercy is a line that needs to be drawn, where do we draw that thin line?

Someone shouted out about a column of prisoners being convoyed through our location, some of the journalists were already setting up their cameras to view them as they pass along. Great, just more publicity for our melodramatic moment, just what we need, damn journalists...

What will happen after this? I’ve been using the soldier mask for years, I haven’t heard from home for a long time. The only family I had left was my old man, and I literally mean he was that old. Broke his heart when he saw me march off, I didn’t even turn back to get one last look at him. Something isn’t right with me, why am I only regretting this now? He’s my father, he’s my only relative, the only bloodline I have left and I abandoned him... Why am I only now feeling regret?

Regret... great, that simplifies things. I regret hundreds of things, I’m sure half of those were in my years shooting at other soldiers because my country wants to get me killed. I’ve killed men and boys of all different ages, I’ve killed women who picked up weapons on the field, and yet I feel more ashamed of leaving my father when he was already on the verge of death? It’s nothing more than pure abandonment, and I’m sure I’ll be having nightmares of that moment. I remember it all, and I’m happy I remember it, remembering the pain my father experienced can be me atoning for that day. Though I may want to atone for what I did, I have no remorse. My life with my father was a dead-end. My only regret is abandoning him when he was dying, and even he wouldn’t do that if it were me.

It was a cold afternoon at our house, it was an old concrete building built on top of a hill along with a few others, we formed a community there for ourselves since nobody ever came to that place and nobody ever left. I had just told my Father that I was going to join the army. He had no reaction for the first few minutes, this has happened before. I took this silence to know that he disapproved, so I left the house.

Next thing I knew the people of the community were staring at me as though I were a stray dog, and I heard my Father bursting out of the house and shouting things at me. I hated myself that day, he was right about everything. He admitted to himself being the worst father a child could have, he also told me that that’s no reason for me to abandon him. He was right, and something inside me knew he was right. I haven’t heard from the village at all after that. I’m sure my father is dead. What I don’t know is whether or not anyone else abandoned the community for the war.

I didn’t even try to look back. I remember stopping for a few seconds to try and hear out my father, but all those years of hatred of him just came back to me, and I continued walking. The street was quiet, all seventeen families of that little village were now outside watching me walk away to join the near-billion soldiers who, once the first bullets fly above their head, have no idea why they joined this godforsaken war.

One of my brothers shouted out at the distance, the prisoners seem to have arrived. As one, the journalists started packing, engines roared alive as they headed to gain some coverage about the prisoners. Finally, let them bother some other unit. Leave my brothers at peace, we’ve sacrificed too much that we deserve at least one moment of peace.

That is all that matters here, my brothers. Soldiers of the unit I belong to, they are the only family I’ve had ever since the death of my Mother. I’ve had no friends in our community. All I ever had was a dead-end job that made me squirm for food that my Father could not provide on account of him spending it all on liquor and drugs, totally forgetting the son he has. I do not blame him, not at all. He loved my mother more than anything, and he crawled inside a bottle after her death. Before her death he was a good man, I remember my childhood with a good father. That childhood seems blurry now, after what I saw him become. He tried to self-destruct, he forgot me and spent most of his days drinking and smoking. I barely remember a day when he wasn’t drunk, drugged or both.

My brothers are good to me, some of them are from worse stock, and they are the most loyal men you’d ever meet in a lifetime. Every night we would raise our glasses to the dead of the Gemini Legion, our legion. We have no differences here, from whatever race we come from, from what name we call God and from what birth we may belong to, we are all the same.

Of the years we’ve spent fighting for no cause other than our own our numbers grow thin. Our first year in hell our numbers would rival that of any other Legion. Now, our own country makes us think we are too precious to replace, and we spend the nights with barely a hundred of my brothers still living. This is my family, my community, my brotherhood. I know no other life than this, and I plan not to. I have friends here, and our country finally plans to help us by donating to us our own community, they are right to do this. We have shed our blood because our country thinks we do it for them.

The prisoner caravan can be seen now, I struggled myself to get a good look at them, a horrible sight, that. The prisoners were bound in ropes, some of them barely had clothes. The soldiers who were bringing them in were of different legions, our Legion would never do this. Some of the men went off to greet the prisoners, completely leaving their weapons and bringing their flasks of water and removing their vests to give to them. This was not mercy, this was brotherhood.

Years of fighting our enemy has given them our respect. They’ve killed many of ours, and we’ve killed many more of theirs. It seems prudent that we should show them respect for their ability to fight back. We would stay awake through nights telling of horrid tales of bravery on their part. All my brothers can testify to the resilience of our enemy, and they are rightly made to be the greatest enemy ever to face the Gemini Legion! I do not pretend myself that I think of them better than me; I merely think that respect for my enemy should be rightly earned. Years of killing my brothers have earned them this right.

What will be waiting for me? I had loved only one other woman after the death of my mother, and it was to her I turned to when my father was in his delirium. She would welcome me to her home for sanctuary and she would welcome me as though I were family. Her family also welcomed me, thinking me as refugee from a distant land, requiring a home. I would spend hours at a time alone with her, at the front of her house on a concrete bench built by her father as rest for passers-by. We would walk miles at an unknown direction and talk of different things, and we’d spend hours a day on our own.

I never knew how her father was able to trust me, something inside me always thought whenever we’d go out on our own we’d be followed, never had any actual proof for those thoughts. But it seemed that every night I’d stand on her doorstep he would be there waiting to greet me with open arms. Besides my brothers here, they were the closest I’ve had to a family. Her family was on a road trip when I made my dramatic leave from the community. If she were there I’m sure she wouldn’t let me leave, neither would her family. I guess I feel lucky, I forgot about her and her family at that moment. How could that have happened? I kept on thinking that I was too blinded by my hate to have remembered her.

I guess I do have something that may be waiting for me. Her family is too traditional to want to leave the community. Will they take me back, is the question I need an answer to. I have a house now, two if our country keeps their promise for the Legion. I have a grave to dig if nobody has done it for me, the least I could do for hating my father. I have friends who will be more than happy to support me, brothers who have bled with me for years.

Then I sat there, all anger suddenly vanished after these moments of thought. For some unknown reason, I laughed. I had no idea why, I just kept on laughing. Why would I be miserable, with a view like this? I finally stood up to get a good look at this landscape, a better look. It was a breathtaking thing, and to think this is what we are fighting for? It can make any man foolish enough to think that.

The nature of the place itself was breathtaking. It would be hard to believe there’s a place on earth untouched by war until you have set your eyes on this. Wild animals roamed freely on a plain enclosed on all sides by thick layers of forests. Wild flowers grew by the thousands on their own parts of the plain and trees grew like ornaments between them. In the middle sat what looked like an oasis, predator and prey alike drank from its waters, having an agreement of neutrality when thirst is the only thing that doesn’t divide them. I have to remember to spend some time there in the future. I threw my weapons away, put down all of my equipment and went over to the prisoner caravan, ready to give them some drink or clothing.

The past is no more, I have a family ready to take me in, and I have brothers ready to take care of me. The war is over, so too are my past troubles. All has been done, and all shall be done. I do hope there is something there, a deity or more. If there is, then I can thank someone for giving me a second chance. If not, then I shall be thankful to anyone who will listen. The war is over, it is done.

The news blasted all over the world. The war has ended! Peace, finally! People cheered, finding out that their beloved country had won a great war. Soldiers were congratulating each other, parties were being held! Even though many deaths were made, it was a happy thought that the war has ended.

On the other side, gloom spread. They had lost the war. They had lost many men, many women and many children. What? All for nothing. They have no control over anything. The winning side now controls them, and they have no doubt that they will be treated like slaves. Slaves to their own home.

The war ending usually is a great thing – stopping all those deaths. But to the one that lost, they will lose things that they may never again regain.

The commander-in-chief of the winning side was drinking to his limit with his friends to celebrate. He should have spent time with his family, but, does he even remember them? What was his wife’s name? Elizabeth? No. Years of war had made him forget about his family. He had many mistresses in many places. How many children he had, he can’t even count. The despair of the war had fogged his mind.

He came home at midnight, smiling at the children that he forgot. He kissed his beloved wife. Thalia! That was her name. He grinned. The war was finally over. He could now spend time with his family.

The soldiers gathered round the big park in the middle of the town. They counted until it was midnight. And with their family. Food was not scarce. No more invaders to take everything from them.

When the clock stroke twelve. They shot fireworks upon the sky and drank booze.

Many were happy. Although it was impossible if all wars to end. As if the peace were never-ending. There were always some petty quarrels that turned into spilled blood.

So there. Even though this war was over… More were to come. And peace… It’s impossible to remain as it is forever. And wars and it’s other demons will always stay, no matter how hard we try. Peace forever, is not possible.

The dust kicked up from the war has settled, and we let go of our breaths. Then, when we think the air is clear, we gasp, we choke in breath. But the air is still filled with dust, poision, toxin- it seeps in. Slowly we cripple, we fall to the ground. Not at once but over time. We die from our creation.

This is how it is. Thirteen long years of war, yet even as it ends, it's imprints remain. The rubble that was once buildings is scattered, the blood that once pumped through a child's heart pools in a gutter. The economy is strangled, the civilians poor and dirty. And as for I, my wife, my dear Juliet, dead seven years. Even now my heart is dark. I'm afraid to go out at night and when I do every moment is a scary and nerve reckoning experience. The scavengers and gangs born from the war clutter the misshapen cities- fighting over beneficial territories where they can feel safe themselves, where they can live. I do so solemnly hope that they don't decide to attack here. My daughter also lives here. For her to die would be for my to die. Since Juliet, Anna is the only reason I live. Dogs bark in the night, guns shoot off, war whoops and screams bound off the walls, and so I am grateful for this shelter. The government provides this shelter, shared with many others, identical to many other buildings, built in haste for us, the people.

Now, I am going to tell you this story, Aaron. It began, one morning, as I woke. Many good stories begin with a happy beginning, and a satisfying ending, yet mine is the opposite. I was awoken by the screams of my daughter, your sister, pulling on my shirt, pleading with me to wake. "Anna, shh, calm down." I picked her up and hugged her laying her head on my shoulder. Yet as I did this she tried to pull away, with all the strength a tiny girl of nine could muster.

"LET ME GO DAD!" The fury in her voice shocked me, "We need to go! Their breaking in the building!" I looked down at her, taken aback. I set her down.

"Alright, Anna. You stay in this room and I'll have you dare not leave. I'll be back in a little." I looked at her sternly until she nodded and I opened the door. And as I opened the door, a man grabbed my arm and yelled, "Damn! I thought we had everyone!" He held out a rifle. I looked back, puzzled. "Dimwit! Take it!"

I took the rifle and he pulled me along to the main corridor. We hurried down the long stretch of hall hurriedly and he asked, "Did you have a rifle like this during the war?" I nodded yes, and he continued, "Good. They had them in here for standard defense, because, well you know." And that was the truth. During the war, everyone had been issued a rifle- one of the twenty-first century models. They shot metallic ammo that was though to be to inhumane now. So they had invented a low grade laser for the military, but don't ask me how it worked. Anyways, they collected many of the twenty-first century weapons with a particular eagerness to receive rifles. More so, they issued them out and had public courses in care and use. "Some gangbangers scavenging in the lobby, we shut them in the reception area, tho. We got some volunteers to help out. Every adult in the building wanted to help. Eh, over here."

Appearing through a doorway was a much older man than me. He looked tall, muscled, and sketchy. "That's the Sergeant Major. His real name is Dominic, a real tough guy. Just call him Sarge. He likes it. I think, at least. Alright, now you know how to use it, so your going up with the front group to shoot up the bangers. We let 'em in, you pop 'em up. Get now." He shoved over to a few other people. They all, at least I though, were pretty young. Maybe some of us old guys had said no when they asked if we knew how to fight. They all looked at me, and one, who looked the oldest said, "Rank?"

I looked curiously about him. I suppose I must have put on a pretty convincing expression because he said, "You looked legit. Army?" I nodded no. "Oh. Could have used a vet. I'm the only one here- I fought the Russians when we sacked Moscow. I got shipped home then, though, because my ten month contract ended." I sighed.

"I wont be much use." I said, "Haven't touched a gun since my teenage years, on the range." He studied me, "Most of these kids haven't."

I laughed, and a small, blond fighter said, "I have, Bryan." He turned towards me, "I'm Mark, this gent behind me is Roger." He pointed to a quiet, dark skinned fellow behind him. "He doesn't talk that much. Over their is Harriet, she's a might pretty isn't she?" Harriet stared at him then said, "Shut up. Like your anything more then a pretty-face." At this even the quiet Roger laughed.

"Come on. Shut up guys. And gals." Mark winked at Harriet, and said, "I think the Sarge and his trusted Sergeants have finished talking, and we're ready." He began looking solemn, "Well. I hope we don't die. Specially you, Harry." She got up and gave him a good, heavy footed kick to the shins. "Damn! Harry!"

Before she could reply, the Sarge came over. "Alright kiddies. You know what your doing. Intel, Damen." A stocky, lean man walked up beside the Sarge. "Together you can stop wars. Claim peace for America. Peace will be made possible. It will be hard, You have to help us crush an organized crime syndicate, just let me explain. Well, this isn't really a gang. We have theorized that this building is a target for settlers. What you could call a gang, supposedly, is going to settle and man this building. Turn it into a fortress. Over the past few weeks we have lost contact with over seven other government defended and provided shelters. Each is equipped with weapons, each holds military contacts and plans. Hostages. Congress is working over-time, trying to solve and find these gangsters all over the country." We all were open-mouthed by this. Except Bryan who challenged this new figure. "So what, exactly does this mean?"

Damen looked over at Bryan, "I'm not finished, private."

Bryan smiled, "I'm not in the military." Now it was the Sarge's turn to smile, "You are now, private. All of you are. This is serious. Now Damen, Intel.

Damen smiled over to Bryan, and continued, "Gangs are associated with mafia, lawbreakers, no-gooders. These gangs are people that have come together, supporting eachother, all of them hurt by the war. They are considered anarchists. And here in New York it's the worst. The leaders and organization, and the main force, of the gangs resides here. With these weapons and intel and plans they might not destroy America, but they will bubble and stir chaos across it. Forever broken. We are open to attack by anyone that wants to attack. Any Americans that don't like the government could rebel. As I said chaos." Even Bryan now stood, frozen. "I suppose you want to know what this has to do with you. You didn't coincidentally come here. You all recieved letters from the government, didn't you?"

We all nodded, and he said, "Each encampment sent out many, many invitations and letters, to provide people with 'safety' we said. Well you were chosen to come here because of your skills. No don't ask what. But you are a team now, work it out yourselves. Your going to bring down the gangs- with military support. Cut off the head of the snake and the body dies. After their leadership is gone, they will separate, and the marines can pick them off at leisure. Bryan was informed of your mission but sworn to secrecy, earlier. He is your leader. Follow him. He knows what to do." He turned away and I spoke out.

"I wont leave my daughter." Damen turned and told me, "Your daughter is in good hands, with Mrs. Loback, but you wont be allowed to see her until you finish. Think of it as pension you have to earn, with my compliments, Mister?"

I ground my teeth, "Mister Dan Rhinehart."


We had settled out and my head swirled with evil thoughts about this Damen. Who was he to tell me what to do? But Bryan had warned me afterwords about what they might do to her if declined the mission. So I agreed to come. That night we had been briefed on what to do. We were to head into the heart of New York and quote on quote, "get disovered by the mafia". Except it wasn't the mafia we were looking for.

Now the five of us were walking to New York City from the Bronx. Originally we had been in Oneida, but they had dropped us off in a helicopter. Bryan asked the Sarge for some military assistance for the group but Damen butted in, saying that five civilians was large enough if not to large. So we, five strangers, supposedly carried the fate of America on our shoulders. Mark joked, I knew, that America was doomed with us. But I took it literally. How would a thirty year old man, a thirty-five year old man, and a bunch of kids take down a gang. Now Harriet noticed my thoughts. "You afraid to, huh?"

So like Juliet she was- slender, brunette, a glossy face and beautiful, blue eyes. Yet she was different too. She was muscled, toned, concentrated, calm. A well balanced person and soldier. "Yes." I sighed, "They just draft us into the military, just like that." She chuckled.

"Yes, just like that." Just then Bryan spoke up, "City limits, folks. Were in New York."

"Ain't this were Disney Land is? Bryan?" I looked over at Mark, and said, "That's Florida." His face fell and then he smiled again, "Bush Gardens."

"No. Shut up Mark." He shut up, then, "'Bout Carowinds?" Bryan turned around and shoved Mark to the ground, "SHUT UP MARK! WE'RE ABOUT TO DIE AND YOUR ASKING ABOUT AMUSEMENT PARKS THAT AREN'T EVEN RELEVANT! For god's sake, Mark. Shut up." He reached out and helped Mark, "I'm sorry. Just, for my sanity, shut up." We continued onward. I decided to spark up a talk with Bryan then.

"Bryan, why is what we're doing important?"

He looked at me, "You don't know, Dan? Hmm. Just had that look about you. Well, Dan my man, I'm not sure why they picked everyone here but me. What are we doing? Saving America. See, I'll explain in easier words what Damen said."

"But why us? Why should we do this? Are we supposed to die?"

"As I said, I don't know." He rubbed his face and said in a louder voice, "But you have to if you have to. I know Harriet was an medic, or corpsman, or something, in the war. Can't really call her a vet. Roger- just something strange 'bout him, I'm not sure. Me? I lead a company in the war. Mark was in with a gang. I don't know anything about you."

"I'm just a family man- or was. My wife's dead obviously. I can't use a gun, I'm not a leader, and I couldn't save someone else's life if mine depended on it."

"But your calm, your smart. Your fairly modest. You aren't a planner. You aren't corrupt. Maybe they lied, what if it was random that they picked us. I have no proof- but why us, you said. Well, I could maybe explain me or Harry. Not you. Not Mark. Definitely not Roger. Maybe it was psychological."

"Pathological. Abnormal."

"Yeah, that too. But you wanted to know what we're doing? We are a small group, going to infiltrate another small-ish group, kill someone, and then get out. Look at this." He held out something shiny, black. It was square and normal, but something about it stuck with me. "It's a microbomb." I backed away.

"Don't worry." Don't worry, word's I'll remember forever. "It's not armed. But if things fail I'm not going back to a dead America. The corrupted here, they'll die one way or another."

"Alright."

He smiled, "Be cool." I moved away and walked in silence for a few minutes.

Then Bryan looked around and called, "We're about a mile away from Central." We kept walking, at some points my spine tingled. I was scared, I was going to die. About ten minutes later we were in the area Bryan had been specified. We walked around, until we came upon two gangbangers. One had a makeshift pipe, the other a pistol.

I looked over at Bryan and he just nodded. 'Play along' he mouthed. I nodded back. "Wat'choo doin'?" A rough, tough, mean looking one spat at us.

Bryan played cool, "What are you doing, then?"

The gangster frowned. "What YOU doin', punk?" My lips twitched. Bryan was at least ten years older then this guy. Bryan said nothing, though, so the gangster shrugged. "Neva mind 'dat. We bringin' you in. Orders man." Roger and Harriet closed together ready to fight, but Bryan looked at them with piercing eyes. "That's right, be cool, dude's." The only movement from us were our eyes. Roger slowly relaxed and muttered something. "What was that, kid?" Roger shook his head. Now some more of them popped out. They began circling us. I raised my fists, back to back with Mark. "Get 'em", was all I heard.

Then everything goes black.


"You awake?" I grunted, my head filled with pain. It felt like an early morning hangover, except the pain, more volatile. "Get up, slowly."

So I got up, my eye's closed, and I rested my head against a hard surface. "We're captive. In an hour the leader wants to see us." A memory flashed in my mind of a black square. "Do you have the bomb, Bryan." I said this slowly.

"Yes, my shoe." I opened my eye's for the first time.

"Hey." I coughed, "Where's Mark? Harriet? Roger?"

"Dead, captive in another cell, and hurt back out in the city." He stood up. "A huge gorilla of a man smacked you on the temple. Knock out. Mark shot him, then got shot himself. They broke rogers legs, and he's stranded out in the city, probably dead. Out in another cell, I think, they are keeping Harry."

Looking around I said, "Not much to do, is there? How long have I been out?"

He looked at me funny and said, "At least a day."

A day? What was going on here? "Why don't you blow the bomb, now?"

"What if we're in a separate building? I'm going to get up close and personal, and you get out with Harry if she comes."

"Harriet can get out alone. I'll stay with you."

"No point in that. Anyway together you two are better off."

"Let's just leave it for now."

He snorted, "Get some rest, superman. I'll stand watch."

"A'ight", I yawned, "Night."

I dozed off, until sometime later I was woken by a kick. A rough voice rebounded through my ears, "Get up. Now." I stood up and a large pale man was standing over me, in front of two other men. Bryan was nowhere in the room. Dead or already taken. To see their leader. Take my to your leader, my first comic thought that week. That year. So I stood up and they grabbed my arms with one man trailing us. Am I going to die?, I thought. I didn't know. But they took me into a huge room, where I spotted a ragged Bryan and Harriet standing beside him. The shoved me next to them, and Bryan whispered to me, "If this works America is normal, and war is over. Harriet knows what to do. What you do is up to you." I nodded.

So then, a group of the gang walked into the room, each equally strange. Their were rugged, rich, beggars, normal. A band. One walked up. He was bald. He portrayed a beard, and he spoke in a thick accent. "Welcome, enemies of the People. We welcome you to this military domain."

Harriet scrunched her eyebrows, "Enemies of the people? We are the people of America. You are rebels. We are fighters."

"No. We are the People, we fight to protect the people. We are the People, for the people, of the people. You see, the World War IV wrecked America. It damaged the people, and government officials got corrupted. Remember that part. Now, I am here with these brave men to stop this corruption and help out America."

"You mean takeover America? Anarchists, rebels, fools."

Now the man's voice boomed, "We are not the corrupt! We are not enemies of the people. The government has taken communism to the people, despite it's years of warnings. They have promoted reforms that give the people anger, and make us their pets. They pretend like stuff is for the people, but no! Little by little they are going to control us! The war wrecked the world, now it's blood and bones remain. They want to control us!"

Bryan spoke out now, "But would that be so bad for a while? You would leave America open to attack, to start over the wars. Military treaties would insure it."

"But we would have support, and the will of, the people! We are the People! You do not understand."

I spoke out now, "Maybe not, but honestly, do you? Do you think a war would benefit us more then a bit of control? Socialism perhaps this is. Not communism. If we have peace, world peace, forever, we can work problems like this out. Rebellion with a side of war. Socialism with a side of world peace. People rather live then die. I don't want to die, at least."

Bryan spoke again, "I mean, we could jump out that window into the lake. But in the long run we would probably be shot up after. Freedom and death. Some oppose that." I got the message.

"So you choose to oppose me? To oppose the voice of America?"

"Your the voice of a hundred anarchists. The People- perhaps- but rebels too." His hand moved so slightly and I saw a square.

"Harriet", I whispered. She nodded, now.

Bryan sent out a message, "Freedom now, death later." And we ran. We burst through the window, hand in hand. Behind us a shock wave raced to kill us and burn us but we ran. And when we slapped down into the water we knew we were safe. No gun's had gone off, no cries, but we knew Bryan was dead. So we knew he had been successful.


"So it was a hoax?" I was looking at Damen.

"A hoax? It was real enough. But yes, you were picked at random to save America. They would have been able to pick out soldiers. Bryan new what to do." He was explaining what happened.

"Don't be melodramatic." He was, though. "America would have survived anarchists."

"Thousands of anarchists that capture America is a pretty grim future. It would have provoked France into another attack. Then a chain reaction, wars again, and boom, only a billion people left."

"Peace forever, now, though? Right?"

"As long as we can manage." He closed his eye's. "Humans are savage in nature."

"But we can love too. We are capable of peace, of sanity and compassion."

"Now your being dramatic."

"Not dramatic."

"Very well. You might want to go meet up with Anna, you have only seen her once since your return. She's with Harriet." He got up and walked away, stopping at the doorway, "Good job Private Dan. Your not in the army anymore." And so he left. I never saw him again, not once in my life.

But when I met up with Harriet, Anna was sleeping. "She is such a little doll." She looked at the sleeping child with fondness. "Your so lucky."

I smiled. "You could be lucky too."

She smiled back. "I already am."

And then we kissed.

Memories flooded my mind as I walked through the small town’s plaza. I couldn’t make anything of them. Scattered visions of light seemed to hold me to the past. Slowly, the memories faded, and I continued through the plaza to the restaurant on the other side. I felt sad walking there. It was the one in business since the war. Oh God, the war...

Mark, help me, save me. A voice cried out in the night. I stuttered my steps for a few seconds and continued towards the bar of the restaurant. This restaurant had become my home. My sacred place since the war. Since I had lost everything...my wife, my children, my home... I cried after this thought. I shuffled to the bartender, and told him to get me a drink. I downed my beer within a few minutes, without feeling dizzy. I left my money on the counter. After chatting to my few friends, I decided to leave. This wasn’t my night to be here.

Getting out of the restaurant, I passed through the plaza once again. This time, I decided to sit at the fountain. This was such a lovely place. The fountain flooded royally everyday. People would toss coins in for luck. Lovers would exchange vows...just as I did. Yes Mark, I will love you forever. I looked around and could not find the voice. After viewing the fountain, and finding memories, I walked around the ruined structure. I wish I was as beautiful as it first was.

Then, as I walked around the fountain, memories exploded into my mind. I tried to grab a few, but the slipped from my grasp. I kept losing them. I hadn’t left the plaza. They were leaving. I was losing the one thing that I needed. Suddenly, I was my family. Their beautiful faces. I heard their voices. I realized that earlier I had heard my wife. I needed her. I wanted to reach out and touch my memories. Become one with the past. As I lunged for my fmaily, they dissappeared. The were gone. I had lost them. My link to the past was gone. I felt as if I was slowly dying. And I cried...