The shaking marine jumps up and tries to take the helmet away from him, but he pushes him off and draws a knife threatening to kill him. More join in, and a fight breaks out among them.
Tarnus fires his pistol into the air grabbing everyone’s attention, and pushes down the instigator holding the pistol to his head. “You’re angry because you have Buzz in your body, and the logical response to you is more destruction towards the enemy. But I will not tolerate dissidence and fighting. Everyone, take DT now.” The NCO’s press a tab on their arm control panels.
We feel calm, blissfully high. I have no headache, and everything is simple and at ease.
“What’s next sir?” says Blake. We sit huddled around Tarnus.
“Let me ask Command,” says Tarnus. He leans to his radio, “Command, Command, this is Love Platoon, the enemy positions in our area are neutralized. We require pick up for KIA’s.”
“Copy that Love, will send extract. Group at point Alpha. We have successfully liberated this part of the city. Command out.”
Tarnus looks over at us, “Hear that boys. We control part of the city. This is Coalition turf. We won’t see any Herculeans for a little bit.” We rise and line up our fallen brothers into a neat row by where the Pave picked up our injured, cover their faces by slanting their helmets foreword over them, and leave to the checkpoint.
Our remaining platoon advances, following alongside a freeway that leads to downtown plaza where the remnants of the assault are gathering. A group of officers atop an APC are ordering units away into the city and telling others to rest. The once towering buildings and offices of the urban sprawl that circle the plaza are now piled on top of each other, or spill over into the streets as internal fires brew smoke from within. Soldiers and marines start to break away from their marching lines to sit against the sidewalks with others, or crawl up the rubble of the plaza to rest. The red battery tips of vapsticks light up throughout the smoke as hundreds of men began taking drags.
“Does anyone have any water?” says a man hoarsely as he walks down the line. Isaac and I follow behind him as we search for a place to sit.
We cross a marine with his helmet and boots off sitting on a prayer rug. He begins to move his water bladder from his camel pack to clean his feet.
“What the hell are you doing!” says the thirsty marine before us. “Give me that goddamn water, don’t waste it on you fucking feet you idiot.” The man grabs the bladder from his hand and walks off with it.
“Should we help him out?” says Isaac.
I shrug, “We’re all Marines together.”
We walk up to the confused man, who sits staring at his unclean feet. “Here, you can use some of my water.” I offer him a canteen of water filled from my bladder.
“Thank you,” says the marine as he takes my canteen. He drizzles a little onto his dirt caked feet.
“You know Peter, I have this dying question,” mentions Isaac.
I look back curious, “What’s that?”
“You know, with us being millions of miles away from Earth, and this planet rotating at a different circumference than ours,” the Muslim marine looks up in interest as Isaac continues, “What direction would Mecca be?”
I grin, “Well, you would probably need a rotating rug to be able to follow Mecca correctly from here I would think.”
We walk away from the marine on his mat back into the avenue of hundreds of men, losing sight of our platoon that must have continued on when we paused. Isaac calls back at the marine, “If you ever figure it out, let me know!”
“You’re a dick,” I say.
“It’s an honest question. I bet they’ll have to make a new Mecca here to solve the problem.”
“If this planet survives that long.”
Isaac grabs his ancients to smoke. I reach over and snag the box. “Hey I thought you didn’t smoke.” He snatches them back, flicking his thirteen colonies ablaze, and bringing an ancient to his mouth.
“Well, what you said is true, this war is going to kill me first, might as well enjoy it.” Isaac hands me one, lighting it for me and I take a drag but end up coughing. Isaac looks away to hide his smile, but I still hear him chuckle to himself. These are indeed nasty. But it also helps calm me down even more. It’s no secret that tobacco is infused with cannabis and other chemicals companies would rather not tell us. The yield in ancients today compared to when they were first made as cigarettes is much more potent and effective. And with also being high on DT, it makes a nice combo.
“Did you ever hear about those protesters back on campus?” I ask Isaac, knowing this conspiracy theory would be right up his alley. “The ones that claimed,” I tap the ancient on his helmet to clarify what I am talking about, “vapsticks, are infused with some chemical by the Party to try and control us?”
Isaac laughs. “Why do you think I smoke only natural?”
“You know I was joking?”
“Well it doesn’t matter anyway, they’re controlling me now.”
“True.”
We carry on down the avenue filling up with collapsing soldiers and marines. The way they drop themselves to the ground haphazardly makes it appear as if they’ve been taken down by an invisible assailant. An engine whines and moves our way, leading a convoy of giant trucks edging slowly through the crowd. Men near us pause to stare at the rear of the passing trucks, and we do too. Riding on the tail of the trucks are people in camouflaged biohazard suits. Behind them inside the beds are unrecognizable mounds of flesh. We follow the crowd some more and discover where the trucks are coming from. To our left is a huge pile of naked dead Herculeans and an equally big pile of their alien equipment next to them. People in biohazard suits grab the mostly mutilated corpses and toss them into the back of trucks. On a metal fencing post, sticking erect out of the ground by the corpse pile, is a planted Herculean head. Marines walking by spit on it. One marine completely stops though, dropping his stuff and kneeling by the head. He opens a book and begins reading out loud. It’s hard to hear what he’s saying, but as we move by him I am able to glance at the book within his hands: a large black book with a gold cross on it.
We catch up to Love that is beginning to unload their sacks. An officer—Lieutenant Colonel—standing on a Stryker assault vehicle in the middle of a nearby cross section directs forces. “Armor, down to the right, heavy enemy positions ahead… I need a platoon-strength force for detail.” The Colonel jumps down and comes to Tarnus. “Captain, take your company left, advance till Mendocino then go east, and clear the streets of Herculean stragglers. I sent a group up there earlier and they have not replied.”
“Sir!” says Tarnus, “I am still waiting on my remaining units. We are barely two fire squads strong.”
The Colonel looks back with puzzlement and replies, “You can wait here, send out one of your detachments then.”
We all wait, acting busy with something as Tarnus ponders who to send. He makes his decision and faces Blake. “Easy, you’re almost fully operational compared to the rest, head on out.”
“Yes sir!”
“Goddamn,” mutters Vance as we get back into a single file line. “We just got here.”
“Shut your whore mouth,” says Isaac, “we haven’t even sat down.”
The rest of our unit rises, putting gear and equipment we just took off back on, and flipping off the rest of Love as they catcall us. We follow behind Blake down the desolated streets that look no different than the all the others.
“We didn’t even get time to piss,” says Vick.