'Well, if you’ll all excuse me, I have to see a man about a horse.' Nobody objected, so I exited and walked down the hall searching for my target. It seemed that I was constantly one step behind him until I saw him leaving the Kitchen. I kept my distance so as to not alert him of my presence, I wanted to see what he would do.
As I followed him down the hall he seemed to walk more slowly than usual, head hanging down, almost like he was focusing on the sound of his boots hitting the floor.
He led me next to the Armoury. I half expected him to collect some new gear, but all he grabbed was ammunition; I guess he formed some sort of emotional bond to those guns and that sword. I don’t see why, I always enjoy upgrading to newer models.
He was walking very slowly now, and judging by his direction he was heading towards the exit. As soon as I saw him stop in place it became evident to me that it was time to make myself known. He didn’t want to go, he needed someone to give him a kick in the pants. I didn’t feel like violence at the moment so I took a different route.
I slowly walked toward him making heavier footsteps so that he’d hear me. Sure enough, he turned around with a look of hope and terror on his face that would make anyone feel pity for him, but he was never one for enjoying pity, this was Reaper at his darkest.
I was the first to speak.
'Reaper, why are you still here?' I asked.
'I, I don’t know, I was about to leave but I heard you walking up so I –',
'You know that’s not true.' I interrupted, finally showing enough emotion to not be unnerving. I walked a little closer, 'I was hoping that you hadn’t gone yet, I wanted to tell you something in private.'
'What is it?' Reaper asked, obviously glad for the distraction from leaving.
'A Story.'
'What Story?'
'One you’ve never heard before...'
*******************************************************************************
'Dad, why did you join the Army?' James asked, sitting in his Father’s study, while his Dad looked over his book into his son’s inquisitive eyes.
After a short pause and look to the fireplace he spoke. 'Well, I was around the same age as you were when you joined, and back then all I could think about was the guns, the travelling... and the Women, of course!' He let out a slight chuckle. 'It was all about the Adventure, the feeling of Grandeur. But son, eventually that feeling wore down. For a while I had no idea why I was where I was, and frankly, I just didn’t care when I won or lost the next day, at least death would provide an adventure that didn’t happen every day.'
James looked shocked, but still interested, 'What did you do?' His Father looked back at him, 'It wasn’t what I did, it was what people around me did that made me change my outlook.' He closed his book and set it on the coffee table between them and picking up his black Coffee, taking a slow sip, savouring the bitter taste and it went down. 'I never really considered the severity of the situation until I was assigned to a platoon that was put in charge of guarding a village near the southern edge of
“Mastering others makes you strong, mastering yourself makes you fearless.” James chimed in. His Father grinned, 'Sun Tzu. That’s the stuff, son. Maybe someday you’ll join the Military, but I don’t want you to go through what I went through,' He looked at the fireplace, glowing with a steady flame, 'nobody should ever have to go through that again.'
*******************************************************************************
'I had that conversation with my father when I was thirteen. Not long afterwards I went to a Military school of my own volition.'
'Why are you telling me this?' Reaper asked, at that point he didn’t see the point to what I was saying, and frankly neither did I, I like telling stories and this might be the last time I get to tell one to my old friend.
'Well,' I began, 'for one, I just felt like telling you that before you’re gone, and also that was the last time I ever saw my father before he was brought back into the Military to serve.'
'At his age?' Reaper asked, I replied, 'He was sharp, nobody else had a mind like him, he was a brilliant strategist, and without his teaching, I’d be dead right now a million times over. Let’s fast forward a bit to after we graduated from College and went our separate ways. The Third of July.'
James was home after celebrating his promotion from a Private to a Commissioned Officer, a Second Lieutenant.
'Mom,' James began, staring out the kitchen window into the field in the back yard, 'have you heard from Dad at all since he left?'
'No, unfortunately.' She replied, 'But after all these years, you come to certain inevitable conclusions. All I’ve heard is what you’ve heard.'
He squinted, eyeing the Vultures in the sky circling over a carcass in the middle of the field. 'I just wish they’d tell me what he was sent to do; they just said it was classified.'
'Boy, why are you thinking such gloomy thoughts on a day like this? Look at yourself, your face is always so stiff; I can never tell what you’re thinking, and dinner’s almost ready, go wash your face, your brother and sister will be here soon.' James’ mother walked off into the dining room with a stack of plates and he went into the bathroom in the hall to clean up.
The sun was setting as assorted distant family and friends arrived to celebrate the occasion, James didn’t feel that it was very necessary, after all, Second Lieutenant isn’t too impressive to say. He stepped downstairs to a crowd of relatives clapping, a nice, warm welcome.
'It’s a shame your father isn’t here to see this, eh boy?' James’ uncle said casually, 'He would’ve been tickled pink, I tell you what.'
The conversations went on for about half an hour before James’ Mother began to fret about the food getting cold so everyone adjourned to the dining room to eat, it wasn’t long after they had sat down that there came a knock at the door.
'Well who could that be? Isn’t everyone here?' James’ Aunt asked looking inquiringly around the table, looking for a few missing heads.
'I’ll get it' James said, getting up from the table and walking through the living room to the front door. He found himself facing two badges belonging to CIA agents. 'Second Lieutenant Watcher?'
'That’s my codename, yes.' James replied, 'What is it?'
'We need you to come with us.'
*******************************************************************************
'So what happened?’ he asked. He seemed to have forgotten what he was doing by this time.
‘Well, it turns out that they were involved in the project that my Father was working on. This Zombie problem was around far longer than we both thought. They blindfolded me when I got in their car and when they took it off I was inside of a Military base.’
Reaper looked genuinely interested, ‘What do you mean?’
I answered, ‘Well, the project that my Father was working on was actually studying the Parasite that was causing these Humans to act the way they were acting, they did all kinds of tests on various animals and insects as well. Not many are immune apparently as you know. Long story short, there was an outbreak in the holding cells where the Zombie specimens were being kept and a large number of them escaped and attacked the workers, apparently my Father didn’t make it out.’
Reaper looked at the ground, ‘You never told me about your Dad before. So did he... you know?’
‘Turn into a Zombie? No, they ate him, and then a large number of them managed to escape into the open.’ I replied, casually.
‘Oh.’
I continued, ‘Needless to say, I was mad. By the time they had finished briefing me on what my Father had been involved in, it was around 7 PM on the fourth of July. They had discreetly cancelled the fireworks celebration telling people that there was going to be an Air Raid Drill.’
‘That was the day of the outbreak!’ Reaper stated, piecing the timeline together in his head.
‘Yes indeed.’ I replied, ‘That was also the deciding moment where I became what I am today. They told me to head home and that there was a car waiting to escort me back. I obliged and went to the bay that they specified; sure enough, a black unmarked car was waiting for me with a driver waving me over. I got in and just as I sat down I reached forward and knocked the driver unconscious.’
Reaper looked surprised, ‘Why did you do that?’
‘Home wasn’t the destination I had decided on, and I knew that the driver wouldn’t be agreeable to my plan. I dumped him out of the car and drove off to another Military Base nearby where I had been stationed, all of my things were there, and I knew my way around.
When I got there, I took a Humvee and loaded it with weaponry, anything I could get my hands on, Pistols, shotguns, grenades, I even found a rocket launcher which was unusual, and of course, lots of automatics.
All of the weaponry I loaded into the back must have ended up weighing it down an extra five hundred pounds, but I didn’t care, I didn’t care whether I lived or died at that point, I just wanted those parasites to know that I didn’t want them to be happy, and I didn’t want them to succeed in anything they planned on doing while they controlled my brethren, my comrades.’
Reaper looked very interested and a little intimidated at this point, ‘So were you just going to go around hunting them down?’
‘That would’ve taken way too much time, remember I told you that the Fourth of July celebration was cancelled? It was nightfall by the time that I finished loading up the Humvee and I drove off towards where the fireworks celebration was supposed to be held, around five miles or so away from the town. Thankfully, due to the last minute cancellation and lazy workers, the fireworks were left laying there, any kid could’ve just grabbed these up and had a grand old time with them, but these fireworks weren’t meant for them. They were bait.
I wasn’t sure whether it would work, but I wasn’t going to let them go to waste. I lit them all up and they fired off into the sky, brilliant lights, and then a booming sound like a Cannon. If that didn’t gather the infected then I didn’t know what would. Sure enough, not even two minutes later I saw some Zombies walking along towards the source.
I popped the back hatch of the Humvee and took out my first choice, a Pistol. I never took time to memorize the names of different guns, their names weren’t as important as their effectiveness, and this one always felt comfy in my hands.
As soon as they appeared I shot them right through their foreheads, the fireworks still going off strong, every time I shot one, a few more appeared, I grabbed a second pistol and started gunning down two at a time. This continued on for about five minutes until I ran out of ammunition for the pistols I had stocked.
The Zombies continued to gain in number until I believed that nearly every single infected person within the state was walking towards me. They were fresh, and I couldn’t have been angrier.
I reached into the Humvee and pulled out the Grenades. I pulled the pins and hurled them into the center of the legion of Zombies coming towards me, their effectiveness was measureable, but still helpful.’
‘How did everything turn out?’ Reaper asked, seemingly on the edge of his seat.
‘I had been fighting for around two hours, and while my body might have grown tired, my mind was still reeling, I was still incredibly angry, I wanted to release every single one. Weapon after weapon after weapon, I eventually went through every single Machine Gun and even that Rocket Launcher that I had found and there ended up being approximately thirty Zombies left.
I had run out of guns, but not out of Spirit, I had one weapon left.
Before I left the Base, I went into my office and took my Dad’s old Battle Axe that he had above the Mantle in the house, back when he was still around, off of my wall and took it with me. It felt good in my hand; it was heavy but still manoeuvrable. I took it in hand and looked toward the group of Zombies still in front of me.
And then, the most interesting and strangest thing I have ever witnessed happened.” Reaper just stood there wide-eyed, he had never heard the story of my Axe before.
‘The Zombies stood there, and looked at me.
I wasn’t about to just stand around and have a little Tea Party with them, I ran at them, yelling at the top of my lungs with my axe above my head. A number of them came to their senses and walked forward with their arms outstretched, they were the first to go. I cleaved their heads in two.
I’m not sure how it happened, I wasn’t focusing on anything at that point, but at one point I had lost my Axe, and I was furious, I ran towards the next one and grabbed his head with one hand and started to squeeze. I squeezed and I squeezed until I felt it give way in my fist, I tore the Zombie’s forehead off and pulled his brain out piece by piece until there was nothing left inside, the Zombie falling limp onto the ground, and just like that, it was over.’
Reaper looked shocked, ‘You must have been pretty pissed. You always seemed more level headed than that. What happened afterwards?’
‘I collapsed and someone found me among the bodies. I woke up in the Hospital the next day, a few bruises but surprisingly, nothing serious.
After that, I was told that I should’ve been Court-Martialed, but instead I was promoted and they put me in the Green Berets, soon after I was told to lead a Platoon down to Arizona to control an outbreak down there, soon after I joined your crew and here we are.’
Reaper looked at me and I looked at him for a long time, Reaper seemed to be looking for something to say, so I finished the conversation for him, ‘So to conclude my friend, you know that I can and will attack a Zombie on command, and you know that I am a trained Soldier. Here’s what I’ve been trying to get at all this time: If I ever run into you, and you are no longer yourself, I will kill you with my bare hands.’
Reaper paused and then replied, ‘I hope so. Goodbye my friend.’
‘Not goodbye,’ I stated, ‘I’ll see you later."
Excerpt from the battle log of James S. Code Named: Watcher.
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