Thorn Within

"But that's not fair to him!"

"Yes! It is!"

"Pray, tell me how!"

"Because he knows!"

She calmed down, the blazing shafts of sunlight caught in the beads of sweat on her forehead. His shout still echoed in the room, slowly consuming his voice until it died down into a loud silence in a corner. The platoon was out on the grounds playing football, and from where they were standing they could both see Kuzner running after the ball. Albert Kuzner, she thought. Of all the people, it had to be Albert Kuzner. Damien hadn't said anything after the argument but she could feel his eyes watching her.

When she'd broken into the lab three days ago, the drawings had shocked her senseless... their only chance of victory against the invaders was a certain superweapon, and she was curious to find out what it was. Her first clue was the lack of resources: they'd run through their supply of metal a week ago, but somehow, Capt. McKinsey managed to stay on track for getting the weapon ready. And then, she'd found out the weapon was really Albert Kuzner.

Damien started to say something but stopped. Tears were beginning cloud her eyes, her vision, beginning to stream down her cheeks. She began to sob, gently at first, but then the loneliness and the injustice broke into her world and she wept. Damien held on to her in a tight but limp embrace. It was not a humanitarian gesture, no; it was an instance of the occasional reflection a soldier has about the people he's going to kill and what it's going to mean in a world without wars. It was a journey made in a split-second to their last day with parents and lovers and children, a vacation taken to reassure themselves that they weren't dead inside.

Moments after sunset, the siren sang its song and the men and women began to shuffle into the showers before they joined one last time for the day over dinner. Sporadic whistles sounded as she entered the men's shower-cells but died out soon enough: nobody wanted to tick off Sgt. Lynn. She found Kuzner by the tell-tale yellow jacket slung over the closed door took the cell next to him. One minute passed. Two minutes passed. Three minutes passed. Then, she saw it - the mark on his lower back. A circular scar, slightly blue from infection.

"Kuzner?"

"Yeah- Sgt. Lynn! What're you-"

"Oh, just felt like some change."

"Ah! Gotcha!"

She didn't say anything else, and a few more minutes later, the valves all shut off in unison and the men left for their rooms. Kuzner knows, she thought, and she could see it in the way he walked. He didn't smile at all and he didn't joke or jest like the other men. He walked alone and in silence, and he walked with a measured pace and posture. It was all very... trained, composed... all too deliberate.

Two weeks passed without much event. The foundries were busy churning out muzzles, bullets, nails and crowbars. The recruits were busy digging trenches on the eastern and northeastern fronts and racking up sandbags. The administrative folk were busy scheduling operational procedures, logistics, transportation, and finalizing evacuation procedures. And then, for some time after all the ruckus, there was a day of silence.

Precisely a day. At sunset, Wednesday, March 25, 3091, a volley of the Fumare ballistic missiles could be seen rising up into the air against an argent moon, plumes of smoke resting against the still wind in their rapturous wake. Damien looked on defiantly as he manned the only remaining AA gun, the rest of the soldiers manning assault turrets, prism towers and Gatling canons. Underneath the base' structure, a moderately sized nuclear-proofed bunker housed forty cramped technicians controlling UAVs and the robotic Battle Fortress tanks.

As more and more missiles rose, she watched from atop one of the turret-towers. Kuzner walked to the gate - or what was left of it - and stood at ease just beyond the perimeter, his arms latched behind him. As the missiles scaled all the skies, the noise of their motors fell off one by one until a destructive foreboding seemed to accompany them. A sudden clang caught the attention of the entire station, and they watched two rods of chromium extend out of Kuzner's houlders, bend around a self-prepared joint, and drive themselves through the ground. Through his torso, two short muzzles jutted out, something like the Hooded Mergansers they'd seen fire at thousands of rounds per minute. Belts of bullets wrapped around his wrists and forearms, and a red gleam swam through his eyes.

For each bullet that he fired, for each missile rocketing out of a barrel of his neck, for each empty cartridge that fell to his feet, for each jet of smoke that he spewed from the pores in his skin, she could only see the monster that was on their side, brutally ripping through an army they were yet to see. She couldn't tell if she still saw him as a human being, or if she was the enemy for seeing him in the same light that the invaders did: a target. But she knew that she was convincing herself of his sacrifice, the service he was rendering to mankind by shielding selfish rogues like herself from certain death.

All's fair in love and war, and when it erases the thin line between individual gain and the humanitarian spirit for which it was fought, she knew that men would turn into animals because they'd been ordered to and nothing else. She knew that Albert Kuzner, deep within his metalloid heart, was comfortable with being used because that'd absolve him of his bestial indulgence, but she also knew that he fired with a knowledge of the inherent fallacy. She knew that she was seeing a seething monster in Kuzner without shedding a tear, but she also finally understood why goodness was incompatible with being human.