GK fic: Static (Part 4/4)
Part Three
Sixty-six
Sixty-seven
Sixty-eight
*
They're down to their last thirty-two MREs. Nate doesn't know what to do. Ray's protective of his goats and it's not like they reproduce quickly anyway. He counts the goats and the MREs. Forty-one. It's not much. He tells the men to split each MRE in half and share. They look at him like he's betraying them, and maybe he is.
He gives his half of today's MRE to Ray, who still seems pissed about his hole. He's got dark circles under his eyes from spending every night in it and snaps at anyone who even looks at him wrong. He takes the food Nate gives him with a look on his face that's half-grateful, half-pissed.
"Just eat it," Nate commands. When he walks away he scratches his neck viciously and his nails come away a bit bloody.
*
Because he still believes that healthy bodies make healthy minds, Rudy organizes a football game. Everyone else views it as an opportunity to try and fuck each other up under the guise of sportsmanship.
There was a time when they might have gone head-to-head with Alpha but now they just split up more or less down the middle, shirts versus skins. The football they’re playing with is a relic, a little flat and obviously repaired, and there are some subtle elbows being thrown already, but it feels nice all the same.
Nate doesn’t play. Even now he’s not really comfortable stepping into his men’s space as if he’s their equal. They asked, but he said he should sit out to make the teams more even. Brad sits out too, which fucks that excuse up, but he says he has to clean his rifle. He hasn’t had to fire it for ten days, since he shot a husk of a body they saw on patrol, but he does clean it while they stand on the sidelines, meticulously, only glancing at the action. He doesn’t seem that interested.
The game is aggressive from the start, even though they’re all too scrawny and fragile-looking. The elbows turn into semi-friendly grappling and a huge dose of shit talking. With Q-Tip leading the way, the skins gain some ground, which leads to a little skirmish between some of the guys. Nate doesn’t have to step in. They handle it themselves.
“I might as well not even exist,” Nate mutters while Ray circles through the skins, saying something to Rudy about needing his sister’s shorts back.
Brad grunts, squinting through the sight on his rifle. He makes a minute adjustment and looks again. Nate rolls his eyes.
The game moves up and down the field behind the hamlet in inches of sandburn and swears. There doesn't seem to be an end zone on either side; they just keep moving back and forth under the hot sun.
Brad shakes out a part of his rifle, examining it for sand. Wordlessly he hands the stock to Nate so he can dig his finger into a nook, flicking sand granules away. Out of his pocket he produces one bullet, the only one he must have left, and loads it.
On the field Lovell calls Garza a little brown football failure and the skins move some more while Brad takes his rifle back and snaps it all back into place, giving it a firm once-over before he clicks it back into its strap and lets it hang. He glances at the field and then looks up at a thin wisp of a cloud.
Ray and Rudy face off in the scrimmage. Ray throws down some verbal shit but Rudy’s rock solid and ignores him when they move. Ray makes a grab at him and gets tossed on his ass. Nate sees his face twist up, but the action's already moving further into shirts' territory, passing him by. Brad and Nate watch him get up, circling around the pack of men to where Rudy is patting Q-Tip on the shoulder. His back is to Ray, but that doesn't stop Ray from flinging himself at Rudy, buckling Rudy's knees with the force of his weight.
He's yelling while he crawls on top of Rudy, his voice grating over, "Motherfucker! You goddamn fucking piece of shit!” and going further, talking about PTSD and some kind of high school hurt.
Rudy shoves him back and rolls them, one large fist coming back so far the point of his elbow seems to touch the sun, slamming back down, over and over.
They're too far away to do anything so they just watch while Garza and Stinetorf pull Rudy up and Jacks lifts a still spitting and swinging Ray clear off the ground.
"Get the fuck off of me," Ray howls, squirming against Jacks. Jacks shakes his head but drops him anyway. He starts striding away, still running his mouth, dirt down his back, his shirt rucked up.
Nate doesn't realize Brad's gone until he sees Brad walking along the edge of the crowd after Ray, his rifle slung across his shoulders.
"Ray! Brother! Ray!” Rudy yells, no longer being held back, just standing there.
It's not the kind of thing Nate would usually hear, but except for Ray it's still quiet, so he can pick up Brad's voice calling to Ray, asking if he's okay. Ray doesn't respond to that, still walking away. He brushes at the dirt on his hip and then looks at his hand.
Brad stops walking. He's barely ten feet behind Ray when he does. "What the fuck is that?" he asks. The question carries even though he still says it quietly. Ray keeps going, wiping his hand on his trousers. Everyone is watching.
"Ray!" Brad barks, and Ray stops. He doesn't turn around and he doesn't pull his shirt down to cover the wound on the back of his hip, a darkly bruised bite that's oozing blackish-red blood.
*
He says he doesn’t remember when he got it, his arms crossed in front of his chest.
“It’s not like there are that many options,” Walt says, sounding struck.
“It was probably then,” Ray says indifferently, like it doesn’t matter, like remembering a blindingly painful bite in the middle of a choking shamal is beneath him. The tape holding the gauze onto the wound stretches around his hip, reaching toward his navel. He was silent when Walt cleaned him up, looking anywhere else.
He glances back over his shoulder, looking way back to where Brad is standing by the five stones, more than fifty feet away. Since he saw the bite this is the closest he’s come to Ray.
Ray’s smirking when he faces forward. He makes a gun with his fingers and points it at his temple with a mean flourish.
“I guess that’s me, then,” he says, pretending to blow his brains out.
*
Even though he has dark circles under his eyes and favours his left side, Ray says he’s fine. And he seems fine enough, right now, so Nate lets him go. He retreats into his hut, followed by Walt and Reporter. Everyone else sits around the fire and avoid talking about it.
Brad’s not around. Sometimes he can be seen watching them from a distance, still in his PT shirt with his rifle slung over his shoulder, and sometimes he’s gone completely.
“Like a goddamn ghost,” Steve says, watching Brad’s figure climb down the side of a berm.
Nate watches Brad pick up one of the dented pails they use to gather water, heading off in the direction of the well.
“Yeah,” Nate says, looking at the slump of Brad’s shoulders as he walks away.
*
Sometime around o'dark-thirty Nate finds Brad standing out in the middle of the desert, staring up at the sky. He's fairly glowing, lit up by the stars.
Nate stands beside him but doesn't bother looking up. Brad blinks slowly. It's as much of an acknowledgement as Nate expects.
He looks up at the stars. They're clearly visible tonight, no cloud cover to mar the silver light shining down on the sand, reflecting off Brad's helmet and the barrel of his rifle.
"It really all was a mistake," Brad says after a while.
Nate nods.
"This will be worse than any of the others," Brad says. He blinks up at the stars.
"Yeah," Nate says, nodding again. He can't imagine.
"Some Marine Killer."
Nate can't respond to that. Brad sounds hurt behind the wall he's building around himself, so he reaches out, clasping Brad's bony shoulder.
"Whatever you need, as trite as it sounds."
Brad glances down at the hand on his shoulder, at Nate's face. One side of his mouth lifts minutely.
"Thanks, LT."
Nate shakes his head. "Nate."
Brad maybe smirks; even with the light it's hard to decipher the specific muscle twitches of Brad's mouth. "Nate," he says finally.
Nate lets his hand fall back. "Don't forget it."
Brad looks back up at the stars. Nate thinks about leaving him there, but can't quite do it.
They stay there for a long time, Brad off in his own world and Nate thinking about this one.
*
"So, when's my time?" Ray asks when they emerge from the hut in the morning. He looks like shit lit up, manic and pale. "Do I get to pick or are you just gonna clip me at random? Because I'd way rather know when I'm gonna go so I can be ready and Walt can be on standby with the shovel."
Brad just stares at him like he's speaking Arabic instead of English.
"I mean, goddamn," Ray says, "it's my fucking brains getting blown out, Brad. I deserve to pick when and where they're gonna splatter."
"Not now," Brad says, waving Ray off. He starts walking away fast.
"What the fuck do you mean, not now?" Ray calls after Brad. "Who put you in charge of this bullshit?"
"You did," Brad says over his shoulder, still striding away. Ray looks over at Nate and Nate shrugs. Ray rubs a hand over his clammy face.
*
The camp is divided. Talking to Ray is difficult. He's clearly ill now, clammy and shaky. It seems impossible that Ray hid this as long as he did. He snaps at them all, even Nate, although he pretends to apologize after. Everyone waves his apologies away, uncomfortable.
Talking to Brad is not worth the effort. He always has his rifle on him and his eyes skate over Ray whenever they're in proximity. He gives his rations to whoever's closest, and sometimes he nods for them to be passed to Ray but he doesn’t say shit. Ray frowns at them and passes everything but the Pop Tarts and Skittles to someone else.
Nate isn't sure what to write in his notebook. He looks at the blank pages for days fifty-two through seventy and taps his pen there. He forces out a few sentences about tension but none of it feels genuine.
Finally he writes, Ray's going to die and Brad's going to shoot him and shuts the book, going to help Poke and Lilley dig the ashes out of the fire pit.
*
They meet in the dark again, Brad staring at a far away berm this time instead of the stars. His Kevlar isn't done up.
“It’s so dark,” he says. “We’re so vulnerable.”
“Human beings don’t like the dark,” Nate says agreeably, shifting next to Brad, their shoulders brushing. “We never feel safe if we can’t see.”
“It’s the truth,” Brad murmurs. He swipes a hand over his eyes.
"You need to sleep," Nate tells him.
Brad shrugs. It would look petulant on anyone else. "Too much to think about."
"You're telling me that you of all people are having a problem compartmentalizing."
Brad cuts him a look at the disbelieving tone. "It's not all handjobs and rainbows in here," he says, tapping his temple.
"Too bad," Nate says. "But still, Brad. You can’t go on like this."
Brad arches an eyebrow. His mouth does something strange, another one of those hard-to-follow tics.
"Give me a handjob and I'll think about sleeping," he says.
Nate looks for the joke, but can't find it. Brad's watching him evenly.
"It's not like I'm gonna shoot you," Brad says silkily, stroking his finger over the trigger on his rifle.
Nate shakes his head. He sees what it is now: a challenge. Part of the wall-building. He's supposed to walk away, disgusted, so Brad can be a Marine-killing martyr.
He steps up and raps a knuckle three times against Brad's belt buckle instead. Brad's hands drop automatically to his sides, his rifle swinging.
Nate doesn't strip Brad, just worms a hand inside his cammies, leaving enough room for it to move. Brad's cock isn't hard when Nate finds it, but he feels the throb that's the start of an erection when he grips it.
Doing this feels like crossing some kind of line so Nate avoids Brad's face while he strokes. Instead he stares at the strap of Brad's Kevlar, moving when Brad does.
"It's not your fault," Nate finds himself saying softly, pumping Brad in that old reliable rhythm. "Really, it's not."
Brad shudders lightly, his hips flexing.
With his other hand steady over the strap of Brad's rifle on his shoulder, Nate murmurs, "We all got fucked this time. Some of us are just more fucked than others."
Brad's hand comes up, resting on the left side of Nate's vest, where his heart is. Nate rubs him quicker, still looking at the strap, the horizon of Brad's shoulder, anywhere other than his face.
"It's just another thing to deal with in the shit," Nate says, soothingly. He's jerking to the pace of Brad's staccato breathing, rolling his wrist. He hasn't touched Brad like this since the night he dreamed of dying.
"Another bullet," he says, "another body. It doesn't matter, Brad."
Brad makes a choking noise, a cross between a word and a sob, his palm pressing down on Nate.
"Just one more thing," Nate says. "One more thing you have to do because no one else will." He's squeezing Brad's cock now, just waiting for it.
He says, "It doesn't matter," at the same time Brad says, "Stop," at the same time he comes. Nate looks at him and he looks like he's been shot, agonized, unable to recover.
Brad's palm shoves him back, warm come sliding off his fingers and onto the dark sand. He stumbles but doesn't fall.
"Jesus fucking Christ," Brad says, wiping his fingers over his mouth, racing to do his cammies back up. "What the fuck was that?"
Nate blinks. "I don't know. It just came over me."
Brad's hands are shaking as he checks his rifle and his belt. "Did you mean it?"
Nate clenches his own hand, semen clinging between his fingers. "No. I'm sorry. It does matter, Brad."
Brad takes a deep breath. "Fuck," he says, wiping his face again. He looks at the berm he was looking at when Nate came up.
Nate rubs his palm on the thigh of his trousers and then scratches the raw spot on his neck. He feels itchy all over.
When Brad looks back at him all Nate can see is the wall, fully in place now.
"Don't do that again," Brad commands and there's nothing for Nate to do but nod and slink away, leaving Brad to it. He uses precious water to wash his hand twice when he ducks into their hut, scrubbing his palm and the soft spaces in between his fingers.
*
Just like Pappy before him, Ray gets sicker, quickly deteriorating before their eyes. He pales under his tan and the peeling across his cheekbones, his eyes turning dark and dull, sunken into the circles underneath them. He snaps at them all and drinks his and Walt's water rations, not that Walt cares about that. He drinks Brad's water rations and Brad doesn't even notice.
Ray drags a blanket out of his hut and the collapsed lawn chair out of Rudy's, dragging it so close to the fire one of the arms go soft from the heat. He sits there, wrapped up, glowering at the fire, napping whenever he's completely alone.
Brad cuts a huge swath around him, like he's more infectious than he appears. Ray yells at him whenever he's not gulping down water or dozing.
"You can't do it forever," Poke says one day, "avoid him, I mean. Little motherfucker is gonna have to be shot sometime."
Brad grunts, tapping his fingers on his vest.
"Good deflection," Poke laughs. "You showed me, Marine Killer."
"Fuck off," Brad shoots back.
"No can do. We're all in this together, homes." Poke walks away from them then, chucking Ray on the shoulder and deftly avoiding the swing from his walking stick. Brad walks in the other direction, far from Ray, his chair and his stick. Poke turns and walks backward so he can keep an eye on everything.
*
Seventy-two
Seventy-three
Seventy four
*
Ray throws up bile, stinking yellow and flecked with blood. He jokes about no more martinis at happy hour but still lets Reporter and Walt drag him into a hut, his head lolling around, the toe of his boot dragging bile through the sand, pointing the way.
*
They meet each other in the Iraqi dark one more time. Nate keeps his hands to himself, only reaching out to hand Brad his own share of water, still cool from being inside the hut all day. Brad sips at it and stares down at the sand.
"I'm sorry," Nate says quietly. "For everything."
"Don't be," Brad replies. "There's no point."
"You're right. There’s not." It feels horrible and freeing to say all at the same time. Nate can almost feel the weight of it leaving his tongue, leaving behind a sour taste.
Brad nods, but there's no discernable expression on his face. He drinks some more water.
"I'm pretty tired," he says finally, passing the water back to Nate.
The stars are murky tonight, swamped with clouds, barely casting any light down on them.
"Yeah," Nate says, "me too."
*
Seventy-five
Seventy-six
On the seventy-seventh day, Ray loses it. Completely absolutely loses it. He sits in the chair he inherited for a while, watching Brad avoid him, anger building up on his face, making his hands clench on the wobbly chair arm.
Brad's pretending like he's never heard of Ray Person in his life. It only works for so long. Eventually he makes the mistake of walking past Ray's hole and Ray springs up as fast as he can, cutting Brad off before he can disappear.
"You fucking coward!" he yells. It shakes around the edges but carries from the hole back to the fire pit.
"What?" Brad answers, standing tall and still, looking like he's trying to be a million miles away without moving a muscle.
"You can't fucking do this to me, you fuck! I don't want to turn into one of those fucking things. You need to fucking shoot me, you dickbag. Or tell me your nuts have rotted off so I can shoot myself."
"I-" Brad says, and then sets his jaw. "Just give it some time."
"Time!" Ray yells. "I don't have any time! Just fucking kill me. I don't want to fuck around anymore, Brad."
Brad's gripping his rifle strap so tight his knuckles are bone-white. He looks at Ray and then back at the camp, where everyone is watching.
"Ray-" he says and Ray steps up to him and shoves him as hard as he can, cutting him off.
"You fuck!" Ray yells and shoves him again, so he stumbles down into the hole. "I can't believe you're going to let me become a monster because you're a fucking pussy piece of shit. What happened to the Marine Killer?"
With Brad in the hole they're the same height, staring at each other.
Ray raises one shaky, bruised finger and points it at Brad's face. When he speaks he does so slowly, like Brad's half-deaf. "I want to die, Brad. Don't make me shoot myself like a hari kari fuckface."
Brad doesn't agree. He looks away from Ray's ghoulish face as he steps out of the hole and sidesteps him to circle around back to the hamlet. With every step his face gets colder. Ahead of him Trombley’s about to walk across his path but he stops dead when he sees Brad’s face, and even steps back to avoid him. Brad strides by and Trombley retreats further.
He bypasses the hamlet completely, ignoring the quiet murmuring: What's he doing?, Here it goes, We're all dead now. Still walking, his face shut down and frosty, Brad unslings his rifle from his shoulder. Almost a hundred feet back Ray's face turns, relieved and terrified. He looks like his knees might collapse but he stays standing, although his eyes close tight.
But Brad doesn't turn around and fire. Instead he hefts it the wrong way, holding it by the barrel with both hands. He's walking faster now, testing the weight of the gun in his hands, quickly approaching the slumped figure of Bub, who barely moves anymore. He yells something related to Fuck and swings his rifle as hard as he can. Bub's head tears clean off, rolling across the sand. The body sags against the threadbare ropes, completely lifeless.
Brad doesn't even stop. He drops his rifle and keeps going, walking off into the desert. Everyone stays where they are, stunned, until Ray starts moving, following Brad's footprints. He picks up Brad's rifle, slinging it over his own shoulder, standing where he dropped it. He yells after Brad, once, twice, and then he just jogs to catch up, his voice suddenly lowering and his hands open. Brad is looking straight ahead, but he does slow down so he and Ray are walking at the same pace.
*
Nate and Brad don't meet in the dark this time. Brad doesn't come back for rations and Ray just shrugs when someone asks.
"Couldn't tell you, dude," he says. He seems more peaceful now.
Nate stands aside from the fire and squints into the dark, but everything is still, no bodies and no Brad. He waits, long past the time Ray has hobbled off to his hut, past the last watch. Eventually it's just him and the dying fire and the soft swirl of the wind. That's when he starts walking, looking for Brad's familiar shape.
He walks out to the well and the one lonesome tree. The rope attached to the well's cover has worn smooth from the hands of nineteen Marines. The water inside isn't as high as it used to be, but it still clearly reflects Nate's face, ugly and thin. Brad's not there, nor is he further out. Nate stands on top of a berm and looks to the west but it's just empty space.
Turning around he looks back, looking at the dim hamlet and the continuing darkness beyond. He shouldn't be doing this alone, but everyone's spooked by the idea of Brad right now. So Nate slowly lifts his rifle up so he can look through the sight on it.
Brad shouldn't be alone out here either.
He scans the terrain slowly, foot by foot, until he sees what he's looking for. He's not surprised where he has to look. Reslinging his rifle he sets down the side of the berm, one foot in front of the other.
He makes some noise so Brad will know he's coming, if he doesn't know already. It's a courtesy he doubts Brad needs, even now.
As he approaches the hole he can see the gleam of Brad's rifle laid across his body, the stock resting on his crotch and the muzzle resting near the pulse in his throat. It's the same way he sleeps sometimes. He's sitting up in the hole, leaning against the side, even though there's enough space that he could lie down. Nate might not have found him if he had done that.
Nate steps close enough to see Brad's quietly despondent face. Brad's staring at his own boots.
"This is his grave," he says dully. "He dug his own grave."
He runs one hand over the hard-packed edge.
Nate crouches and sets his rifle down, parallel to Brad's body in the grave.
"Then why are you in it?" he asks.
There’s a long pause and then Brad says, "I couldn't shoot him." He says. "I can't, Nate."
"Then don't," Nate says, gently.
"I shot Pappy." Brad shifts, pushing back against the side of the hole, scratching the edge so a little dirt crumbles onto his thigh. "He asked me to."
"Someone will take care of it, Brad," Nate says, and what he means is I will take care of it, because it always should have been him, so many days ago. "You don't have to do it."
Brad looks at his dirty fingers and then up at Nate. He seems to be coming back to himself slowly, the haunted look receding a little.
"Thank you," he says.
Nate smiles at him because he needs it. He picks up his rifle again and steps close to the edge of Ray's grave.
He extends his hand down for Brad to take and his voice is still gentle when he says, "Get out of the hole, Brad.”
*
81
82
I am so tired.
*
Time feels like it's slowing down, more and more every day. They're all so hungry and tired that every minute feels like an eternity. Nate can hardly be bothered to write anymore but when he does there's either nothing to say or he starts writing and when he stops he's left looking at pages of scared ramblings about being afraid to die like this.
He burns those pages in what little fire they can keep going. He has to push through the rest of the platoon to get at the flames.
Hardly anyone speaks anymore, too busy counting breaths and watching the flames. Even Ray doesn't bother. He sits closest to the fire than anyone else, sipping the water Walt gives him, some of it trickling down his chin because he's too sick to really be there anymore.
They're broken, all of them. Nate will be surprised if they all live another month.
Brad's the worst by far. He's a thin as the rest of them, as tired, but that's nothing in comparison to the guilt he seems to be carrying around. He spends a lot of time staring at the stone markers, and then Ray, clearly feeling the weight of the things he has done and the one thing he couldn't do.
Nate can’t help him. He has his own guilt. It's an impossible situation but he's the leader and he hates the job he's done leading these good men out here to die. He spends a lot of time alone, sitting in the hut, shivering in his cammies even though it’s hot, trying to put into words where he went wrong.
I, he writes and then stops. I never should have stopped here
He crosses it out.
I never should have stopped here
I should have worked harder to make sure we would survive longer
He crosses that out too.
I never should have stopped here
I should have worked harder to make sure we would survive longer
I should have shot them all and then myself
No. He couldn’t have, even if he wanted to.
I never should have stopped here
I should have worked harder to make sure we would survive longer
I should have shot them all and then myself
I should have never joined the Corps. It was a mistake. I'm sorry.
*
He wants to rip the page out but he makes himself keep it in and even signs the bottom of the page, Lieutenant Nathaniel Fick and the date as well as he remembers it. He won't write anymore.
*
On the eighty-fourth day, Ray slips into a coma in front of the fire. No one probably would have noticed if not for the baby goat jumping out of his lap, bleating loudly and running off, kicking its back legs.
Walt shakes Ray's shoulder, holding out his canteen but Ray's head just flops to the side and settles there.
"Ray?" Walt asks, something scared dawning in his voice. "Ray, wake up."
Ray doesn’t move.
"Shit," Walt stutters, "Shit! LT!"
Nate hasn't moved at anything faster than a wander in weeks, but he runs when he hears the shrill waver in Walt's voice. Ray's face under his hands is cool and waxy-feeling and it's impossible to see if his chest is moving underneath the heavy woven blanket draped across his body.
"Ray!" Nate calls, his voice picking up that same waver. "Ray, wake up!"
He sticks a hand under the blanket, feeling more waxy skin and the thickness of his breastbone. Nate is frantic, terrified of what he might find. It's hard to stay still and concentrate and for a few seconds there's nothing at all, but when he focuses he can just barely feel the shallow breaths Ray's still taking.
"He's alive," Nate says, too loud. "He's still alive."
Walt's hand bumps up against his, pressing down against a weak exhale.
"Thank you, Jesus," Walt sighs.
Nate pulls his hand away. Walt's stays. "We need to move him." Walt nods hesitantly, removing his hand, tucking the blanket around Ray tightly.
They each take one side of the lawn chair, lifting it carefully. Neither of them are that strong anymore, but Ray weighs almost nothing so they manage to lift him the necessary few inches off the ground, taking slow steps toward the hut.
Walt is swearing under his breath, more colourful swears than Nate has ever heard from him. Mixed in with the swearing are prayers, fervent and equally colourful.
The door to the hut is wide and poorly made, covered with a blanket that matches the one covering Ray. Walt swats at it while they guide the chair through the door, still mumbling.
The hut Ray shares with Walt and Reporter is still full of the detritus of the well-off Iraqis, the Super Nintendo tangled up in the cords, the other half of Moby Dick, some dusty old VHS tapes. Mixed in with all of that is articles of clothing, Ray's Kevlar, and tools taken from the Humvee.
They set Ray on a futon that looks like it came from IKEA about fifteen years ago. He doesn't move at all. Walt checks his breathing again while Nate resettles the blanket.
"When," Walt asks quietly, his tucking the hand he touched Ray with under his armpit, "do you think he'll die?"
It looks like it could be any moment.
"I don't know," Nate admits. "I can't remember how long it took Pappy to die."
"Me either," Walt says, even quieter. Nate takes a big breath at the same time Ray takes a little one.
"Ray's cut from a different cloth than the rest of us. Don't give up on him yet, Walt."
Walt shakes his head fiercely. "I won't," he says. He sticks his hand under the blanket again, feeling Ray breathe, a stubborn look set on his face.
Nate suddenly feels so proud he can hardly stand there beside Walt. He puts one hand on Walt's shoulder and clenches the other into a fist to try and deal with the burden of what he's feeling.
*
He doesn't stay for long. It's too hard to see Ray like that. He leaves Walt at Ray’s side and runs right into the rest of the platoon, standing close to the hut's doorway. They look like a pack of bodies, hungry for news instead of flesh.
"He's not dead," Nate tells them. "But it won't be long." No one says anything but their sad faces get sadder.
"I'm sorry," Nate says and he is. Not just for this, but for everything. There are some nods but still no one says anything. Nate figures he deserves about as much.
*
He doesn’t even bother asking anyone. He just squints into the sharp sunlight, searching for one long shadow in the desert, letting his sense of dread guide him. Brad's standing almost at attention out there, but he's not quite right. Instead of having his rifle in position it's down at his side, his hand holding it by the muzzle like he might drop it at any moment. But he might not. He might use it one more time.
Nate swallows, looking at Brad. He knows what he has to do and what might happen, but he's still in charge. So he turns away from Brad, looking for Reporter's Kevlar and sharp chin.
"Evan," he says when he finds him, standing guard to the door of his hut. "I want to give you this."
He's holding out his notebook, the one he's been carrying in his vest for all these days.
Reporter's brow furrows, but he takes the notebook anyway, opening it to the exact middle, reading over what he finds. His eyebrows shoot up and he flips to the first page and then the last, checking the dates.
"You might be able to use it," Nate says. The missing weight on his chest feels strange. Evan nods readily enough, tucking the book under his arm with his own.
And then, for a reason Nate will never understand, he unclips his rifle and holds it out too.
"And this," he says.
"I can't," Reporter says, trying to rebuff the rifle with his hand.
Nate holds it out again. "I know you can shoot. There's six bullets left in the clip."
Reporter takes it, but sets it down to lean against the side of the hut. He rubs his fingers together like they’re dirty.
Nate scratches the back of his neck for a moment. He thinks about shaking Reporter's hand, but that feels too final. Instead he says, "See you later," smiling shakily at Reporter before he walks away.
*
Brad's moving further into the desert, slowly but steadily. Nate keeps pace with him for a while, following from a respectable distance. He doesn't want the men to see this.
When he can't see the hamlet anymore shimmering behind him anymore he starts to take two steps for every one Brad takes.
Brad's back slowly stops shimmering, the lines of him becoming more and more clear as Nate catches up. The rifle in Brad’s hand must be hot, but he keeps carrying it in that loose grip. Long minutes into the desert he starts slowing down. Nate speeds up.
Before he can get there Brad stops suddenly, swaying, going slowly to his knees on the sand, his rifle dragging behind him. Sweat trickles down Nate’s back, cold across his spine.
Nate’s voice comes out weaker than he’d like when he says, “Brad…” so soft he has to say it again. Brad doesn’t look, but he does pull his rifle closer.
Nate clears his throat. “He’s not dead, Brad.”
Brad’s chin is almost touching his chest. He doesn’t reply.
“You don’t have to shoot him. Do you remember me telling you that? I meant it.” Nate steps closer, so he’s near Brad’s rifle. He tries to appear calmer than he is. His shirt is sticking to his back now, and there is something cold in his veins.
Nate crouches so he can see Brad's tilted-down face. He feels strange without the weight of his rifle, vulnerable.
"Are you listening to me?" he asks. Brad blinks. His eyelashes are dusty-looking against the tan of his cheeks.
"No," Brad says, completely straight-faced. It's not a joke.
Nate reaches out, for the gun or Brad's shoulder, one of them, and Brad stiffens. It's hardly a movement, but Nate feels it. His hand freezes in the air, curved around an invisible bicep. "I'm unarmed."
Brad's silent again. Nate's hand drops a few inches, settling on his own knee. They must look so strange, frozen in this thin and desperate tableau. Like some religious epiphany gone horribly wrong.
Nate can hear the wind picking up and he sighs tiredly. The sun is beating down hot on his bare head.
"You should give me the gun," he says quietly, trying to make it a suggestion. "I told you you didn't need it."
Brad shifts his grip on his rifle, pulling it closer to his armpit.
"Talk to me," Nate says. He's reaching out again. "Give me the gun, Brad."
His fingers brush worn fabric and the butt of Brad's rifle hitting his jaw is a surprise. He can hear the thick thump inside his face as he falls backwards on his ass. The sand is burning his hands and he can feel his heart beating hot under the skin of his jaw.
There's the echo of the Don’t fucking touch me Brad yelled in the air, but Nate wasn't listening so he missed it. He shakes his head, trying to shrug off the pain but he can't.
Brad is staring at him with frosty eyes, his rifle half-raised, his fingers closer to the trigger.
Nate's not afraid of him. He's angry. The coldness in his veins lights on fire, propelling him off his hands and toward Brad.
He tackles Brad and takes the stock of the rifle to the chest, but it doesn't hurt now. Nate's beyond that. He uses his weight to take Brad down onto the sand and scrabbles to get around the lever of the rifle.
"You dumb fuck," he's saying. "You dumb piece of shit. I'm trying to help you." He gets a fist around the rifle and slams it into Brad's mouth, following through with his elbow. His blood boils at the slick crack and the blood that starts trickling out of Brad's nose. "Give me the fucking gun!"
Brad hardly looks dazed. "No," he spits, blood splattering Nate' face.
Nate tries to hit him again, but Brad shoves the rifle up, blocking the shot. Nate grabs the rifle, his hands outside of Brad's, trying to twist it away, Brad twisting it the opposite direction.
The air smells like blood, Brad's blood and the blood rushing through Nate's ears, loud like a shamal. He's not thinking about helping Brad anymore. His mind is split between getting the gun and going for Brad's throat.
Brad is snarling at him like he's thinking something similar, wearing a beard of blood, little snakes of it staining his blouse, blowing out with every breath. Nate wonders how much blood Brad has to lose.
His knee is digging into the thick part of Brad's thigh, but when he lets go of the rifle to try and choke Brad out Brad kicks out his ankle and forces the gun up, hitting Nate in the Adam's apple.
Clotheslined and gasping Nate rolls to the side to get away from the rifle, feeling sick. Brad rolls the other way, coming to his feet, still holding the gun.
Nate gets up, but he's not as fast as Brad, who's advancing, sand stirring under his feet, grains of it flying in the wind. Nate has to scramble, but he's not quick enough. He regains his footing at the same time Brad hefts the rifle like a club, swinging it.
It's like being hit with a huge wave. There's no pain, just sudden pressure on the side of his skull that makes all of Nate's murderous thoughts turn to static.
When he hits the ground it starts to hurt, pain that makes his vision grey out. He can't move his limbs but he rolls over onto his back, moaning. In a place that doesn't hurt he vaguely knows that Brad's going to kill him soon.
For a second he can see: greyish-blue sky, then it's gone again. The pain is still coming, whock-whock-whock.
Time is slow, measured in heartbeats and the rolling pain. Nate tries to think of something meaningful: his mother or something good he’s done, but Brad’s yelling. It’s so hard to focus.
He sees again, a sharp black cloud across the blue sky. It must be the rifle. He can’t sense Brad but he’s waiting for the blow to come. It might only take one, if Brad’s aim is still good.
He can’t feel Brad though. Maybe it’s only been a second. He doesn’t know. His vision is fading around the edges, sharpening in the center. The black cloud isn’t Brad’s gun and the rushing isn’t the wind.
Brad steps up and over him while his senses dim down to a flickering point, waving his rifle in the air, yelling, “Hey! Hey! Jesus Christ, it’s a fucking helicopter! Hey!” his voice shattering with pain and relief.
*
For a while Nate doesn’t know what happens. Everything is snapshots: a full MRE in someone’s hands; the radio attached to a vest, buzzing away; Ray’s doll-like hand and the oxygen mask they put over his mouth; a Marine’s craggy face looking down on his, his thin mouth saying, We always come back for our own. His breath smells like cheese.
Nate wakes up in a clinic in America that looks like a basement hospital out of a WWII film. He has an IV in the back of his hand pumping him full of clear fluid. He can’t stay awake for long.
When he wakes up again he’s aware that time has passed although the clinic looks the same, sunlight slanting across his cot. He can hear again, clear in the centre and muffled around the edges. He can hear Reporter talking.
There’s a TV on the wall, some dinky little thing sitting on a bolted shelf. Reporter’s on TV, sitting up in a real white hospital bed, Nate’s notebook in his hands. He’s reading from it, his finger tracing the lines he’s reading so he doesn’t lose his place. Sometimes he comments, explaining terms like AO and shamal, saying, I didn’t write this. Lieutenant Fick did. These are his words. He keeps reading and the camera keeps filming.
It doesn’t sound real. Coming out in Reporter’s thin but calm voice it sounds like a story, pasted together and insincere.
Someone behind the camera asks if he was afraid and Reporter nods seriously, his finger marking the page in Nate’s book.
Were they afraid? the voice asks. The Marines, I mean.
I don’t know, Reporter says. You’d have to ask them.
Whoever it is behind the camera laughs lightly.
Nate closes his eyes. He’s not crying but there are tears leaking down his cheeks. A passing nurse wipes them off with a piece of gauze and continues on her way.
*
Twenty-four men started an invasion together. Eighty-four days later nineteen men came back from a completely different invasion. Three of those men die in the American hospital, too sick and starved to come back to their old lives.
It’s over for them now and none of it means anything. The world is so much bigger than a hamlet in Iraq and their problems are so small in comparison.
They weren’t supposed to be found. It was just dumb luck, living Marines looking to set containment parameters for an experimental hunting camp.
But of course, they’re heroes, the new news and restricted radio say, their story touted around like a 1984 morale booster. Those who died are heroes for being dead and those who lived for living. If they can do it in an Iraqi desert, you can do it in one of the plush government-made compounds.
Nate watches it and listens and doesn’t quite believe it, despite the letter on his bedside from the President promising him a medal when they fix the world, whenever that will be.
He’s sitting on his cot that’s exactly the same as the one in the clinic, holding the letter, sort of reading …bravery such as yours must be rewarded, Captain Fick. There are soft wrinkles from where he’s held the fine stationary.
He puts it down on the bedside table again. It’s late. There’s no window in the closet that passes for the single room Nate’s rank affords him in the compound, but Nate knows. He hasn’t slept well but his body hasn’t given up its sense of time passing.
The clock says it’s after one-thirty in the morning. Nate doesn’t know what time it is in Iraq. It’s not important. He touches the thick clean bandage on the back of his neck while he stares at green LCD. A doctor at the clinic gave him some cream to reduce the scarring although a certain amount of scarring is to be expected. It doesn’t hurt. The cream has some kind of numbing agent in it so Nate can’t feel anything.
The compound is so quiet, the curfew well-reinforced to prevent break-ins. There are watchtowers manned by soldiers but the fence isn’t the greatest. Nate doesn’t worry about it; he hasn’t seen a body for weeks.
It’s quiet enough that he couldn’t miss the knock on his door, the three solid raps that echo.
Nate has a rifle in the space between his bedside table and his cot, loaded and ready, but he leaves it behind.
He’s not surprised to see Brad on the other side of the door, but he wasn’t expecting it either. Nate hasn’t seen him since he used Nate’s skull for batting practice.
Brad’s dressed like Nate, cammies and boots and his PT shirt, standing a safe distance from the door, his arms crossed. He’s without his rifle but Nate can see the handgun at his hip.
No military personnel are to go unarmed, in case they need to protect themselves and others.
Brad looks good, broader than Nate remembers, no more dip between his ribs and his stomach. He still has bruising in the corners of his eyes though, remnants of black eyes.
He blinks at Nate, taking stock too. If he’s pleased by what he finds he doesn’t show it.
“Good evening, sir,” he says. “All quiet on the Western front?”
There’s a spotlight starting a slow sweep from the far watch tower, inching around, searching for something wrong.
“As quiet as it can be,” Nate replies. He scratches the edge of the bandage on his throat. “What brings you to my door?”
Brad appears to shrug without moving. “Rounds.”
Nate’s not currently active, but he has enough intel to know Brad’s not either. He nods anyway.
“Anything?”
“Nothing to report. But you’re never really safe in the dark.”
“Is that so?” Nate leans on the steel doorframe. He feels oddly tense, like Brad’s trying to play a game with him but not sharing the rules.
“So I’ve heard,” Brad says levelly. He rubs underneath his eye lightly, careful of the bruise. He almost smiles and the bruise crinkles around the edges.
The spotlight is moving toward them, sliding from the ground up to the top of the fence and back, catching the numbers hastily painted on the doors to people’s rooms.
Nate looks back to Brad. “Have you seen Ray?”
Ray Person, a beacon of hope, the new reality TV winner, his sick face plastered all over the television while doctors talk about treating what they call The Disease. The cure seems to be working, they say. We may have found the answer.
“Yeah,” Brad says, making a tilting so-so signal with his palm. “He seems alright. He doesn’t have that black fucking Chow-Chow tongue anymore and he bleeds red instead of black ooze. I told him he was famous and he preened, the vain fuck, so he’s probably gonna be okay.”
“Good,” Nate says. Maybe now he can stop seeing Ray’s face every ten minutes on the news.
Brad tilts his head to the side. “I told him you said hello, which is a lie.”
Nate resists the urge to scratch. “Thanks,” he says lamely.
He’s important enough that he could get into the hospital to see Ray, or any of the others who haven’t gotten out yet. But he doesn’t want to. There’s a big part of him that desperately wants what happened to be the story Reporter told, with no consequences. He knows he’ll have to face it eventually, but later always seems like a better time.
Brad doesn’t press the issue further. Instead he glances at the spotlight and then says, “Nate,” quietly.
It sounds different than any other time he’s said it, asking without a question mark. It makes Nate’s guts go tight for a moment.
“Yeah,” he replies.
“We all made mistakes,” Brad says, like it’s supposed to mean something. There’s a shadow of discomfort on his face, almost impossible to see in the dark.
“You sound like me,” Nate says gruffly, feeling uncomfortable.
“And that’s okay,” Brad says. It’s unclear if he’s finishing or responding.
Nate wonders if this is Brad apologizing for the three-inch gash behind his ear, or the shots he fired. He’s not sure if he can handle that right now.
There’s nothing to do but nod and watch the spotlight creep up on them.
In the dark Brad steps closer, looking determined. He raises his hand and it takes effort to be still and look disaffected.
It feels so slow but it can’t be, Brad’s finger hooking underneath a loose edge of the bandage, worming in to touch the ridges of the scar tissue forming on Nate’s nape. The new skin there prickles but before Nate can shake him off the finger’s gone again, Brad halfway between where he just was and where he was standing when Nate opened the door.
Nate scratches the itch away reflexively. He can hardly feel his nails on his skin. Brad watches.
The spotlight shines over them then, lingering because they’re figures. Brad’s lit up from behind, so bright Nate can’t really see him. He shades his eyes. Brad is still looking, his fingers against his mouth.
The light doesn’t stay long. They must just look like two soldiers talking, not anything special or worth bullets, so the light slides off slowly, moving on to light up other dark doorways.
It’s dark again, too dark, but Nate can see better, the distance and the oddly open look on Brad’s face.
Nate steps out of the doorway, standing almost close enough to touch Brad if he wanted to.
“I don’t want to talk about mistakes,” he says.
Brad blinks at him, slowly. His mouth is a smooth line, giving nothing away.
“We don’t have to talk about anything,” Brad says.
In the desert Nate imagined being sick sometimes, in his paranoid moments, how it would feel, the heat of the fever and the ache of knowing you were going to die. This is nothing like that.
Nate asks, “Are you done your rounds?” and Brad says, “Yes,” exactly on time, his teeth just visible.
“Maybe we are safer in the dark,” Nate murmurs. “Just this once.”
Brad smiles at the joke, looking like a man Nate can’t really remember, it’s been so long. Or maybe this is the first time Nate’s seeing him.
Nate steps back, reaching for the doorknob as Brad steps forward, close enough for Nate to feel the heat of his body and his breath. He opens the door, taking sure steps back into the blackness of his room, Brad following him, kicking the door shut with his boot, dousing them in pure darkness.
There’s nothing to see, but there is everything else: Nate’s body going loose and free and hopeful, the clean smell of Brad, the feeling of his hungry mouth on Nate’s, and in the far-off distance, the sound of a siren going off.
Thanks to about a million people: amberlynne, shoshannagold, mclachlan, alethialia, snglesrvngfrend (again) for audiencing, listening to me whine, telling me I am good/a jerk and just pushing me along. And thanks to anyone who was like, "You're writing a story? That's pretty cool. I'll read that." Which was, oh, EVERYONE IN THE FANDOM. And if you made it this far and you're still reading then thanks for that too.
Sixty-six
Sixty-seven
Sixty-eight
*
They're down to their last thirty-two MREs. Nate doesn't know what to do. Ray's protective of his goats and it's not like they reproduce quickly anyway. He counts the goats and the MREs. Forty-one. It's not much. He tells the men to split each MRE in half and share. They look at him like he's betraying them, and maybe he is.
He gives his half of today's MRE to Ray, who still seems pissed about his hole. He's got dark circles under his eyes from spending every night in it and snaps at anyone who even looks at him wrong. He takes the food Nate gives him with a look on his face that's half-grateful, half-pissed.
"Just eat it," Nate commands. When he walks away he scratches his neck viciously and his nails come away a bit bloody.
*
Because he still believes that healthy bodies make healthy minds, Rudy organizes a football game. Everyone else views it as an opportunity to try and fuck each other up under the guise of sportsmanship.
There was a time when they might have gone head-to-head with Alpha but now they just split up more or less down the middle, shirts versus skins. The football they’re playing with is a relic, a little flat and obviously repaired, and there are some subtle elbows being thrown already, but it feels nice all the same.
Nate doesn’t play. Even now he’s not really comfortable stepping into his men’s space as if he’s their equal. They asked, but he said he should sit out to make the teams more even. Brad sits out too, which fucks that excuse up, but he says he has to clean his rifle. He hasn’t had to fire it for ten days, since he shot a husk of a body they saw on patrol, but he does clean it while they stand on the sidelines, meticulously, only glancing at the action. He doesn’t seem that interested.
The game is aggressive from the start, even though they’re all too scrawny and fragile-looking. The elbows turn into semi-friendly grappling and a huge dose of shit talking. With Q-Tip leading the way, the skins gain some ground, which leads to a little skirmish between some of the guys. Nate doesn’t have to step in. They handle it themselves.
“I might as well not even exist,” Nate mutters while Ray circles through the skins, saying something to Rudy about needing his sister’s shorts back.
Brad grunts, squinting through the sight on his rifle. He makes a minute adjustment and looks again. Nate rolls his eyes.
The game moves up and down the field behind the hamlet in inches of sandburn and swears. There doesn't seem to be an end zone on either side; they just keep moving back and forth under the hot sun.
Brad shakes out a part of his rifle, examining it for sand. Wordlessly he hands the stock to Nate so he can dig his finger into a nook, flicking sand granules away. Out of his pocket he produces one bullet, the only one he must have left, and loads it.
On the field Lovell calls Garza a little brown football failure and the skins move some more while Brad takes his rifle back and snaps it all back into place, giving it a firm once-over before he clicks it back into its strap and lets it hang. He glances at the field and then looks up at a thin wisp of a cloud.
Ray and Rudy face off in the scrimmage. Ray throws down some verbal shit but Rudy’s rock solid and ignores him when they move. Ray makes a grab at him and gets tossed on his ass. Nate sees his face twist up, but the action's already moving further into shirts' territory, passing him by. Brad and Nate watch him get up, circling around the pack of men to where Rudy is patting Q-Tip on the shoulder. His back is to Ray, but that doesn't stop Ray from flinging himself at Rudy, buckling Rudy's knees with the force of his weight.
He's yelling while he crawls on top of Rudy, his voice grating over, "Motherfucker! You goddamn fucking piece of shit!” and going further, talking about PTSD and some kind of high school hurt.
Rudy shoves him back and rolls them, one large fist coming back so far the point of his elbow seems to touch the sun, slamming back down, over and over.
They're too far away to do anything so they just watch while Garza and Stinetorf pull Rudy up and Jacks lifts a still spitting and swinging Ray clear off the ground.
"Get the fuck off of me," Ray howls, squirming against Jacks. Jacks shakes his head but drops him anyway. He starts striding away, still running his mouth, dirt down his back, his shirt rucked up.
Nate doesn't realize Brad's gone until he sees Brad walking along the edge of the crowd after Ray, his rifle slung across his shoulders.
"Ray! Brother! Ray!” Rudy yells, no longer being held back, just standing there.
It's not the kind of thing Nate would usually hear, but except for Ray it's still quiet, so he can pick up Brad's voice calling to Ray, asking if he's okay. Ray doesn't respond to that, still walking away. He brushes at the dirt on his hip and then looks at his hand.
Brad stops walking. He's barely ten feet behind Ray when he does. "What the fuck is that?" he asks. The question carries even though he still says it quietly. Ray keeps going, wiping his hand on his trousers. Everyone is watching.
"Ray!" Brad barks, and Ray stops. He doesn't turn around and he doesn't pull his shirt down to cover the wound on the back of his hip, a darkly bruised bite that's oozing blackish-red blood.
*
He says he doesn’t remember when he got it, his arms crossed in front of his chest.
“It’s not like there are that many options,” Walt says, sounding struck.
“It was probably then,” Ray says indifferently, like it doesn’t matter, like remembering a blindingly painful bite in the middle of a choking shamal is beneath him. The tape holding the gauze onto the wound stretches around his hip, reaching toward his navel. He was silent when Walt cleaned him up, looking anywhere else.
He glances back over his shoulder, looking way back to where Brad is standing by the five stones, more than fifty feet away. Since he saw the bite this is the closest he’s come to Ray.
Ray’s smirking when he faces forward. He makes a gun with his fingers and points it at his temple with a mean flourish.
“I guess that’s me, then,” he says, pretending to blow his brains out.
*
Even though he has dark circles under his eyes and favours his left side, Ray says he’s fine. And he seems fine enough, right now, so Nate lets him go. He retreats into his hut, followed by Walt and Reporter. Everyone else sits around the fire and avoid talking about it.
Brad’s not around. Sometimes he can be seen watching them from a distance, still in his PT shirt with his rifle slung over his shoulder, and sometimes he’s gone completely.
“Like a goddamn ghost,” Steve says, watching Brad’s figure climb down the side of a berm.
Nate watches Brad pick up one of the dented pails they use to gather water, heading off in the direction of the well.
“Yeah,” Nate says, looking at the slump of Brad’s shoulders as he walks away.
*
Sometime around o'dark-thirty Nate finds Brad standing out in the middle of the desert, staring up at the sky. He's fairly glowing, lit up by the stars.
Nate stands beside him but doesn't bother looking up. Brad blinks slowly. It's as much of an acknowledgement as Nate expects.
He looks up at the stars. They're clearly visible tonight, no cloud cover to mar the silver light shining down on the sand, reflecting off Brad's helmet and the barrel of his rifle.
"It really all was a mistake," Brad says after a while.
Nate nods.
"This will be worse than any of the others," Brad says. He blinks up at the stars.
"Yeah," Nate says, nodding again. He can't imagine.
"Some Marine Killer."
Nate can't respond to that. Brad sounds hurt behind the wall he's building around himself, so he reaches out, clasping Brad's bony shoulder.
"Whatever you need, as trite as it sounds."
Brad glances down at the hand on his shoulder, at Nate's face. One side of his mouth lifts minutely.
"Thanks, LT."
Nate shakes his head. "Nate."
Brad maybe smirks; even with the light it's hard to decipher the specific muscle twitches of Brad's mouth. "Nate," he says finally.
Nate lets his hand fall back. "Don't forget it."
Brad looks back up at the stars. Nate thinks about leaving him there, but can't quite do it.
They stay there for a long time, Brad off in his own world and Nate thinking about this one.
*
"So, when's my time?" Ray asks when they emerge from the hut in the morning. He looks like shit lit up, manic and pale. "Do I get to pick or are you just gonna clip me at random? Because I'd way rather know when I'm gonna go so I can be ready and Walt can be on standby with the shovel."
Brad just stares at him like he's speaking Arabic instead of English.
"I mean, goddamn," Ray says, "it's my fucking brains getting blown out, Brad. I deserve to pick when and where they're gonna splatter."
"Not now," Brad says, waving Ray off. He starts walking away fast.
"What the fuck do you mean, not now?" Ray calls after Brad. "Who put you in charge of this bullshit?"
"You did," Brad says over his shoulder, still striding away. Ray looks over at Nate and Nate shrugs. Ray rubs a hand over his clammy face.
*
The camp is divided. Talking to Ray is difficult. He's clearly ill now, clammy and shaky. It seems impossible that Ray hid this as long as he did. He snaps at them all, even Nate, although he pretends to apologize after. Everyone waves his apologies away, uncomfortable.
Talking to Brad is not worth the effort. He always has his rifle on him and his eyes skate over Ray whenever they're in proximity. He gives his rations to whoever's closest, and sometimes he nods for them to be passed to Ray but he doesn’t say shit. Ray frowns at them and passes everything but the Pop Tarts and Skittles to someone else.
Nate isn't sure what to write in his notebook. He looks at the blank pages for days fifty-two through seventy and taps his pen there. He forces out a few sentences about tension but none of it feels genuine.
Finally he writes, Ray's going to die and Brad's going to shoot him and shuts the book, going to help Poke and Lilley dig the ashes out of the fire pit.
*
They meet in the dark again, Brad staring at a far away berm this time instead of the stars. His Kevlar isn't done up.
“It’s so dark,” he says. “We’re so vulnerable.”
“Human beings don’t like the dark,” Nate says agreeably, shifting next to Brad, their shoulders brushing. “We never feel safe if we can’t see.”
“It’s the truth,” Brad murmurs. He swipes a hand over his eyes.
"You need to sleep," Nate tells him.
Brad shrugs. It would look petulant on anyone else. "Too much to think about."
"You're telling me that you of all people are having a problem compartmentalizing."
Brad cuts him a look at the disbelieving tone. "It's not all handjobs and rainbows in here," he says, tapping his temple.
"Too bad," Nate says. "But still, Brad. You can’t go on like this."
Brad arches an eyebrow. His mouth does something strange, another one of those hard-to-follow tics.
"Give me a handjob and I'll think about sleeping," he says.
Nate looks for the joke, but can't find it. Brad's watching him evenly.
"It's not like I'm gonna shoot you," Brad says silkily, stroking his finger over the trigger on his rifle.
Nate shakes his head. He sees what it is now: a challenge. Part of the wall-building. He's supposed to walk away, disgusted, so Brad can be a Marine-killing martyr.
He steps up and raps a knuckle three times against Brad's belt buckle instead. Brad's hands drop automatically to his sides, his rifle swinging.
Nate doesn't strip Brad, just worms a hand inside his cammies, leaving enough room for it to move. Brad's cock isn't hard when Nate finds it, but he feels the throb that's the start of an erection when he grips it.
Doing this feels like crossing some kind of line so Nate avoids Brad's face while he strokes. Instead he stares at the strap of Brad's Kevlar, moving when Brad does.
"It's not your fault," Nate finds himself saying softly, pumping Brad in that old reliable rhythm. "Really, it's not."
Brad shudders lightly, his hips flexing.
With his other hand steady over the strap of Brad's rifle on his shoulder, Nate murmurs, "We all got fucked this time. Some of us are just more fucked than others."
Brad's hand comes up, resting on the left side of Nate's vest, where his heart is. Nate rubs him quicker, still looking at the strap, the horizon of Brad's shoulder, anywhere other than his face.
"It's just another thing to deal with in the shit," Nate says, soothingly. He's jerking to the pace of Brad's staccato breathing, rolling his wrist. He hasn't touched Brad like this since the night he dreamed of dying.
"Another bullet," he says, "another body. It doesn't matter, Brad."
Brad makes a choking noise, a cross between a word and a sob, his palm pressing down on Nate.
"Just one more thing," Nate says. "One more thing you have to do because no one else will." He's squeezing Brad's cock now, just waiting for it.
He says, "It doesn't matter," at the same time Brad says, "Stop," at the same time he comes. Nate looks at him and he looks like he's been shot, agonized, unable to recover.
Brad's palm shoves him back, warm come sliding off his fingers and onto the dark sand. He stumbles but doesn't fall.
"Jesus fucking Christ," Brad says, wiping his fingers over his mouth, racing to do his cammies back up. "What the fuck was that?"
Nate blinks. "I don't know. It just came over me."
Brad's hands are shaking as he checks his rifle and his belt. "Did you mean it?"
Nate clenches his own hand, semen clinging between his fingers. "No. I'm sorry. It does matter, Brad."
Brad takes a deep breath. "Fuck," he says, wiping his face again. He looks at the berm he was looking at when Nate came up.
Nate rubs his palm on the thigh of his trousers and then scratches the raw spot on his neck. He feels itchy all over.
When Brad looks back at him all Nate can see is the wall, fully in place now.
"Don't do that again," Brad commands and there's nothing for Nate to do but nod and slink away, leaving Brad to it. He uses precious water to wash his hand twice when he ducks into their hut, scrubbing his palm and the soft spaces in between his fingers.
*
Just like Pappy before him, Ray gets sicker, quickly deteriorating before their eyes. He pales under his tan and the peeling across his cheekbones, his eyes turning dark and dull, sunken into the circles underneath them. He snaps at them all and drinks his and Walt's water rations, not that Walt cares about that. He drinks Brad's water rations and Brad doesn't even notice.
Ray drags a blanket out of his hut and the collapsed lawn chair out of Rudy's, dragging it so close to the fire one of the arms go soft from the heat. He sits there, wrapped up, glowering at the fire, napping whenever he's completely alone.
Brad cuts a huge swath around him, like he's more infectious than he appears. Ray yells at him whenever he's not gulping down water or dozing.
"You can't do it forever," Poke says one day, "avoid him, I mean. Little motherfucker is gonna have to be shot sometime."
Brad grunts, tapping his fingers on his vest.
"Good deflection," Poke laughs. "You showed me, Marine Killer."
"Fuck off," Brad shoots back.
"No can do. We're all in this together, homes." Poke walks away from them then, chucking Ray on the shoulder and deftly avoiding the swing from his walking stick. Brad walks in the other direction, far from Ray, his chair and his stick. Poke turns and walks backward so he can keep an eye on everything.
*
Seventy-two
Seventy-three
Seventy four
*
Ray throws up bile, stinking yellow and flecked with blood. He jokes about no more martinis at happy hour but still lets Reporter and Walt drag him into a hut, his head lolling around, the toe of his boot dragging bile through the sand, pointing the way.
*
They meet each other in the Iraqi dark one more time. Nate keeps his hands to himself, only reaching out to hand Brad his own share of water, still cool from being inside the hut all day. Brad sips at it and stares down at the sand.
"I'm sorry," Nate says quietly. "For everything."
"Don't be," Brad replies. "There's no point."
"You're right. There’s not." It feels horrible and freeing to say all at the same time. Nate can almost feel the weight of it leaving his tongue, leaving behind a sour taste.
Brad nods, but there's no discernable expression on his face. He drinks some more water.
"I'm pretty tired," he says finally, passing the water back to Nate.
The stars are murky tonight, swamped with clouds, barely casting any light down on them.
"Yeah," Nate says, "me too."
*
Seventy-five
Seventy-six
On the seventy-seventh day, Ray loses it. Completely absolutely loses it. He sits in the chair he inherited for a while, watching Brad avoid him, anger building up on his face, making his hands clench on the wobbly chair arm.
Brad's pretending like he's never heard of Ray Person in his life. It only works for so long. Eventually he makes the mistake of walking past Ray's hole and Ray springs up as fast as he can, cutting Brad off before he can disappear.
"You fucking coward!" he yells. It shakes around the edges but carries from the hole back to the fire pit.
"What?" Brad answers, standing tall and still, looking like he's trying to be a million miles away without moving a muscle.
"You can't fucking do this to me, you fuck! I don't want to turn into one of those fucking things. You need to fucking shoot me, you dickbag. Or tell me your nuts have rotted off so I can shoot myself."
"I-" Brad says, and then sets his jaw. "Just give it some time."
"Time!" Ray yells. "I don't have any time! Just fucking kill me. I don't want to fuck around anymore, Brad."
Brad's gripping his rifle strap so tight his knuckles are bone-white. He looks at Ray and then back at the camp, where everyone is watching.
"Ray-" he says and Ray steps up to him and shoves him as hard as he can, cutting him off.
"You fuck!" Ray yells and shoves him again, so he stumbles down into the hole. "I can't believe you're going to let me become a monster because you're a fucking pussy piece of shit. What happened to the Marine Killer?"
With Brad in the hole they're the same height, staring at each other.
Ray raises one shaky, bruised finger and points it at Brad's face. When he speaks he does so slowly, like Brad's half-deaf. "I want to die, Brad. Don't make me shoot myself like a hari kari fuckface."
Brad doesn't agree. He looks away from Ray's ghoulish face as he steps out of the hole and sidesteps him to circle around back to the hamlet. With every step his face gets colder. Ahead of him Trombley’s about to walk across his path but he stops dead when he sees Brad’s face, and even steps back to avoid him. Brad strides by and Trombley retreats further.
He bypasses the hamlet completely, ignoring the quiet murmuring: What's he doing?, Here it goes, We're all dead now. Still walking, his face shut down and frosty, Brad unslings his rifle from his shoulder. Almost a hundred feet back Ray's face turns, relieved and terrified. He looks like his knees might collapse but he stays standing, although his eyes close tight.
But Brad doesn't turn around and fire. Instead he hefts it the wrong way, holding it by the barrel with both hands. He's walking faster now, testing the weight of the gun in his hands, quickly approaching the slumped figure of Bub, who barely moves anymore. He yells something related to Fuck and swings his rifle as hard as he can. Bub's head tears clean off, rolling across the sand. The body sags against the threadbare ropes, completely lifeless.
Brad doesn't even stop. He drops his rifle and keeps going, walking off into the desert. Everyone stays where they are, stunned, until Ray starts moving, following Brad's footprints. He picks up Brad's rifle, slinging it over his own shoulder, standing where he dropped it. He yells after Brad, once, twice, and then he just jogs to catch up, his voice suddenly lowering and his hands open. Brad is looking straight ahead, but he does slow down so he and Ray are walking at the same pace.
*
Nate and Brad don't meet in the dark this time. Brad doesn't come back for rations and Ray just shrugs when someone asks.
"Couldn't tell you, dude," he says. He seems more peaceful now.
Nate stands aside from the fire and squints into the dark, but everything is still, no bodies and no Brad. He waits, long past the time Ray has hobbled off to his hut, past the last watch. Eventually it's just him and the dying fire and the soft swirl of the wind. That's when he starts walking, looking for Brad's familiar shape.
He walks out to the well and the one lonesome tree. The rope attached to the well's cover has worn smooth from the hands of nineteen Marines. The water inside isn't as high as it used to be, but it still clearly reflects Nate's face, ugly and thin. Brad's not there, nor is he further out. Nate stands on top of a berm and looks to the west but it's just empty space.
Turning around he looks back, looking at the dim hamlet and the continuing darkness beyond. He shouldn't be doing this alone, but everyone's spooked by the idea of Brad right now. So Nate slowly lifts his rifle up so he can look through the sight on it.
Brad shouldn't be alone out here either.
He scans the terrain slowly, foot by foot, until he sees what he's looking for. He's not surprised where he has to look. Reslinging his rifle he sets down the side of the berm, one foot in front of the other.
He makes some noise so Brad will know he's coming, if he doesn't know already. It's a courtesy he doubts Brad needs, even now.
As he approaches the hole he can see the gleam of Brad's rifle laid across his body, the stock resting on his crotch and the muzzle resting near the pulse in his throat. It's the same way he sleeps sometimes. He's sitting up in the hole, leaning against the side, even though there's enough space that he could lie down. Nate might not have found him if he had done that.
Nate steps close enough to see Brad's quietly despondent face. Brad's staring at his own boots.
"This is his grave," he says dully. "He dug his own grave."
He runs one hand over the hard-packed edge.
Nate crouches and sets his rifle down, parallel to Brad's body in the grave.
"Then why are you in it?" he asks.
There’s a long pause and then Brad says, "I couldn't shoot him." He says. "I can't, Nate."
"Then don't," Nate says, gently.
"I shot Pappy." Brad shifts, pushing back against the side of the hole, scratching the edge so a little dirt crumbles onto his thigh. "He asked me to."
"Someone will take care of it, Brad," Nate says, and what he means is I will take care of it, because it always should have been him, so many days ago. "You don't have to do it."
Brad looks at his dirty fingers and then up at Nate. He seems to be coming back to himself slowly, the haunted look receding a little.
"Thank you," he says.
Nate smiles at him because he needs it. He picks up his rifle again and steps close to the edge of Ray's grave.
He extends his hand down for Brad to take and his voice is still gentle when he says, "Get out of the hole, Brad.”
*
81
82
I am so tired.
*
Time feels like it's slowing down, more and more every day. They're all so hungry and tired that every minute feels like an eternity. Nate can hardly be bothered to write anymore but when he does there's either nothing to say or he starts writing and when he stops he's left looking at pages of scared ramblings about being afraid to die like this.
He burns those pages in what little fire they can keep going. He has to push through the rest of the platoon to get at the flames.
Hardly anyone speaks anymore, too busy counting breaths and watching the flames. Even Ray doesn't bother. He sits closest to the fire than anyone else, sipping the water Walt gives him, some of it trickling down his chin because he's too sick to really be there anymore.
They're broken, all of them. Nate will be surprised if they all live another month.
Brad's the worst by far. He's a thin as the rest of them, as tired, but that's nothing in comparison to the guilt he seems to be carrying around. He spends a lot of time staring at the stone markers, and then Ray, clearly feeling the weight of the things he has done and the one thing he couldn't do.
Nate can’t help him. He has his own guilt. It's an impossible situation but he's the leader and he hates the job he's done leading these good men out here to die. He spends a lot of time alone, sitting in the hut, shivering in his cammies even though it’s hot, trying to put into words where he went wrong.
I, he writes and then stops. I never should have stopped here
He crosses it out.
I never should have stopped here
I should have worked harder to make sure we would survive longer
He crosses that out too.
I never should have stopped here
I should have worked harder to make sure we would survive longer
I should have shot them all and then myself
No. He couldn’t have, even if he wanted to.
I never should have stopped here
I should have worked harder to make sure we would survive longer
I should have shot them all and then myself
I should have never joined the Corps. It was a mistake. I'm sorry.
*
He wants to rip the page out but he makes himself keep it in and even signs the bottom of the page, Lieutenant Nathaniel Fick and the date as well as he remembers it. He won't write anymore.
*
On the eighty-fourth day, Ray slips into a coma in front of the fire. No one probably would have noticed if not for the baby goat jumping out of his lap, bleating loudly and running off, kicking its back legs.
Walt shakes Ray's shoulder, holding out his canteen but Ray's head just flops to the side and settles there.
"Ray?" Walt asks, something scared dawning in his voice. "Ray, wake up."
Ray doesn’t move.
"Shit," Walt stutters, "Shit! LT!"
Nate hasn't moved at anything faster than a wander in weeks, but he runs when he hears the shrill waver in Walt's voice. Ray's face under his hands is cool and waxy-feeling and it's impossible to see if his chest is moving underneath the heavy woven blanket draped across his body.
"Ray!" Nate calls, his voice picking up that same waver. "Ray, wake up!"
He sticks a hand under the blanket, feeling more waxy skin and the thickness of his breastbone. Nate is frantic, terrified of what he might find. It's hard to stay still and concentrate and for a few seconds there's nothing at all, but when he focuses he can just barely feel the shallow breaths Ray's still taking.
"He's alive," Nate says, too loud. "He's still alive."
Walt's hand bumps up against his, pressing down against a weak exhale.
"Thank you, Jesus," Walt sighs.
Nate pulls his hand away. Walt's stays. "We need to move him." Walt nods hesitantly, removing his hand, tucking the blanket around Ray tightly.
They each take one side of the lawn chair, lifting it carefully. Neither of them are that strong anymore, but Ray weighs almost nothing so they manage to lift him the necessary few inches off the ground, taking slow steps toward the hut.
Walt is swearing under his breath, more colourful swears than Nate has ever heard from him. Mixed in with the swearing are prayers, fervent and equally colourful.
The door to the hut is wide and poorly made, covered with a blanket that matches the one covering Ray. Walt swats at it while they guide the chair through the door, still mumbling.
The hut Ray shares with Walt and Reporter is still full of the detritus of the well-off Iraqis, the Super Nintendo tangled up in the cords, the other half of Moby Dick, some dusty old VHS tapes. Mixed in with all of that is articles of clothing, Ray's Kevlar, and tools taken from the Humvee.
They set Ray on a futon that looks like it came from IKEA about fifteen years ago. He doesn't move at all. Walt checks his breathing again while Nate resettles the blanket.
"When," Walt asks quietly, his tucking the hand he touched Ray with under his armpit, "do you think he'll die?"
It looks like it could be any moment.
"I don't know," Nate admits. "I can't remember how long it took Pappy to die."
"Me either," Walt says, even quieter. Nate takes a big breath at the same time Ray takes a little one.
"Ray's cut from a different cloth than the rest of us. Don't give up on him yet, Walt."
Walt shakes his head fiercely. "I won't," he says. He sticks his hand under the blanket again, feeling Ray breathe, a stubborn look set on his face.
Nate suddenly feels so proud he can hardly stand there beside Walt. He puts one hand on Walt's shoulder and clenches the other into a fist to try and deal with the burden of what he's feeling.
*
He doesn't stay for long. It's too hard to see Ray like that. He leaves Walt at Ray’s side and runs right into the rest of the platoon, standing close to the hut's doorway. They look like a pack of bodies, hungry for news instead of flesh.
"He's not dead," Nate tells them. "But it won't be long." No one says anything but their sad faces get sadder.
"I'm sorry," Nate says and he is. Not just for this, but for everything. There are some nods but still no one says anything. Nate figures he deserves about as much.
*
He doesn’t even bother asking anyone. He just squints into the sharp sunlight, searching for one long shadow in the desert, letting his sense of dread guide him. Brad's standing almost at attention out there, but he's not quite right. Instead of having his rifle in position it's down at his side, his hand holding it by the muzzle like he might drop it at any moment. But he might not. He might use it one more time.
Nate swallows, looking at Brad. He knows what he has to do and what might happen, but he's still in charge. So he turns away from Brad, looking for Reporter's Kevlar and sharp chin.
"Evan," he says when he finds him, standing guard to the door of his hut. "I want to give you this."
He's holding out his notebook, the one he's been carrying in his vest for all these days.
Reporter's brow furrows, but he takes the notebook anyway, opening it to the exact middle, reading over what he finds. His eyebrows shoot up and he flips to the first page and then the last, checking the dates.
"You might be able to use it," Nate says. The missing weight on his chest feels strange. Evan nods readily enough, tucking the book under his arm with his own.
And then, for a reason Nate will never understand, he unclips his rifle and holds it out too.
"And this," he says.
"I can't," Reporter says, trying to rebuff the rifle with his hand.
Nate holds it out again. "I know you can shoot. There's six bullets left in the clip."
Reporter takes it, but sets it down to lean against the side of the hut. He rubs his fingers together like they’re dirty.
Nate scratches the back of his neck for a moment. He thinks about shaking Reporter's hand, but that feels too final. Instead he says, "See you later," smiling shakily at Reporter before he walks away.
*
Brad's moving further into the desert, slowly but steadily. Nate keeps pace with him for a while, following from a respectable distance. He doesn't want the men to see this.
When he can't see the hamlet anymore shimmering behind him anymore he starts to take two steps for every one Brad takes.
Brad's back slowly stops shimmering, the lines of him becoming more and more clear as Nate catches up. The rifle in Brad’s hand must be hot, but he keeps carrying it in that loose grip. Long minutes into the desert he starts slowing down. Nate speeds up.
Before he can get there Brad stops suddenly, swaying, going slowly to his knees on the sand, his rifle dragging behind him. Sweat trickles down Nate’s back, cold across his spine.
Nate’s voice comes out weaker than he’d like when he says, “Brad…” so soft he has to say it again. Brad doesn’t look, but he does pull his rifle closer.
Nate clears his throat. “He’s not dead, Brad.”
Brad’s chin is almost touching his chest. He doesn’t reply.
“You don’t have to shoot him. Do you remember me telling you that? I meant it.” Nate steps closer, so he’s near Brad’s rifle. He tries to appear calmer than he is. His shirt is sticking to his back now, and there is something cold in his veins.
Nate crouches so he can see Brad's tilted-down face. He feels strange without the weight of his rifle, vulnerable.
"Are you listening to me?" he asks. Brad blinks. His eyelashes are dusty-looking against the tan of his cheeks.
"No," Brad says, completely straight-faced. It's not a joke.
Nate reaches out, for the gun or Brad's shoulder, one of them, and Brad stiffens. It's hardly a movement, but Nate feels it. His hand freezes in the air, curved around an invisible bicep. "I'm unarmed."
Brad's silent again. Nate's hand drops a few inches, settling on his own knee. They must look so strange, frozen in this thin and desperate tableau. Like some religious epiphany gone horribly wrong.
Nate can hear the wind picking up and he sighs tiredly. The sun is beating down hot on his bare head.
"You should give me the gun," he says quietly, trying to make it a suggestion. "I told you you didn't need it."
Brad shifts his grip on his rifle, pulling it closer to his armpit.
"Talk to me," Nate says. He's reaching out again. "Give me the gun, Brad."
His fingers brush worn fabric and the butt of Brad's rifle hitting his jaw is a surprise. He can hear the thick thump inside his face as he falls backwards on his ass. The sand is burning his hands and he can feel his heart beating hot under the skin of his jaw.
There's the echo of the Don’t fucking touch me Brad yelled in the air, but Nate wasn't listening so he missed it. He shakes his head, trying to shrug off the pain but he can't.
Brad is staring at him with frosty eyes, his rifle half-raised, his fingers closer to the trigger.
Nate's not afraid of him. He's angry. The coldness in his veins lights on fire, propelling him off his hands and toward Brad.
He tackles Brad and takes the stock of the rifle to the chest, but it doesn't hurt now. Nate's beyond that. He uses his weight to take Brad down onto the sand and scrabbles to get around the lever of the rifle.
"You dumb fuck," he's saying. "You dumb piece of shit. I'm trying to help you." He gets a fist around the rifle and slams it into Brad's mouth, following through with his elbow. His blood boils at the slick crack and the blood that starts trickling out of Brad's nose. "Give me the fucking gun!"
Brad hardly looks dazed. "No," he spits, blood splattering Nate' face.
Nate tries to hit him again, but Brad shoves the rifle up, blocking the shot. Nate grabs the rifle, his hands outside of Brad's, trying to twist it away, Brad twisting it the opposite direction.
The air smells like blood, Brad's blood and the blood rushing through Nate's ears, loud like a shamal. He's not thinking about helping Brad anymore. His mind is split between getting the gun and going for Brad's throat.
Brad is snarling at him like he's thinking something similar, wearing a beard of blood, little snakes of it staining his blouse, blowing out with every breath. Nate wonders how much blood Brad has to lose.
His knee is digging into the thick part of Brad's thigh, but when he lets go of the rifle to try and choke Brad out Brad kicks out his ankle and forces the gun up, hitting Nate in the Adam's apple.
Clotheslined and gasping Nate rolls to the side to get away from the rifle, feeling sick. Brad rolls the other way, coming to his feet, still holding the gun.
Nate gets up, but he's not as fast as Brad, who's advancing, sand stirring under his feet, grains of it flying in the wind. Nate has to scramble, but he's not quick enough. He regains his footing at the same time Brad hefts the rifle like a club, swinging it.
It's like being hit with a huge wave. There's no pain, just sudden pressure on the side of his skull that makes all of Nate's murderous thoughts turn to static.
When he hits the ground it starts to hurt, pain that makes his vision grey out. He can't move his limbs but he rolls over onto his back, moaning. In a place that doesn't hurt he vaguely knows that Brad's going to kill him soon.
For a second he can see: greyish-blue sky, then it's gone again. The pain is still coming, whock-whock-whock.
Time is slow, measured in heartbeats and the rolling pain. Nate tries to think of something meaningful: his mother or something good he’s done, but Brad’s yelling. It’s so hard to focus.
He sees again, a sharp black cloud across the blue sky. It must be the rifle. He can’t sense Brad but he’s waiting for the blow to come. It might only take one, if Brad’s aim is still good.
He can’t feel Brad though. Maybe it’s only been a second. He doesn’t know. His vision is fading around the edges, sharpening in the center. The black cloud isn’t Brad’s gun and the rushing isn’t the wind.
Brad steps up and over him while his senses dim down to a flickering point, waving his rifle in the air, yelling, “Hey! Hey! Jesus Christ, it’s a fucking helicopter! Hey!” his voice shattering with pain and relief.
*
For a while Nate doesn’t know what happens. Everything is snapshots: a full MRE in someone’s hands; the radio attached to a vest, buzzing away; Ray’s doll-like hand and the oxygen mask they put over his mouth; a Marine’s craggy face looking down on his, his thin mouth saying, We always come back for our own. His breath smells like cheese.
Nate wakes up in a clinic in America that looks like a basement hospital out of a WWII film. He has an IV in the back of his hand pumping him full of clear fluid. He can’t stay awake for long.
When he wakes up again he’s aware that time has passed although the clinic looks the same, sunlight slanting across his cot. He can hear again, clear in the centre and muffled around the edges. He can hear Reporter talking.
There’s a TV on the wall, some dinky little thing sitting on a bolted shelf. Reporter’s on TV, sitting up in a real white hospital bed, Nate’s notebook in his hands. He’s reading from it, his finger tracing the lines he’s reading so he doesn’t lose his place. Sometimes he comments, explaining terms like AO and shamal, saying, I didn’t write this. Lieutenant Fick did. These are his words. He keeps reading and the camera keeps filming.
It doesn’t sound real. Coming out in Reporter’s thin but calm voice it sounds like a story, pasted together and insincere.
Someone behind the camera asks if he was afraid and Reporter nods seriously, his finger marking the page in Nate’s book.
Were they afraid? the voice asks. The Marines, I mean.
I don’t know, Reporter says. You’d have to ask them.
Whoever it is behind the camera laughs lightly.
Nate closes his eyes. He’s not crying but there are tears leaking down his cheeks. A passing nurse wipes them off with a piece of gauze and continues on her way.
*
Twenty-four men started an invasion together. Eighty-four days later nineteen men came back from a completely different invasion. Three of those men die in the American hospital, too sick and starved to come back to their old lives.
It’s over for them now and none of it means anything. The world is so much bigger than a hamlet in Iraq and their problems are so small in comparison.
They weren’t supposed to be found. It was just dumb luck, living Marines looking to set containment parameters for an experimental hunting camp.
But of course, they’re heroes, the new news and restricted radio say, their story touted around like a 1984 morale booster. Those who died are heroes for being dead and those who lived for living. If they can do it in an Iraqi desert, you can do it in one of the plush government-made compounds.
Nate watches it and listens and doesn’t quite believe it, despite the letter on his bedside from the President promising him a medal when they fix the world, whenever that will be.
He’s sitting on his cot that’s exactly the same as the one in the clinic, holding the letter, sort of reading …bravery such as yours must be rewarded, Captain Fick. There are soft wrinkles from where he’s held the fine stationary.
He puts it down on the bedside table again. It’s late. There’s no window in the closet that passes for the single room Nate’s rank affords him in the compound, but Nate knows. He hasn’t slept well but his body hasn’t given up its sense of time passing.
The clock says it’s after one-thirty in the morning. Nate doesn’t know what time it is in Iraq. It’s not important. He touches the thick clean bandage on the back of his neck while he stares at green LCD. A doctor at the clinic gave him some cream to reduce the scarring although a certain amount of scarring is to be expected. It doesn’t hurt. The cream has some kind of numbing agent in it so Nate can’t feel anything.
The compound is so quiet, the curfew well-reinforced to prevent break-ins. There are watchtowers manned by soldiers but the fence isn’t the greatest. Nate doesn’t worry about it; he hasn’t seen a body for weeks.
It’s quiet enough that he couldn’t miss the knock on his door, the three solid raps that echo.
Nate has a rifle in the space between his bedside table and his cot, loaded and ready, but he leaves it behind.
He’s not surprised to see Brad on the other side of the door, but he wasn’t expecting it either. Nate hasn’t seen him since he used Nate’s skull for batting practice.
Brad’s dressed like Nate, cammies and boots and his PT shirt, standing a safe distance from the door, his arms crossed. He’s without his rifle but Nate can see the handgun at his hip.
No military personnel are to go unarmed, in case they need to protect themselves and others.
Brad looks good, broader than Nate remembers, no more dip between his ribs and his stomach. He still has bruising in the corners of his eyes though, remnants of black eyes.
He blinks at Nate, taking stock too. If he’s pleased by what he finds he doesn’t show it.
“Good evening, sir,” he says. “All quiet on the Western front?”
There’s a spotlight starting a slow sweep from the far watch tower, inching around, searching for something wrong.
“As quiet as it can be,” Nate replies. He scratches the edge of the bandage on his throat. “What brings you to my door?”
Brad appears to shrug without moving. “Rounds.”
Nate’s not currently active, but he has enough intel to know Brad’s not either. He nods anyway.
“Anything?”
“Nothing to report. But you’re never really safe in the dark.”
“Is that so?” Nate leans on the steel doorframe. He feels oddly tense, like Brad’s trying to play a game with him but not sharing the rules.
“So I’ve heard,” Brad says levelly. He rubs underneath his eye lightly, careful of the bruise. He almost smiles and the bruise crinkles around the edges.
The spotlight is moving toward them, sliding from the ground up to the top of the fence and back, catching the numbers hastily painted on the doors to people’s rooms.
Nate looks back to Brad. “Have you seen Ray?”
Ray Person, a beacon of hope, the new reality TV winner, his sick face plastered all over the television while doctors talk about treating what they call The Disease. The cure seems to be working, they say. We may have found the answer.
“Yeah,” Brad says, making a tilting so-so signal with his palm. “He seems alright. He doesn’t have that black fucking Chow-Chow tongue anymore and he bleeds red instead of black ooze. I told him he was famous and he preened, the vain fuck, so he’s probably gonna be okay.”
“Good,” Nate says. Maybe now he can stop seeing Ray’s face every ten minutes on the news.
Brad tilts his head to the side. “I told him you said hello, which is a lie.”
Nate resists the urge to scratch. “Thanks,” he says lamely.
He’s important enough that he could get into the hospital to see Ray, or any of the others who haven’t gotten out yet. But he doesn’t want to. There’s a big part of him that desperately wants what happened to be the story Reporter told, with no consequences. He knows he’ll have to face it eventually, but later always seems like a better time.
Brad doesn’t press the issue further. Instead he glances at the spotlight and then says, “Nate,” quietly.
It sounds different than any other time he’s said it, asking without a question mark. It makes Nate’s guts go tight for a moment.
“Yeah,” he replies.
“We all made mistakes,” Brad says, like it’s supposed to mean something. There’s a shadow of discomfort on his face, almost impossible to see in the dark.
“You sound like me,” Nate says gruffly, feeling uncomfortable.
“And that’s okay,” Brad says. It’s unclear if he’s finishing or responding.
Nate wonders if this is Brad apologizing for the three-inch gash behind his ear, or the shots he fired. He’s not sure if he can handle that right now.
There’s nothing to do but nod and watch the spotlight creep up on them.
In the dark Brad steps closer, looking determined. He raises his hand and it takes effort to be still and look disaffected.
It feels so slow but it can’t be, Brad’s finger hooking underneath a loose edge of the bandage, worming in to touch the ridges of the scar tissue forming on Nate’s nape. The new skin there prickles but before Nate can shake him off the finger’s gone again, Brad halfway between where he just was and where he was standing when Nate opened the door.
Nate scratches the itch away reflexively. He can hardly feel his nails on his skin. Brad watches.
The spotlight shines over them then, lingering because they’re figures. Brad’s lit up from behind, so bright Nate can’t really see him. He shades his eyes. Brad is still looking, his fingers against his mouth.
The light doesn’t stay long. They must just look like two soldiers talking, not anything special or worth bullets, so the light slides off slowly, moving on to light up other dark doorways.
It’s dark again, too dark, but Nate can see better, the distance and the oddly open look on Brad’s face.
Nate steps out of the doorway, standing almost close enough to touch Brad if he wanted to.
“I don’t want to talk about mistakes,” he says.
Brad blinks at him, slowly. His mouth is a smooth line, giving nothing away.
“We don’t have to talk about anything,” Brad says.
In the desert Nate imagined being sick sometimes, in his paranoid moments, how it would feel, the heat of the fever and the ache of knowing you were going to die. This is nothing like that.
Nate asks, “Are you done your rounds?” and Brad says, “Yes,” exactly on time, his teeth just visible.
“Maybe we are safer in the dark,” Nate murmurs. “Just this once.”
Brad smiles at the joke, looking like a man Nate can’t really remember, it’s been so long. Or maybe this is the first time Nate’s seeing him.
Nate steps back, reaching for the doorknob as Brad steps forward, close enough for Nate to feel the heat of his body and his breath. He opens the door, taking sure steps back into the blackness of his room, Brad following him, kicking the door shut with his boot, dousing them in pure darkness.
There’s nothing to see, but there is everything else: Nate’s body going loose and free and hopeful, the clean smell of Brad, the feeling of his hungry mouth on Nate’s, and in the far-off distance, the sound of a siren going off.
Thanks to about a million people: amberlynne, shoshannagold, mclachlan, alethialia, snglesrvngfrend (again) for audiencing, listening to me whine, telling me I am good/a jerk and just pushing me along. And thanks to anyone who was like, "You're writing a story? That's pretty cool. I'll read that." Which was, oh, EVERYONE IN THE FANDOM. And if you made it this far and you're still reading then thanks for that too.