“The Soldier” — MRS Sci-Fi Series, Chapter 2.
MRS Sci-Fi Series — Chapter 2: The Soldier
MRS is a sci-fi web series by Adan Carter Aspland. Check out Chapter 1 here.
The soldier fled the raging battle, a short burst of machine gun fire rattled behind him, followed by an explosion in reply. His boots flew across the bitumen barely touching the ground. He moved through the war torn street like a cockroach attempting to out run a giant boot. He could run and duck behind burnt out cars for cover, but eventually it would catch and crush him. The soldier turned off the street, careered down a tight alley way and crashed into a seven foot chain link fence. Out of breath, he struggled to scale the fence. He heaved him self up and over, and dropped down to the other side.
A flash high in the sky above the rooftops, caught his eye. A single bolt of lightning cracked horizontally across the grey smoke filled sky. He flinched when he noticed that part of the sky looked like it had a pattern across it, it reminded him of a texture glitch in a video game. He started to turn to continue down the alley, the sky smashed like a mirror and an alien ship shimmered into existence.
His feet froze stiff in his boots, something told him to keep moving but he was awestruck by the beauty of the alien ship. The shape reminded him of a stone spear head, the surface was a seamless gold. The soldier could hear something, no, feel something. It was a low frequency tone except there was no rhythm to it, just a constant reverberation that was building and growing stronger. The hull of the ship began to pulse, the colour turned from gold to dark bronze. The tone was overwhelming and filled his bones and internal organs. The reverberation peaked and the soldier was thrown backward down the alley; knocked unconscious, darkness enveloped his senses.
He woke up, head throbbing like the morning after a night out. As he sat up, warm liquid ran out from his left ear and trickled down the side of his neck. He wiped it with his gloved hand and discovered it was blood. It was then he saw the fence and realised he had been thrown a good five meters. It was as if no time had passed at all, except the soldier realised the battle had ceased, there was no longer the rattle of machine gunfire or explosions going off in the distance.
He attempted to stand and struggled to his feet, a prang of pain shot through his stomach, if it had not been for the wall behind him, he would have fell. Three more times he used the alley wall as a crutch to regain his balance as he hobbled out towards the street. His world was spinning and he was the worn needle on a record player. He exited the alley the same way a drunk in the city emerges from the darkness of a bar. Confused and disoriented he staggered out onto a footpath which wound around a small residential cal-de-sac.
Slowly he shambled his way onto the street, and made his way across the bitumen. Most of the homes had scars of war, some had been ravaged by machine gun fire, others had been ripped apart by small explosions. The air was acrid with smoke, one house had copped a direct hit from either artillery or airstrike; it was nothing more than a smouldering crater of debris.
Exhausted and dehydrated, his boot caught the edge of a gutter, he collapsed up onto a concrete foot path, with his elbows and forearms he dragged his body forward toward a white picket fence; which didn’t look so white anymore. With one gloved hand outstretched, he gripped the sharp top picket and painfully managed to pull him self up. As he drew level with the house in front of him, he was surprised to find it looked relatively untouched by the war. The fence kept him steady as he moved down the footpath and made his way toward the front gate. He pushed the gate open and painstakingly began to make his way up the concrete path which split the manicured lawn. As he approached he noticed the front door was slightly ajar, perhaps it had been left open during the evacuation or maybe it was kicked in and looted shortly after the occupants left. It didn’t matter either way, pushing the door open he stepped into the house.
Stale dust permeated the air as he made his way down the corridor. He moved past past a series of moving family pictures, rendered memories which hung like ghosts on the wall. He stopped and studied one of the screens on the wall, a loop was playing, it was a family pick-nick in the park, a young boy was playing fetch with a dog while a little girl practiced doing cartwheels.
He entered the first room on the left, it was an abandoned bedroom. A chest of drawers containing clothes hung open, the occupants must have left in a hurry, perhaps they were only evacuated days before the fighting started. The king size bed was made up but had been left ruffled, untidy with movement. Then he saw it, on the opposite bedside table was a square black glass device. If it had not been for the faint ray of afternoon sunlight coming through the western window, he would have easily over looked it. With renewed vigour, he raced around the bed, picked up the small glass device and pressed two thumbs into the middle of the surface.
“Please have charge, please, please have charge!” Hope swelled inside him, and then slowly drained out of him as he realised the device did not respond.
The soldier swore and pegged the device into the floor, it smashed into pieces.
“What I need, what I need…” He said as he pulled at his hair.
“Is to render this memory and get it out of my fucking head before it fades”.
He stormed out of the bedroom and went to search the rest of the house, hell, he would search every room in every house in the neighbourhood if he had to. The soldier moved down the corridor and into the next room. It was a small study, once again he was filled with hope, he needed to render the memory fragment before it was too late. He went straight to a small timber top desk, and paid no attention to the book shelves which lined both walls. The desk was similar to an old school desk, in the way the storage space was located beneath the top surface and was accessed by lifting it up. He sat down in the chair, pressed two thumbs into each of the small grooves located on the front.
“Access Denied” a soft female voice said.
The soldier sprang to his feet, drew his side arm and fired shots down into each of the four corners of the desk, blasting away the locks and hinges. He returned his sidearm to the holster on his hip and he gripped the timber lid. He ripped it up splintering timber cranking under the strain revealing the contents inside he tossed the lid aside. Inside lay two large sketch books, a few pencils and a square black glass device. The soldier snatched the device and pressed both his thumbs against the surface.
A blue light emanated from the glass beneath his thumbs. The soldier smiled, sat down in the chair and made himself comfortable.
“Render Memory, Encrypt and Erase Log”.
“Render Memory, Encrypt and Erase Log function not possible. Your memory log has been encrypted to be shared with only one device. Please use your original MRS device to render and share your memory.”
“I don’t have the original device! The Union has it, do you have any idea what they will do to me if they scan my log? Now. Render memory, encrypt and fucking erase”
“Render memory, encrypt and “fucking” erase command not recognised. Please try again”
The device flew across the room, hitting the door frame and smashed sending glass shrapnel flying across the floor. He let out a long breath as a bead of sweat dripped from his brow, it carved through the dirt which had been caked on his face like concrete and formed a tiny filthy river running down his face. He left the small study and made his way back to the bedroom where he collapsed onto the kingsize bed.
He drew a long deep breath in and exhaled, sleep was pulling him down, his arms and legs heavy with exhaustion. It had been over twenty four hours since he last slept. His eye lids slowly closed shut and a soft whir off in the distance lulled him to sleep. It was a familiar sound but he couldn’t quite place it due to his exhaustion, he allowed the sound to soothe him. Just as a dreamless sleep was about to take him, there was a flash in his mind. He sat bolt upright, this noise was no sweet lullaby. The soldier’s eyes snapped open with full awareness.
“Union Helicraft” he murmured in a defeated voice.