Fragments of Silence

Another short story yeah I know it is getting old. (I enjoy writing them though)

Spoiler alert: this may make you feel sad but don't. 

It sounded as if the sky was ripping itself to pieces with each strike of lightning and the instantaneous crack of thunder that shattered the silence. Brad huddled under his tarp in the rain as chills crept up his neck. He pulled his rifle closer to his chest. Thunder was something to be thankful for, because he knew he had little chance of dozing off while on sentry duty. He preferred to be placed on the late night sentry shift. The darkness gave him a sense of safety; as though nobody could see him, but he could see the rest of the world.

 The storm had raged on for the span of four or five days, but his unit was on a mission and they were not permitted to pull out from the vantage point on the mountain until reinforcements arrived. The view they had was beautiful; they sat upon the tallest peak of the mountain range that clasped the edge of a valley as though it he stood atop the spine of an ancient beast that had collapsed and died. Brad found the area rather peaceful, it placed him in a somber and inquisitive state that let the time pass without much recognition. He had noticed that most of the men in his unit had been writing letters for their loved ones at home—letters that would never be mailed. They wrote these letters to make themselves feel better, because he knew they were all afraid that they were going to die. He didn’t write any letters.

Brad fumbled around in his pocket trying to locate the pebble his little brother had given him when they were kids. He pulled it out and just rubbed it between his finger and thumb. There was nothing spectacular about this little rock. It was small, triangular like with rounded soft black edges and extremely smooth—a simple river rock. He had been with his little brother at the river one time when they were kids. They had been talking about what they wanted most in the world: hopes, dreams, desires, and they had been skipping rocks along the water all the while. Brad was only focused on finding flat rocks that would skip for long distances while his brother examined them all closely looking for any particular thing that made them unique. Brad thought about it, and it had not really been a significant moment. It just happened, but for some reason Brad took a liking to this rock. His brother came up to him and said, “Brad look at this rock! It’s so soft and smooth.” Brad took it in his hand and moved it between his fingers as he would continue to do for years and mildly replied, “Yeah, that’s nice,” and proceeded to hand it back to his brother. His brother stopped him shaking his head, “No you keep it. That one is yours, I have another one just like it.” Brad only smiled and stuffed it in his pocket. After that day, Brad never let it go.

He rolled and rubbed it between his fingers, the soft edges slid across his skin like silk. This little rock always reminded him of his little brother; he could never bring himself to part with it. His deep connection with everyone was why he had enlisted in the first place. He wanted to get away and be forgotten, but the problem was that he could not forget them, friends, family, all the people that he cared and loved were still alive and well and he could not bring himself to hurt them; he could not bring himself to leave. The desire to leave was so strong, but he could not take it, and so when the war started he enlisted so that he could justify no longer having to be concerned with the future.

The future: that was one of the things he talked about most with his brother. His brother had dreams and hopes, and Brad only found himself wanting one thing; he wanted to leave. That was how he thought of it at least—leaving, not dying. He never called it dying. Calling it dying only made his brother and the few friends that he told deeply concerned and upset. The response was always the same, they wanted to get him help for his depression and they wanted him to enjoy life. That was the thing he had realized, he couldn’t get help, because he wasn’t depressed; he just didn’t generally enjoy life. It always puzzled him why people wanted to struggle and fight their way through life when it was so difficult. To Brad it just didn’t make sense, why would people rather live and be miserable than die and feel nothing, be nothing? There was nothing wrong with nothing—to Brad at least, but the rest of the world seemed to find it the most terrible and horrific thing. He remembered hearing a story once about how a man had gotten in a car accident and had lost an arm and was paralyzed from the waist down. After the man told the story he said, “Well, yeah, it is awful, but it could have been worse.” How could it have been worse? You mean he could have died? How is death worse than essentially being a vegetable for the rest of his life? It didn’t make any sense. These were questions Brad always wanted to pose but never did, apparently people thought life was the most sacred thing in the world, but Brad didn’t.

The hissing roar of the rain hammering against the tarp had increased in strength, and the lightning had grown in anger as well—it seemed as though the sky wanted to bring down the mountain. It was late into his shift and he knew he needed to get up and stretch his legs whether it was raining or not. He checked his rifle and grabbed a couple magazines making sure his rifle was in order and properly loaded. He made his way around the camp checking on his unit. He circled around observing the perimeter of rocks surrounding it, which slowly broke off to the edge of the cliff. They had chosen a camp that was completely encompassed by rocks save one narrow point that allowed them to watch over the valley. It was a cliff that embodied every terrible and fantastic thought that surrounds the idea of the word. It was a shear drop all the way to the base of the mountain unlike anything he had ever seen. It jutted out like a diving board or the perfect perch for a hawk swooping down on its prey hundreds of feet below. Brad liked to come to the edge of the cliff and stand, he wasn’t going to jump but just the thought gave him a thrill. The thrill of the height made his stomach fly up into his chest. He stood there for a couple minutes, but he was strangely disappointed when he realized the rain was so thick he could only see a couple hundred feet; the ground, was not in sight. In fact, it looked as though there was nothing below, he stared into an empty abyss of darkness and rain, watching it fall forever and ever.

            He turned back towards the camp and sighed, he had told his commanding officer that this was a bad spot to make camp. The enclosing back wall of rocks was the summit of the mountain, and this made them easy targets for an attack if the enemy were to approach from the other side. All the enemy had to do was send a sniper unit up the back of the mountain and they could begin picking off his unit one by one. The only cover they had was for receiving enemy fire coming up the valley side. Nobody had listened to him, and because of that he made it a regular thing to climb to the summit and check the opposite side of the mountain every night he was on sentry duty. This would be his first time doing it since the storm had hit. While his commanding officer may be unfit to take care of his unit, Brad would not allow his CO’s poor judgment be the reason his unit dies.

The rocks were slippery due to the rain, and Brad had trouble retaining decent footholds, but he made it up to the spot he had found a week or so before from his first climb. There on the summit of the mountain the earth had created a small platform of which a god might sit upon to watch over the world. It was though the rocks had been carved out to make a throne. Layers of black slate had been perfectly cloven into the shape of a chair. The sharp and angular lines made it appear too perfect to have been made by nature alone. The throne sat facing the southwest, and when the sky was clear one could watch the sun dip its flagrant orange, as crimson and purple light paint the clouds, while the brilliant gold tinge fades beneath the ocean.

 He sat down with his rifle in his lap squinting down the side of the mountain. The view from here was equally beautiful, before the ocean there stood meadows and creeks with thick forests patched in between. Climbing up here was pointless tonight; he couldn’t see a thing, but then there was a flash and a crack of thunder and lightning, and the mountain lit up like day. In that flash he thought he saw a glint of something other than rock. Without hesitation he dropped down and flattened his body against the mountain. He knew there would be another lightning flash soon and began crawling to the edge to get a better look. When the next flash came he knew it was a tent, but it looked like one issued by the Army. Perhaps it was a tent left from the unit that was before him; they had found a different camp than previous units that had held the mountain, so it was likely there would be remnants of other camps. He decided that he needed to get a closer look.

This side of the mountain was a lot less steep which also made it a lot more practical for the enemy to come from, and that may have been why the previous camp was made there. Brad made his way down and was now about ten yards from the tent, and then he noticed something, a light. He crept around to get an angle so he could see in the tent. The light inside was a small propane stove that could fit no more than a can of beans. His heart began racing faster and faster as he realized this was no friend. He knew because the Army only used dry food meals, but he could see most of the way into the tent and there was no one inside. Panic gripped him, and he began spinning about looking for the enemy scout. What if the scout had found their camp and was beginning to take them out one by one, he thought, but the thought was soon dismissed as he considered the beans cooking on the stove. The scout would not have gone out for long if he was making food, he wouldn’t leave the light on to give him away. So then the next question was why would he leave the light on? Was he careless? No, scouts were never careless they did things with a purpose, and the only reason to leave the light on would be to use it as a focal point or distraction so Brad wouldn’t look away. The scout knew he was here.

            Immediately he switched the safety off his rifle, and his eyes darted around looking for the scout, why hadn’t he been shot yet? If the scout knew he was here why had he not killed him already, but maybe, Brad thought, the scout knew he was here but couldn’t see him yet. It was hard to see in the storm and Brad’s combat gear blended perfectly with the grey and black shadows of the rocks. Brad held perfectly still for several minutes trying to locate any sign of movement. After sitting there for and seeing nothing he decided it was time that he made an escape to tell his unit about the enemy scout. He slowly turned around and began scrambling up the rocks up towards the summit.

The climb had made him tired and the rain along with the fear that had control over him was making his body numb. The throne was just over the last rock and as he rose over to see the throne, there was the enemy scout his rifle pointed down at camp. Brad was frozen for a moment, and in that moment the scout had realized he was there and had turned towards him raising his rifle to bring Brad his death. He pulled the trigger and felt the ram against his shoulder. There was no noise; it was completely silent, just the continuous tap as each shot hit its target.

Rain continued to fall, the lightning continued to rip apart the sky; the thunder could not be heard there was only silence. Brad walked over to the throne and the scout’s body had fallen into it perfectly. Brad stood in the deafening silence and watched the scout’s chest rapidly rise up and down, gathering what little bits of oxygen his body could before he left, and with every flash of lightning Brad saw red. The scout’s breathing slowed as the blood began to pool at the foot of the throne. He looked at the scout’s face, and realized he was only a boy—a boy no older than his little brother. Brad began shaking and crying, he knelt down next to the body and ran his fingers across his forehead and down to close the eyes. It wasn’t fair their roles should have been reversed. He hadn’t even realized he was the one shooting. The boy was about to kill him, yet for some reason Brad had stopped him. He couldn’t understand why he had stopped him. He stood back up and looked down at the boy sitting on the throne, perched on the saddle of the ancient beast’s spine, and thought that it should have been him sitting there with his eyes closed towards the sky. It should have been him with the hollow empty look on his face. The boy is free now he thought, the boy is at peace. He wanted so badly to die, and yet he couldn’t.