The Padded Room of Love

I wrote this as a play about two friends of mine.  The class I wrote it for dismissed it as unrealistic.  Most of this is factual and in fact ver batem quotes.

Characters:

DAVID, a graduate student living in a large apartment paid for through his cushy government job.  Aged in his late 20’s.

JACK, an unemployed young man, friend of David, who is always stopping by the apartment and hanging out.  Is currently dating Anna when he can afford it.  Age 20.

ANNA, Jack’s ostensible girlfriend, has money through her well off parents, with whom she lives.  Goes to community college and is also close friends with DAVID, and stops by the apartment often as well, most often with Jack.  Aged early 20’s.

ACT I

Setting:

David’s apartment living room, the present.

David is sitting in a chair in the living room, reading.  Jack knocks, enters without waiting for a reply, and sits down too.

JACK

[sighing] Well, David, I did it.  I talked to her.

DAVID

What do you mean “her?”  Did what to who?

JACK

I talked to Anna.  I told her it wasn’t working.

DAVID

[incredulous] Jack.  Why the fuck did you do that?

JACK

Yeah.  I told her I just couldn’t do it anymore.

DAVID

But why?  That’s like… Really sad, man.

JACK

[sighing] Yeah I know.  I mean she’s a good girl and all, it’s just that, I mean, I just don’t have feelings for her like I thought I did.  I think I’ve fallen in love with someone else.

DAVID

Someone else?  Like who?

JACK

Well, don’t tell anyone but…  You remember Mary?

DAVID

[stammering, incredulous] Um… That one girl from Scotland?  The one who’s pictures you’re always liking? The super emo looking one?  The 16-year-old one?  I know you’re just kidding me.  I know this just a prank, because you are not that fucking stupid.

JACK

Yeah I know, I know… Me and her just have a lot in common, you know?  And she’s not emo!

DAVID

Ok, Goth. Whatever.

JACK

 She’s just like, alt.  She only dresses that way to look cool.

DAVID

Cool? [shouting] She looks like a necromancer, out of a video game!

JACK

Yeah! Like the one in Guild Wars!  Isn’t that cool?

DAVID

[Shaking his head] I can’t believe I’m hearing this.  This is crazy.  You’re crazy.  She’s a fucking kid.

JACK

Yeahhhh… Yeah…  I know…  But I mean, she’ll be 17 in like, 2 months.  We just have so much in common.  We both like Marilyn Manson a lot and, um…

DAVID

This is insane.  Is this because you haven’t been sleeping well?  I mean I know you haven’t slept in like a couple of days or something.  I think you need to rest on this.

JACK

Yeah that’s what was keeping me up.  For a while I thought I really liked Anna, and it was so much easier to be with her.  But when she was over here this last weekend, this all hit me.

DAVID

What hit you?  That you’d decided you’d made too many rational, reasonable choices in your life?  That it was better to chase a bird in the bush rather than be content with the perfectly fine one in your hand?

JACK

Mary told me she liked me and stuff, and at first I was like “I think you’re a great girl, but you’re a bit too young for me,” but the more I talked to her, the more I couldn’t help falling in love with her.

DAVID

What? Over Facebook?  You’re in love with this image you’ve created of her in your mind.  You don’t really know her.  She, too, likes an image that she’s created of you, not the real you.  She’s as clueless as you are.

JACK

She’s like, really mature for her age though.  I mean, I’m only 20 and she’ll be 17 in a few months.  I mean it isn’t that bad.

DAVID

Isn’t that bad?  If you were 30 and she was 26, it would be completely different.  But it isn’t.  A 16-year-old girl is going through a lot of changes.  She’s going to be very different in a year, more so in 2, and still more by the time she’s 20.

JACK

 I’m going to visit her later this year.  I’ve been saving up and I’ll stay with my cousin Danny.  I’ve always wanted to see Scotland!

DAVID

With what money?  You have no job.  You know why Anna was so great? Because she seemed to love you, despite you never getting anything for her, despite you never having money for her, despite you never being able to take her out.  She never judged you for your poverty.  All that aside, how the fuck are you going to pay for a trip to the UK, which is absurdly expensive anyway?

JACK

I’m going to use my tax return.

DAVID

That is not income.  That is a one-time bonus.  That is something you would be far better off squirreling away for unanticipated expenses.  Not… Blowing it on trips to visit teenage girls in fucking Scotland.

JACK

I’ll be staying with Danny, remember?  I’ll save a ton of money.

DAVID

That’s not a real solution.  This is crazy, and not in the funny, cool way.  This sort of thing works out in books and stupid rom-com movies.  Not so much in real life.

JACK

Yeah, I know.  I’d laugh at myself too in your shoes.  But she’s literally perfect for me.  Like if I made a check list about all the things I’d like in a person, she would fill every box.  I don't think I’ll ever meet a cute, intelligent, Marilyn Manson loving, guitar playing, brilliant artist and singer with super long hair that collects exotic animals.

DAVID

 [sputtering angrily] That’s your fucking checklist?  That’s the ideal woman? Long hair and loves Manson?  Likes snakes?

JACK

The only thing that bothers me is the age difference which - she teases me about constantly. [laughs]

DAVID

You know why its bothering you? That’s your fucking conscience, pleading in vain for you to start loving sanity more than teenagers.   How would you even do this?  You go to Scotland once, then what? Gonna have a long distance relationship from here to there?  What is your end game on this? What plan of action could you have?

JACK

Well, she’ll probably be coming here for art school in like a year and then we’ll see what happens.

DAVID

This is madness.  Not cool Sparta madness, just the batshit crazy kind.  I’ll talk to you later man.  You need to go and do some thinking and get some sleep.  This is just insane.

David gets up exits the room.  The scene ends, and Jack leaves as well.

ACT II

Setting: David’s apartment, the day after Act I.

David is sitting in the living room reading, when Anna and Jack knock and walk in.

DAVID

 [surprised] Well, uh, hi.  I wasn’t exactly expecting to see you two… together.

ANNA

 [laughing] Yeah, can you believe it?  This guy wants to break up with me.

Anna and Jack sit down next to each other on the couch.

DAVID

Um.  You seem to be taking that rather well.

ANNA

Yeah.  I kind of already knew he was into someone else, and so I didn’t take it too seriously.

DAVID

 [incredulous] So you just kept kind of quasi-dating anyway?   

JACK

[laughing] yeah I guess so!

DAVID

And that seems normal and fine to you?

ANNA

We’re just friends.  I actually support him in this.

DAVID

You what?  Is this like your way of getting revenge?  Encouraging this lunacy?

ANNA

No! I really think it might work out or something.  They seem to like each other.

DAVID

So he’s not only gone insane, but you have too?  I feel like I’m in the looney bin listening to two crazies in straightjackets telling me that up is down, and that the sky is red. 

Anna and Jack laugh together.

DAVID

I’m glad you find it so… amusing.  I don’t know whether to laugh or cry listening to this nonsense.  Maybe it’s good that there’s no screaming or hitting each other, but this is just bizarre.

JACK

Eh, we’ll see what happens, you know?

DAVID

What happens is you guys drag out this farce while you pretend to love her, and then in a year she realizes that you’re not what she thought you were, or vice versa, and you go your separate ways.

JACK

[laughing] Yeah man, maybe.  Shit’s weird.  Hey, we’re going to go catch a flick, see you later.

DAVID

You’re going on a date?  I feel like I’m the only one around here who isn’t huffing paint.

Laughing, Anna and Jack leave.  The scene ends.

ACT III

Setting: A large public park

David and Anna are walking together on the path through a park.

DAVID

So it’s been a dramatic couple of days.

ANNA

Yeah, I mean I knew this was coming.  I already knew he liked her better.

DAVID

So um... Why put up with it?  I mean that seems a little absurd to stick around with him in the face of that.  It’s not like you guys even dated that long.

ANNA

[shrugging] I don’t know.  We talked and I told him I’ll be there anyway if she doesn’t work out, and since he’s got like a year left until she’ll get here anyway.

DAVID

[incredulous] Wait so… you’ve basically told him you’re ok with being the side chick while he pines after another woman?  Do you realize how you sound?

ANNA

[looking away] Yeah, I know.  It’s just that I mean, it might be the best I can get.

DAVID

 [concerned] That’s insane.  You’re still young and beautiful and smart.  Even if you weren’t, there’s no reason for you to… degrade yourself like this.

ANNA

The thing is its still better than I’ve been treated in the past.  Like, I don’t want to give this up completely and just go back to being lonely.

DAVID

[shocked] But that’s crazy!  How on earth will you find any sort of happiness or genuine love with that mentality?  Why would you settle so low?

ANNA

 I don’t know.  It’s just what I’m used to.  He still talks affectionately to me when we’re in bed together, and it’s nice.

DAVID

[sputtering in surprise] Wait… You’re sleeping with him still?  So he ostensibly sets you aside to proclaim his love for this fucking girl he’s never met overseas, and still fucks you on the side?  That’s love?  That’s a relationship?  I’m not sure who’s getting the worse end of the stick, you or this other girl.  He obviously doesn’t care that much for her if he still warms his bed with you.

ANNA

 I know it sounds crazy, it’s just all I’ve had.

DAVID

 It breaks my heart to hear you say that.  You deserve better.  Everyone does.

ANNA

Do I really? What you say sounds so logical, but, deep down, I just don’t believe that.

DAVID

Then there’s your problem.  And until you do, you’ll never find something remotely satisfying.  This entire thing is a train wreck and you seem to be aware of that, yet you just continue on anyway?  I’m not sure which of you is more crazy.

ANNA

Yeah.  I don’t think they’ll last too long anyway, then he might come back.

DAVID

Of course it won’t.  It’s a ridiculous pipe dream and the odds are she’ll realize he’s not whatever image her teenage mind has constructed of him, and grow out of him, and probably fairly quickly.  When that happens, you would have to be afflicted with the worst sort of servility and defeat to take him back.  I can’t imagine what sort of self-esteem fail you’d have to have, to accept that state of affairs.

ANNA

[placing her hand on her abdomen] I know. I’m not stupid.  It’s just that I’m holding out hope that he changes his mind and sticks around when the baby comes.

DAVID

[eyes tightly closed in a wince as he stops walking] Oh Jesus Christ.

Scene ends.

Open Letter to Senator Cruz

This was written to Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX) during the GOP primary, late may 2016.  It is reposted here as a matter of record.

Dear Senator Cruz, and whomever else is concerned with the current state of affairs,

I am writing this letter to express my opinion, and offer my advice for your consideration, regarding the current speculation regarding the potential of some sort of collaboration or rapprochement between you and Mr. Donald Trump. I am writing this also in case you are considering succumbing to the well-known pressure from the entrenched party elites to endorse Mr. Trump in the name of “unity” of a political party. I am writing as one who is also being surrounded by clamor to pay homage to a golden calf, and to embrace ideas that I have always opposed, and renounce other ideas that I have held in higher regard than any party or organization. I am writing this as an open letter as well, for any who may desire words to consider regarding what we, who have thought ourselves lifelong Christians and conservatives, ought to do, now that our party (or former party) has seen fit to anoint a man utterly repulsive to everything we stand for, as its presumptive nominee.

I am not a man of such prose and eloquence so as to fully capture all the reasons why acquiescence in this would be terrible, but I will attempt anyway. Perhaps I need only point to the example of Dr. Ben Carson, who has sullied himself with the naïve notion that lending his good name and character to a man of Mr. Trump’s stripe will somehow benefit him, or America, or anyone except Mr. Trump. What has since become of him? Has Mr. Trump apologized to him even once, even in private, for comparing him with a child molester?

If you agreed to a similar fate, you would utterly cease to know what stature and respect you currently command, even in your difficulties. You would fade from all respect both in the eyes of the principle and the eyes of politics, as you would cease to stand out. You would simply be merely another anonymous face in the crowd of sycophants at a king’s court. By failing to be distinct, or principled, and merging with the vast sea of those who are cynical and corrupt, you would fail to be noteworthy any further. In addition, you would be accepting him and all the base lies he has spewed about you (and still worse, your wife and father, among others).

If you carry on the fight, however, know that you will undoubtedly pay a heavy price. Successful in the election or not, be assured that Mr. Trump and the leadership of the Republican Party, the same establishment that Mr. Trump has railed against in feigned outrage, will seek to end your career and public service. You will, like the rest of us who have refused to prostrate ourselves before him, be called a traitor, a coward, a spoilsport, a poor loser, and a shill for Hillary Clinton. Do not be deterred! Some have said that it is time to bend our knee to their messiah, to accept his victory, and fall into line behind him, that he may bring forth his contradictory and vague utopia. Yet this I cannot do, as I know of only one messiah, and He has not walked among us for some two thousand years.

Even if they were to somehow take everything from you, leaving you naked in the gutter, you would have the one thing that no man can take without your consent: your dignity. With your dignity in place, you are still richer in spirit than any billionaire, and that is worth far more, as not even all the material wealth in the world can buy character, integrity, or a good legacy. Strip away a man’s façade, and you will see who he truly is, for richer or for poorer. What are you, truly? We can reasonably imagine what our present domestic enemies would look like, stripped of their trappings and status: vain, insecure, shallow, cowardly wretches, scheming and conniving with and against each other as they try to chase the prevailing wind. You, however, may show a different example to an America yearning for any kind of real leadership at all. So long as you stand with your spine straight, however persecuted, poor, and hated you may be, then you stand taller than even the highest mountain.

While it is true that Jeremiah, and what few faithful remained, could not alone prevent the fall of Jerusalem, and that his words were not heeded until the fated hour had already come to pass, and doom had already been decreed, he still stands shining through the ages as an example of faithful courage and fidelity to virtue. He was imprisoned and treated far worse than any of us ever were, for the crime of speaking the truth. How can we be any less than he? Was he spat upon less than us? Were his words derided as treason and folly any less?

Supposing we were to bend our knee to this man, what would necessarily follow? Are we then to acknowledge the bankruptcy of all our principles? Shall we admit to the whole world that we have no answer to a statist populism, the inbreeding of liberalism with incoherent anger? Are we to become Democrats, and our party one of essentially the same ideas masquerading in a patriotic guise, promoting the illusion of any distinction? Where then will arise the counterpoint to these foolish and emotional notions that are strangling America? Will that shining city on a hill that was founded centuries ago be allowed to become a hollow and dead husk, for want of good men to champion its cause? If Mr. Trump is considered an acceptable compromise of everything we have ever claimed to stand for, then who exactly is too far? Will the legacy of Lincoln, Reagan, and others, truly be forsaken?

If we are too cowardly to stand against the wind, then who can we count on to do so in the future? When the time comes for an even more abject surrender of whatever pitiful shreds are left, what example shall we leave them, if we demonstrate that at the crucial hour, we simpered quietly and obediently in pathetic moral weakness? Will we be looked upon as the men of Munich are, as the men of Vichy are: collaborators in our own debasement and destruction? Will they ask why there was not even one last besieged outpost of the values that the nation was built upon? Will they even know what those values are, if we allow our backs to sag now, our nerves to fail us, and meekly accept the easy wrong over the hard right?

It may be that God has already determined this to be an hour of testing and trial. Perhaps the likes of Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, Bernie Sanders, and Donald Trump, and worse, are foreordained, and that their madness must come into the world, and, for a time, lead America into a dark wilderness. Woe to us, however, if we should aid and abet such malcontents with our silence and complacence! To paraphrase the immortal words of Martin Treptow: we must act as if the whole issue of the struggle depended on each of us alone. If the last public holdouts of decency, liberty, tradition, and faith sell out, then that cause will be dealt a debilitating blow from which it may not recover. Even if it does, we would all do well to recall the warning of Mordecai to Esther: that relief and succor may come even if we refuse this cup, but it will fail to absolve our guilt, nor cleanse the tiniest amount of our disgrace.

It is in light of these reflections that I prevail upon you to stay the course, to maintain the fight, to be the leader America needs, even if that does not bring you to the White House or other pinnacles of worldly power. While you must never succumb to the hubris that has become the hallmark of this interloper, I implore you to endeavor to be the last major voice of our American cause, especially if none other is able or willing to take that mantle or bear that wearisome burden. Even if the only person standing with you for our values, our principles, our basic American way of life, is me (and certainly I am not alone), then nevertheless stand you must!

-          Joshua Nybo

Compilation of submissions

Since I've been sharing around some of the work I'm going to be submitting for class, here's one post that just links to the somewhat scattered submissions:

Non-fiction story:
http://mentiserrores.blogspot.com/2016/05/the-longest-night.html

Fiction short story:
http://mentiserrores.blogspot.com/2016/02/the-picture.html

Runner up short story:
http://mentiserrores.blogspot.com/2015/06/a-story-written-at-behest-of-certain.html

Also considered for submission:
http://mentiserrores.blogspot.com/2014/12/the-noisy-neighbors.html

3 Poems:
http://mentiserrores.blogspot.com/2015/01/smeester.html

http://mentiserrores.blogspot.com/2014/08/beyond-mirror.html

http://mentiserrores.blogspot.com/2014/05/to-start-with-how-about-nice-poem-about.html

The Longest Night

A true story from the war

            On that fateful night of 18 October 2003, I was standing in the motor pool of the FOB (Forward Operating Base) in Taza.  My friend John Hart was present, and both of us were taking in the Iraqi evening with its perpetually dusty smell, playing black jack on the hood of a Humvee.  We were both enjoying a Marlboro Red, and talking about nothing at all.  The evening was cool but not cold, quite pleasant for all involved, after a 110+ degree summer. 

Overall there was a relaxed mood, with neither of us worried about much.  We’d met shortly after Airborne School and had enjoyed some time together in the rear detachment of the 173^rd Airborne Brigade in Italy, being too new and green to join the unit until several months after the war began.  He was a good man, with a good heart, and everyone liked him.  Many thought he would become a psychologist one day, due to his kindness and empathy.  He was a good listener, and was easy to talk to.  We were alike in that we both seemed fish out of water.  Both of us seemed to have an odd disposition for being airborne infantry (paratroopers, to use another term), him being so empathetic, me being so aloof and nerdy.  Like me, he was also at the bottom of the totem pole, a fellow Private First Class.  His platoon would stop by my little FOB almost every night, either to go on patrol or to drop things off, or pick things up and take them back to the airbase at Kirkuk.

            It was about 6:30 pm or so when the platoon had to return to the airbase, and left those of us at the FOB behind for another night in the village of Taza.  Hart and I shook hands and said goodbye, sure we’d see each other with the resupply tomorrow night.  I noted that the company Executive Officer, David Bernstein, was going on the convoy.  He was the second in command, and him tagging along struck me as odd, since the commander and first sergeant were going as well (normally you don’t have all 3 top leaders in the company at the same place at the same time, just in case).  There was a coin toss in the mortar section as to who would be part of the escort back to the airbase (and back), and I won.  I would be staying and pulling guard, while Martin got stuck driving Bernstein and Hart back in Bernstein’s personal Humvee, Charlie 5.

 Relieved of the burden of having to sit through a roundabout convoy, I strolled back into my little room, happy once again that I was living in a confiscated building and not on the concrete foundation of an unbuilt home, the way I’d spent the previous two months.  I even had air conditioning!  Compared to the miserable, mosquito infested position we’d held for months on the Zab river, suffering through that infernal summer, I was living in the lap of luxury.

            My guard shift started in 10 minutes, and so me and Smithey, a fellow private in the mortar section, geared up and went to the roof.  We were just passing the time in talk, when suddenly we heard distant rumbling.  Somehow I knew it portended the worst, and my stomach clenched.  It was a few seconds later that I saw the soldier below on radio guard sprinting into the main building.  Smithey and I exchanged wide-eyed looks, and saw first platoon running to the remaining trucks, the first responders.

            Long minutes passed while first platoon got ready, and finally drove off into the direction of the rumbling.  The radio was handed up to Smithey and I, as one of the few people left back at the FOB.  Something in me changed then, as I listened to the commander’s voice asking where the FLA (Humvee ambulance) was.  Every 30 seconds to a minute he’d come on to ask the inbound reinforcements where the ambulance was and how soon it would be there.  The strain and concern in his voice become more and more evident, and it was then that I knew that it was really bad out there. 

            Smithey and I did our best to play relay between the attack site and the airbase, until a screaming lieutenant from first platoon told us to get off and find a sergeant.  We did so, and were relieved to be rid of the radio.  Smithey and I were relieved for guard, and I was shocked that it’d been 3 hours since it had all started.  It had seemed like 30 minutes.  We had somehow become very tired over those three hours, and climbed down. 

Inside our little room, Smithey and I took our gear off and began to get ready for bed, but we both stopped halfway through as if by some unheard command, and simply looked at each other for a moment.  The events of the night so far played out again in my mind, and I can only imagine what was going through his head.  After that silent minute, I got up and went outside and just sort of stared into space.

 I had been standing outside for a few minutes when Tuttle, my team leader at the time, came and asked me, “Did you know Hart?”  Did?  Past tense?  My heart sank, and I silently nodded.  He motioned for me to go up the ladder to the radio.

 I climbed back up to the roof, and stood dumbly in front of the sergeants collected up there.  My section sergeant, Pullen, was blunt: “Hart’s dead.”  Even now I’m not sure what I felt.  Mostly just numb shock.  I didn’t cry.  I wasn’t overcome with sorrow.  At first I simply I stood there silently and uselessly.  Then an unbelievable anger filled me, and something in my changed for life, just then.  The Iraqi scum had killed Hart.  My friend since Airborne School was dead.  Up until then I’d somehow half-heartedly believed in Hearts and Minds, and all that other politically correct nonsense about winning over the locals.  It was bullshit of course, but such had been our orders and the priority of the leadership.  After that night, though, I was filled with a singular hatred.  What had been a more general distaste for them had morphed into something very visceral and personal.  I wanted nothing more than to execute every man, woman, and child I found on street. 

It seemed foolish to stand up there any longer, so I wordlessly climbed back down in an angry daze, and returned to the room.  I climbed into the sleeping bag on my cot, and managed to pass into a dreamless sleep, shock overcome by exhaustion.

I was awoken by Tuttle, here again to tell me we had some cleanup to do.  The worst was not over yet.  The whole convoy had come back, everyone looking haggard and dejected.  I followed Tuttle through the motor pool and there it stood: Charlie 5, the truck that both Hart and Bernstein had been on.

The air reeked of sweat and dried blood.  The sun was just starting to come up, and some birds were chirping, adding a morbid quality to the air.  The passenger’s side of the Humvee had a deep puddle of blood pooled below the seat.  Seeing the raw volume of blood, doubt began to fester in me as to whether Bernstein could possibly have survived.  There were unidentifiable bits of organic matter on the seat, which was also soaked in blood.  The whole truck was riddled with holes, hinting at what the passengers must have gone through.  In the back, there was still more blood, everywhere.  Spent shell casings practically covered the truck bed. 

I felt somehow detached from the whole scene as I took a green scrub pad and got to work.  Some of the other guys with me started to tear up, but choked it down.  Others began dry heaving.  I think only one actually vomited into the slit trench nearby.  There was something grisly and ghastly about the whole affair, yet we carried it out, working for at least 4 hours on that truck.  I didn't know what to feel, and I recall feeling only numbness.  I simply shut out the situation and cleaned a Humvee.  I had a job to do, and as a lowly Private First Class, I was being paid to follow orders, not speak or think.  As we finished the job, someone came up and told me it was a shame Bernstein hadn’t survived the flight.  His femoral artery had been hit, and he’d bled out on the medical evacuation helicopter.

Late at night, when I’m deep in my drinks, as usual, sometimes I think about that night.  A coin toss kept me off of that truck.  I think about what good, promising men Hart and Bernstein both were.  The former was my friend, and the latter was truly an exceptional soldier.  I look at my life and wonder – should it have been me instead?

The Picture

He finished blousing his trousers in his tall jack boots.  He adjusted the last few items on his uniform, looking somewhat the way an  SS-Obersturmführer was supposed to.  His temples were gray now, no longer the Party approved shade of blonde.  His once chiseled face was now aged with stress.  Deep lines sliced into his skin, and crows feet danced around the edges of his eyes.  He was 28, yet looked 50, and felt 70.  The gray of his uniform, once so dashing, now seemed to merely reflect the bland, care-worn apathy and numbness that seemed to permeate him.

Behind him, the young woman sat on the edge of the bed, absentmindedly getting dressed.  She looked at him briefly, caught his eye in the mirror.  She turned away quickly, but not before her eyes briefly came to life and shone with the hatred she had for him and his kind.  He stepped over to her in a few long, quick strides, and raised his hand.  She began to cry, and cringed in anticipation of the blow.  It would simply be the latest in a long line of them, yet she cried every time.  He stood over her, and this time was reminded of the girls in the picture, which led to thoughts of the past, of his family, of who and what he used to be. 

He took out the picture from his pocket, and looked at it.  As he examined the picture for the umpteenth time, his brow became furrowed with thought, his eyes not even seeing the picture as introspection took over.  He felt the anger return then, directed at everything and nothing.  Grabbing his cap and sidearm, he quickly left the apartment and climbed down the stairs, completely forgetting that the girl existed, lost in his new purpose.

The street felt lifeless and empty to him, knowing that they had once been so much more lively and bustling, packed with people of all types going about their little lives.  Now there was just the occasional group of soldiers striding purposefully to and fro, sometimes marching in formation.  Occasionally one of the locals could be spotted, shuffling along in a hurry, trying hard not to be seen or noticed, especially if they were young and pretty, like the girl he had just left upstairs.  He strode over to a Daimler-Benz staff car and turned it on, proceeding to drive out of the city, taking sips from the flask of Schnapps he had come to rely on more and more.

It was noon when he reached his destination, a clearing in the forest outside of the city.  Standing before the mound where they had dumped the bodies, he stared blankly at nothing, collecting his thoughts.  There were birds singing, oblivious to man's upheavals and worries.

He reached into his pocket and took out the picture again.  Emotion washed through him once more as he went over it yet again.  The look of contentment in the handsome little family, so much like his own. There were three lovely daughters, appearing to be in their teens.  He himself had only two sisters, and imagined what a third would have been like.  His eyes then narrowed on the boy in the picture, a young lad of perhaps nine or ten.  The boy was standing in the front, holding a toy train, just as the man himself used to.  

When he had been a boy, he had loved trains.  He would watch them come and go at the tracks near his family's house.  The conductors would see him on the fence, and would blow the horn for him while he squealed in joy.  Those times were so long ago now, a bygone era of zest and life.

There was no returning to innocence. He could not go back now, and knew that though he still breathed air, and blood still pumped through his veins, he was a casualty of this war.  He had been swept up in it, and now the destroyer was destroyed, yet only belatedly realizing it.

He noticed that there were birds singing, oblivious to man's upheavals and worries.  There hadn't been any birds on that day when they'd shot this batch, when he had claimed this picture from the clenched hands of the boy's naked corpse.  He reflected on that day, and how it had ended him.  Everything he had been raised to believe was evil, was what he now saw himself as.  He had lost his mental defense, his power to numb himself to his crimes and simply not think about it too much.  There was no longer any room to pretend that he was doing right, building a shining future, the promised racial utopia.  

He sighed as he glanced from the picture to the mound of dirt, his face tensing with emotion.  The birds continued singing, ignoring him as he pulled out his Luger P-08.  Placing the barrel under his chin, he thought of the time before all this, when he'd still been truly alive.

The noise frightened the birds, and it was some time before they resumed their singing.  

My calligraphy is somewhat improving.  I'm still no master but its a lot better than when I started.  I find myself really enjoying it, a lot more than something as studious as this would normally elicit from me

The Last Dance

A story written at the behest of a certain Sharm (allegedly of Azeroth)

The smoke cleared somewhat as the wind blew enough for them to see each other once more. The violet-blue sparks of her readied magic cascaded gently around her, serenely unaffected by the smoke, wind or the battle that had just occurred.  Her golden tresses were possessed of no such discipline, and were chaotically tossed every which way.  Her green eyes narrowed as they met his steel grey ones.  Her mouth tightened in angry determination.

His face betrayed no emotion, as was appropriate for a blackguard of Moloch. Vile black-green tendrils of smoke-like vapors swirled about his armor clad form, seeming to caress the ornate armor, with its menacing skull motifs and ebony runes of dark power.  His skin had taken on an unnatural pallor, his hair a pale, sickly gray.  Nothing about him seemed alive.  Nothing like she remembered.  Not like they used to be, all those summer days of yesteryear.

Thinking of that time brought a tear to her eye before she could catch herself.  Her face briefly lapsed into a contraction of mourning.  It was in that flicker of time that his eyes lost a fraction of his icy composure, and his focus seemed to diminish, as if he were no longer observing the situation at hand, but staring down some corridor of time and memory.

It lasted but briefly before the swirling vapor around him slashed and writhed, and his eyes hardened once more.  Raising his sinister blade, crackling with dark negative power, he charged once more.  She, too, gathered herself and swung her staff in a wide arc, the powerful Ileth’ar gem at its tip glowing a brilliant white-blue. She was enveloped in a translucent blue sphere, while simultaneously a wave of raw kinetic force shot forward, further tearing apart the ground. The wave hit him, yet barely budged him, though it did siphon off some of the momentum of his charge. He brought his sword around and above his head, preparing an overhead slash

She had only a second to react, and used that second to focus all her attention on her shield, pouring all her power into fortifying the barrier as she braced for the oncoming blow.  His blade connected with her shield, grunting as he pressed forward, slowly pushing through. Icy fear began to grip her as she realized she had perhaps seconds until the raw power of his cured blade overcame her magical defenses.  Mind racing, she took a gamble and reached forward, placing her hand on his face, and from her fingertips discharged a blast of brilliant light into his eyes.

He let out a roar and staggered back, his vision dazzled briefly while his own perverse sorcery worked to dispel the shock to his vision. Through the searing blindness something else was fighting to get through as well: the memory of her hand on his face, her warm and alive skin on his corrupted, yet technically living, form.

The swirling vapors around him sputtered as he was assaulted by memory and longing. He recalled a time when she had caressed his face eagerly, rather in desperate defense of her life. He remembered her smell, her smile, her laugh.  His road had been so long and so utterly corrosive, that he had forgotten what a laugh was, what it was like to smile.  A wave of emotion rose up within him, weakening the darkness somewhat as the storm of emotion diluted the hatred and madness within.

For the first time in a very long time, he asked himself what he was doing. Like a man waking up, it was only dawning in increments where he was, and even who he was. She stood before him watching the conflict on his face play out. He stared at her, seeming to see her for the first time.  Hell’s prize was not to be denied, however, and the darkness asserted itself anew, reminding him how he came to this dark path in the first place. All the hurt, disappointment, bitterness and anger. His brow furrowed as the old wounds were opened up anew.

She saw all these warring emotions battling across his face, hope struggling up from some tightly locked closet deep inside her.  Then she saw the anger restore itself in him and that hope crumbled, and she too underwent the agony of the past once more. He raised his weapon again, and brought it swinging in a sideways arc. It was a strike of passion rather than calculation, though, and she was able to deflect it with her staff and magic. She knew she could not hold him for long. He had many slain mages under his belt, and he was in fact specially equipped and empowered for resisting the arcane.

He bellowed, part wail and part warcry, a thunderous sound filled with all his vast pain and regret. She saw that he was now sobbing, his face a contorted grimace of equal parts fury and bitter sorrow.  The raw anguish in that cry touched her heart, and in that moment she wanted nothing more than to embrace him and comfort him.

There was no chance of that, though, as he resumed his furious offensive. The blows rained on her one after another. She dodged and blocked as best she could but it was clearly a losing battle. In desperation she diverted all her power into transforming her staff into an offensive weapon forming a brilliant blue-white spear of pure magic, her last hopeless counter-strike. As he swung one final deathblow, his blade a jet black sabre of raw infernal entropy, she jabbed upward with the last ounce of her strength. Her thrust pierced his ebony breastplate, lancing through his chest and exiting his back. Their eyes met, his shock and agony staring into her grief and exhaustion. They remained locked as his sword, carried on by momentum, ripped into her side, cutting her nearly in half.

A red haze of pain filled her world as she collapsed onto her side, her vision already beginning to swim and fade. He too collapsed, sinking to his knees as the energy spear that had vanquished him reverted back into an inert Ileth’ar staff. The profane power bestowed upon him faded. He was now simply an expended asset, and the darkness abandoned him.

His clouding eyes were now a more natural blue, and he turned them toward her, rolling his head in order to look at her directly. For the last time they locked their gaze on each other. At last, it was settled and done with.  The greater conflict would continue of course, but their war, their struggle, was finally over.

With the last remnants of his once unstoppable strength, he reached a trembling, armored hand toward her. Somehow she dredged up the will to reach back slightly. Their hands fully clasped, and she even managed a smile. “I love you” he managed to mouth as their savage wounds overcame them, and their eyes glassed over.