1 Chapter 1: One More Battle

MILO'S POV

War is hell. Anyone that tells you differently, that sees it as some sort of artistic expression of empires dancing back and forth in the cosmic balance, is a dumb*ss, a liar, or both. Probably both. War with aliens who’ve advanced their killing methods beyond anything the human mind can imagine isn’t just hell, it’s every layer of Dante’s Inferno rolled into one and shoved down your throat during your one bid to make dry January happen.

I am just a cog in the machine of war. It’s a machine that’s breaking down, that’s losing screws and chipping paint with every mechanical shutter. This is evident in our uniforms. Mostly, they’re hodgepodge now. Some of my mates’ pieces don’t fit, either too big and hanging off their bodies or too tight, hugging joints and chafing. That’s if you’re lucky enough to have matching pieces. I don’t anymore. I did during my first tour, four years ago. Now, I wear my uniform jacket over ripped jeans dotted with charcoal-colored burn holes. The jacket has been repaired so many times with so many different colored threads it looks like the garment baby of the union between a military jacket and a shirt meant to celebrate pride month. I’d laugh at it, but I haven’t done that in years. I’m not sure I even know how anymore.

Rich, the Sergeant Major, came back to the pod. His handprint keyed him in, a fairly new development in the Paraxeptional Operational Dens. Before, we’d dug holes and tried to hide in trenches, WWI style. The top brass told us that we’d have to resort to guerilla fighting methods since we knew the land the best and were more camouflaged in the environment than the enemy. The memory of the stench of all those bodies, layered one on top of the other, decaying in the smoke left on a field after battle will never leave my mind. There were good men down there. Men whose families will never know what happened to them, if those families have made it this far themselves.

Rich came in and threw down his jacket before sinking onto it. He reclined cross-legged, his back up against the metal wall of the pod.

“We’re going to be the front line soon. There are enemies headed this way. Have a meal. Have a cigarette. Say your prayers. Then, get your gear on. You’re the best b*stards I ever met,” he gruffed.

Rich has said this same goodbye every time the squad is called to fight. For a while, it’d been nearly every day. This past month there’s been less fighting. None of us knows whether that’s because the invaders are regrouping or because there just aren’t that many more humans to kill. Either way, it’s a relief to know the end is probably coming. We’ve been at this a long time.

Aiden gets up and stretches. There isn’t much room in the pod, so we mostly sit cross legged or with our knees up to our chests. I lean out of his way, knowing he gets jittery and needs to shake it off before we head into combat. Aiden is only seventeen. Two years into the war for earth, it was decided the draft age would come down a year. I’ve seen plenty of kids freeze in terror or crap themselves before a fight or during one. Aiden is solid, though. He just has to keep moving.

“Gum?” Chavo asks me.

“Yeah,” I agree, reaching out to take a piece of gum that lost its flavor long ago. By the smell still on the wrapper, I guess it must be cinnamon.

Aiden bounces. Chavo, whose real name is Jorge but says he hated being called ‘hey, whore’ by little racists growing up, chews. It used to be tobacco, but there’s nowhere to spit in the pod. Now, it’s gum.

As I chew, I put my hand over my breast pocket. I feel them there, little lumps that tell me the rosary is resting over my heart. I don’t bring it out. I used to. Pressing the beads with my fingers before a fight used to be an act of comfort. Instead, I push them into my flesh, through the fabric, and think of all the times my mother held the smooth, polished beads in her hands.

Anytime my siblings or I got into trouble she would say, “I’m going to pray for you now. I’ll pray and pray until I don’t want to smack you anymore. Así que ayúdame Dios!” and from her pocket, her rosary would appear.

That, and every night at bedtime she would drape the rosary over our fingers and hers, encasing us in a web of prayer one by one. On some days it was the only individualized attention you got from Mom, but she always tailored the prayers just for you.

How many times did I hear her say something for me like, “Dear Lord, please help Milo with his grades in school so I do not have to use this rosary a hundred times tomorrow!”

I feel the edges of my mouth turn up for a second. I miss her. And dad, too. All my siblings. I don’t know if it’s silly to ask the higher power for them to be safe, to be protected from the violence that seems to have touched everyone else. I don’t know if it’s silly to believe there’s still a being out there looking out for all of us. I don’t know and that hurts. If Ma heard that, she’d slap me upside the head. She’d tell me she didn’t drag me to church all those years for me to second guess things now. She’d say that, but her eyes would tell me she understands. Ma was always like that, theatrical bluster over a kind heart.

I feel it, the earth-shaking in a jaw-cracking rhythm. They’re almost on us. I drop my hand away from my jacket. It’s time.