General Order 24 [Tankiverse Fanfic]

[Hippin_in_Hawaii 639]

General Order 24

Fanfic in the Tankiverse by Hippin_in_Hawaii

 
Fred trudged up the shattered street, the wagon squeaking along behind him.
 
He’d bought the wagon earlier that morning - purchased, actually, for the sole purpose of a fairly lengthy drive to the nearest uncontested city. It was red, had golden wings emblazoned on its sides, and was a perfect clone of the one he’d had as a child. He could faintly remember sitting in the wagon, bundled in layers of winter clothing and wrapped in several blankets, as his father pulled him down the sidewalk to go to the park. As the wagon bounced and climbed over the gravel and rubble littering the street, yanking and tugging at his protesting shoulder and elbow, he realized how thoroughly he had underappreciated his father’s efforts.
 
The wheels had not squeaked at first, but it didn’t take too many blocks of being towed over unfriendly terrain under such a heavy load for them to begin complaining. He hoped it would help make the scenario a little more obviously non-threatening. How, he wondered, would the screenplay for this moment read?
 

Scene1: Exterior, Monday afternoon. A war-torn street. FRED, a soldier dressed in field uniform, trudges down the middle of what used to be a four-lane parkway. His path is circuitous; there are bomb craters and debris to avoid. A fallen aspen blocks the way; he must go around. Fred drags a red wagon behind him, a child’s toy, piled high with crates of military foodstuffs and flats of bottled water. The wheels squeak as Fred leans forward to pull it over a large crack. Fred pauses to wipe sweat out of his eyes, the coolness of the day not enough to offset the effort he is expending.

 
Yeah, probably something like that. Fred peered around, compared his surroundings to the carefully-memorized map in his head. The major intersection he wanted was just two blocks ahead. Sighing, he leaned forward against the wagon’s resistance, and resumed walking.
 
The center of the intersection was a crater that plumbed the city’s foundations. Apartments stood on three corners; a shopping plaza on the fourth. A grocery store, several convenience stores, a liquor store, and half a dozen restaurants shared these blocks. If there were refugees hiding in the part of the city, here was a pretty good place to look for them.
 
Fred dropped the handle of the wagon and started looking around for convenient-sized scraps of lumber. There were some advertising signs lying mangled on the sidewalk, a broken counter visible through the shattered front window of one convenience store. A rack of newspapers provided easy kindling; within a few minutes, he had a small fire going. He dragged a few seat-sized pieces of rubble up to serve as makeshift chairs, sparing a moment to criticize himself for having not built the fire near the rocks instead.
 
The sun slid lower in the sky. Fred opened the top crate on the wagon and took out a meal. He pulled the heating tab and set the package on the ground to wait while it warmed, taking the opportunity to pull out and open a bottle of water. Then, balancing the tray on his lap with the skill acquired from years of practice, he peeled back the foil cover and fell to.
 
After dinner, Fred tossed the packaging in the fire, taking the opportunity to add a couple of chair legs and some other smashed furniture, stoking the blaze against the increasing chill of the evening. He found a stick suitable for fire-poking and settled down to wait. His troops had a pool going on how long it would take the first person to show: he had bet on two hours.
 
Roughly half an hour later, he heard the rubble shift somewhere behind him. Well, bother. Lost that bet. Fred stopped stirring the fire and sat up straight, but did not turn around.
 
“We’ve got you covered,” came an anonymous voice. Male, mature, scared but trying to sound tough.
 
“I’m sure you do,” responded Fred.
 
“Take off your pistol and toss it away,” demanded the voice.
 
“Sorry, but no.”
 
There was a beat. “I said, drop your gun!” The voice seemed uncertain, but definitely louder.
 
Fred sighed theatrically, large and loud. “Sir, if you and your friends decide to shoot me, there’s nothing I can do to stop you. But my tombstone is not going to read ‘he laid down arms.’ I am not here to be your hostage, I am here to talk. Have a chat. Share some food. Now, I can do all those things with a gun pointed at my back, but I will not do any of them without a token of respect. You can shoot me, walk away, or come join me by the fire.” He paused. “I’d appreciate it if you didn’t shoot me, though.”
 
Fred resumed poking the fire with his stick. After a few minutes, a man walked gingerly into his peripheral vision, a hunting rifle clutched tightly in his hands. Fred nodded at a small pile of cinder blocks beside him. “Have a seat. Mind the wind, tho. Don’t want the smoke in your eyes.”
 
The man sat down, laying his rifle on the ground away from Fred. “My friends still have you covered,” he warned.
 
“I’m sure they do,” nodded Fred.
 
They sat in silence. Fred poked the fire for a few minutes, then casually offered his stick to the other. “Care to poke?”
 
The man started to chuckle, and then to laugh. Fred joined him. Together, they laughed long and loud. “Oh, you are one cool customer,” gasped the man.
 
Fred said nothing, but pointed at his wagon. “You hungry? Thirsty? Help yourself.”
 
The man stood and went to the wagon. “These all the same?”
 
Fred chuckled. “No, there are three kinds in there: crap, puke, and swill.”
 
“Which one is puke?”
 
“Blue sticker.”
 
“And how’s this work?”
 
“Pull that tab on the bottom. Yank it hard. Ok, now set it down. There’s a chem pack that will heat the food, but it’ll scorch your lap if you hold it while it’s heating.”
 
They sat and waited, staring at the fire. After a couple of minutes, Fred said “It’s probably safe to pick up now.”
 
Fred sat and waited while the other opened the tray. The man took a couple of timid bites, then started shoveling the food in. Fred went back to poking the fire.
 
“That hit the spot. You got a name, Gak?”
 
“Fred. You?”
 
“Call me Chucky.”
 
“Well, Chucky, that wagon is for you. There are three cases of meals, twelve units per case, less what we ate. And four cases of bottled water from a big box retailer. You can take that and walk away any time you like.”
 
Chucky stared at the fire. “That’s a handsome gift.”
 
“I’ve got an even better one. About two kilometers that way,” Fred gestured over his shoulder, back where he’d walked, “I have a truck full of these. One hundred cases in assorted flavors. Two thousand liters of clean water in drums. Full tanks of gas.”
 
Chucky reached into his pocket and pulled out a small leather bag. From this, he produced some loose leaves and rolling papers. Neither man spoke while Chucky proceeded to roll a cigarette. As he pocketed his supplies, Fred held the end of his poking stick in the fire to catch a small blaze, then offered the flame to Chucky, who lit the fag and took a deep drag before offering it to Fred.
 
“Don’t mind if I do,” said Fred.
 
They passed back and forth, each holding his own thoughts.
 
“We Gaks,” said Fred, “well, our intelligence believes that this city is filled with terrorists.”
 
“I believe the term you’re looking for is ‘insurgents,’” responded Chucky.
 
“Thing is, Chucky, that one only gets insurgents in territories one has invaded. We, however, have liberated this area from evil oppressors. Clearly anyone so misguided as to oppose liberation is either a terrorist or a Mong operative.”
 
Chucky nodded. “I see.”
 
“Since the Mongs put up a bit of resistance here, the city took a beating. It’s not really worth salvaging. Now, we’ve evacuated all the loyal repatriates. We set up refugee centers, are providing them all with medical care, and are creating resettling opportunities for them.”
 
Chucky snorted.
 
“Our problem, Chucky, is that now, the only thing left in these ruins are terrorists and Mong operatives. And we simply cannot have that. Wednesday morning, come dawn, the Air Corps is going to firebomb the crap out of this place. They haven’t gotten to do much during this liberation, so they are itching to really do it up right. Once they’re done, my troops and I are going to push through whatever is left standing, neutralizing any opposition.” He took a final drag and threw the stub into the campfire before turning to look Chucky straight in the eyes. “By the end of the week, there will not be anything alive here larger than a rat.”
 
Chucky looked genuinely frightened. “Look, we’re not insurgents, or spies, or anything!  We’re just…”
 
“Going to die in two days,” interrupted Fred. He reached into his pocket, pulled out a set of keys, and dropped them on the ground between himself and Chucky. “There’s not much activity to the west of us. A group of healthy people, with enough food and water, could probably walk clear out of the Federated States and into Coalition territory in a few weeks. That border is still open. Or they could head south and present themselves at a refugee camp. Or they could disappear into some of the unsettled areas and hope for the best.” Fred paused. “Probably best to avoid attracting attention, though. My truck has Gak markings. It can pass through this area without challenge.The truck won’t draw attention, but a parade of civilians behind it could. ”
 
“But I’m a college professor! I don’t know anything about… What do I do?”
 
Fred stared into Chucky’s eyes with his hardest expression. “You spread the word. You pick a destination. Vote on it, dictate it, elect a committee. But get moving. You need to be far enough away by dawn Wednesday that the planes on the airstrike don’t see you and decide you’re a column of Mong.”
 
Fred stood up and turned in a circle. “Damn. I seem to have lost my keys.” He sighed heavily. “It really is gonna be a long walk back to camp.” He turned and strode into the gathering gloom, not looking back.
 

Mahalo (thank you) for reading; I hope you enjoyed! This story is part of a series. Information on the series, and links to the other stories, can be found here.

[Blackdrakon30 2,943]

- Made a few small edits to sentence structure, just to smooth things out a little

 

Approved

 

 

Noice. The interactions with Chucky were really well designed, especially the earlier dialogue in their meeting. It really pulled this story section together, and made it all feel really nice. The only notable change I did was I removed a "replied Fred," from the line where he says "Sorry, but no." I made the edit in order to avoid repetition a little better, because you used "responded Fred" in his previous line of dialogue. It caused a bit of an odd feel. Other edits were just small tweaks and rearranging of words.

[shafter9 156]

“Have a seat. Mind the wind, tho. Don’t want the smoke in your eyes.”

Is the "tho" intentional, though?

[Hippin_in_Hawaii 639]

“Have a seat. Mind the wind, tho. Don’t want the smoke in your eyes.”

Is the "tho" intentional, though?

It's a commonplace substitution in colloquial US written english. It wasn't so much intentional as subconscious. I'll probably change it in the novelization, tho... good catch!

Edited April 3, 2018 by Hippin_in_Hawaii

[GrandExecutioner 1,403]

:)

[tweezers 1,034]

 

 “Damn. I seem to have lost my keys.” 

 

 

 

Unfortunate. I assume that when he returned to the truck with the spares, it had been destroyed by a rogue group of enemies?

[Viking4s 10,791]

It's frustrating the way you deliver each story, the pulp fiction way.

[Hippin_in_Hawaii 639]

It's frustrating the way you deliver each story, the pulp fiction way.

I'm glad to be a source of frustration! It's my goal to publish once a week until the story is done. So far, I haven't missed a deadline. I'm sure I will; life doesn't respect deadlines. And I need to build up a surplus of at least seven stories before mid-June to cover my summer travels. Currently, I've got zero completed stories in the can. But that's ok! It's why pulp writers earn the big bucks, right?

[Viking4s 10,791]

I'm glad to be a source of frustration! It's my goal to publish once a week until the story is done. So far, I haven't missed a deadline. I'm sure I will; life doesn't respect deadlines. And I need to build up a surplus of at least seven stories before mid-June to cover my summer travels. Currently, I've got zero completed stories in the can. But that's ok! It's why pulp writers earn the big bucks, right?

I gonna wait that wrote more and read them all in one go. :)