Before the Quake [Part I]

[pieface101 285]

Before The Quake
Alan Watson

_____________________________________________________________________

 

Alan packed his suitcase with a sigh. Today, he would be dishonorably discharged from service, thus ending his career as a soldier. General Enton just would not take another failure.

 

To be fair, Operation Takedown started off well. Alan's squad was supposed to clear the way into the small town of Ala-Safar, allowing a group of tanks to rumble in easily. They had taken out quite a few insurgents and detonated plenty of mines before the insurgents began a full retreat.

 

Alan decided to pursue the insurgents, pressing them harder and gaining more ground. As his company glided through the desert, they exchanged fire with the insurgents, eventually clearing an additional five miles or so. And then they lost sight of the enemy.

 

At first, Alan continued forward, reasoning that since the insurgents were in front of him, they would eventually catch up. Ten miles later, Alan realized that the chase was fruitless. He heeded his adviser's advice and returned to Ala-Safar. There, he found the insurgents, along with the butchered carcasses of four tanks.

 

"Sir, General Enton will meet with you now." said Alan's assistant, popping his head in the door.

 

"Tell him I'll be there." replied Alan, stuffing a picture of his family in the suitcase. His wife was waving at the camera. His oldest son had struck up a ridiculous pose, and his daughter had raised her hand mid-slap. His youngest son, barely a few months old, was looking at the camera with the curious, fearful, expression that so often pervaded the faces of the newborn.

 

"Sir, he wants you right now." Alan's assistant persisted. Alan grunted and got up, following his assistant into General Enton's office. As always, it was neat and tidy, a reflection of his expectation for the military.

 

"Sit down. We have a lot to discuss."

 

Alan sat down awkwardly in the chair, and forced himself to look into the piercing eyes of his superior.

 

"It appears that you have yet another failed operation, deviating from the orders once again. You do realize this sets you up for discharge, right?" asked General Enton coldly. Alan gave a curt nod.

 

"However, I have direct orders to give you a chance at redemption. You are to be sent on a stealth capture mission. We need a man. Alive. For questioning. He is a well known terrorist. Fail to do so, and you can rest assured that I will send you back home the hard way."

 

Alan gulped. "Continue."

 

General Enton handed over a folder. "These are a collection of important leads, photographs, and orders. Be sure to follow them. Unfortunately, we do not know where this man is located, right now. We need to gather information of his whereabouts. You have the address of his last refuge written on the inside. Go there first. Before deviating from orders, be sure to contact me. That's all."

 

Alan nodded. "Who is this man, then?"

 

Tewu

_____________________________________________________________________

 

 

Tewu woke up on his cot, soaked in sweat. The sun pierced through the windows, illuminating strange designs on the tan colored walls. His brother, Little Eno, was already up, drawing on the walls with chalk. In a few minutes, Tewu would have to go to work to support the two of them.

 

Tewu had started off with a family of five. His father and mother, his older brother Zeku, and Little Eno. When he was very little, he remembered a happy little village with huge desert rocks everywhere that they would climb on.

 

But all good things must come to an end. When Tewu was just five years old, his father and Zeku went off to fight in a war. At first, they wrote often, but gradually, stopped writing. Mother would work extra hard to support her family. Every night, she would collapse on the bed, while Tewu and Little Eno begged for a nighttime story.

 

"Your grandfather used to live in a great, beautiful city. You will go there someday. Life was good and he made a living selling crafts. You should have seen his wooden carvings. One day, bad men came and took the land from us. They made their own country on our land. Grandfather could no longer bear to live in the beautiful city, so he moved to this quiet village. He sold his crafts here, but they never caught on. One day, he fell gravely ill while he was working on a masterpiece. It was a carving of our family. His dying wish was to be buried in the beautiful city, but it was never safe to move back. Maybe if father and Zeku win this war, then we will be able to move back and properly bury Grandfather."

 

And then the sounds of Mother's snores pervaded the room.

 

One day, the enemy soldiers seized their small village. They looted shops and burned down houses, and terrorized the inhabitants. Mother locked the doors and shut the windows. Those who didn't got their houses intruded and their possessions stolen. The sounds of violence and screaming lulled Tewu to sleep each night.

 

A week in, a soldier broke down the door, the smell of alcohol on his breath. He demanded a place to stay. When Mother refused, he kicked her. As Tewu and Little Eno ran to assist Mother, he strode into the room and ate the remainder of their meager provisions. That night, Little Eno ran into Tewu's room to sleep. Tewu stayed up, stroking Little Eno's hair.

 

Around midnight, Tewu heard screams coming from Mother's room. Stopping to make sure Little Eno was still asleep, he crept to the door and peered through a crack. Mother was being assaulted. As Tewu watched in horror, the soldier took his fleshy fist and closed it around Mother's throat. Tewu dashed back to his room, swiped up Little Eno, and ran for it.

 

Tewu ran across the desert for the rest of the night, but exhaustion caught up with him by morning. He collapsed, and would have died had it not been for a kind nomad who showed up at noon. He brought Tewu and Little Eno to a government official, who then designated them a place to stay.

 

Since Little Eno was too young to work, Tewu woke up each morning to support the two of them. It was hard work, and bread and milk were the only food they could afford, save for some cheese if they were lucky.

 

One day, the same government official who gave Tewu the home came back.

 

"I have an offer for you. To defend a very important... possession, along with others like you. You can accept it, and have all the food, water, and supplies you need, or you can remain here in poverty. You only have one chance at this offer."

 

As the man explained the offer to Tewu, his face paled.

 

"Sir... I don't think I want to risk that."

 

"You don't?" said the man, leaning forwards and clasping his hands, "Not after all they've done to you?"

 

Tewu was confused. "All what?"

 

The man smiled and took out a box. He slowly opened it, revealing Zeku's head. His face was riddled with bullet holes. There were a few scars here and there, that completely distorted his face. He was also a little more emaciated than before.

 

Tewu gulped. "I... I accept."

 

Alan Watson

_____________________________________________________________________

 

Alan found himself in a Pathfinder-768, a chopper that would deliver him and his squad to his destination. It was small in stature, with the necessary agility to dodge anti-aircraft fire. It could also slip through radar largely undetected.

 

The pilot was a man named Jerome, with a tendency to be slightly on the annoying side. He played loud music over the sounds of the helicopter blades, and chattered constantly. He also had a habit of cutting the engine and doing "nosedives".

 

Alan examined the files he was given carefully. Sergei Mansworth. The terrorist mastermind. After sifting through several inconclusive photographs, he finally found what he was looking for in a diary. A different address. He underlined it, and thinking some more, circled it in pen.

 

"Jerome?" asked Alan.

 

"Yo wassup dawg? If ya wanna request to change the music, then I ain't buying it. Just lettin' ya know, dawg." Jerome shouted over the ear piercing shrieking that he called "music".

 

"No, it's not that, actually. I was just wondering if you could land about a mile due south of Morana Heights."

 

Jerome paled. "But that's like... twenty miles off course, dawg! I ain't wanna argue with orders, dawg. You know what they said. You be facing discharge if you do it without my man Enton's consent, ya know."

 

"Tell them I ordered you to do it."

 

Jerome swallowed hard, hesitating, before making up his mind and banking sharply to the right.

_____________________________________________________________________

 

Alan found himself on flat ground again, after an uncountable number of nosedives. It was rather vertigo-inducing, to say the least.

 

"Yo dawg, if you need anything, just ring me." called Jerome from the chopper.

 

"I'm fine, thanks." replied Alan. He watched as the chopper took off and flew away, before heading to his rendezvous point. He had sent it to the other members of his squad. He hoped they all arrived. He sighed, before starting the trek across the stretch of desert.

 

When he got there, he found the other members of his squad, already having pitched up tents and collected water. It was a strategic overpass, a cliff drop leading to the village of Morana Heights. The village below was swarming with soldiers. Somewhere in there, was important information. The only way to get it with all the soldiers guarding the village was with a distraction.

 

"Me, Johnston, and Beckett will try to sneak up to get a closer look. When we get past that line of bushes, back us up with fire and cause a commotion." ordered Alan. Although it was not ideal to rush into an attack, he only had so much time before General Enton discovered his little detour.

 

"Roger that." replied various members of his squad. Alan hesitated briefly before setting off down the cliff face, avoiding the view of the soldiers below. Johnston and Beckett followed closely behind.

 

They made slow progress downwards. Loose rocks kept turning into mini landslides, and the sparse scraggly bushes offered barely any handholds. Luckily, they were sliding down the hill from the left of the village, or they would have been spotted long ago.

 

They made a rest stop halfway down. A line of tall bushes formed a line a few feet below them. It would be the ideal spot to sneak around the hill to the front of it, facing the village. And then they would run past it while gunfire above distracted the soldiers. They would come running up the hill. Alan would rush past them and acquire the information he needed. Although he was not looking forward to the last part, he would call Jerome and have to endure some more "music" and "nosedives".

 

"Ready?" asked Beckett. Alan nodded. They crept up to three different tall bushes, and slowly made their way along the line, sneaking across gaps and stopping to make sure the coast was clear. Alan slowly mouthed 3... 2... 1... GO! and they charged across the line of bushes before Alan came to a halt. Johnston and Beckett saw what he saw too and stopped.

 

These weren't soldiers. They were innocent children. Alan was about to call off the fire, when a crack resounded. A stream of blood spurted out of the neck of a little girl. Her teddy bear fell to the ground, covered in a new coat of red.

__________________________________________________________________

 

Part 2

Edited December 21, 2016 by pieface101

[Hex 11,520]

Approved.

 

Edits:

Gave it a new look, and

A wee bit of grammar.

[I3.R.0 1,700]

+1

[BLASTER872 1,892]

Scary..

[GeeVuh 1,647]

Oh my. I'm speechless at your writing ability... Oh my.

[pieface101 285]

Oh my. I'm speechless at your writing ability... Oh my.

Thanks!

[Penguin40 1,714]

Wow. Just, wow. I couldn't read the whole maybe due to some writing style stuff or so (no offense), skimmed it and I loved it. You just turned out to be a brilliant action-thriller writer too, after the bunch of emotional reminder-for-care stories you wrote. Wow.

[Crip 4,735]

You're a very able writer, and the rate at which you churn these articles out is astonishing.

 

Keep it up. Another very enjoyable read.

[pieface101 285]

You're a very able writer, and the rate at which you churn these articles out is astonishing.

 

Keep it up. Another very enjoyable read.

Actually, I had many of these articles pre-planned, but it's true I spend more time on these than actual English essays.

 

Don't tell my teacher I said that.  :ph34r:

[King_Imply 8]

Wow....

 

The quality of writing is astonishing...

[mydoom.exe 5,154]

Actually, I had many of these articles pre-planned, but it's true I spend more time on these than actual English essays.

 

Don't tell my teacher I said that.  :ph34r:

pieface101 doesn't spend much time on his english essays read all about it folks

Edited December 21, 2016 by Hexed
Please do not write in (a) size 24 when unnecessary and (b) capital letters. Both break the Rules.

[NERF836 202]

Great job you have a lot of talent and maybe a career.