The Girl and The War

Chapter Two- Sam

   I woke up to the sound of Drill Sargent Redwall screaming.

"GET UP PRIVATES THIS ISN'T KINDERGARTEN Y'ALL HAVE 5 MINUTES TO BE READY WITH BUNKS MADE OR SO HELP ME GOD-" he kept on going for another minute until I was sure the whole base must have woken up. This was my first day as a cadet for the Allegiance. I arrived last night on a bus after giving my grandmother a tearful goodbye, promising I would make her and my parents proud. My parents had fought for the Allegiance as well, and they died in action last month. On my sixteenth birthday I was given the option to fight for them too, and I took it. I was going to make their deaths mean something. I had to.

  I quickly got up and threw on my uniform. Basic army green pants and jacket. I quickly made my bed the "right way" as Sargent Redwall so kindly said when he taught us last night after arriving. I laced up my boots and waited at the end of my bunk in attention. My bunk mate Charlie was a little slower then me.

"Hurry up man," I whispered "almost out of time." At first look, Charlie was rather intimidating. He was about 6ft 4, and had dark skin and eyes, and a demeanor that stood out in any room. But after talking to him for only a few minutes, it was clear he was as soft as a teddy bear.

"I'm trying man, this shits harder then it looks." He was struggling tucking the top blanket in properly under the mattress. As Sargent Redwall was yelling at a female for wearing jewelry, I quickly helped Charlie fix it. "Thanks man."

"No problem." The two of us waited as Sargent Redwall checked our beds and uniforms for any imperfections. After finding nothing, thankfully, he walked back in front of us and read my name tag.

"Sam Watts eh?" He said

"Yes sir."

"Were your parents George and Sarah Watts?"

"Yes sir." The mention of their names made my heart sink. They were alive two month ago, and now their remains were scattered in a war field somewhere.

"Good soldiers those two, by the looks of you, I'm not sure you will live up to their legacy." He was trying to ruffle my feathers, I remember a while back my father telling me that the officers here were always trying to test him. They would see if you had an easy temper, or showed any sign of weakness. The Allegiance did not want weakness. I didn't respond to him. "What son? Cats got your tongue?" He got real close into my face, to the point where are noses almost touched. After a moment, he smiled then backed up again. "PRIVATES," he screamed "MAKE YOUR WAY TO THE TRAINING FACILITY, THE LAST ONE THERE CLEANS THE LATRINES!"

  Quickly we all rushed to the training center, no one wanted to be the one to clean the latrines, which by the few seconds I had spent there, had been pretty disgusting. The training center was a large room, in the center of the underground base, with many different parts. There was a field which resembled a war ground, there was a shooting range for practice, a jungle course complete with actual mud, despite us being deep underground. There was also a track that ran along the outside perimeter of the entire area. The rest of the new trainees and I spent the next few hours running, jumping, doing sit-ups, pushups and basically anything that was going to make us throw up our breakfast, which had only been an apple they gave to us when we showed up at the facility. When the training session was over, I was drenched with sweat.

   Charlie wasn't doing much better. Drill Sargent Redwall was making him run an extra lap around the perimeter because he had been the last one to finish the exercise. I was drinking water out of the hose they provided when I was interrupted by someone shouting my name.

"Private Watts!" I spun around quickly and was met eye to eye with a man. He had black hair and pale skin. His eyes, however, were dark, for a moment making time slow down. I recognized his uniform and medals immediately as a lieutenant. I saluted him.

"Yes sir." I asked, water still dripping from my face.

"At ease Soldier." He gave me an up and down look and I put my hand down back by my side. "I'm Lieutenant Streeter. I was requested to retrieve you."

"Retrieve me sir?" I asked nervously.

"Yes, the General would like to speak with you."

"The General?" That couldn't be good, since when did the General of the Allegiance want to speak with a private, especially one as new as me.

"Are your ears broken son? Yes the General, lets go." I followed the lieutenant out of the training facility to an elevator. He pressed floor ten and the elevator shot up. I wiped my sweaty palms on my pants. Lieutenant Streeter led me down a long corridor until we reached the end. It was a wooden door with the words General carved on it. "Good luck." The lieutenant said and winked at me. Then he walked off. I whispered a quick prayer to myself that my mom use to say:

My lord, watch over me, guide me, lead me to the sun.
From the dark of which I've found, show me the light,
Times of trouble hold me, for I haven't got a clue,
Lead me, guide me, make me anew.

Then I knocked on the door.

"Come in." I opened the door and saluted the General immediately. I had never seen him before, but he looked just as one would expect. Tall, muscular, a clean shaven haircut. His hair was grey from old age. His skin had many wrinkles from years of stress and work.

"At ease private, take a seat." I carefully took a seat in the padded wooden chair across his desk. My eyes immediately caught the attention of a picture on his desk. It was of a girl around my age, no more than sixteen. and she was beautiful. She had dark brown hair and sparking blue eyes and a big white smile. Her skin was pale but so smooth it looked unreal.. The picture also included a birthday cake with 16 candles sticking out of it. It almost made me jealous to see. My family could never afford a birthday cake, due to growing up with the war going on.

"That's my daughter Kayla." He said while watching me stare at the picture. "Beautiful, isn't she?"

"Oh yes sir. All thanks to your genes I'm sure." I said in a very foolish attempt to ease the tension. He thankfully laughed at that.

"She's not my biological daughter, but I'll take that as a compliment." He folded his hands across his lap. "I'm sure you are wondering why I asked you to come here today."

"Yes sir." I swallowed nervously my throat felt swollen.

"Well I wanted to give you this." He pulled out two medals. Purple Hearts. "They were awarded to your parents bravery in battle. I wanted you to have them." I rubbed my fingers over the medal, over their names that were engraved in them.

GEORGE WATTS
SARAH WATTS

"Thank you sir." Was all I could say. My parents had been awarded Purple Hearts. Maybe Sargent Redwall was right, I couldn't live up to what was the legacy of them.

I thanked the General and said goodbye as I was dismissed. I made my way back to the dorms where the rest of the privates I'm sure were showering and getting rest. I hadn't been paying attention to when the Lieutenant had shown me how to get to the Generals office, and I found myself lost on the way back. I ended up walking down a hall or two until I found a very narrow staircase that only went down. I assumed it would take me back to the main floor so I walked down it. But the staircase kept going and going and going. After awhile of walking, I knew I should turn around. Maybe if I had, my life would have been so different, but a part of me, a very tiny part knew that I had to finish my path.

Eventually the staircase ended and I found myself in a dark place. No lighting, except for torches on the walls. This place was oddly medieval for the current updates of the base I went to turn around until a voice spoke to the left of me.

"Help." In what appeared to be in some sort of jail cell, was a woman and a man, most likely in their forty's. They were covered in what appeared to be some sort of  dark red shiny liquid. Blood. They looked sickly and small, even in the faint light I could see the abhorrent condition they were in.

"I..umm..I" I didn't know what to say I was scared.

"Please!" The man spoke. "Help us they have kept us down here for years please free us!" I was about to respond when I heard another voice down the hall, directly across from me.

"Whose there!" I quickly ran back to the staircase and sprinted back up before I could get caught. No one followed me, except the dark feeling that never went away.