The Cross of Mithras Vol. 1: EOD Operation Welcome to Hell (88 page)

  After their escape the 158 escapees, blinded by what they couldn’t see on the other side of the fires from the trenches, and knowing that there had to be an opening on the other side, ran around the fire and met up with the Heavy APCs from the right flank. But everybody in the Heavy APCs assumed that Lenkov would make certain that the prisoners had no way to escape. So they assumed that the EOD personnel that they saw coming around the fire were Lenkov’s people and not their own.  The killing stop when one of the drivers recognized one the escapees (who was shot in the right chest and was killed instantly) coming at them. The wounded was then taken back to the lobby of the building that once held them captive.

  “Sir, I just wanna tell you…” Dawson’s driver was saying. Just then both of them saw a flash of light coming from the sky. What they saw was three drop-ships heading towards the base at top speed. Each of the drop-ships have been retrofitted with a torpedo and was basically a kamikaze robot.

  “Get out of the base you sons-of-bitches!” The driver screamed through the com system. But it was too late. The drop-ship crashed into the very building that was being used to hold their wounded. None survived. And then the rest of the defenders made their last attack run and then it was all over. All of the defenders were killed and Dawson had 522 personnel left alive. When Dawson saw those drop-ships hit the base, he laughed. It was evident that he was losing his mind.

(5)

  Lieutenant Sanchez was in the barracks crying and holding a picture of her children. She was having a dreadful feeling that this will be her last mission. She was telling the picture that she was sorry for how she neglected them and she asked for their forgiveness. She then had this strange feeling of death and then she had the thought that she must seek forgiveness before she can be forgiven. Then she had the feeling that when she seek forgiveness it is not with her children, but with someone else.

  As Sanchez was sitting there, without her realizing it, it got colder. It was cold enough for her to see her breath, but she didn’t notice it. She then could swear that she could hear her husband’s voice. But it sounded like a whisper. Not only could she hear him, but she could also smell him. She smiled, called out his name, and told him that she misses him.

  “Go talk… to Caparzo. He’s nearby.” The disembody voice said. She then got up and left.

  Through a camera lens on The Hammer of Doom, the EOD Security AI saw something and did not know what it was. It then contacted the Security Chief on duty. What it saw was something that Parker would have recognize in a instant, for it came from his dream. But this time it is no dream, it was for real. Proving that what Parker dreamt was something far more than meets the eye.

  The Security AI saw a black shape the size and built of Sanchez’s husband. It then turned and looked at the camera and then its eyes turned red. It then grew much taller and it never took its eyes off of the camera. It then said, “Iiyku’dkk byn o e’yyo y no fru’wyda (e-eye-ku doc bin o e-eyido e no fru [sounds like through] why-da).” And then it disappeared. The Security Chief, unable to believe what he had just saw, had the Security AI to track Sanchez and to monitor Caparzo.

  When Sanchez got to the barracks that Caparzo was in, she could hear loud music playing. It was the type that she knew neither Caparzo, nor anybody else in Task Force ZH-3C like. She then went into the bathroom and saw him. He was lying in the bathtub with his shorts on. On the outside of the tub, near his left hand, was a bottle of tequila. In his right hand was a small knife. Sanchez then turned off the music, put the toilet seat cover down, and then sat down on it. At first she didn’t say anything, and then she held out her left hand to him. Caparzo for a brief moment did nothing, he then handed her the knife and looked down in shame.

  “Why? I know it’s not because of me. So why?” Sanchez asked.

  “I don’t want to talk about it.” Caparzo said under his breath and with his head down in shame.

  “And why not?”

  “Isn’t this what you wanted? For me to die?” Caparzo said in a self-pity tone of voice.

  “No. I would never wish something like that upon anyone.”

  “Not even upon those who did what they did to your husband?” Caparzo asked her. Sanchez didn’t respond because she was thinking about something and did not want to mention it.

  “I’m not going to turn you in.” Sanchez said. It confused Caparzo because he didn’t expect that from her. Not from someone who is a bitch like she is.

  “Why?” Caparzo asked her. Sanchez didn’t say anything because she didn’t want to.

  “Look Caparzo… I know that you won’t believe me but, I’m here to help.”

  Caparzo laughed when he heard that. He then said, “You sure could have me fooled.” He then took a sip from the tequila.

  “Do I have to order you to tell me? Or would you prefer me to turn you in?” Sanchez asked Caparzo. He gave her a dirty look and mouthed something. He then took a long sip of tequila. With a lot a hurt and pain in both his eyes and voice, he told her a ugly truth about himself.

  “I have no idea as to where I was born.” Caparzo was saying. “For some reason my family didn’t like to talk about it. I grew up upon a strip mining colony on a moon that was at least 500 miles across. Not much to do on a world like that other than to gamble. My father was no different.”

  “What about your mother?” Sanchez asked.

  “She died when I was three. My family never talked about it. It turned my father into an alcoholic. It was like he was never there. My eldest sister took care of me until my tenth birthday. That’s when she died in a mining accident. After that it was just me and Cindy. My other older sister. I would say my father but… like I said, he was never there for us.

  When Cindy was sixteen she was sexually active with her boyfriend. If my dad knew he wouldn’t have care. Two years later Cindy and her boyfriend broke up because of what he did to her. He told her that he got promoted out. But Cindy caught him, and one of her friends, in bed at his apartment. Cindy claimed that her boyfriend said that he thought that she was into FFM action.

  Cindy was crushed. She came home crying and telling me what happened. She then went downstairs, got a tequila bottle and got drunk. She later came upstairs and got me to try some. I didn’t like it, but she got me drunk. She then put on that music that you turn off. She said that she knew that it was not my twelfth birthday so she is going to give me a late birthday present. She then… rape me I guess you say that.” Caparzo was saying.

  “I’m so sorry to hear that.” Sanchez said. She really meant that and Caparzo could tell.

  Caparzo was crying more deeply and had the thousand yard stare. He sounded like a person who is so depressed that he is fixing to commit suicide. “That relationship…” Caparzo was saying. “…lasted for two years. It ended when my sister got promoted out of the colony. I guess that I should have been glad but I wasn’t.”

  “How come?” Sanchez asked.

  “I often wondered that myself. I should have been since she wouldn’t be a-touchin’ me anymore. The sad, or I guess sick from your point of view… I actually missed what she did to me and I don’t know why. I don’t know if it was loneliness, missing my sister, a girl who liked me, or a combination of the three. At times I wished that I knew. Maybe it could help me to heal if I knew.

  After she left, and during the next school year, a girl liked me but I blew it with her. I didn’t get any girlfriends after that and I don’t know why. I guess it’s because I was quiet, withdrawn… The feelings that one has when they have PTSD. I was confused, angry and I started to get into trouble. I guess it was my way of telling people that something was wrong with me, but nobody was listening. I had run-ins with the law and when I turned fifteen I turned to drugs. A cry for help to those who are deaf. God help me.” Caparzo was saying. He took another long sip from the tequila bottle and was visibly drunk. He also got out of the bathtub and sat on the rim. He then let out the water.

  Caparzo continued on. “I did drugs because it was my way of grieving the lost of my childhood. My life changed when I was a senior in high school. That was the year that a recruiter for the Army came, so I joined. I just wanted to get away from the bad memories. The Army helped me to get in touch with my sister and I learned that she became a Jesus freak. I was able to meet up with her and I confronted her over what she did to me. She then got mad at me. She acted like it never happened. That as a good Christian girl she would never do anything so disgusting like that. She threw me out when I told her that she has a tattoo of a pickaxe through a rose in which the rose is bleeding and it is one inch above her vagina. She called me a pervert and never wanted to see me again. To this day I still haven’t heard anything from her. It made it that much more harder for me to heal.”

  Sanchez was hurt for the way that she treated him earlier. She really did regretted it and wished that she could take it back. She now understands him and what she doesn’t know is that she’s not the only one. Not one former member of the EOD told them to always act as if someone else is listening in on your conversion. It’s hard to say why they never mentioned it.

  “I’m sorry for how I treated you back in Roscadia.” Sanchez said sincerely.

  “It doesn’t matter. We’re all going to die here.” Caparzo responded.

  “You don’t know that.”

  “Yes I do. After I saw Venito died I had this constant feeling of death. It was like it was following me or something. At first I thought that it was because I saw her died, but now I’m not so certain anymore. When I saw you come in I got that feeling again. It’s like death was surrounding both of us.” Caparzo responded.

  Sanchez thought for a moment before she spoke. When she spoke she really did meant what she said. All she said was, “I believe you.” Caparzo could tell that she meant it. Sanchez continued on. “What I’m about to tell you, you never heard it from me.”

  “I understand ma’am.”

  “It was the CIA who ordered me to rescue my husband. But they kept it a secret from my superiors and I don’t know why. Bad intelligence led me to the wrong place. The CIA then struck a deal behind my back with the EOD forces there, and together both of them threw me under the bus. They, the CIA, said that if I didn’t remain quiet about their involvement they would make my life, and the life of my children a living hell. And to answer your question from earlier…” Sanchez was saying.

  “What question?”

  “The reason why I went to see the mafia on Roscadia was that they had a connection to both the CIA and the EOD. And I was hoping that they…” Sanchez was saying.

  “That’s alright ma’am. You don’t have to continue. I understand why you did what you did.” Caparzo said. Sanchez started to leave when he spoke and what he said caused her to sit back down.

  “Ma’am, I need to tell you something that is so classified that it could get both of us shot.”

  “Alright. Go ahead.” Sanchez said after she sit back down.

  “Before I joined the Army I heard about Roscadia. It was the reason why I wanted to join the Army. I felt like I could make more money there than where I was. After I joined the Army my drug addiction got me kicked out. So I used my enlistment bonus to head to Roscadia. That’s where my gambling debt comes from.

  I heard about Golden Hyperion from the locals and how the mafia didn’t run the casinos there. So I got a job, saved up enough money and headed there. Or should I say to here. When I got here, I got a job and a girlfriend. I loved her enough to tell her what Cindy did to me. I won money at some of the casinos and I was going to pay off part of my gambling debt in order to keep the mafia happy enough to stop them from coming for me, but I never got the chance.” Caparzo was saying.

  “How come?” Sanchez asked.

  “My girlfriend and I ran into to trouble. One thing led to another and she was dead and I was sent to the Volunteer Room. There I met a scientist who, when she found out that I used to be in the Army, she gave me a choice – help her to escape to Project 21 or else. So I had no other choice but to use my winnings to help her to escape.”

  “Why didn’t she use her money for that?”

  “Because the EOD was monitoring all financial transactions of everyone who worked there. It was from her that I learned everything about the EOD. Including what really goes on in that room.”

  “And what did you learn?” Sanchez asked.

  “The EOD ability to control it’s people through fear and intimidation is seriously waning. They no longer fear what it can do to them, but rather they are only concerned. You see, people within the EOD has subtle ways in which they rebel against it. Especially those in the Volunteer Room.

  When the EOD first came out with the Volunteer Room, yes it did turned people into monsters, but they stop because of people like that scientist. It was becoming too costly for the EOD to liquidate, and to find a replacement for those scientists. Besides, they always had far superior ways to extract Intel from anyone. I don’t know what it means, but she said that they would Smersh anyone from the CIA after they extracted the Intel.” Caparzo finished. With that, both of them left.

  “Ma’am, the reason why both of us would be shot for me telling you that is because of the Intel that the scientist provided Project 21 with.” Caparzo inform Sanchez.