It was exactly 2:00 in the morning, on a night as freezing
as all the others, with his feet deep in the mud, his bones
hurting from the cold, and a poker-face frown - when Marco
recalled a memory from his childhood. It crept in quietly in
the back of his mind like a familiar face seen in the crowd:
It was an image of himself on the floor on his 5th birthday,
opening presents, with his parents and friends, and
laughing. He kept walking slowly, his eyes fixed on the
terrain ahead, his hand on the rifle expecting surprises,
and his mind - drifting only a little - staring at his
younger self. The memory was so real that he felt as if the
warmth of the fireplace was burning him. "It warms if you're
warm," he thought, "but it burns if you just came in from
the freeze". Little Marco looked up at his parents and
smiled like a boy that never knew any troubles. Old Marco
smirked - he wasn't allowed anything but frowning on guard
duty. Then, they both looked at each other. The smile
quickly disappeared from both of their faces.
The heat from the fireplace stopped burning, and Marco
suddenly felt frighteningly warm and cozy, as if the memory
has become a reality, and reality was nowhere to be found.
His legs, that have been carrying him for a mile and a half
against his will, stopped, and he stood paralyzed and
baffled: He realized that he was opening presents he never
received, in the company of family and friends he never
knew, and speaking a language he could not understand.
He woke abruptly. The sound of gift-wraps torn echoed away
into the mountains; Marco heard his own heavy breathing, the
wind whistling violently and nothing more. Around him was
the darkness of the graveyard shift, except for thin lines
of light describing mountains in the distance and the dim
lights of a city. He started to feel the freezing touch of
the metal-made M-16 against his arm. He also realized that
his uniform was wet and had a strange stench, one that only
uniform can have. Piece by piece, rotten reality was coming
back.
"Something on your mind, trooper?!" - A sharp voice attacked
him from behind. Marco turned quickly. It was the 2 to 4
guard coming to replace him. He was older than Marco, around
12, and had the bitter face of one who's been here long but
still was getting treated like a freshman. "S-4's waiting,
trooper. Go to camp", he said. Marco did not answer.
He was drowning in a flood of memories that were all foreign
to him, and could not find a single known image to hold on
to. The mental image of an unfamiliar old woman suddenly
filled his heart with love and concern; random images - the
woman is young now, and beautiful. A picture with the guys,
taken at the steel factory. A trip to Spain when he was 26
(he could have sworn he just turned 11). And the house on
the cliff, with the machine, and the old woman again, and a
boy soldier (couldn't be older then 10) peeping through the
window. He could read the soldier's name tag too. The name
was Marco.
The events of the rest of that night will be perplexing to
Marco's commanders and many rumors will spread amongst his
comrades in arms. Jason, the bitter soldier who came to
replace Marco at the patrol, will tell the investigating
officer: "I went to replace him on guard duty at 1:55. As I
was coming close to the patrol start point, I saw him
talking to himself. I guess he just flipped."
But at 1:55 that night, Marco was still himself. No false
memories had come into his mind, as he was preoccupied with
getting enough sleep before the training tomorrow, and with
thoughts of cigarettes.
"I wonder what became of Paul," he thought. "I could use
some of Paul's cigarettes now; crazy motherfucker. S-4
probably got him and blew his brains out in front of the
entire squadron. Ha... code violation by far... - 'if I9m
smart 'nuff to smuggle them in, I'm smart 'nuff not to get
caught'. Yeah, right Paul, your brain is now splattered all
over the concrete falcon, I bet... S-4 stuck a Marlboro in
your dead mouth and took a Polaroid with everybody in the
company smiling... I wonder, can you tell in the picture
that the veins in your eyes popped, or did they put the
sun-glasses on? The evening guards just came back from guard
duty and they are scraping your brain together with the dry
leaves Paul. Or maybe you didn9t get caught... Maybe you're
watching me right now, from those woods over there... are we
still in the same side, or are you fighting against me now,
Paul? I hope you are on the other side now, cause I'll find
you and I'll kill you and I'll take all your fucking
cigarettes."
"You're probably dead, man. I should get my cigarettes
elsewhere."
"You know, Paul..."
"You know, something strange happened today. Remember that
huge house on the cliff? (Were you even with us when we
camped here?) Well, I was taking a minute's rest from the
exercise in the valley, and I passed by that damn huge
house. I sat down to sleep for a few minutes and as I leaned
against the wall, I heard foot steps coming from below; I
got down immediately and loaded up. I think I made too much
noise when cocking her. I looked through a window into the
basement, and I saw the most amazing thing: a huge machine,
huge like a monster, with thousands of heavy metal gears and
electrical rods and what-not. All of this was tied up with
thin copper wires to a wooden wheel, and an old man was tied
to the wheel. He seemed sad. No, not sad - something else.
Tense maybe."
"He was talking to his old fat wife. She was walking around
the basement and checking the machines. He called her name,
I don9t remember what it was, and then they both just looked
at me. 'My god, can't be older than 10', he said to her. It
was so strange that I forgot I had the rifle aimed at the
old man9s brains. They saw me and they saw the rifle, but
they didn9t do anything; their faces were sealed, like they
weren9t really there, and then they just went about their
business. The fat old woman went back to the machine and the
old man turned his head back to the ceiling. I think he
looked at my name tag though."
Marco shuddered; he saw the old man looking at him, as if
from the old man's eyes, but the vision suddenly seemed a
little too real... "He looked sad like he was about to die,
but also happy, like he was going to heaven. The woman
seemed really sad."

"Then she told him it was all working right. He said do it,
do it right now and on the now she pulled on an iron lever.
Then everything started to move and make noise; the gears
started rotating quickly, one jump-starting the other, and
suddenly a huge bolt of electricity started flowing in the
rods and into a helmet on the old man's head. I thought she
was electrocuting him; it was kind of funny for a moment;
but then the weirdest thing happened. Pictures started
popping out of his head. I know it sounds weird Paul but you
gotta believe me, I didn't flip yet; it's all real. And all
these images of peoples and places, they popped out of his
head and got sucked into this huge metal pipe that was right
next to him. The pipe started shaking and making these
noises like it was about to explode any minute, and I had to
move away because I felt the ground move, because the pipe
was right under me, so I got up and walked back a little.
The noises went on for a few more seconds, and then it was
all silent again. The pipe was still rattling though, and a
second later it spewed something out, right outside where I
was standing. It looked like a strange piece of meat, and it
was shaking, and it looked like it was crying or something,
little drops of water kept coming out of it. I looked in the
window again and the old woman was hugging the old man, but
she didn9t cry, so I knew he didn't die."
"Then he opened his eyes. He looked at her, and asked her
who she was. She said, 'I'm your wife, and this you're home
- don't worry. Don't be afraid.' I don't know what happened
later; I heard the company marching again so I took that
meat thing on the floor and ran back to camp. I touched it
on my way back. It was very soft. It stopped shaking too,
and looked like it died. It actually looked a lot like plain
ol' food once it stopped shaking."
"I... I ate it, Paul. I know it sounds gross but I was so
hungry I could eat anything, and I swear to god it looked
like food. It was pretty good actually. Definitely better
than military steak. Now isn't that weird, Paul?"
The alarm in Marco's watch went off. It was exactly 2:00 in
the morning, and his shift had ended. But Marco didn't hear
the alarm. He was thinking it would have been funny if the
old woman actually electrocuted her husband to death, and
that he couldn't understand how they could be with each
other so long anyway. He wondered if his parents are still
together and how old they were now. It was a long time, he
thought, since he saw his parents. Probably not since his
5th birthday. Oh, yes, he thought - my 5th birthday...
"Something on your mind, trooper?!" - A sharp voice attacked
him from behind. Marco turned quickly. It was bitter Jason
coming to replace him. "S-49s waiting, trooper. Go to camp",
he said. Marco didn't answer. He was flooded with new
memories that once belonged to the old man and were now his.
He remembered a trip to Spain at 26, and a new job at the
steel factory. He remembered moving to the coast, and the
war, and living in fear of the war and of those animals, the
boy soldiers. And finally, he remembered accepting old age,
and death; but only because of the machine. He was scared
that morning, for a minute, when he saw the boy-soldier
peeping through the window; but then he lay back on the
wooden wheel, and relaxed. In a few minutes the machine will
erase almost of his memories; the war will have never
existed. He can be killed now by the machine, or ha can die
in a month or a few years - death is certain. But whatever
many days he has left to live, he will live them in
ignorance and bliss. Everything will be new to him again -
like a little boy.
"Have you flipped, trooper?! Answer me!!!" - Bitter Jason
yelled at Marco. "No, I haven't..." he said.''I only..." -
but there was no point. "I know this argument already",
Marco thought. "I have it ten times a day. He plays his
part, I play mine, we go to sleep for three hours and wake
up again, to fight with everyone else and each other." Marco
could not go to sleep and could not go back to camp. His
mind turmoil with happy memories and the frustration that
they were not his. His was the camp, the war, the S-4's and
a concrete falcon. He looked back at the camp, and could see
behind it the dim lights of the city. He couldn't move - his
body, like his legs, was still paralyzed.
Then, without a thought, he threw the rifle and his
back-pack to the ground, and ran to the city.