John O'Brien - Chaos

The last vestige of the sun disappears below the horizon, signifying the end of another day. The soldiers within the tower prepare quick meals and settle in for the evening. Darkness comes quickly as it is wont to do in the desert and Lynn climbs out onto the roof with the night watch. She posts two guards on top with one more inside alongside the night radio operator. Settling down on her belly near the edge of the roof, she gazes out over the encampment. The street lights along the major avenues and roadways shine down on the emptiness casting their circular patterns of light on the sandy ground below. In a few buildings, lights shine in the darkness creating the image of a small city in a seeming normalcy of night. Here and there, rectangular patches of darkness show where the small generators powering those areas have either failed or are depleted of their fuel.

The ramp itself is lit by large banks of lights around the perimeter illuminating most of the ramp but leaving some areas near the middle in darkness. Looking towards the runway, Lynn sees the white lights of the runway stretch away to the left and right terminating in red lights toward each end. The blue lights of the single parallel taxiway, coupled with the runway lights, create an image reminding her of Christmas. Focusing back toward the camp, she sees an occasional flash as small groups of figures dash beneath the street lights. Off into the distance on the far side of the camp and close to the barracks, several shrieks rise into the air above the encampment faintly reaching Lynn’s ears.

Lynn brings the binoculars from the tower to her eyes and focuses on one group of figures as they dart through the lights. They are running close together in a pack-like formation seemingly intent on something. What that intent could be is unknown to her. She notices that each group she spies in her magnified view seems to run from place to place. In none does she notice any individual walking as they transit. The only exception to this is when they seem to stop to investigate something, whether that is a door or building or something lying in the road. When investigating something, they still seem to maintain a pack-like stance with none venturing off but each one conducting its own individual action within the pack.

With one group she is watching, they appear to be investigating a building door, seeming to mill about. One of the creatures looks suddenly to its left and she sees its mouth open up; the shriek it emits reaches her ears a second or two after. The entire group breaks into an immediate run in the direction indicated by the one who emitted the shriek. It comes to Lynn that the shriek could be their form of communication and seems to indicate a discovery in some fashion or another. She makes one other interesting discovery and that is the other groups seem to respond to the shriek as well. The shriek seems to inform others and they react as if it is a calling as well; much like wolves or coyotes will in the night with the discovery of food.

She scans around and finds the area around her seemingly vacant for the present moment. Bringing the binoculars skyward, she attempts to find any moving points of light to indicate aircraft in the vicinity but is only met with the bright diamonds of stars twinkling back. Handing the binoculars to the soldier lying next to her, she scans the fence perimeter with her mark one eyeballs. The fence and the ground directly below her are well lit from lights shining downward from positions about half way up the tower. This way, the area can be lit without affecting the vision of the controllers.

“Wake me if you see anything unusual or if any of the creatures ventures close. I’ll be at the bottom of the trap door stairs,” she says rising.

“Yes, Sergeant,” the Private responds as Lynn reaches to grab her weapon and descends down the stairs into the control room to settle into her sleeping bag.

She stands alone on a small hill with sand stretching endlessly around her and turns around confused as to how she arrived there or what she is supposed to be doing. Her mind tells her that she is supposed to accomplish some important errand but can’t remember what it is. A panicky feeling comes upon her as she feels something bad will happen if she can’t remember what it is or the errand goes undone. A hint of movement out of the corner of her eye to the right causes her to look in that direction.

About twenty feet away, a turtle slowly makes its way across the sand, pulling itself along with great effort. What in the fuck is a turtle doing in the middle of the desert? She thinks as her vision zooms in close and she can see in the turtle’s eye that it is not in great pain nor worried about its situation but is merely doing its thing. No destination or plan; just one step after another. It has accepted its lot in life and is just doing it with no thought to anything else. A gust of wind suddenly whips by shaking her.

She looks away from the turtle and in the direction the wind came from. Where before there was an endless blue sky, there is now a towering mass of clouds billowing upward. The clouds are building quickly, far quicker than anything she had ever seen before and turning the cloud mass into a dark, greenish gray color. The gusts continue to radiate outward from the mass, each one shaking her and rocking her backward on her heels.

The storm continues to build and creates a gigantic wave of sand that begins rushing towards her. Lightning stabs out from the clouds striking the ground in all directions. The wave closes in quickly, gaining momentum with gusts that continue to rock her. They carry a new sound along with the booming crash of thunder as if the thunder is speaking words. With each lightning bolt the words come to her; ‘Sergeant;’ lightning flash, ‘Sergeant’; lightning flash……

Feeling panicked, her eyes spring open to see the face of the Private on guard hovering close to hers lit by the cupped flashlight in his hand. “Sergeant,” he says rocking her shoulder slightly with his other hand.

“I’m awake, Private. What is it?” Lynn asks sitting up and rubs the sleep from her eyes. She looks at her watch and notices it is 0330. Two hours until sunrise .

“You asked me to wake you if any of the creatures came close. There are several of them milling around outside the fence.”

“Did they notice you?” Lynn asks grabbing for her weapon lying on the ground next to her.

“I don’t think so.”

“Okay, let’s take a look. Absolute silence,” Lynn says rising and stepping on the first rung of the roof stairs.

On the roof, Lynn settles down on her belly and crawls slowly to the roof’s edge. Peering down onto the ramp, she sees five of the creatures close to the fence milling aimlessly. A couple of them seem interested in the Humvees parked a short distance away; looking in the windows. One even climbs onto the hood of one and seems to want to pull the windshield open using the windshield wipers. Two of them closest to the fence occasionally put their noses in the air.

“Are they sniffing?” The Private asks in a quiet whisper next to her.

Lynn turns slowly toward him and puts her finger to her lips. The Private nods. She looks back down at them and, to her; it does seem like they are sniffing at the air around them. Every minute or so, one will seem to catch a scent of something and hold a sniffing stance with a greater intensity as if trying to identify some scent or retrieve something that momentarily came to it. With a suddenness that is startling with its quickness and intensity, given the apparent aimless milling a moment before, one sniffing creature turns its head sharply in their direction and gazes intently up at them.

Lynn knows they are in the darkness above and the glaring lights shining down on the creature have to be blinding it as to their location, but it is staring very intently and directly at them. Its body turns to orient it in their direction without ever moving its gaze from them one iota. Lynn senses more than hears, given the sound of the generator, growls emitting from the creature only fifty feet below. The growling attracts the attention of the others and they wander over to it and look upwards. Suddenly, all five of them stiffen and begin to emit loud, rumbling growls of their own and stare directly at the two of them perched high on the roof above.