Artyom Dereschuk - Hate the Sin

Something unrecognizable was sticking out of her wound, as if it had decided to take a peek at what all the commotion was about. Flesh without flesh, a plant that grew up under some other sun. The boy wasn’t sure where to place it, but one glance at it was enough to conclude that it wasn’t something he—or any of his ancestors, down to the first organism—had ever seen. He revolted against it on instinct; he despised how it was swirling and licking her many wounds, and he didn’t understand where those feelings were coming from.

She raised her hands to defend herself from more shots, and instantly, without a moment of delay, as if they were an extension of her, the creatures jumped toward her, covered her as a veil. Guarding their priestess from more wounds. They started heading toward the door, ignoring the soldiers they were stepping on… and very quickly the brigade caught on to that.

To fall back was seen as a weakness, and the brigade had been preying on the weak since the beginning of the war. They recognized the opportunity to attack, and just as a pack of wolves senses the right moment to attack, so did they.

One after another, they started picking up their weapons and opening fire on the retreating formation, peeling one monster away from it after another. With newfound valor, they capitalized on the opportunity Tsetse had created.

There was a pause at the door, and then the sound of the rain outside burst in from one more location when the doors were opened. The formless mass of monsters squeezed through and dispersed into the night. The fight was over.

Nobody cheered.

Except for the General.

“Tsetse! My hero!” the man shouted from above. “I knew you’d save me some day.”

The boy silently nodded and headed for Homewrecker. Everyone was stepping aside to clear his path.

“Tsetse, I—” Homewrecker tried to say something, but Tsetse just put his hand on his shoulder and leaned in to whisper into the boy’s ear: “When you anticipate a grenade explosion you cover your ears and open your mouth. I taught you that, didn’t I?”

Homewrecker was taken aback by that comment. They had just fought back the army of hell and Tsetse was concerned about something like that? Wasn’t he even a little bit shocked at what had just happened?

“Next time you don’t listen to what I say—you die” Tsetse grimly warned him and walked off into the crowd, leaving the boy confused.

The night was restless for everyone; the fighting had left everyone exhausted and drained, while the terror that the creatures and their undying leader could return at any moment kept them on edge. Homewrecker couldn’t catch any sleep; as soon as his eyes would start closing, he would either wake up in terror, fearing that something was sneaking up on him, or he would be awakened by the shouting of other soldiers who believed they had seen something moving in the shadows. He only managed to get a few hours of sleep near the morning, when the exhaustion finally claimed its victory over anxiety and forced the boy to get some sleep. At that point, he was so tired that he wouldn’t miss any sleep even if it meant certain death. Certainly, it was a better alternative to the waking reality that surrounded him.

He was woken up by Tsetse, who told him that it was no time to sleep. Homewrecker blurted out something offensive and snappy, but nevertheless obeyed the captain’s command.

Everyone in the camp had already woken up, so it seemed that Tsetse had allowed them to sleep more than the adults. Homewrecker didn’t know how the captain accomplished that, but he suspected that, with everything going on, the adults simply didn’t care about them.

There was a palpable tension in the air. Looking around, Homewrecker could easily see that the usual careless attitude of the soldiers was gone. For the first time since the beginning of the war, they weren’t invincible or above morals. Their actions had real repercussions now, and, scariest of all, the word “justice” wasn’t something that only they decided. Throughout all of their lives, they had been the only judges of right and wrong in these lands, their power and numbers establishing their authority. To have both of those things questioned was a wake-up call they were not ready for.

The biggest blow to their morale, however, was the fact that the dead had risen from their graves, imbued with whatever mystical power the witch possessed. They had been surrounded by stories from their folklore, and legends about revenge from beyond, from their very childhood. Although they had never openly doubted the existence of the supernatural and mystical, being superstitious folk, they had never faced it either. And now, when the slain had indeed returned as spirits of vengeance, the soldiers were in shock; what other myths and legends that were so meticulously and creatively crafted by their ancestors could turn out to be true? Would they drag them to hell or simply deny them the afterlife? Would they hang their souls on the tree branches to dry out in the sun? Was their entire family tree cursed now?

Nevertheless, the adults did their best to keep themselves busy. To distract themselves from such thoughts with menial tasks. They were all split up into groups and each was doing something of their own. Some were staying on high alert, walking along the perimeter of their camp in small groups; the boy could see that they were pretty anxious about their assignment.

Others were gathering up the corpses of their fallen comrades and pulling them to the muddy stream that ran behind the warehouse; they liked to refer to piles of corpses formed that way as “brotherly burials,” and Homewrecker didn’t want to discourage them.

The third group, as far as the boy could tell, were rounding up the corpses of the demons into one big pile in the middle of the camp. They worked in groups of three: two would pull the carcass while the third one would follow them with his gun ready.

Just one glance at their faces was enough for Homewrecker to conclude: that job was as stressful as it looked. At any moment, it might turn out that the creature that had defied death once before had enough life left in it for one final showdown, with the closest targets being the soldiers who carried them. If Homewrecker didn’t want to get assigned to that, he would be smart to find something else to do for himself.

With that in mind, he noticed the closest duo of soldiers who were carrying the body of a dead man and headed toward them, intending to help them. However, it seemed that they had it all figured out and didn’t need his help.

’Get lost, kid!” one of them shouted. “We already got this, the hell do we need you for? Go look inside that building—there was a massacre on the second floor.”

“Yeah, go help the guys there,” the second one added, adjusting his grip on the body in his hands. “One leg at a time.” With that grim remark, they laughed and left.

Homewrecker could take a guess at what they meant by that. But he figured that even if the second floor was as messy as they suggested, he’d be working indoors, and thus would be safe from eyes looking for some extra set of hands to help with the devils. With that in mind, he hurried toward the building they pointed out.

The stairwell to the second floor was all covered in dried-up blood; one of the poor souls had met his end at the top of it, and it looked like the devil that got to him made sure to bleed him dry.

The boy had no desire to go up there. He already knew what he would find there: dismembered bodies, blood-stained walls, and maybe the remains of one of the things that the soldiers had managed to mortally wound before it got to them. Pulling a cigarette out of his pocket, the boy lit it up and took a heavy hit. Even if it was just an ordinary cigarette with no drugs in it, he still eased up as nicotine spread through his body.