Gods

Maybe a week after we set up a base at the palace, we started to take in all kinds of strays. There were chickens and cats and birds and even an emaciated water buffalo. We also had vendors trying to sell us everything from trinkets to contraband to illegal recreations. There were whores waiting for us every night and sometimes we took them in but TM always said to never let them stay more than two nights or they'll be like fleas and you'll never get rid of them. I tried to stay away from them all together because I figured I'd get something worse than fleas that I'd never get rid of.

One day, TM came back from patrol and had a run in with one of the whores. She was waiting on the steps outside the palace, hunched over in the shade. When TM came in and dropped his pack, she sprang up and started screaming at him. At first we all just started laughing because TM put on a dramatic performance of being confused and shocked. The more we laughed, though, the more pissed she became and she screamed at the rest of us in broken English that she was pregnant. That shut us all up and TM quickly grabbed her elbow and hustled her through the crumbling building and out of our sight. He came back around later as we were warming up some food, giving us all a lopsided smile. Everyone waited for him to bring up what had happened but he never did. Just kept stuffing his mouth with fake ham and grinning at us.

The next day, we went out to patch of sand where there were supposed to be an insurgent hidey-hole. We got caught in a firefight, they had dug in and would pop up and fire off a couple of rounds. We lobbed a few grenades but they were in pretty deep, Used the sand to cover their bunkers and we thought for a while they'd never come out.. Lt finally sent Pez and TM around to take out a sniper hole but TM charged towards one of the main bunker. The Lt was screaming at him to stop and yelling at us to back him up. We ran like banshees into the fray and TM disappeared into the bunker.

When all the dust settled, TM had killed three in the hole and seven in the bunker. He stood in the doorway, his M16 in one hand and an AK in the other. "I am God." he declared. The rest of us snorted, taking pulls on our water to wash the dust and death out of our throats. "I can create life and I can take it away." We all figured he'd gone crazy from the heat but in the back of my mind I was thinking he was right. The rest of us had been banging the girls in town and only he had created life.

After that day, we never saw the girl again, Dr. Hirsch made his first visit and TM never got so much as a scratch. Still wonder what happened to him after Germany

-Soldier Z