Chereads / The Omniscient Conscript / Chapter 7 - The First Death

Chapter 7 - The First Death

Magnus was astounded to see such a predator, a beast of steel. It roared and rumbled across the muddy field, running over any barbed wire or fortification in its way. This beast was much higher than Magnus on the food chain. If just one thing went wrong, it was game over.

Magnus thought to himself, "Crap! I already used all my grenades! All I can do it try to punch a hole in it by shooting it repeatedly."

This being the only plan he could come up with, he wisely went with his second plan: to rummage around for anti-tank grenades. This would make his success in this heated rivalry much greater.

While the tank slaughtered all the UPC soldiers that attempted an assault on it, Magnus went into the Deutschlandian quarters. Magnus opened the door in the side of the trench wall, and went in, taking his time so as not to be caught, with his pants down, as they say, by a hiding soldier or hidden trip wire.

While he heard the thunderous thuds of the tank outside, he carefully looked around for grenades in the dimly lit area, only his flashlight providing any sort of visibility. He searched high and low, but to no avail. Magnus went on to the next row of bunks. One of the cots still had a bag on it. He searched thoroughly, but only found a decomposing core of an apple. Still finding nothing of use, he decided to hit the deck and search under the bunks.

Magnus looked and looked, yet still found nothing. Then, out of the corner of his eye, he spotted a black mass. Magnus crawled over to inspect it. It was a fully automatic rifle!

It only had half a magazine left, but it would do much better than the bolt-action rifle he had been given by the UPC Army. The dust and dirt falling from the wooden beams supporting the room had now ceased. Magnus wondered, "What happened? Is the fighting over? Did someone destroy the tank?"

Magnus opened the door and went to the pile of sandbags. No more UPC soldiers were flooding from the trenches, and no soldiers were there. Magnus then heard two loud thunderous thuds, the same as that made his rifle sound wimpy. One of these sounded rather different from the one from earlier. Magnus contemplated the meaning of this new kind of thud as he ran out of the quarters, gun raised, ready for combat.

Magnus then saw it, two beasts of steel, matching off. Driving around in a circle, both constantly firing and missing. The dirt had stopped falling because the two tanks were now battling in no-man's-land. The difference between the two tanks was that one had a star painted on its side. Magnus then shouted, "It's one of ours! It's one of our tanks!"

Multiple shouts in distinct dialect that was not his own sounded off. They steadily approached Magnus as he was awe-stricken by these two great war-machines. Magnus then realized that his fate would take a turn for the worse if he didn't do anything in that moment.

Magnus had seen a plane earlier, acknowledging the buzzing it produced existed, but paying no heed. Magnus heard a quite fearsome explosion, and looked over his left shoulder. A large burning mass fell towards him at a frightening pace. The Deutschlanders who had just rounded the corner and spotted Magnus were now booking it to safety.

Just as Magnus tried to move, he heard a small "Pop!", and felt a searing pain in his left calf. He looked down and saw blood gushing out of it. Magnus then realized that one of the Deutschlanders had been cheeky enough to score a quick hit on him before he turned tail and ran out of the path of the eagle swooping down for it's prey.

Magnus was forced into a genuflection, as the handgun bullet entered his tibia. The origin of the explosion was now falling out of the sky, it was a burning plane with a dead pilot. The plane fell and fell towards Magnus, who was unable to move. The plane looked like an eagle, swooping down on its prey, as it crashed onto the surface, crushing Magnus and killing him.

The next moment, Magnus realized he was floating in a dark space. It felt warm and relaxing, a good place to rest, maybe even for eternity. Magnus was then transported into a line with other people. A sign hanging above the entrance said, "Judgment Room", and all the people in line went through that door.

One person went through. And then another. And then another. It was a fifteen more people before Magnus would get a crack at going through that gate. Magnus, becoming sublimely bored by all the standing around in line, decided to look at the other people in line behind him.

One man was shivering, repeating the words, "It's too cold outside. We should stay inside."

A little girl was looking around, asking all the people she saw if they were her mother.

Magnus then decided he had seen enough and returned to waiting patiently. Then, the floor gave out under him. Magnus fell into a large open area. He saw a large cube in the distance, with a boat going to it. He assumed that cube was the Judgement Room. Magnus fell and fell, but his perception of the cube not changing. Magnus thus surmised that the room was so big and the cube was so large that even travelling at high speeds would change you're view of it.

Magnus was correct in his assumptions, except for that the room was so big. Magnus' body hit a roof, and went straight through it. Magnus was now on solid ground again. Magnus got up and started to explore the walls surrounding him, as he felt no pain from the fall, but, knowing he was already dead, didn't care from the sheer shock of it. He couldn't even contemplate what was going on.

All he knew was that he was in the afterlife, having been killed by a plane falling out of the sky and crashing on his immobile body. He couldn't get out of the way because his tibia had been broken and so he couldn't move fast enough to move out of the way.

Magnus now looked around him. He was in a small house with walls made of purple brick. The occupants of the house numbered three and were huddled in a corner, shaking. They did not know what Magnus was, but they did know they were scared of him.

Magnus then heard in the distance a siren go off. Something was repeating "Alert, alert. Intruder in the Administrator's Quarters. Alert, alert..." repeating that in what seemed, to Magnus at least, to be a rather obnoxious loop.

Magnus heard screams and panic ensuing the streets.

The town looked like a futuristic metropolis. Magnus then saw what appeared to be big, round, floating tanks with two barrels on each side patrolling the city. Straight, flat beams of light were projected from the floating tank, scanning the people in search of the intruder. Magnus knew those things were bad news.

Magnus then sprinted with a crowd that was flooding the street. Magnus thought he would be safe if ran with the crowd. He thought that would go to the top of the tower that scraped the sky. "The floating tanks surely couldn't reach me up there." Magnus thought, formulating his plan as fast as he could. A couple more meters and he would miss his turn. Magnus thus executed the rashly made plan and broke away from the group. He darted towards the tower.

Magnus ran down the street, a long way away. Magnus then saw a floating tank approaching him. Magnus thought that since it was made out of metal and therefore heavier, Magnus would surely be faster. The two sped towards the one another, and Magnus just need to reach the door of the tower before it fully scanned him.

Magnus was almost there, he would beat it for sure. Then, suddenly, a floating tank came out of the tower, and started to scan Magnus. In half a second, the scan was complete.

"Intruder Found! Commencing elimination..." The floating tank began glowing a bright pink. This hurt Magnus' eyes as it was much brighter than any pink he had ever seen. The tank shot, Magnus couldn't feel nor see anymore.

Magnus then woke up on the battlefield, tank directly in front of him. Magnus was astounded with what was happening. He knew exactly where to shoot to destroy the tank. He knew exactly... well, exactly everything! Magnus got up and cocked his rifle, because he knew he had to conserve the automatic rifle's ammo.