'I still remember the day it happened as if it was yesterday.'
It was a sudden noise that woke up Ash from her sleep. She sat on the bed and waited for a noise to follow up, but a minute's silence faded Ash's anticipation.
She sighed, buried her face in both of her palms. With a restless expression on her face, she wiped her face down to her lips and gathered her hands to let her head rest on her fist.
Her heart started beating in fear; a fear which had no reason. The decimation war took many lives that the remaining few could fit in a single room; that was two decades ago, yet two decades were too short of a time for a soldier to forget how she faced almost certain death many times yet to survive with only a severely wounded body and a heavily scarred soul. The decimation war had irreversibly changed her: changed her from a cadet seeing nothing beyond being paid to walk in parades to an escapee trying best to survive, like a wild beast caught in the drought. There was no rest for her with the shots being fired, men, women and children screaming in pain helplessly, afraid to die and the grenades continuously exploding in her head.
'Honey,' Rupert was awakened by Ash's deep breaths and the restless creaking of the bed. He stood still lying under the bed sheet next to Ash. 'Is everything alright?' He asked, concerned.
'Yeah, I uh... I just need some fresh air,' Ash replied and got up from the bed. 'I'll be back.'
Ash walked out of the wooden shed but past the door, she couldn't leave, for something was missing. She turned back, eyed the shed all over and found what was missing. The shotgun was lying next to the door leaning against the wall. She picked it up and left the shed.
The cornfield was calm, silent and was glowing in the moonlight. Not a single noise could be heard in the field. Ash stepped quietly without disturbing the silence. Ash looked around, in search of something out of the ordinary, and when she found none, she sat on the dirt, rested the shotgun on her lap and calmed herself down.
There was not a single soul for miles down the footpath surrounded by the massive fields. The mountains in the distant stood sentinel over the grounds. The sky was clear, the stars were twinkling, and a full moon stood at the center of it all. Noises inside Ash's head started fading away. The starry night started washing away the rush in her heart and her exhaustion started taking over.
A couple of minutes passed before she could gather enough energy to stand up. Now, with the restlessness fading away she could return to her sleep, but she started noticing something unusual on her way back to the shed: it was too quiet. She looked around her, there was no wind, and it was a complete silence. She turned back to look at the cornfield. The mountains were no longer there, instead there was a never-ending cornfield and a footpath that seems to lie till the horizon. In the distance, through the mist Ash saw someone holding a gun, standing still, looking at her.
'Hello?' Ash yelled for the other person to hear. There was no response. She aimed her shotgun and slowly marched over to the person she saw in the field.
The person on the other end started marching towards Ash. She continued to walk towards the stranger, still exercising caution. The closer she walked she started to notice that the one on the other end was a woman. She had black hair, and she was holding a shotgun. She was walking at the same pace as Ash. She was wearing the same clothes as Ash as well; then it hit her. Ash didn't have to walk further for she realized what the stranger was: a perfect reflection of her.
Ash lowered her weapon and walked closer to the reflection. She was scared to walk closer, hence that's exactly what she did. A perfect mirror dropped from the heavens? the last sight every soul meets before death? A mirage so perfect that it shines like glass? she had to know.
The closer she got the louder was her heartbeat. She could hear nothing but her heart thumping on her chest. Once she was close enough, she slowly leaned towards it and touched it.
She woke up to a steady repeating beep. The blur of colors and feelings twisting in her head started to clear up. The ceiling was damp white, with cracks running across. The wall was covered with different writings and notes attached to it. The table next to her was full of metallic pieces and tools covered in blood. Right above her was a huge machine with many small arms, some holding different surgical instruments and some without any. The bed was not comfortable, and the smell wasn't pleasing either. There were noises of people talking and moaning around her, but she could see no one.
About a minute later, a rather young woman, with long black hair, walked through the corridor passing Ash. She was wearing a white coat, which had red bloody markings and patches on it.
'Hello,' Ash raised her weary voice.
The girl heard it and turned to see ash awake.
'Oh, you're up,' she stated, surprised. 'Dad, she's up,' she announced and quickly continued to haste away. Soon, an old man, wearing the same kind of white coat appeared in Ash's room.
'Oh hello, dear,' He spoke in a calm, soothing voice. 'How are we feeling today?'
Ash really couldn't tell. She felt no pain, but she felt nothing else either. Everything was confusing. A minute ago, it was night, she was with her husband and now it was the middle of the day, and she was in a hospital.
'What is happening?' Ash questioned. 'Where am I?'
'Don't mind that dear, are we feeling any pain? any aches or any kind of restlessness?' the doctor asked.
'No,' Ash was more restless now that she is not getting answers, but she was weak to speak up. 'What is happening? Where am I?'
The doctor sighed and looked up and around trying to find a sentence to begin explaining.
'Something... it's still a misery what it was... happened a couple of months ago and it injured you badly. It's hard to explain, but we call it the shatter and you've been in a coma since. It's a massive area in space where nothing can exist, basically. Right now, we are living in a pocket surrounded by this 'shatter'. When it first appeared, you were somehow caught in it, and you are the first person we successfully pulled out of the shatter... well... not hundred percent successful though.'
Ash, with all her strength, tried to stand up. It was then, she noticed what the doctor said. From her neck to her toes, instead of flesh she saw a metallic wireframe running through. Most of her body has been prosthetically reconstructed to appear normal, but her right palm and both of her legs had the visible metallic exoskeleton. Her right arm on the other hand appeared normal, her skin, nails reconstructed just like how she remembered, but the touch of warm air against her skin didn't feel the same. She was too conflicted to think clearly, so many questions she wanted answered that she didn't know where to start, but she knew she had to try and get up before processing any of this.
'Easy now, easy,' the doctor replied. 'I'm not that good at replacement prosthetics. This is one of the kits I found from this lab, it's not completely set up. You've been on so much sedation for the last couple of weeks, it's extremely unhealthy to keep you unconscious for longer; that's why we decided to wake you up, but you are still months away from healing completely.'
Ash rested her head back on the bed. So much of the unknown circled her, she decided to process one question at a time and the fog started to clear up forming a list of questions she needed answered. She has been through so much that losing her entire body barely affected her. At least all of it happened when she was in a coma, when she couldn't feel anything, and besides she'll walk again in a month.
'Uh, have you seen Rupert Young? My husband? Is he alright?' Ash asked the next question on her list. Ash wondered that if even she managed to survive whatever that was, Rupert would have made it way easier. 'Is he in the shatter as well?'
The doctor became less enthusiastic at the face of that question. He knew that he had to do his part, but maybe just not yet, so he recovered his smile that almost faded away.
'He's fine,' the doctor replied after a slight delay. 'But you should get some rest.'
'Well, I should get back to the others,' with an assuring smile the doctor got up onto his feet and with a heavy sigh, shifting the mood of the conversation he remarked 'Drink plenty of water. I wouldn't recommend any hard food just yet and whatever you do, do not get up.'
Ash didn't feel like bothering the doctor with too many questions after he stood up, but the tone he did answer her question was not as assuring as the smile that followed. Few seconds later, he walked out of sight. Ash could not help but wonder where Rupert was, but she didn't have a good enough reason to worry about him. In her eyes, he was more capable than she ever was. Whatever the tide is, she knew he'd be just fine.
Ash looked around her bed. Sentenced to about a month of bed rest, she didn't have much of a choice when it comes to entertainment. The scary arachnid-looking surgery equipment hovering over her was not a sight to behold, but Ash had total faith in the two gigantic supports that held it above her wouldn't give up. The small desk to her right had a couple of bottles of pills, used and unused syringes and small bottles of vaccines. Among what was mostly just medical equipment, what stood out was a flower vase. From its color to the shape, everything about it shrieked that it did not belong there. In the flower vase there were the remnants of what used to be lilies. Each of them was wrinkly and were a shade of dark gray. You can tell they used to be beautiful, and fragrant, but now there was no smell coming out of them. One could see moss starting to gather in the water and stems rotting through the glass. The petals that were dropping off the side of the vase were a metric of how much life had been drained off these once beautiful flowers.
Few seconds later someone peeked around the corner of the curtain that separated Ash's bed from the bed to her left. It was the daughter of the doctor, the one who first noticed that Ash had woken up.
'Are you Rupert Young's wife?' she asked, walking into Ash's range of vision.
'Yes?'
'Oh, I'm sorry,' both her and her father hated this part of the job. 'But I have rather tragic news for you.'
A fan stood over the room spinning at a slow steady pace, wobbling as most of them are. It was a surprise that the ceiling fan never got replaced even after two centuries since its invention. The room was quiet, other than the occasional noise the fan made. It was a well-lit room with no bulbs turned on. The gigantic window on the side of it provided enough light for both the interviewer and interviewee. Ash had taken a seat, with her palms resting on her lap ready for the interview at hand. It had been two months since Ash's bed rest was over, but she still hadn't recovered mentally.
'Why do you want to enlist?' a woman holding a tablet computer in her palms inquired, but Ash stood staring blankly into the space.
'Miss Young?' the doctor inquired after a few seconds with no response.
'Huh?' That's when Ash snapped back to reality. Her eyes were wet with tears of pain and burning anger, but she managed to keep them from escaping beyond her eyelids. 'I uh... I'm a veteran, I was in GDI, 87th Bumi regiment and as of my discharge I was a captain, I want to serve my reality.'
'Field promoted captain.'
'Is that a problem?'
'Oh no, no... I was just going through your file,' the doctor, who had made herself comfortable on her chair with her legs crossed, rested the tablet on her lap and took off her glasses. 'I understand your late husband had enlisted before you?'
'Yes'
'And he passed away in battle?'
'Yes'
'If it's not too much trouble I would like to discuss your knowledge of your late husband's death'
Even for a setting sun the graveyard was darker than it should be. All alone, with no-one around, Ash stood kneeling next to Rupert's grave after setting down the flowers she brought him. After many minutes of silence, in the shade of the birch tree next to the grave, she stood up. Staring down, reminiscing about their past. The more she reflected the more pain she felt, the more pain she felt the more anger it built up to and the more anger it built up the tighter her metallic fists clenched.
Ash had had four months to process his death, but between recovering physically, augmenting herself, replacing her normal looking right arm with a much stronger, much bigger version, and training with the jump-kits she was barely past her denial phase. She stared down at her cold metallic palm before she replied 'Sure. He was shot in the chest during the fifth collection.'
'Hmm, a pretty... pretty straightforward answer,' she noted down something on her tablet. 'How would you characterize your relationship with him?'
There was no straightforward answer for that question. After the decimation war was over Ash had no family left. Most of her squad was dead. It was undoubtedly some of the darkest days of her life. Through it all, the one person she always had by her side was Rupert. He suffered the same war she did, but he stood strong for her to rely on. He was there through her phases of PTSD, he was there through her phases of distraught and he was there for her until a new promise of a new world settled into her mind. He was consistently there for her, in her path from scarred soldier to a blissful corn-farmer he stood by her side, but when he needed her the most, in her head, 'she was taking a nap.'
'He, uh... he was my... husband,' were the only words Ash could let out without bursting into tears.
'Yes, for sure, but I was looking for-' the doctor couldn't continue before Ash leaned in forward and decided to interrupt her.
With a shriek, focusing all her anger to the tip of her knuckles, she hit the birch tree, hard and fast. The trunk of the tree didn't just crack, it exploded. Shards of wood flew following a cloud of dust as half the tree just simply vanished. It took a couple of seconds for the tree to comprehend the damage that had been dealt to it and collapse.
'Look, I'm as good as you are gonna get to fight in whatever this is. People out there are just out there because there's no one else to take their place. They have no experience. They are just kids. If you need to get anywhere with this, you need real soldiers, people who've shot someone before getting stuck here. Maybe I'm not your poster-girl for sanity, but at the end of the day I'm a soldier. I know how to buckle down and do what needs to be done.'
A moment of silence overcame the room. Ash stared right into the eyes of her doctor. Not a moment later, a drop of tear, that landed on her hand without her noticing, managed to catch her attention. Noticing it, now with a different blank expression she blinked once, letting one more drop escape her eye, and requested 'please, doc?'
Soon again in the graveyard, it was nothing but a deafening silence which was soon accompanied by Ash weeping, holding onto whatever was left of the birch tree stump. Her face unapologetically drowned in tears as she kneeled before the tree crying into it. This was the first time after her coma she felt the need to let out her pain, so she held nothing back.
A couple of minutes were spent before the graveyard was quiet again and another couple of minutes passed before Ash got back up onto her feet. Wiping off the tears with her right palm, she picked up her rifle laying on the cold grass and mounted it on her back. Turning towards the setting sun marching onwards, she set her sights on what was next for her.
'Maybe I still have stuff I haven't dealt with, but I'll heal,' Ash begged. 'I'm ready, more than I ever was and I know that the committee knows that I'm more than invaluable. They wouldn't regret a decision to have me on the field. Please... let me honor the memory of my husband.'
The doctor got into thinking her options through. After moments in thought, she leaned forward towards Ash and rested her palm on Ash's hand. Looking deep into Ash's eyes she continued, 'I'm not sure about that Miss Young... What if, in the battlefield, the person you have to pull the trigger on is your husband?'