Day 143 - Raid Story

 Raid Story

Matthew Ryan Fischer

There was a moment of silence and with it came a moment of clarity. Carl didn’t want to die. He was vaguely aware of that for the first time in his life. It wasn’t something he had ever truly considered before. He wasn’t ignorant or obtuse or particularly shallow. He had never carried himself with the arrogance of youth. He certainly never felt immortal or pushed the boundaries by excelling at stupid behavior. Until now that is. He knew death was always a possibility; it just hadn’t ever been real. But now that it was here, he felt extremely foolish for having never thought about it before.

The raid was coming. The raid had been signaled. He had been warned. There had been whispers and rumors of a coming attack. Everyone was talking about it. There had been a general unease going around for weeks whenever he would check in with anyone else in the program. They all knew it. They all knew the time was coming and their evacuation would be imminent. Carl, of course, knew more than some of the others, but that was part of his job – to have information that other people didn’t.

Finally that morning, outside his apartment door, there had been the final signal – a single flower, next to his newspaper. He knew what he was supposed to do – he was supposed to get out and flee as fast as he could. The raid was coming.

Everything was quiet, it was barely dawn. The sun had just begun to show. Somewhere people were waking and getting ready for their daily routine – people in their cars, people at work, people with their families. No one knew what was coming. How could they?

Somewhere on another world men and women did their jobs, but their jobs were of a much more deadly nature. They had been making plans for a long time. There was much to be figured out in order for much to be destroyed. The object was simple enough. The object was to kill as many people as possible with as little damage done to anything else. It wasn’t hard to do. It just took the proper planning.

Carl had just done his job. He was a scout. His job was reconnaissance. He was to watch and study and find out if anyone had any idea of what was coming. It was just a job. It was just something that needed to be done. For his world to survive they needed new resources and places to live and grow. This world was just a logical step. That was all. There were lots of justifications, arguments about nature and survival and who deserved what. None of that mattered to Carl. He wasn’t a deep thinker. It was his world and it was his job and so he did it.

His job proved to be needless. No one on this world was aware of the existence of the other world. But the others were aware of this world, and the others had their sinister plans.

The time was coming. It was past time to have left. He was now running out of time to go before the raid came and wiped out everyone. His job was done and his life was on the line, but still he stayed.

Carl understood enough to know that there was a good chance that another one of him existed on this world. He knew as much. It was possible. His job was not to find out. He was supposed to take every precaution not to find out. He hadn’t.

He didn’t care about meeting himself. There was no value in that. No lesson to be learned. Especially when faced with the knowledge that this other self would soon die. There was no reason to get attached to someone that he couldn’t save. There was no reason to know and face their death and have to remember and feel that sorrow.

He didn’t care about himself. He had found it easy to kill his other self and assume his place. What he did care about, was seeing her. Not his her, but the her that existed here. She did. He had found that out. He had done his own research and found where they had been. He had given himself a second chance even though it was against every regulation and rule. Now he couldn’t leave her. Not when he had a chance. Even if she wasn’t his, she was still her. And that would mean he would have some sort of chance, even if it wasn’t perfect. And so he waited for her to come home. Together there might still be a way to slip out. But time was running out. In silence he waited, thinking about things he did not want to think about. Soon the raid would be there. Soon the raid would come.