Warren

A quick two knocks sounded from the front door, interrupting our game of chess. Duster
stood up from his chair and lumbered over to answer, but my eyes were still glued on the knight
he had moved. When the front door opened, I turned my head to see a sleek but muscular
middle-aged man standing in the frame, wearing a gray military uniform and a black helmet; the
emblem of the Civil Guard was embossed on the shell. It was Bucky, our friend in the Army. He
used to be part of our little group until he signed himself away some two years ago. Now, he only
comes once in a while.
“What’s with you?” Duster asked Bucky. I was no longer focused on our chess game. I
shifted my chair toward the front door and took a look at Bucky. He seemed concerned.
“Got some bad news for y’all,” the soldier said.
“I’ve been dealing with bad news for the past twenty years, surely this can’t be worse
than anything I’ve heard before. Come in, don’t stand out there like a fuckin’ idiot.”
“I can’t, Dusty.” Another man stepped into view of the doorframe. It was another soldier,
but his helmet had three bright white letters stamped onto it — MPC. At once, Duster’s
composure stiffened. I sat up straight in my chair. The man was part of the Military Police Corps.
They didn’t usually come into cities but when they did, it meant something serious.
Bucky inhaled. “We’re going to war with the Cetes. I’ve got to go door to door tellin’
people to join up, do their part, you know?”
“You askin’ us to enlist?” Duster asked, his tone softening now with the presence of the
MPC.
“Y’all are able men. Army’s offering good pay for a fight that’ll last no more than a
month, they say.”
“No more than a month?” Duster chuckled. “For what, a couple more rations a week?”
“More than that. I promise you by the end of this war, everything’s gonna go back to
normal.”
Duster was irritated, but he could not let out his frustrations in front of the MPC. “That’s
what they been telling us for the past two decades. I’ve nearly forgotten what it’s like to sleep
peacefully without some loser in the street beggin’ for his life and wakin’ up the whole block.
Why don’t they get the rich folk from up north to chip in?”
“Are you gonna join us or not?” Bucky asked sternly. “All you done before is complain
and complain, and you’re still doin’ it now. I’m giving you an opportunity to make a change with
your own hands. Just a simple ‘yes’ or ‘no’ will suffice.”
After a couple of seconds of thinking, Duster accepted the offer. “I’ve gotta do something
new anyways,” he said.
Bucky shifted his eyes toward me. “You gonna come along, Warren?”
“I dunno. I’ll think about it,” I replied.
 “Well, you gotta think about it now. You ain’t only gettin’ paid by the Army; maybe
Corvus will send a miracle your way for helping to take what was stolen from Him. That goes
for all of us.”
I opened my mouth to reply. Only a sigh came out as I shook my head.
“Come on, it’ll just be a month. Quick in n’ out. You won’t be doing things you haven’t
already done out here in the city.”
“Don’t be chickenshit, Warren,” said Duster.
“Alright, alright,” I gave in. “I’ll come along.”

And just like that, I was filling out paperwork to join the Army. They gave me a uniform,
some bags, and that black helmet everyone wears. Basic training was a breeze for all of us —
just hop over some walls, do things quickly, shoot straight. Wasn’t all that hard. Everybody in my
unit was from the cities; no weak rich folk from the north would slow down our pace.
It’ll be just like the city, I thought to myself. In my twenty-eight years of living, I felt I’d
seen all the craziest things — mobs busting up bakeries for running out of bread, Duster cutting
off the hand of a guy who owed us money, and starving beggars eating live rats out on the street
among other things. It wasn’t even crazy at this point. It was almost like a daily occurrence, but
nobody cared.
Except this time we’d be going up against the Cetans. I had never met anybody who
wasn’t a Corvun in my life. I don’t even know if they’re human like me. From what I’ve heard,
the Cetes were thieving sons of bitches.
“Kill every last one of them!” was the command from our platoon leader. I was ready. We
were all ready. Everybody knew our history with the Cetes, and how they caused our problems.
And now, we were willing to put it right.

My first battle was a little underwhelming. Sure, the bullets gave me a good scare
whenever they snapped in the air, but it’s nothing a little hiding couldn't fix. They trained us to
hide, never to stand out in the open. I guess it was second nature to me since the same unspoken
rule applied in the city streets.
That was the first time I saw a Cetan. He wasn’t alive, but he was still fresh enough for
me to take a look. The Cete I looked at wore a green uniform and a turtle shell on his head. It
looked funny to me until I saw his face. He was human, just like me, just like the people I was
fighting with. But something was different. He wasn’t exactly like us. I couldn’t feel sorry for
these pieces of shit knowing what they did to us. They took our country’s lifeline; they’re the
ones who are responsible for the way we live.
Duster and Bucky weren’t in my unit, but I made a new friend. For some reason, he
didn’t like being called by his last name, so I had to call him Collin. I met him after the first
battle, where I saw him dragging a Cete soldier around. The green turtlehead was still alive with
two bullet holes in his chest and blood spilling out of his mouth.
“What’re you doing with him? Didn’t staff sergeant say to kill them all?” I asked.
 Collin dropped the Cetan on the ground. “That’s what I’m getting to.” He unsheathed his
bayonet and plunged the blade into the gut of the Cete soldier. The Cetan twitched and tried to
scream, but there was too much blood in his throat for him to make a sound. All that came out
was a rough gurgle.
“Why’d you have to do that?” I winced watching Collin disembowel the soldier.
“Could’ve been less messy just shootin’ him.”
“For Corvus,” Collin replied.
“What?”
“An offering.” He rolled up his sleeves and stuck his hand into the Cetan’s gut wound,
pulling out a few feet of intestine.
“But we’re already doing Him a favor by retaking His land.”
“Don’t speak of Him like that. Don’t you know?”
“About what?”
“Good things are to come my way with this offering.” Collin finished pulling out the
dead Cetan’s intestines and used his bayonet to separate the organ from the body. His entire
forearm was covered in blood.
“Take a look at the trees,” Collin said. I looked up at the birch above us. Two black birds
sat upon a white branch. “That’s Corvus watching us at this very moment.”
“The crows? I’m sorry if I’m talking in vain, but I don’t go to church that often—”
“No Corvun needs to go to church to understand that crows are sacred and that each one
of them is an embodiment of Corvus. All crows are one and the same body.”
I was intrigued by what Collin told me. There were crows everywhere — if what he said
was true, that meant Corvus watched me wherever I went. He knows what I’ve said. He knows
what I’ve done. Maybe this war was a message from Him to repent.
I watched Collin lay out the intestines neatly on the ground. He stepped away as the
crows flew down from the birch tree and hopped around the offering. They began pecking at it
with their beaks and eating it — Collin dropped to his knees and intertwined his hands, muttering
a prayer to Corvus. It felt surreal to know that I was possibly in His presence.

A few hours after we returned to the camp, our unit was on the move again. It was about
three hours past noon. As we marched, my eyes darted from tree to tree, now knowing that
Corvus was watching our every action. When we finally reached the outskirts of a Cetan town,
we waited for other units to arrive.
The battle began an hour later. The bullet snaps and cracks still startled me, but I knew I
couldn’t get hurt as long as I was safe behind cover. Collin was next to me, and we took turns
taking shots at the enemy. I fired a round while Collin was taking cover, and then he fired while I
was in cover. It seemed like a good tactic, but I didn’t know if we were even hitting anyone with
our shots.
As quickly as the fighting started, it was over. I thought the Cetans retreated, but it turned
out we killed a lot of them. Bodies littered the dusty streets — some of them were Corvuns from
our unit. I was getting tired, but I wanted to know more about how I could repent to Corvus.
Collin seemed like he was knowledgeable, so naturally I went to him for questions.
He was almost glad that I wanted to learn. I had been to church a few times with my dad
as a kid, but maybe I was too young to understand anything. Collin gave me a quick rundown on
what I could do to improve my status in the eyes of Corvus. Live sacrifice was the most effective
way to receive His blessings. However, murder was illegal back home, so sacrifice was more
common in war, where there were no laws about killing the enemy. Soldiers like us did need His
blessings, after all, being in a situation that could cause our untimely death. Collin said sacrifice
was like asking Corvus for His protection, His guarantee that we would make it back home alive.
“Why does it need to be a live victim?” I asked.
“It’s fresh,” Collin explained. “Blood still runs through a live person, and so does their
soul. You must make sure that the offering is appealing, like a prepared meal.”
“Appealing? It doesn’t seem very appealing to handle a living person’s organs,” I said.
“Not for you, but for Corvus. Remember those intestines I laid out? It’s like preparing a
nice meal for the crows.”

Collin told me that the crows eat the “soft parts”, like the eyes or inner organs. He said
it’s usually easier to cut out a victim’s stomach as an offering because they’ll be shaking their
head around if I tried to take out their eyeballs.
“And then what?” I asked.
“Make sure the crows eat it. Say a prayer while you’re at it. Tell Him what you want.
What you really want, not just money or material objects.”
It seemed relatively simple, but the hardest part was finding a Cete soldier who would let
me take him alive. I didn’t blame them — I wouldn’t let someone take me alive either if I knew I
was going to be sacrificed for their false god. What god did the Cetes even believe in?

The sun was beginning to set. I needed to find a place to sleep. Most of the guys in my
unit had already taken to the abandoned shops and houses, and MPCs wouldn’t let me explore
past the east side of the town. The town itself wasn’t in bad shape — it was very rural, yet it
seemed more peaceful than the city where I grew up. Crickets began to sing from the forest.
Collin was out on the main street while everyone else was preparing to get some rest. He
was smoking a cigar, which was something not a lot of lower-ranking soldiers had.
“Hey, where’d you get that?” I asked.
“Got it off some dead Cete in the alley. Miracle that I was able to get these.”
“You got a spare? Might help me sleep.”
“No, but you can go check the body. Maybe he’s got something more.”
I sighed, trudging toward the alleyway. Sitting against a box was a dead man wearing a
beige suit and a bowler hat. Must’ve been a rich man, I thought. He had a big gunshot wound
right in the middle of his chest. I walked over to his corpse and checked his coat pockets for any
cigars. Nothing.
 There was a faint sound coming from the corner of the alleyway. It sounded like crying,
so I checked to see who it was. They were hiding behind a stack of crates, and they must have
heard me approaching because the crying stopped right when I came close. I shifted around the
boxes and stood still.
A girl was curled up in the corner, her face red with tears. She looked at me — her body
was as still as a statue. She’s a Cete, I thought. Collin didn’t say anything about who I sacrificed;
it didn’t have to be a soldier. The girl looked like a teenager, and I didn’t think Corvus would
make any exceptions. I couldn’t let this opportunity pass.
As soon as I vaulted over the crates, she began to shriek.
“No, no, no! Please!” she screamed. I grabbed her arm — she tried to pull herself away,
so I gripped onto her hair. It was not difficult for me to drag the girl out of the alleyway. She was
very light.
Collin was still smoking his cigar, and he watched me with a nod of approval. The girl’s
screams echoed through the street, and some soldiers from my unit came out of their makeshift
sleeping quarters to see what was happening. An MPC came over, startled by the sounds.
However, he did not care and went back to his post. Even though the MPCs might strike fear into
an enlisted, they still grew up the same way we did.
I felt a jab of pain in my hand as the girl dug her nails into my skin. In retaliation, I
yanked her hair harder as I looked for a spot on the outskirts of the town to perform the sacrifice.
The forest would work, I thought. As I walked into the treeline, a prayer began to spill from my
mouth. I was certain the crows were watching.
“I will cleanse this land of these pagans,” I muttered. “None shall live by my hand.”
Under normal circumstances, I would have never said anything like this. But I figured divine
actions called for divine words.

The girl kept pleading with me not to kill her, but from what I realized, any Cete soldier
would kill me the moment he had the chance. The same went for me and her. Either she died, or I
died. Corvus would grant me His protection if I did this deed. If she didn’t want me to kill her,
she should have run.
We were deep in the forest.
“Please, please don’t kill me,” the girl sobbed. I let go of her hair, and she dropped to the
floor. Her skin was scraped up by the ground that I dragged her against. The moment I let her go,
she tried to crawl away, still crying and groaning in pain.
Should I have felt sorrow? I was hesitant. I wanted to let her survive. But then I
remembered it was people like her who caused the problems I’ve had my entire life. It wasn’t
like she was going to fix it anyway. She was living on our land, enjoying the spoils of war
bestowed upon her by her forefathers. I was sure no thought ever came to her mind that she was
living on stolen land.
 The crows were watching. Corvus would never forgive me if I let the girl go. She had
dragged herself a few feet away while I was thinking, but now I had made up my mind. A feeling
of rage ran through my veins as I trod over to her and pinned my boot on her spine.

I knelt on the girl’s back and used my bayonet to sever her limbs. Her soft flesh was easy
to cut through, especially with a serrated edge. Her blood gushed onto my hands and sleeves. I
felt like I was not in control of my body. There was an impulse to continue and finish the job.
My ears hurt. She was constantly screaming, which I don’t blame her for.
“It’ll all be over soon,” I whispered. One arm was completely butchered. Onto the next
one.
Hand.
Forearm.
Upper arm.
Shoulder.
“Kill me! Ple-ease!” she begged.
“I can’t,” I murmured. Corvus needed a live sacrifice, but she wouldn’t understand.
Her crying made me want to cry. It sounded so painful, but I had no choice if I wanted to
live through this war.

I was halfway done cutting off her legs when her screams faded into silence. There was
no sound but the squelching of my bayonet slicing her flesh.
Foot.
Calf.
Thigh.
I stood up and looked at what I had done. The girl was now a limbless corpse. My gray
uniform had turned red, drenched in blood – her blood. I saw her pale face, a young freckled face
forever frozen with an expression of fear and agony. At least it was over for her.
I remembered Collin said the crows eat the eyes. I picked up my bayonet again and began
sawing off her neck. I made sure her head faced away from me; I didn’t want to see the dead face
of a girl who happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.
My knees dropped. “Here is my offering,” I prayed. I needed to tell Corvus what I really
wanted. “Help me purify the land they have taken from you.”
I backed away from the mutilated corpse. Now the crows needed to eat it.

I waited for minutes. The sun had completely set, and the dark violet sky was speckled
with stars. I sat in the forest for an hour before someone came from the bushes. It was Collin. He
looked at what I had done.
“The crows rest at night,” he said.
A feeling of remorse immediately came to me.
“What does it matter?” I scoffed. “The crows will still eat it by dawn.”
 “I know. I’m just saying you shouldn’t waste time waiting for them to come, ‘cause they
won’t right now.”
I couldn’t say anything.
“You should come back. Who knows if a Cete patrol is wandering out here? If they catch
you with that body, they’ll do things much worse to you.”
I nodded.

Collin led me around so we wouldn’t be mistaken as enemy troops. The MPCs were on
fire watch, taking a look at my blood-soaked uniform.
“Get that cleaned by oh-eight-hundred,” one of them instructed.
I understood. Collin offered a reassuring pat on my back before retrieving a cigar from
his pouch. He lit it for me and then made his way to his foxhole. I couldn't even savor a puff. The
cigar slipped from my fingers, and I stepped on it to put out the embers.
My feet carried me toward the corner where the young girl once hid. Carefully navigating
over crates, I retrieved a blanket from my field pack and settled into the quiet nook.

Sleep is nice.