The Enemies

Strange Encounter

Two months later.

Oden

God, I am exhausted.

'The hall. Clear.'

My voice hoarse, as I mumble the affirmative into the mic. The silence envelopes me singing sweet lullaby into my ears.

I stretch the fingers and curl them around the weapon again. My rifle feels like part of my hand by now. We spent almost all week securing the city. Today we received another order to swap a few more buildings in the area close to our base. It is extremely hard to concentrate after two sleepless nights in a row. And I have no wish to get killed because of that.

'Bedroom. Clear.'

I hear Tom from the second floor.

'Closet. Clear.'

Holt croaks as I pause at the entrance of another room.

'Hey, Holt. Two sleepless nights and not with your wife.'

The joke is stupid but talking means, I am still awake. We are almost sleepwalking, though. Almost.

'Three, smart ass.'

I am on the first floor; others - upstairs.

The building is old. Built for the rich, no doubt. However, the idea of someone living in it is hideous to me. The house is weird. The location of the rooms is illogical. The furnishing is odd. Focusing on not bumping into things, I step into the living room. A lot of useless junk is lying around. As much as it could be the doing of burglars, it could easily be the owners of this place. Karmians are puzzling at best. Bunch of loonies. Their priorities vary from ours. The way they think may be different too. Each time I encounter someone from Karm, even if he speaks Drellian, I can never understand the person – the way they form sentences, the way they pick words. Their heads work backward. No wonder Drell and Karm are foes for as long as anyone can recall. We are on opposite sides. We can never agree, as we simply do not understand each other.

Well, it is a lame excuse for slaughter. But who am I to argue?

'The living room. Clear.'

I hate this place. Several more rooms and I will get my rest. I just need to focus.

'Another bedroom. Clear. There is an odd painting. Now I am afraid of them.'

Tom echoes into the mic.

'Tell me about it.'

Soft carpet silences my footsteps. Those dust catchers are everywhere. All sounds are muted here. Or maybe it is just me.

'An odd room with three green coaches and a tiny coffee table. Clear.'

'What do you think they do in those rooms, Major?'

'Why don't you ask the owner when you find him?'

Holt is the toughest one of our measly crowd. 'You know those weirdos take personal belongings with them. There is no way to know who lived here.'

Everything looks good, quiet as I progress slowly from room to room. I keep up my internal pep talk that I will get some rest after we have finished here and my mood brightens a bit.

One last room.

'I am even curious to see if someone bothered to place a kitchen next to the living room.'

There is no answer. Is there something wrong with the signal?

'Hello?'

Without waiting for a reply, I go in. This is against the protocol. Completely out of my character. My mouth is open and I hear my quiet breathing.