Operation Fortnight

Sechs: Aufstieg

10949 2100 hrs

Flying at 55000 feet in the air at 200 mph en route to Kosovo, a country in eastern Europe. 

Washing the blood off my hands took longer than I thought it would. I guess I can't really say that I was washing them. I just stood there over the sink, letting the water run through my fingers until the redness stopped. I couldn't even bring myself to look up into the mirror for the first fifteen minutes of it, and even when I did, the way the violet metal plates of my artificial eyes ticked back and forth, constantly sliding over each other like a tectonic plates to make up the shape of my pupil was too much. If there had been a need for a tear duct in those metal-filled sockets, I would cry. 

This was not the first time that I had lost a soldier in the line of duty, of course. It fell into the job description. I ad gotten used to the idea that any one of my teammates could not come home one day, and had long since come to terms with it. But this, this was different. It was one thing to lose a co-worker. It's another to lose a friend. It's the kind of thing that burns itself into your memory. Their last words become etched in eternity for you. 

You're gonna go far, kid. 

Sequoia trusted me. I held her life in my hands and it slipped through my fingers.

Just like water.

I punched the mirror, making it shatter to bits. Glass flew across the room, some slivery bits get stuck in my skin, but I didn't care. I pulled the biggest chunk of glass that remained out of the framework in the wall and began to furiously dig a massive gash into the marble countertop. The edges of the glass dug into my fingers and made blood of my own rush down my hand and into the sink, mixing crimson into the scarlet that was already there. I knew that the janitorial staff would hate me from now on for this, but I didn't care. I just wanted to make sure to permanently enscribe all the emotion I felt at this particular moment into the marble, which ended up just being a series of jagged scribbles and scratches. But that's how I felt. 

Finally, the door of the girl's bathroom was punched open, and there in the doorway stood a private first class who was now staring at me like I has just lost my mind. I quickly recomposed myself, and returned to my quarters. 

I have a shelf in my room full of souvenirs from my adventures. I carefully laid Sequoia's binoculars, the only thing of hers that I was allowed to take from her body before I had to turn it over to the Brazilian government, on the shelf between a rusty horseshoe and a porcelain fairy statue. I also unholstered my Mauser and put it up there too. It would be a while before I would feel comfortable using the pistol that killed a friend of mine. I'd just have to pick a standard field pistol from the barracks before leaving for the next mission. 

From there it was onto the medical clinic for the usual functionality checkup that all of the ATRIUN agents are forced to undergo after returning from the field of duty. Cardinal took one look at me and immediately knew my diagnosis. Without a word, although he might have made some disapproving hums now and then, he directed me into the room, where I laid down upon an examination table and plugged myself into an exoternal scanning system to search my body for injuries. The results were no surprise. 

"Ah just as I suspected. You're brain is experiencing a temporary chemical imbalance appropriate for an individual who has just experienced an emotional trauma. You'll be fine, but you knew that."

I sat up while he pulled over a small table on wheels which was covered in little bottles of just about everything, each one marked with colorful labels as to the identity of the many nondescript liquids held inside, many of them perfectly clear, and began to fish through the bottles to find the right concoction.