River Hawkins

We smelled them before we heard them, and we heard them before we saw them.

The smell was like the taste of metal, as if the road itself were breathing rust. What produces such a smell? It seeped into our bodies and threw our heads back, made us suck in our cheeks. Some of the men started shaking.

Then, from over the hill, came thousands of voices, growling like a morning storm.

The smell grew stronger.

The sergeant stepped back.

“What the hell is that fucking smell?”

The Cambodian took his helmet off.

“That’s the smell of blood. They are murderers. They bring the smell of death.”

That brought us back from wherever the copper smell had taken us.

Murderers.

They carried the fresh stench of their victims. Who had they massacred, those wretched bastards?

Then we saw them.

Our stomachs grew weak.

They came toward us down the road, leaving a trail of blood behind them.

We were a sight to see.

Proud, bleeding people.

Fearless and ready to die.

The soldiers’ stomachs knotted at the sight of us—wretched souls willing to mutilate ourselves before marching into battle.

“Captain, how do you stop a people who will happily torture themselves?”

“The same way you stop anyone.

You kill them.”

We left a trail of blood through the streets for miles.

Soldiers became sick at the sight of us. We were gruesome—bloody, maniacal grins on the whole lot.

We knew we had either God or the Devil on our side.

The soldiers knew it too.

It would come to be known as The Pawn Revolution.

The path we walked through the capital became known as Blood Alley. The stains in the concrete could never be washed clean. It remains a monument to the power of faith.

Now, if people ever question our power as God, they have only to walk down Blood Alley and see for themselves:

The blood of the faithful cannot be washed away.

Not psychotic.

Enlightened.

Standing before the soldiers were the Messiah, his first believer, her child, and the rest of the Scarred Rebellion.

People of every race, class, and religion.

At the front stood a pregnant woman with her four-year-old boy hanging from one hand and a shotgun in the other.

Farmers with pitchforks.

Gas station attendants with swords.

Secretaries with baseball bats.

These were not soldiers from any army on Earth. They were not skilled killing machines forged in the barracks of some secret government stronghold.

They were a misfit collection of spiritual warriors preparing to bring the wrath of God upon their enemies.

“We will not hesitate to open fire on you and your children if you do not disperse immediately!” Captain Brennan hollered.

The pregnant woman answered:

“I’m gonna skull-fuck your eyehole with your own gun if you so much as raise it toward my child!”

This unnerved more than a few soldiers, including the captain.

They hadn't expected this.

They certainly hadn't expected it from a pregnant woman standing beside her four-year-old son.

They were outgunned, perhaps, but not outnumbered—and they showed absolutely no fear.

The captain didn't raise his gun.

I'd like to think it was because he was afraid she'd skull-fuck him with it.

The boy threw a rock.

It struck a soldier in the shoulder.

The soldier raised his gun.

The Messiah spoke.

“Go ahead. Fire on the boy. Kill him. If it is in you to kill a child, exercise that demon.

He came here to die anyway.”

That was when sedition began seeping into the minds of the soldiers.

In their hearts, many had already begun to give up the fight.

The people began to dance.

A stomping dance that seemed to shake the earth.

Blood poured from their wounds and flew from their bodies like water from a wet dog.

Some of the soldiers vomited.

Others tried to run.

The captains had the deserters executed as they fled, but orders to kill their fellow soldiers didn't sit well with the remaining men.

Sedition spread.

The Scarred Rebellion continued to dance.

They stared.

They growled.

At first it sounded like distant thunder building beneath an approaching storm. Louder and louder it became until the guttural roar was deafening.

They looked like rabid dogs preparing to pounce, growling and drooling blood.

Soldiers began to piss themselves.

Not merely because the rebellion was terrifying.

Because the reality of what stood before them had finally become impossible to ignore.

At any moment, they would be ordered to fire upon fellow Americans.

Men.

Women.

Children.

These were not foreign invaders.

These were not terrorists from some distant land.

These were neighbors. Families. Children.

Every soldier now faced a choice between betraying his duty and betraying his conscience.

Neither choice left him innocent.

Sergeant First Class Anthony R. Sweringen finally broke ranks.

He fired on his commanding officer.

Then they gunned him down.

But not before he killed his captain and three of his superiors.

The act of mutiny terrified the generals.

Once again, they ordered the Messiah and his rebellion to disperse.

Soldiers and savages...

Before I go into any more depth about this story, let me tell you the ending.

The hero will die.

The villain will succeed.

Much of the world—and many of the people upon it—will be destroyed.

Enjoy.