Decommissioned
Guard duty was always a bore on base, until this night.
I’ll never forget this night.
Being an MP mostly consisted of yelling at, and occasionally arresting, drunk assholes on the base. That part at least got my adrenaline (and sometimes blood pressure) running. But by far the worst part was junkyard duty.
There was a lot for decommissioned vehicles on the south side off the base. These were bases that had been trashed in fire fights overseas, and damaged beyond any hope of repair. Now they sat rotting in the lot, rusted husks of their former operational glory.
And of course, it took two of us to patrol it night after night. Normally it consisted of walking around its three mile perimeter a couple of times.
This night was different.
I was walking around the perimeter, like I had always done, with my buddy Gray at our side. We both had our M4s slung over our shoulders. Like I said, normally we just rounded the perimeter, making sure all the locks were snug and tight. We didn’t venture too deep into the junkyard. It was a mess of shrapnel and busted Humveees inside.
It looked like tetanus waiting to happen.
Tonight though, we really didn’t have a choice.
As we finished making our rounds, we heard something within the confines off the junkyard. It sounded like metal banging metal. I gave a confused look to Gray.
“That’s gotta be something to check out,” I said.
“Better not be another drunk asshole,” he said.
He began to open the padlock while I called it in. We proceeded deep within the belly of the junkyard. All around us we saw the broken shells of dozens of battles. Tank, Humvees and various other transports were strewn over the junkyard in disrepair. There were even a few broken-down helicopters and drones. I suddenly felt a pit open up with my stomach. How many of this damage had been dealt with the men still inside? How many of the explosions which ripped into these metallic machines had been remotely survivable?
How much death surrounds us right now?
The first thing we noticed was the metal banging sound had stopped by the time we reached the center of the yard.
The second thing was the smell. A heavy scent of decay fell into our nostrils.
“What the hell died out here?” Gray said.
I didn’t want to answer Gray’s question.
That’s when a figure emerged from the shadow. It was squat, with a long mane of greasy black hair. Its sex was mostly likely male, but honestly, I couldn’t quite tell between its long dark hair and the tattered and ruined rags which covered it.
Beneath the tattered hair I saw blotches of gray skin and rows of sharp yellow teeths. We had clearly found both the source of the banging sound and the smell.
I didn’t know how it lived inside the confines of the junkyard for so long.
Frankly, I wasn’t sure if it was alive at all.
“Shit, call this in,” Gray said. “Sir, this is a restricted area. Hands where I can see them.”
I frantically grabbed my radio and began to call in the trespasser. I had just reached command when the sound of gunfire erupted into my ear drum. I turned to see the thing racing towards Gray, who instinctively opened up with his M4. The thing - whatever it was - fell into a mass of rags and hair.
And then immediately stood up, as if nothing had happened.
It raced towards us once more. The wind raced through its hair, revealing a face with too large of teeth to ever be human, at least, not anymore. Its skin was a mess of gray and black, and looked as pallid as a corpse as it raced towards us.I didn’t have time to grab my M4, not while I still clutched my radio. Instead, I grabbed my sidearm and fired one single shot at the creature, which stumbled over, apparently dead this time.
“What the fuck was that?” Gray yelled out.
“Is it dead?” I asked.
“Yeah, it’s dead,” he said, giving the mass of hair and rags a swift kick.
The creature’s eyes bolted open as if Gray’s kick had just awoken it from a nap. He bounded towards Gray with renewed speed, and this time, it was too close for Gray to respond with a burst from his M4.
I grabbed my sidearm and fired three more rounds into the creature. The first seemed to knock it back, but the second shot revitalized it once more.
It was only the third shot which brought it down once more.
“Yeah, asshole, that’s what you get,” Gray said as he rounded up for another kick.
“Don’t touch it!” I yelled. I had a feeling it would wake up again and start this whole thing over again.
Reinforcements arrived soon after. They bundled the thing up, whatever the hell it was, and we never saw it again.
I did spy several strange writings scrawled onto the back of a Humvee in what I could only assume was blood. I described them to a buddy of mine a couple of days later and he said they were Syrian markings. I don’t know what they said.
I’m not sure I want to know.
After hours of debriefing, we were finally released to return to our duties. The junkyard was crawling with guys in hazmat suits looking for God knows what.
They never found anything, and if they did, they sure as hell didn’t tell us.
Both Gray and myself transferred out of that unit shortly thereafter. None of us wanted anything to do with guard duty ever again.