I arose early one Fall morning to find Benny awake by the fire. He was staring intently at it with no emotion on his face. I wondered what he was thinking about. Blank face and mysterious intents. What’s going through your head, Benny?
Two months passed since our escape from the city and we'd been on the run since. Shortly after our escape, we found supplies in a few convenient stores and abandoned pharmacies. My stump was no longer infected, and we had enough food to last us for a while.
We went through forests when possible to escape the dangers of the open road. Government drones and highwaymen patrolled the roads. There were checkpoints all along government-controlled territories which ensured we wouldn't make it far if we pursued that path.
I approached Benny carefully. He hadn't noticed me. Something kept his attention trained on the fire. I decided to implore further.
“Benny, you look crazy. What are you thinking about?” I asked. I walked across the fire and sat on the log with him. He kept his gaze on the fire but loosened his mouth.
“What I'm gonna do when I get home,” Benny responded half-heartedly. He moved his head up and looked me in the eyes.
“Yeah? And what is that?”
“I was kidding. There is no home anymore,” Benny said as his face started to lighten up again.
Benny had intrigued me since I met him. There seemed to be something genuinely concerning him and he didn't want to talk about it. The wrinkles on his face showed more than just his age. They showed the stress and hardship he must have endured prior to saving Levi and myself. I wanted to know more but I was afraid to ask at the time. I decided I would take small steps to figuring out more about him.
“Well, where was home?” I inquired politely.
“Virginia. My home was in Virginia. Not that I'd been there in a while. I was deployed overseas,” Benny responded.
“As a tank commander?” I asked.
“As a tank commander. I got to blow up stuff. I got to blow up a lot of stuff. Those fields and buildings didn't stand a chance. I got to blow up a lot of things. Other… things just got in the way,” he said with a hint of disgust for his own actions.
“Tell me about home,” I said, attempting to turn the conversation away from the war.
Benny looked away from me and threw a piece of wood he'd been holding. He cupped his hands around the lower part of his mouth and closed his eyes.
“Fine,” Benny answered. “Home was just fine.”
We looked over as Levi approached. His hair had grown out and he wore a black polo with tattered jeans. We were down to wearing whatever clothes we could find. I motioned for Levi to join us and he sat in the leaves in between us. He scooted over slightly toward Benny.
“How are you today?” Benny asked Levi.
“I'm fine,” Levi replied with a smirk.
“You want another round of drinks tonight?” Benny asked him. “It'll help with the nightmares.”
“Yeah. Thanks, Benny,” Levi responded.
Levi had been having dreams about the conflict with the doctor. No amount of intervention on my end had done any good. He talked to me less and less every day and talked to Benny more. They had a growing relationship that made me feel uneasy. Benny resorted to drinking with him to cheer him up. I reluctantly allowed it, knowing nothing else was working.
“Don't you think you've had enough to drink the past few nights? Aren't the nightmares getting any better?” I asked Levi. I was hoping he would agree with me and we could finally put an end to the severely underage drinking.
“He's fine,” Benny said to me. He lowered his head and stared at me intently.
“He's my brother, Benny,” I responded. “Mind your own business.”
“You're both of my responsibilities, Stumpy,” Benny retorted. “You'd both be dead without me. You couldn't even keep from getting caught. That was your only job.”
“Well, here's your new job: Stay out of my way and let me take care of my brother. I'm in charge, Benny. Besides, we still don't know if we can trust you.” My voice was starting to sound angry, but I couldn’t help it.
“Dustin,” Levi broke in. “You can't talk to him like that. He's part of the team now.”
“No, that's fine, kid. He's right,” Benny said. “I was with those rich assholes for months and they're the enemy. I was in the military and they're the enemy too. You guys are probably wondering about a lot of things. I can assure you that you can trust me, though.”
“Why did you switch sides, Benny?” I asked with a sense of victory.
“Which time?” Benny laughed.
“Start from the beginning.” I thrust my hand out in some form of primal way, feeling that I was in charge of the situation.
“I was there,” Benny began. “I was at the Battle of D.C. I was called back to the States to fight the terrorists. Well, that is what we are. That's what you are. You're the original one, Mr. Marley. And that makes me one too. But soon we'll be called 'Founders' or some shit. Ha! Imagine that! I'm escorting the most important man in recent history. What will I be? Will I be Franklin? Maybe Jefferson? You could let me sign the new Constitution so I can be Hancock.”
Benny was laughing at what he was saying. It seemed like he was purposefully getting off-track. I snapped my fingers and raised my eyebrows when I had his attention. Benny's small figure mixed with his shifty eyes gave me an uneasy feeling. I motioned for him to continue his story. I had always been intrigued by the events of the Battle of D.C. and wanted to know more from Benny's first hand accounts.
“Anyway, the revolutionaries dug tunnels underground all along the area. The government started finding some of them and knew immediately what was coming,” Benny explained. “Now, as you know, this took place three years ago. The revolution was gaining strength but the government controlled the skies. The revolutionaries knew a frontal ground assault would be suicide. I'm just assuming the Hyena generals didn't tell you any of this. Why would they? You're just a symbol.
“Speaking of symbols, that's what D.C. was. The President and the other officials had fled long before any fighting started, so the Hyenas weren't looking for any hostages. They were looking for a bigger prize; they were looking to claim a piece of the government's will to fight.
“The Hyenas took many of the cities surrounding D.C. in the months before the battle. This led them to grow more brash and to come out in the open more. They believed they had the upper hand. The government ordered more drones to the area and for more bombing runs on Hyena outposts. They also believed they had the upper hand. They had advanced technologies the Hyenas could only dream of. They had power armor, tanks, armored cars, planes, jets, and drones. The Hyenas were just people playing soldiers to the government. But that's what we all are now.”
“And you were in a tank for the fight?” I asked. What have you been through, Benny? What did the war do to you?
“Yes, I was in a tank. My tank. I had a team, of course. We had all grown very close. We fought in Iraq together. But that's a story for another time.
“The rebels tried to get as close as possible to the White House without being detected; that was the goal. Drones spotted the rebel scouts and the government began their artillery barrages and bombing runs. I remember the intense sounds of those guns. Man, it was crazy. I was safe inside my tank for another hour, though. I had time to think and eat my bagel. That was the turning point, though. That was when the government realized they had been tricked.”
“When they realized they accidentally gave you control of a tank?” I said laughing.
“No!” Benny looked at me angrily. His face slowly started to become cheery again and he continued: “Well, kind of. I meant during the artillery barrages. The Hyena scouts tricked the government into thinking the main attack was coming from the front. They ended up using most of the gun batteries' ammo on the false positions. That's when the Hyena's launched the real attack from the flanks.
“Now, I'm not proud of
it, but I had to kill a lot of the Hyenas. Ha! Hyenas... Hyenas, government, soldiers. We give them all names so we don't have to admit we're killing another human being. It was them or me, my friend! And if Benny died, Stumpy wouldn't still be here, would he? So don't judge me!” Benny was acting more strange. erratic than usual. If I had to guess why, I would assume it was because he had such a hard time admitting these things. He was not comfortable with telling Levi and myself about all of this, but knew he had to to gain our trust.
“We're not judging,” Levi said to Benny.
“Good, kid,” Benny replied. “We've all killed to survive now.”
“It doesn't make it right,” I cut in. I wanted to have the last say as to what was right and wrong for my brother.
“No? Why not?” Benny asked. “Really, tell me why not! You think I'm a bad person? You think I'm going to hell?!”
“You're a character, Benny,” I said passively. “You're a man of many different faces. I never know how you'll react.” I didn’t want a confrontation with Benny while he was like that, but I could see I upset him.
“I like to keep you on your toes. The same could be said for you, though. You say you don't like killing, but then what do we find you doing?” Benny asked provocatively.
“I don't like it. It's a necessary evil. Just like bringing you along.” I ensured my responses were not too threatening. A fight would have been too much for me after the loss of my arm.
Benny laughed and looked around. It was about the time we would be up and moving for the day. We still had a long way to go and we hadn't even packed up our gear yet. I wanted to know the rest of the story, though.
“Continue the story,” I commanded of Benny.
“Alright, this is the good part,” Benny stated. “My tank and my team were forced onto the front lines. The military men managed to dig out some trenches and foxholes for cover. We were on the defensive. My tank was on a hill; a good spot for continuous firing. They kept coming up and we kept knocking them down.
“The Hyenas didn't have a whole lot of explosives to destroy our tanks with, even if they did get close. The drones passed by overhead and completely obliterated spots of land. We were fighting average people. They didn't know what they were doing; they didn't know what they had gotten themselves into. Once they got onto the ridge and saw our tanks, there was no turning back. They definitely had us outnumbered, though. Our resources began dwindling but they kept coming. My tank ran out of shells and we were forced to abandon it. I ordered one of my men to get on the turret and cover our escape. That was the turning point. Not just for me, but for the war. That was the moment the government lost; that was the moment the people took back their land.”
“The war isn't over yet, Benny.” I knew what he was getting at, but I could not stress enough that we were still in danger.
Benny's face turned idle and then his eyes wandered. He was thinking about something as his gaze strayed further away from me. I looked to Levi with an uncertain expression and he shrugged, not knowing what was happening.
“Benny, what's going on?” I asked him. I got to my feet and walked over to Benny. His face was bobbling further away. I snapped my fingers a few times in front of his face, finally getting him to acknowledge us again.
Benny said: “My brother was the one on the turret. I looked back one last time and watched as the bullet penetrated his armor. It should have been me. What kind of leader sacrifices his men for himself? Sacrifices his own brother.
“But you want me to get to the really good part.”
Benny's tone shifted as he spoke about the different topics. He talked rapidly for most of the time and his movement seemed unnatural.
“The line was breaking apart. I ran down the path covered with holes created by the shrapnel and stray explosions. It slowed me down but not enough. Turning back occasionally, I used an assault rifle to suppress the Hyenas chasing me. The bullets were whizzing by and I wondered when mine would come,” Benny said in a more somber tone.”
“I know what comes next,” Levi said excitedly.
“It's not as glorious as they made it seem,” Benny explained. “I kept my pace down the path until a bullet struck my leg. It was mine. It finally came, I thought. At that point, as I screamed in pain on the ground, time slowed down and I took note of the other soldiers doing likewise.”
“How did you get out, Benny?” I asked suspiciously. “Don't think I don't know what happened.”
I had been examining Benny's face as he told the story. He didn't appear entirely honest in his account; he seemed the type to lie and to be good at it.
“An angel reached down and grabbed me,” Benny laughed. “Well, it was actually a soldier lifting me into the helicopter. I didn't want to be saved. I couldn't live with what I'd seen, with what I'd done. Nonetheless, medics rushed me to a nearby helicopter that was getting ready to take off.
“I was really high in the sky, Stumpy. I watched the White House fall to the Hyenas. They spread out and stormed all the other buildings nearby. There were swarms of your people. The government never stood a chance. They never knew what they were up against. You can't fight the American people. Not even the American people can fight the American people.
“How does one describe what I saw next? The light of a thousand suns? The heat of a thousand more? God coming down and decimating everything it took Him six days to make? No, those all make it seem too glorious. No, it was a nuclear bomb. The kind no one survives from. No one thought the government would resort to it. Perhaps the White House was just bait for the Hyenas to bite. They took it and the government took them. And themselves. There's nothing left.”
“Your story checks out.” My voice was almost mechanical. His story was tragic, but I did not want any more reason for Levi to be drinking. I turned to face my brother and asked: “What do you think?”
“That's everything Jess told us,” Levi responded.
“Think we can trust him?” I asked Levi about Benny.
“I think we can keep him around for a little longer,” Levi said back jokingly.
“Yeah, real funny,” Benny cut in.
“We’ve been through a lot,” I said. “We have to learn to get through it. Maybe even with a smile.”
“This is all your fault, though,” Benny replied.
I kept forgetting that I was Marley. That I was supposed to be Marley. I forgot that’s how everyone else saw me. I had to live with everyone believing I was responsible for their suffering. I didn’t have to pretend for seven years because Jess knew my secret. Our secret. But now I was thrust into the horrible world Marley created. Maybe it was my fault. I could have told them the truth. I knew Levi questioned my motives; he didn’t always believe I just went along with it for him.
Jess had chosen the path for me the past few years. Now that she was dead, I had the option to be what I wanted. Once I reached the Hyena outpost, I could shape the entire world how I wanted.
“You’re right, Benny,” I said after some consideration. “But you chose my side for a reason.”
“I did,” Benny replied. “I chose it because Marley hadn’t resorted to using nuclear missiles on his own people. I heard about you, Marley the Great, and that you were a leader for the people.”
“So choosing the Hyenas was just a matter of morals?” Levi asked.
“Absolutely,” Benny replied, showing his pearly white teeth to us. “I went with a few of my fellow soldiers traveling the remains of the country until I found the folks living under the city. I was coming up with a plan, but you stumbled in.”
“You didn’t see us coming?” I looked to Benny suspiciously, narrowing my gaze.
“Not until you were very close,” Benny replied.
I put my hand flat on the ground behind me and pushed up. I had heard enough. I then motioned for Levi to come with me as I turned my back to Benny. Levi stood up and walked to me. Benny stared at us suspiciously.
??
?Want me to accompany you?” Benny asked.
“We’ll be fine,” I replied. “Just going for a walk. Watch camp for us, will you?”
Levi went to his sleeping bag and uncovered his bow as well as a few arrows. He picked them up and walked back to me.
I led the way into the woods and away from camp.
“Do you need a warmer jacket?” I asked when we got deep into the woods. “We can go into town and scavenge. I’m sure some clothes will be left in a few of the stores.”
“No, I should be fine,” Levi said back. He put his head down for a moment and continued: “Why don’t you trust Benny? He’s trying to help us.”
He caught me off guard. I struggled to find a response and finally said: “It’s not that I don’t trust him. You and me are a team, though. We have to rely on each other.”
“You have to learn to trust other people.” He gave me a smirk. “You trusted Jess for seven years and she was just using you. You couldn’t trust Dave or Chuck and they had the same goal as you: Stay alive!”
“Look, I know you think you know what you’re talking about, but-”
Levi cut me off saying: “No, Dustin, I know what I’m saying! Benny is going to help us. He’s a good guy.”
“We’re the good guys, Levi. We’re a team. We watch out for each other.”
“And now we have Benny to look out for us even more! He saved you, didn’t he?” Levi gripped his bow tightly.
“We don’t know him, Levi. He’s with us for now. We’ll see what happens.”
“Fine.”
“Damn straight it’s fine! You gotta trust me. I might not always make the best decisions but we’re both still alive, aren’t we?!”
“That’s all that matters to you, isn’t it?” Levi asked.
“That you stay alive? It’s one of my higher priorities.”
“You’re not dad, Dustin.” Levi said coldly. “You keep saying everything he used to like it’s gonna bring him back.”
“Every man needs a legacy. He’s still alive through us. If I repeat it, a part of him is still there,” I explained. What he was saying was starting to get to me. I hadn’t thought of my family in so long, but he was forcing the memories back into my head. My parents’ dead bodies. My world had crumbled, but Levi could only pick fights with me, hoping it would change something.
“Alright,” Levi said back after contemplating.
“Thank you, Levi. I don’t like fighting. The cold is starting to get to me.”
Levi attempted to change the subject by saying: “But why can’t I have my gun?”
I laughed and replied: “You’re getting pretty good with the bow.”
“That’s for hunting animals. We’re hunting people.”
I looked at him in complete disbelief. Was that my brother talking?
“We’re not hunting anyone, Levi! We only kill to stay alive. You know that! We’re not soldiers,” I said with conviction.
“Yes we are. We’re fighting for a cause, aren’t we? That’s what soldiers do.”
“No, we’re not fighting for anything other than survival. That’s it,” I explained definitively.
“You have to have a cause. We have a chance to make a difference, Dustin. Everyone really believes you’re the leader of the revolution. You can shape everything from here on out.”
“That kind of responsibility doesn’t belong to someone like me,” I said back with fear of disappointing Levi.
We made our way back to camp after walking a full circle. Loud talking could be heard as we approached the location we left Benny at. As we got closer, we saw a group of men and women standing over a tied-up and incapacitated Benny. They had weapons aimed at him. Benny looked up, spotting our position. His eyes widened, letting us know danger was imminent.
Chapter 5:
Is This Progress?