THE SHOEBOX PURSUIT
POPPIES AND WARPAINT
By
Benjamin Maxwell
Copyright © B.Maxwell
INTRODUCTION
As the colourful yet tragic history of humanity will no doubt agree, time and time again, the greatest of heroes can conquer the most deadly of villains. They can overcome struggles beyond their capabilities, and wow us all with acts of incredible bravery and selflessness. Their adventures are recorded, honoured, regaled and even reanimated for entertainment, for they are held above all else as our saviours. But one thing should also be considered - sometimes heroes can get lost.
Vampire slayers, warring wizards and galactic fighter pilots, they all walk the same lonely path with a trail of blood laying behind them. Forced to make decisions and sacrifices past their comprehension, the thin line between good and evil can rapidly become blurred. The knight in shining armour is not always what he claims to be - kinks form on his suit, his shield breaks and his sword rusts. Just as Sleeping Beauty is not as innocent and pure as she appears - her pretty smile cracks, whilst the life in her eyes begins to fade.
Whatever your intentions, if enough time passes by, mistakes will be made, errors will occur, and the win will barely outweigh the losses it cost. But dragons need to be slain, dark armies need to be crushed, and masterminds need to be thwarted - because Wonderland needs to be saved, Oz needs to go on, and because, for the briefest of moments, everyone is innocent, everyone is good and everyone deserves a chance of freedom.
There is however, one exception to this rule - a man with a soul like no other, that has never known goodness or purity. He is the thing of nightmares, the voice in your head telling you to misbehave, the shadow in the corner leading you astray. He comes from the darkness, a mania of laughter and madness enticing you down the wrong path. Fairy tales do well to avoid him, whilst horror stories barely scrape the surface of his terror. He is a being of sheer wickedness, clear and simple.
But luckily there are always people who oppose evil in its purest form. People who put themselves between the good and the bad, for the greater good. For when the lines of morality become blurred, when people speculate what really lies beneath Wonderland, and when people start to question a madman’s reasoning, the extremity is all that remains - the right thing to do, and the wrong thing to do. And at this very moment, a small group of individuals who do just that were busy doing what they do best…
It is now late November, in the tragic year of 1944. Christmas is coming, but the overwhelming mass of death and destruction makes it impossible to tell. The mission was still in Germany, though trailing very close to the Polish border and pushing upwards towards the Baltic Sea. The location was nothing but ordinary - a plain stretch of land, snow on the ground, foliage and rockery sporadically decorating the area. Whilst in the heart of it all stood a seemingly small and insignificant looking hangar - a square, breeze-block built structure, with two Nazi soldiers placed either side of the large aircraft doorway, its only entrance and exit.
Captain Charlie Crumble, leader of the Alpha-Omega missions, knelt low, hidden in an abundance of bushes, a fair distance away. With busted binoculars pressed up against his face, this was not an explosive reintroduction for the man, nor did he look like the hero he was once revered as. His hair was longer, almost scruffy, brushed back behind his ears. His face looked gaunt, as if he hadn’t eaten a good meal in months, and a greying beard was gradually pushing through. Yet his uniform remained rather well-kept, and his holster still had the same pistol resting in it. He lowered the binoculars and passed them to the young soldier laying low on the ground next to him.
The raggedy looking man snatched them away, lifting them to his eyes and analysing the scene for himself. There he was, the boy who fell to earth - Billy Random. He looked the same as he always had done since the day he made his impressive entrance into their lives. Characteristically moody, ever strange, dark hair and pale skin, with his heavily-armoured bionic arm looking awesome in the fading sun, and white light of the snow. His typical shirt and tie were present of course, but now hidden underneath a ‘borrowed’ uniform jacket, with the right sleeve ripped off, revealing, and perhaps even boasting his magnificent abnormality - the squad’s rather large and bulky handiwork of an add-on, making the thing look even more deadly than ever. Truth be told, he didn’t like the jacket one bit, but it shielded him from the bitter winds that the harsh German winter was bringing this season. He dropped the binoculars, giving Charlie a concurrent nod of the situation.
Behind the pair sat the small geek, Specks. His legs were crossed, his helmet and uniform looked big on him, and his glasses were slowly sliding down his nose, as they had a tendency to do. He automatically pushed them back up, jotting down his findings in his notepad, repeatedly checking the compass in Billy’s arm without his permission, whilst muttering things under his breath that only he could be bothered to understand.
Charlie almost mustered a smile as Billy tried to snap his arm away from the pesterings of the small science officer, the pair slapping each other away in silent argument. But the Captain was preoccupied, and his intent deadly serious. Quietly, he pulled some branches out of his way and peered a few hundred yards to his right to a large cluster of rocks. After a few moments of waiting a big hand revealed itself signing the thumbs up. The hand it seemed, belonged to Yankee, who was lying flat down in the dirty snow next to his brother, Doodle.
Both looked first-rate. They were still suited and booted, looking All-American, and sporting large grins on their faces as they beheld the instruments of destruction laid out before them. Any cuts or scars the brothers had procured over the passing months and masses of missions, were hidden beneath their suits, yet often talked about to lighten the mood and show off to anyone willing to lend an ear! Both had their entire - yet small - armoury lined up before them, as they quickly gave them the once over, reloading them in the process. Instinctively they placed them on their person, before turning their attention to their latest additions, a pair of sniper rifles, positioned directly in front of them, already aimed at the guards below. All they were waiting for now was Charlie’s signal!
A long while had passed since the isolated squadron’s last encounter with Shoebox Stone. In the time between, things had been very tough indeed. They had been on countless adventures, all the while tracking Shoebox’s signal, using Billy’s compass in his arm as guidance. Battles had been won, lives had been lost, weirdness witnessed on multiple occasions, and ‘His’ projects thwarted many times over. But today was significant. Today, according to the tracking device, encumbered with Speck’s calculations, they had finally reached their target. And ready or not, it was time to make their move.
Yet in their travels, they hadn’t noticed the war around them turning from sour to savage, like nothing the world could have imagined in its darkest ideas. Of course, if they happened upon a battle by chance that was outside the constraints of the Alpha-Omega missions, the squad had always helped out - after all, they were elite soldiers and beneficial to the cause. But truth be told, Charlie had become somewhat obsessed with his pursuit, losing sight of what was really going on, relentlessly chasing a man some would even debate exists! His humour and wit had been drying up over the passing months, replaced instead with a ruthless determination, which was only rarely broken by the occasional forced attempt to alleviate the tension with a one-liner. But they were few and far between nowadays.
The obsession was taking its toll on him, and it was taking its toll on his men. But Billy, Specks, Yankee and Doodle were committed to Charlie, no matter how
questionable his behaviour. They were all in this to the last.
So with everyone accounted for, we should begin again…