Here's the first story I got published in this year's local literature and arts magazine! Enjoy!
One Last Song
By S. Athas
"Cap, you sure you're okay coming back?" comes through on my radio.
"It's all past now. The place is a safe-zone, ain't it?" I say, and check my weapon.
"Yes indeed, Sarge," the comms man chimes, "their Third Army hasn't been spotted anywhere near here. You and yours are clear to proceed."
It doesn't leave me with any notion of calm. The whole squad's been all kinds of queer, but that's just ‘cause the history of the place. Truth told, there’s at least ten years and god-knows-what between life and us in this town. And us going and pokin’ around can’t be sure to stir up anything friendly.
"You clear this floor," I order and motion my man down the hall.
The rest of my squad split to comb the adjacent buildings, and I turn with rifle read and take the stairs to the second floor. Not like we'll find any enemy, the war's been on for far too long for that. Operations that used to consume hundreds or thousands of men now only take a half-dozen. There are still remnants left behind from those larger engagements, but none of it is of any use now.
I glance out a shattered window and eye the artillery on a far hill. Would those rotting guns have anything to say about their place now? Ten years ago they barked their opinions all over this town, now they’re just relics to a time long past.
"Some kinda monument." I spit. No good they’ve ever done for anyone. “You yearn for a war no one’s left to fight, but we who remain would rather you rust away.”
The dust is thick in the air, like those guns shelled the place yesterday. The sun's high now. It spears through the blown out sections of wall and roof and bathes the hallway in bleached yellow. Least that gives some light, I think as I step over a mixture of concrete, re-bar, and old textbooks.
"Is it you?" I hear.
I hold up at the voice. Frail. Small. Longing.
A girl's voice sounds from a room down the hall. I run. I whip through the classrooms’ doorway with weapon ready to a shattered room and a smiling face. The girl is in her uniform, a little stained with grime, and sits atop a desk. She kicks her legs through the air as if nothing was amiss.
"Did you come to listen?” the girl asks as she fiddles with a bullet hole in her guitar. “It's show and tell today.” I lower my weapon and pin a hand to my radio. I’m here, and so is she. Questions race through my head faster than I could say them, so I say nothing. Ten years since the battle here, there’s just no way she could hav– "I hid beneath the bridge at first,” she says, “There were so many stars falling."
Stuck. Feet nailed to the wood floor. I don’t speak. I don’t move. This is just, I can’t. Not again.
She plucks the strings, singing, and all the walls return. There's no artillery on the far hill anymore. Everything's like it used to be. Halls of students and teachers. Desk lids snapping shut. Heels on the hallway like a thousand rolling snares. The noise of all this life deafens, and all is in time with her song.
For a moment I see the time when all was right in the world.
A sharp clatter as my rifle falls to the floor. The girl halts, and all the sight and sound halts with her. All to attend and wait for me.
“Sarge?” my radio chirps, “Check in.”
Slowly, I pry my weapon from the floor and, with no small effort, turn away from the girl and the room and what could’ve been.
I will not remember her.
I will disconnect.
Some other town.
Some other school.
"Daddy," the girl calls as I walk away, "Did you like my song?"
Someone else's daughter.