Ruff's Den
the end of Existence
I jumped the three feet from the back of the ship, and landed on two paws. I knew I was going to die, and as if asking a sign of it, a piece of shrapnel from a nearby grenade skimmed my cheek, taking fur and flesh alike off a small portion of my muzzle. I spun to motion the rest of the troops out. Immediately a scared-looking young hare dropped next to me, then fell to the ground missing his head, the effect of a PgC 22 (Portable ground Cannon, 22” barrel width). I had felt the wind from the shell and looked behind to see it land and explod several hundred yards away. I spun back around and saw that two other troops had leapt out. I could feel myself shiver even through the beyond-warm flying dust and ash. Another shell flew overhead, and we ran. The projectile rammed our jump ship head on. The ship fell the last few feet to the ground, and its fuel caught fire. Just another fireball to join in the rest, throwing engine pieces, door handles, glass, and dust directly at us. We hit the dirt until the bombardment of particles had ended. Jumping to our paws, we sprinted back to the ship and pulled three survivors from the wreckage, none of them were wounded. Our group rotated to face the opposing army, dropped behind our original bunker, and prepared for battle. I could only hope the other landings were going better. We had come with a company of twenty, and were down to six, not to mention the death of the pilot and the navigator. I flipped my stealth night-vision goggles down, and checked my weapon. It was already hot, and I was sure it would over-heat. Tiny particles that could only be enemy gunfire flew around us like snow.
The Manhattan Project had failed almost two hundred years ago, and World War II was still in at high tide. Only it wasn’t called World War II anymore. It was nameless. It was just ‘the War’ and that was all anyone worried about. Weaponry was highly advanced; however, if you wanted anything done, you had to send foot-troops in. Planes had been grounded five years previous to this point in time. The heat and smoke clouds made it too risky for even ace pilots to fly. The only vehicles were the drop ships, like the one I had come on, and were only flown in when reinforcements were a last resort.
I guided a clip into my gun, and popped up to take a look. I could see nothing but giant black clouds of smoke, indistinguishable from one another. It was the same thing, the only thing, I had seen for years. The dust clouds were worldwide now. Food was being manufactured in large greenhouses across the world. If the sun was blocked, they would turn on millions of lights and hope the crops make it through the muck long enough to keep the year’s crops alive. All of our species’ were hanging by a thread to existence, and yet we were still fighting.
My thoughts came back down with my peers, to the war. There was no general, captain, or any rank for that matter. We were all fighting for what we believed in, and took whatever actions we saw fit to take. That was the main cause for the number of casualties in this war. Turning to my companion, a lanky polecat, I shouted, “Well, what do ya think? Shall we charge enemy lines?” He shook his head, grinning at my joke. Then something terrible, and unexpected, happened. He leapt up and over the barrier. I tried to call him back, but stopped when he was felled by crossfire. I felt the weight of what had happened fall upon my chest, and began weeping in anger. Gathering my courage, I, myself, leapt the wall followed by my five remaining friends. I ran with all my heart, the rage boiling inside of me. I could hear the screams of my friends behind me as they were taken out one-by-one. The smoke was too thick to see targets, so the most successful way to kill was to shoot randomly into the dust. Remembering this, I raised my barrel and launched my first salvo of flying missiles at the foes.
I could remember training very clearly. That was years ago when they had actual training facilities, and the world wasn’t a giant dust cloud because of the constant shelling. The war had actually once had ‘sides’. It was just recently that chaos had taken over. I had stood in a small room with targets, and shot them. To simulate battle, they would then begin releasing ash and debris into the compartment. I was trained to brace myself against a wall (thanks to my small bodily structure), and spray bullets to where I had previously seen the targets. This was different however, I thought, as I reflected on my training days. I had never seen this enemy, and I was never even sure how far away they were, not to mention where their positions may be. I slowed my pace, and turned to look behind me, still firing madly.
I was alone.
Spinning back around, I charged the enemy. I was never shot, shelled, or blown to pieces by a grenade. I was still thinking of my training. I could not remember the start of the chaos, now that I thought about it. And World War II… that seemed strangely related to something I remembered reading about in my history books at school. I could not remember the exact date that I had last seen the sun, or when the Manhattan Project had failed. I could not remember when sides had split, why they had split, or even what side I was fighting for. It was a mad chaos.
My clip ran out, and I grabbed another clip to load into my gun, however, it seemed to squirm… Looking down, I saw a large snake hanging from my paw. I threw it away in disgust. Somehow it had gotten into my ammo pack. I stuffed my paw back in, and it came back up empty. I swore, and threw my gun aside. Two weapons left. My ancient magnum and a CRKT 5” blade. I drew the magnum, and was once again surprised when it turned to ash, leaving only the six bullets in my paw. I looked at them closely when suddenly they burst forth a green liquid. I wiped the wet substance off onto my clothes, and drew the CRKT. This time, nothing happened. I flipped it though the air once…
…remembering the time I had been trained with a knife by a good friend. He had shown me how to flip it open, and make a good show with it by tossing it through the air, and catching it by the blade. I had also, of course, learned to fight. The blade was ‘tanto’, an excellent blend of angles; very sharp, and heavy—obviously best quality.
This was the same knife, the fox taught me with, now scarred and battered. I felt more secure with this weapon then I had sense…
But there was nothing. I could only draw a blank. And now I couldn’t remember any of my training at all, except for the blade training. It seemed it was my whole life. Everything had been stripped away. Just then a thought both idiotic and ingenious struck me. Some sort of gas had been released, causing insanity. No. It was impossible.
Then, with a terrible shredding sound, the black clouds around me were stripped away, quite like my thoughts, leaving only a white void. Looking behind me, I witnessed a terrible sight. Millions upon millions of my fellow dead furs lying behind me, slaughtered mirthlessly. I spun, once again, to look for the enemy responsible for the killing. There, floating on the horizon was a floating reflection of me, facing the rest of the white world. I gasped air greedily, realizing what it all meant. I was the last fur, no other creature, alive on the face of the planet. All dreams and hopes had been stripped along with life, color, and everything else. This was the result. And I was the last spark of life in the existence of our world. No; in our entire universe. The image floating above me faded into the whiteness. Life had come to an end, simply blown out like a candle. I sat and began to weep. I sat there for hours, and then died of a broken heart.
Thus ended life.
-Ruff B. Cagnus
10/03/02