Amongs this devastation
I make my declaration
to take this world by storm and darkness
word by word, as history proved seven fold
between the pen and the sword, the pen is more bold
-Hector's Crusade, 1st canto

I had always wondered what war was like. My grandfather was a soldier in the Imperial Army in his youth, I remember sitting on his knee as a child while he smoked his pipe and told me of his stories and adventures, his friends and his enemies, of epic battles and heroic leaders. And I, being younger than what I am now, took in and hung on to every word of it. I wanted my own stories, I wanted to be my own hero, I wanted it my whole life. Being the sucker that every teenage boy is for glory and bravery, I enlisted in SpecForce. I could of went into the Army or the Navy, but no, I wanted SpecForce. Honor, Courage, Commitment; Semper Fi; The Few, The Proud. Those were words that meant something to me. But now, those were words that were nothing but a charade, they were on a recruiting poster and that was about the only place they were.

Well, I got my wish, Im at war and it sucks. The only enemy Im fighting is boredom. There are times when my mind goes completely rotten. We've been in country for almost two months now, but it seems like two years, some days, I honestly do think time is going backwards. I forget what day of the week it is, what month it is, I wonder what all my friends are doing back home, which guy is sleeping with my girlfriend and more importantly when or if Im ever going to see any combat.

Why didn't grandpa tell me about this? Because there was no glamour in it. Now that I have some of my feet in his shoes, I doubt he was fighting all day every day he was in the military. Do I blame him? No, who wants to hear about having to fill thousands of sandbags a day to fortify a post you'll never stand? or sweeping the sand off a dirt runway or plenty of other senseless bull****. Grandpa probably saw combat once every couple of days or once a week or something, those are the stories people want to hear, so those are the stories people will tell. This is my story, for my entertainment, not yours. There is no honor, no hero in this story. There is brutality and selfishness, this is the story of MY war and the few good men and even more scumbag men that were in it.

I have seen a world that most of you dont know and I hope you'll never know.

Re: Hector's Crusade

I swear I'll tare this world apart
by driving a sonnet straight through its heart
lies and cries, tears and alibies
romantic tragedys and social comedys
I choose the second layer of Hell of all destintys
-Hector's Crusade, 1st canto

Im an Urban Guerrilla in Charlie Company, 1st Battalion/6th Regiment. My company's AO (area of operation) is the entire North-Western side of the Capitol of Ithor. We have the best AO of all the companies and I mean that with the upmost sarcasm. If you look to the North, there is nothing but desert as far as the eye can see, which, just so happens to be the only desert on Ithor. To the South there is the city itself, the West is filled with the planet's infamous jungle, the East is half city, half desert. So take your pick, dry heat or humidity. I think the coldest it ever got during the summer noon was 110. I remember waking up one ealry morning and having ran to the piss pit to relieve myself, I felt this chill and goosebumps running up my skin from it. I did my business and ran back into my hooch, I couldn't help but notice the thermometer read 90 degrees and here I was, cold as hell, in 90 degree weather.

We operated in squads and had an eight day rotation. For the first four days, you stood post, six hours on, six hours off. The next four days you patrolled, four times a day, three hours a patrol, I can't decide which sucks more. When your on post, your usually with one other guy. In a world that makes sense to officers, you sit on post in full gear and weapon and stare out into the same, unmoving terrain for six hours. You don't talk, you don't sleep, you don't read girl magazines and take the quizzes, you don't learn everything there is to know about your boy, you don't describe everything you've done with every girl you've been with and wish you've been with but lied about, you dont take off your gear, you don't discuss religion or politics, how drunk your gonna get when you go back home, why you joined the Suck, if we should be in Ithor or not, if your alone, you don't shake hands with the unemployed until it files a restraining order if it could. We did everything we weren't suppose to do on post.

Patrolling was different, we couldn't waste valuable time the way we did on post because we were on the move. The average tempurature was 130 degrees by noon, by days end, it peaked to 140 for atleast two hours. If we patrolled the city, it was literally hot enough for the rubber on our boots to melt slightly into the asphault or whatever they use on the roads in Ithor, whats bad about that is there is a dry heat, so once you start sweating, it dries right up, not giving your body enough time vendelate. The jungle wasn't any better, it was humid, so you would sweat alittle TOO much, after about a half hour of patrolling, you look like you just got out of a pool. The good thing about the jungle was the small rivers that ran through it and crossing them, because atleast your lower torso was able to cool off a bit. Either way, you could never drink too much water, we were forced to, not encouraged to, drink 12 liters a day. I was worried, because something made sense for once. If you were lucky, you went on a desert patrol or mounted patrol, because they involve vehicles. You sweated not so much, cold water was always in supply, there was a nice breeze on your face and you weren't so miserable that you prayed for an Imp sniper to hit you in the leg or somewhere not fatal, but enough to get back on a capitol ship's Aid Station for a few days.

Notice how I didn't mention the enemy. When I cross him, I'll let you know, but for now, I don't know and Im not surprised. The Imps were limited in thier resources, so thier not going to go toe to toe with us. And why should they? Only a fool would go into a fight he knows he's going to lose. So where are they? how will they fight? Will they use guerrilla tactics? Like I said, when I know, I'll tell you. This being said, I quickly learned that if the enemy isn't f***ing with you, your chain of command is. There is always something that needs to be improved, whether its the dust on the vehicles that need to be cleaned, the rocks that need to be picked up, or the neatly displayed boots under your rack, or your shave not being close enough. There is always a report from Intel saying how an attack is coming from this direction at this time and how we need this many sandbags to fortifty and build this post, only for nothing at all to end up happening. Or how we got a report that mysteriously came to us in the darkest hours of the night saying how a squad of Imps is hiding in this building and they have these on thier posts, this many numbers, these weapons, only for us to raid the building and find nothing. After a few of those "intel reports" I never laughed at the joke how "military intelligence" is an oxymoron. I couldn't laugh because, well, that joke just happened to be true and the truth hurts sometimes.

Re: Hector's Crusade

Unable to wait what will bound me in my homeland
and how many I can break with the simple stroke of my hand
imagination being the only thing that holds me down
morally unbound, there's no way I can frown
-Hector's Crusade, 1st canto

No matter what branch of the military you are or what your occupation may be in the military, all have one thing in common that helps you survive almost anything. This thing is so simple, so routine, so important, yet people usually dont think about it and that is the person next to you, your friend. Odds are very good you never met this person before, you barely know them, you know thier name only because thier in your platoon or company, thier rank is obvious, maybe you overheard thier first name, maybe you know where they came from. In the real world, if you saw this person in a street or social gathering, you wouldn't care, you probably wouldn't even remember him two hours from now if you walked next to him, the next day, you would have completely forgot them.

The grunt world isn't that much different, except for the matter of time it took that stranger to become your best friend. This is because he ends up right next to you on a hump. Your both carrying atleast 100 pounds of gear, so far you've humped 10 miles, the sweat coming down your face can be described as a water fall, your feet dont hurt cuz you cant feel them anymore, all you feel is your crotch moving to the left then the right and find yourself moving forward. You try to get a sip of water only to see that you ran out, this is where the guy gives you his last sip that is lterally a drop. He pats your shoulder and tells you were almost there, then it doesn't seem so bad anymore. About 3/4 of the way done, he starts to fall back, this is where you grab his patrol pack that takes off about 20 pounds and carry it for him. You drain the last of both your waters onto his face to cool him off. His arm is thrown over your back and no matter WHAT happens, you do not let him go or fall back, after all, he gave you his last drop of water. My friend's first name was Franko, I called him Francis because it pissed him off. He called me T because he couldn't pronounce my name. Either he was illiterate or had an odd sort of lazyness, like all grunts.

Francis wasn't that much different from me. He was one of three children from a lower middle class family from Corellia. His mother was a house wife and his dad was a lumberjack. He didn't have much growing up, but he also had a full stomach. I guess thats why him and I got along, pretty much the same lifestyles, I might of had it a little easier than him though. Francis remind me of my friends back home and hanging out with him kept whatever was left of my sanity in tact. To say Francis is sane implies that he had sanity at one point, which he didn't, I think this is another reason why I liked him. The fact that his head is shaved and is skinny adds on to the fact that he may be crazy.

"Hey, wake up,"….Francis kicked me in my sleep while we were on post,
"What?"
"I was thinking," he said as he squinted one eye, "whats the difference between anarchy and terrorism?"
I actually had to think about it, it was an intelligent question, crazy people usually are smart.
"An anarchist attacks the economy, a terrorist attacks the people, so I guess the difference is if someone gets killed or not."
"What about an anarchist and a nihilist?"
"An anarchist cares about something………why? you gonna start some revolution when you get back home?"
"No, not yet, I was just thinking about it, a galaxy with no government. Imagine it, we wouldn't be in this ****hole right now, we'd be free to carryout whatever passions we had and no one could stop us, it'd be euphoria."
"It'd be chaos, you ever read any mythology, remember the Titan Wars?"
"Well, how are you suppose to appreciate something if your not going to suffer or fight for it? Imagine if we were in the same place we're in right now, but no politicans on our ass, we'd be completely free to kick in any door, kill anything in our way and literally weed out any Imps. I wouldn't have to sit on this god**** post waiting for some Imp to shoot at me and me having to wait five minutes for Higher to say I can take a shot, in the mean time a hole ends up on my forehead."

The kid had a point and I wasn't afraid to admit it. He was pissed, just like I was, just like everyone else we knew was. We put so much of our time and effort and every fiber in our being in training. We sweat, we bled, we shit, we pissed busting our asses training. We fired hundreds of thousands of rounds through our rifles on sim-ranges, we stood hours and hours of post, and patrolled miles and miles. We sucked it up, we hacked all the pain we could possibly take, we pulled our weight and alittle bit of the guy next to us in hopes that we would get just one, one encounter with the enemy. We wanted to fight, we wanted to fire our weapons in hatred towards the enemy. We gave four years of our life to the Suck for that one moment, but we can't wait for it anymore, we want it now but we couldn't have it and it was driving all of us insane.

And why shouldn't we? Every generation has its war, this is our war and we want to be in it. No one put a blaster to our head and forced us to join SpecForce, we volunteered, we wanted to go to Ithor. Are we really afraid? Not of combat, but of the fact that we are in a "war zone" but never fired our weapons and all that time training could of been spent doing something else. Could we have been building a house? Could we have been writing a book? Could we be persuing whatever hobbie we have and hope it makes us rich? We don't want to think that we wasted four years of our lives and our time in this war, atleast thats what I am afraid of.

Re: Hector's Crusade

Driven solely on insanity
my motivation is to cross every boundary
on my side, the best weapon, creativity
I feel sorry for those who mess with me
-Hector's Crusade, 1st canto

When you sit around and forced to do literally nothing for hours on end, you start to lose your mind in ways you can't comprehend. You have all the
time to accomplish whatever goal you may have that may seem logical on a deployment. For example, I don't know one person that doesn't want to get in better shape this deployment. We have a small run-down gym on the firm base, its got everything you need and the equipment is safe, just old. You have no problem sweating out here, all the water you could possibly imagine and while the food (if you want to call it that) isn't the best or nutritious, it's still there, you gotta work with what you got. I remember the gym being packed, no matter what time of the day it was. I especially remember that sense of accomplishment one feels when you finally get done bench pressing. Your chest is swollen, you can barely move your arms at the shoulder, but it feels good, you just lifted the world over your chest and your proud of yourself. The next morning, your chest is so sore that you could trace out where it hurts and your proud of yourself, you want to keep this up and feel like this the next seven months.

The gym is a dust museum now, I haven't seen anybody at it for almost a week now, Im not saying no one uses it, Im just saying I never saw anyone there. What happened? Nobody cares anymore, thats what happened. To a lot of us, this is our first deployment and we were dissappointed by it, its nothing how any of us imagined it to be. We were told we were going to invade the Capitol, that the Imps are battle hardend, how this battalion is taking contact everyday, how this company's AO is so dangerous they can't even leave the wire (slang term for the defensive line around a firm base), how a convoy can only come out once a week, if that, because of supply routes being ambushed, Imps being caught emplacing IEDs (improved explosive device). So what happened to us? Did the Imps in our AO decide to take a vacation, or did they say f*** it and just pack up and leave? You'd figure they'ed have the common decency to atleast tell us if they did.

What most of us were having trouble believing was if all this was true. Or were we just being fed lies by our own command as an ill-attempt to keep us on our toes? One of two things would of happen: after we heard this, we would be more cautious on the first patrol or first post we stood for the first few hours, then human nature would of taken over and then we wont care anymore. Or, we wont believe a word our commanders are saying, say "yeah right" in the back of our heads and be even more lazier than what we are now. Either way, this was getting terrible.

Our company 1st Sergeant has been in the Suck before most of us have hit puberty, but he's been riding a desk, he was an admin pogue (Personel Other than Grunt, often used as an offensive term towards non-combat military personel), this was his first combat deployment, so its easy to tell why none of us like him. He was responisble for the "great ideas" of clearing the runway of any rocks so the repulsor lifts on the vehicles wouldn't get disrupted, sandbag fortifying the two foot thick concrete walls in the abandond houses we lived in, cleaning the astromeric droids to where they were inspection ready daily so thier sensors would jam and plenty of other great ideas. I didn't know if this guy was seriously that dumb or if he was just f***ing with us. He had a philosophy, "complacency kills, keep' em busy so they won't get complacent."

I understood his philosophy and it made sense, but we didn't want to keep busy, atleast not like this. I don't remember seeing on a recruiting poster Urban Guerrillas cleaning an R2 unit with a paint brush or whatever other bull**** they could come up with to keep us busy. If we were actually fighting, I wouldn't mind filling thousands of sandbags a day, because then they would have a use. But doing random, senseless bull**** most of the day? That just pisses us off, we'd rather have the little amount of free time that we do have to read a classic novel to make us look smart, catch up on sleep, write a letter to our questionably faithful girlfriend, cheat on rosy palm with mary hand, talk about our first meal when we get back home, or the crazy things we did in our childhood.

But we can't help it, we're going to be complacent. The enemy isn't coming out, our day is filled with orders we don't understand and aren't even explained to us later, everything we do, we do for hours at a time and grow tired quickly in the heat. We're going to get complacent, before SpecForce there was nature and nature is more powerful. Nature decided that after senseless labor, lack of faith and boredom, we're going to get complacent.

Re: Hector's Crusade

Not only do I want to push the envelope
I want to ignite it with gasoline
my fate surely has no hope
I made a fire all the world should have seen
-Hector's Crusade, 1st canto

When you sit around and forced to do literally nothing for hours on end, you start to lose your mind in ways you can't comprehend. You have all the
time to accomplish whatever goal you may have that may seem logical on a deployment. For example, I don't know one person that doesn't want to get in better shape this deployment. We have a small run-down gym on the firm base, its got everything you need and the equipment is safe, just old. You have no problem sweating out here, all the water you could possibly imagine and while the food (if you want to call it that) isn't the best or nutritious, it's still there, you gotta work with what you got. I remember the gym being packed, no matter what time of the day it was. I especially remember that sense of accomplishment one feels when you finally get done bench pressing. Your chest is swollen, you can barely move your arms at the shoulder, but it feels good, you just lifted the world over your chest and your proud of yourself. The next morning, your chest is so sore that you could trace out where it hurts and your proud of yourself, you want to keep this up and feel like this the next seven months.

The gym is a dust museum now, I haven't seen anybody at it for almost a week now, Im not saying no one uses it, Im just saying I never saw anyone there. What happened? Nobody cares anymore, thats what happened. To a lot of us, this is our first deployment and we were dissappointed by it, its nothing how any of us imagined it to be. We were told we were going to invade the Capitol, that the Imps are battle hardend, how this battalion is taking contact everyday, how this company's AO is so dangerous they can't even leave the wire (slang term for the defensive line around a firm base), how a convoy can only come out once a week, if that, because of supply routes being ambushed, Imps being caught emplacing IEDs (improved explosive device). So what happened to us? Did the Imps in our AO decide to take a vacation, or did they say f*** it and just pack up and leave? You'd figure they'ed have the common decency to atleast tell us if they did.

What most of us were having trouble believing was if all this was true. Or were we just being fed lies by our own command as an ill-attempt to keep us on our toes? One of two things would of happen: after we heard this, we would be more cautious on the first patrol or first post we stood for the first few hours, then human nature would of taken over and then we wont care anymore. Or, we wont believe a word our commanders are saying, say "yeah right" in the back of our heads and be even more lazier than what we are now. Either way, this was getting terrible.

Our company 1st Sergeant has been in the Suck before most of us have hit puberty, but he's been riding a desk, he was an admin pogue (Personel Other than Grunt, often used as an offensive term towards non-combat military personel), this was his first combat deployment, so its easy to tell why none of us like him. He was responisble for the "great ideas" of clearing the runway of any rocks so the repulsor lifts on the vehicles wouldn't get disrupted, sandbag fortifying the two foot thick concrete walls in the abandond houses we lived in, cleaning the astromeric droids to where they were inspection ready daily so thier sensors would jam and plenty of other great ideas. I didn't know if this guy was seriously that dumb or if he was just f***ing with us. He had a philosophy, "complacency kills, keep' em busy so they won't get complacent."

I understood his philosophy and it made sense, but we didn't want to keep busy, atleast not like this. I don't remember seeing on a recruiting poster Urban Guerrillas cleaning an R2 unit with a paint brush or whatever other bull**** they could come up with to keep us busy. If we were actually fighting, I wouldn't mind filling thousands of sandbags a day, because then they would have a use. But doing random, senseless bull**** most of the day? That just pisses us off, we'd rather have the little amount of free time that we do have to read a classic novel to make us look smart, catch up on sleep, write a letter to our questionably faithful girlfriend, cheat on rosy palm with mary hand, talk about our first meal when we get back home, or the crazy things we did in our childhood.

But we can't help it, we're going to be complacent. The enemy isn't coming out, our day is filled with orders we don't understand and aren't even explained to us later, everything we do, we do for hours at a time and grow tired quickly in the heat. We're going to get complacent, before SpecForce there was nature and nature is more powerful. Nature decided that after senseless labor, lack of faith and boredom, we're going to get complacent.

Re: Hector's Crusade

An ambition to be mad
a whole new definition of bad
how many lives is there to corrupt
my mind is set to self-destruct
-Hector's Crusade, 1st canto

The filling of sandbags was a daily ritual, we filled atleast 500 a day and put them in a pyramid, this was usually a punishment. Secretly, I liked filling sandbags, since I was too lazy to go to the gym, I saw this as a forced work out and a pretty good one at that. We stripped off our shirts to get a tan, it took no time for our skin to get clovered in a thin layer of sweat. I liked this, it was hot back in my part of Naboo and it reminded me of home, what didn't remind me of home was the three X-Wings that flew low and over our heads, almost a little too low.

"What a retard, I hope he gets shot down for flying too low," said Hernan as he looked up at them,
"Out here, yeah right, thier probably doing an exercise run," Francis threw in his comment.
"Your right about the exercise part," I had to say it, I had no faith that we would see combat anymore, I accpeted my fate.
"Face it Hernan," said Francis as he grabbed his sandbag, "we ain't gonna see shit."
I looked at him in disbelieve, I accepted it, but I didn't want to believe it.
"That pogue-ass, motherf***er up in that X-Wing, he's fighting the war out in space," he pointed up at the sky, " that motherf***er ain't gonna leave nothing for us. This ain't a deployment, this ain't a war, this is a training range."
I dropped my shovel, I had it, "F*** YOU FRANK, F*** YOU," I grabbed him by shirt collar and screamed at the top of my lungs, "you got no right to tell me that, who the f*** are you? who the f*** are you? you don't know that, you peice of shit, don't f***ing tell me that."
"Hey T, get the f*** off me," he grabbed my wrists and pulled them off his shirt, he pushed me hard on my chest, not as a threat, but as a defensive move for himself and he was smart for that, now he had time to react incase I moved in.
"Face it man," he continued, "look at this shit, we ain't gonna see nothing, we're waisting our time out here, we know it, they know, they know we know it, why else are they making us do all this bull****."

He spit and I sat there, I couldn't decide whether or not he was right or if he was bull****ing. Either way, I didn't want to believe him, why would they send in ground troops if they weren't going to use us, would they just spend bllions of credits like that? I didn't know, I didn't want to hear an answer I didn't like.

I couldn't hit him, he was my friend, but I wanted to. He was no different than me, if anything Francis probably wanted to see combat more than me and for him to actually voice his concern only let me know he was more dissappointed by that fact than I was. I started crying, just a few tears at first, then it was so noticable that I had to wipe. Francis knew why I was crying and like a brother, he hugged me and started weeping with me. He knew how bad I wanted to see combat, he knew better than anyone why I wanted to kill someone. He heard me talking about it for hours and hours on post and I heard his reasons. Were they wrong? No, who is anyone to say our dreams and our reasons are wrong? We were warriors, it was our purpose, we just wanted to fulfill our purpose.

Re: Hector's Crusade

As long as I carry a pen in hand
my riegn shall have no end
I'll bring to life this masquerade
you won't know whats real or a charade
-Hector's Crusade, 1st canto

Imagine a metaphorical bigger picture. From about the time we hit puberty, we're always told to look at the bigger picture of things, the grand finale, the meaning to it all. What we forget about, what we should pay extra attention to, but never do until usually its too late, is the small details and brush strokes that make us see the bigger picture differently. In the bigger picture of things, we're in Ithor for the people of the New Republic, to protect thier freedom, thier way of life, but if you look carefully at the brush strokes of this bigger picture (i.e., us), you'll see that we could give a f*** less about the Republic, its freedom and its way of life. We don't know the people of the Republic and they don't know us. If one of us die, they might look over our name in thier local newspaper or forget it right after a news reporter says it, but thats it. Then thier going to go back to thier lives, thier going to use the paper as a coffee cup coaster, after nothing interesting is on the news thier going to change it. Knowing this, we are there for us more than we are there for you.

But you cannot blame us, because that is the reality of things, we would fight for our own friends and family before we would fight for yours, you would do the same. When we are kicking in a door to an unknown building not knowing whats on the other side, we do it for the protection of our children before we do it for yours, any parent would do the same. Im not saying we dont care about you at all, Im saying we need to take care of ourselves before we take care of you, because how can we take care of you, if ourself isn't taken care of?

We are young men, most of us can't legally buy alcohol, some of us can't legally buy cigarettes, but someone in our government decided we can legally carry a rifle, go to the other side of the galaxy and fight. It made sense to somebody. We took advantage of this decision, we are young, we have an ambition, a goal we want to accomplish, a whole life to live and somewhere in our lives SpecForce was there to help us with this ambition, its the main reason we joined. We're going to do our four years, get out around the age of 22 or 23 and have more world experience and bridges to a better life than probably most 22 and 23 year olds. Most of us went from our mom's house to SpecForce, so all we know about the Galaxy is our hometown and Ithor, thats all we done with our lives at this point and strange to say is more than most people done thier whole lives.

Do I regret it? Not at all, looking back at it now, Im glad I joined SpecForce. I wouldn't take back any decision I made, because I wouldn't be where I am now in my life, I wouldn't of met the people I did. I don't hate SpecForce as much as I hate some of the people in it, but that comes with every job. There are people you hate, bosses you can't stand, tasks you dont want to do in every career, there's just a lot more in SpecForce. So why am I here, why join SpecForce in the first place? I get that question all the time, my answer changed only once. I use to tell people that I wanted to fight, I wanted my own glory. My answer now was a Crusade. I believe I commited many sins in my life, ones that only I understand and that I want behind me, in my past. I did things I regret, things I should of done but haven't. I believed that if I fought, if I killed the enemies of my faith, I would be forgiven and they would be behind me, in my past.

But that's my reason, Francis has a completey different reason. He's from Correllia, the target of mulitiple insurgency attacks by the Imps, one of which his grandmother was a victim of. He wants revenge, he doesn't want his little brothers to be targets and even if he gets one kill in, thats one less chance in his eyes. These are just two of the brush strokes among the thousands of others that make the bigger picture. Like I said, we need to take care of ourselves first, before we are able to take care of others.

Re: Hector's Crusade

"When you make believe, what do you see?
a man too mad, too bad, too dangerous for you to be
lacking a reflection in the mirror
goes to show it's that much clearer."
-Hector's Crusade

We were on QRF (quick reaction force) when it happened. I was laying on my rack, hands folded behind my head staring at the patterns of the rack above me.  There was an explosion and a loud one, enough to shake the dust off of whatever had dust on it, followed by automatic fire and a lot of it. No one had to tell us to get our gear and our weapons on, it was a given. My heart was racing with excitement, the moment I was praying for was about to come. I couldn't get my gear on quick enough. We were told to report to the briefing room. I took a seat next to Francis, his eyes were tense, none of us talked, we just knew what was on eachother's minds. I couldn't speak for anyone else in the room, I had no clue what they were thinking. Were they scared? excitied? or just didn't know what to think? None of us knew what happened, we just know something happened.

The after action report from whoever was caught out there was taking forever to come back, or maybe it just seemed like it. Distant firing was still going on, it would stop for a few moments, continue for a few seconds, the pattern seemed to be repeating itself. I was growing impatient, I checked the parts of my heavyblaster over and over again, making sure everything worked, I checked my gear a dozen times, making sure I had everything I needed, I wondered if I had enough powercells, should I get more? Francis handed me an envelope with his fiance's address on it, I knew what it was. I handed him an envelope with my mom's address on it, he knew what it was. We looked at eachother and pounded our fists, we knew what it meant.

The enemy was out there, they hit us, and hit us hard. A convoy from 2nd Platoon was ambushed less than a hundred yards away from the firm base. An IED hit the lead vehicle and the Imps opened fire on them. 2nd Platoon was able to hold them off long enough for them to get the lead vehicle back up and get out of there. They didn't report and casualties…..yet. For the first time, we had answers, not more questions. 2nd Platoon reported that the Imps set up posts and mortar positions in a part of the city called the Pine Grove, an orchid of pine trees and destroyed buildings. The outskirts of the Pine Grove was where 2nd Platoon was ambushed. 1st platoon (us) was ordered to attack and secure a house on the outskirts in order for us to conduct operations against them and this was happening tonight.

A hundred yards normally wouldn't be a problem, even in combat gear. But if your taking a narrow route, balancing yourself on the ruins of destroyed buildings with five days worth of chow, over 2,000 rounds in powercells and two rockets all while trying to stay quiet, a hundred yards is a pain in the ass. It was about 2200 and the night was dark, if I didn't have my NVGs, I wouldn't of been able to see my hand even if I had placed it as close as my nose. Now I was scared. I could barely move, what if we got ambushed? We'd all be dead, the fastest one of us walked at a snail's pace. We got within twenty yards of the house and surrounded the entire east side of it. An entire squad was sent in to secure the building…….it was clear, the rest of the platoon moved in.

We set up four posts on both floors of the house and four more on the roof. Francis and I were ordered to the roof, we had first watch. When I dropped my pack, it finally kicked in how sore my feet and shoulders were. I had a general idea of what it felt like to have the world on your shoulders. I rushed quickly to the western post, overlooking the Pine Grove. While I was still scared, I was also selfish. I wanted to fire my blaster first, I wanted to be the first one in on the action. Our rotation was six hours, for the first time, we actually did what we were suppose to do on post.

Re: Hector's Crusade

Confide in few, the rest your enemy
bring the world to the brink of travesty
don't deny any negative speculation
embrace any and all reputation
-Hector's Crusade, 1st Canto

It sounded like firecrackers were exploding in a bucket right next to our ears. That was the sign to get your gear on and haul ass to whatever post needed support. In this case, it was post 4. It was in a little room looking out the back of the house. The sandbag wall we put up in the room the night before proved its worth. I still hit the ground and low crawled up to the window, I was smart enough to know that shit happened. Then I was dumbfound by the fact that there was no one manning post 4 to begin with. I set my heavyblaster on the sandbag platform we made on the window. My head was propped up enough to hide myself, but still look out and around.

I once again heard the sound of firecrackers, followed by loud bangs. It sounded as if someone was trying to break down a door. Where they? Its broad daylight out, how could have they came up that close to us without anybody seeing them? There was no time to think now because red blaster fire lit up my window. While I never actually saw anyone shooting at me, I saw the muzzle flashes had come from a house at our 7 o'clock. I pulled the trigger, I guided my firing where I saw the muzzle flashes. I made sure I fired 3-5 round bursts, to ensure my weapon didn't over-heat. At this rate, I would go through 200 rounds in one minute. Whenever I saw red muzzle flashes, I switched my firing to that location, my job was to suppress the enemy, to pin him down so he wouldn't fire back.

It was all worth it now. The endless hours of training, the exhaustion that our muscles, minds and backs went through was all worth it. I couldn't think, therefore, I couldn't be afraid, I only reacted. I knew how to fix a problem as soon as it arose, my mind was one step ahead of my actions. I felt every emotion known to man at its fullest potential, this feeling was blissful, it was euphoric, this feeling was combat.
"CEASE FIRE, CEASE FIRE."

The order was repeated and screamed multiple times, I didn't even empty out my powercell. How much time went by? It must of been a couple of seconds, it felt like hours had passed. What was going on? I still had my eye on my sights looking around for any movement. Was this combat? Was this it? Was that all the Imps had to give, just a couple of seconds and a couple of shots? I felt ripped off, I felt cheated. It felt like I had been making out with a girl for hours while she was hinting she wanted more and never let me get pass 2nd base. I felt like I was starving and I could only eat one bite of a gourmet dinner. I wanted more, I wasn't satisfied and now I was angry. I didn't want to wonder if I killed anyone, I wanted to know.

I went from angry to worried. Would I get this chance again? What if they never come around again? What if they know our strength now and decide they need more? Will they wait another month before they attack again with the information that they have now? In combat, the enemy decides how much sleep you get, how many patrols you do in a day, how many hours you stand on post. Were the Imps just f***ing with us? Just teasing us by torturing us with some combat, just so we would up our patrols and posts to piss us off? Do they not have emotions like we do? Isn't there an Imp equivalent of me who'es tired of filling sandbags, is so bored they actually read a dictionary cover to cover, is going completely insane from all this? Isn't there?

Re: Hector's Crusade

Let morals be nothing more than words
simply do what you in your mind have heard
the sole purpose of a heart is to break it
go and see how much you can take it
-Hector's Crusade, 1st Canto

It took four days to get OP (outpost) House up before it was capable of running operations out of. As soon as the sun set, we were sandbag fortifing anything that could be sandbag fortified. Once the sun rose, we either stood post, cleaned whatever needed to be cleaned and stole however much sleep we could get. It was only a matter of time before we got into a firefight, they were becoming more frequent. We all looked horrible and smelled just as bad. Due to the lack of sleep, we had bags under our eyes that made us look 20 years older. I can't speak for others, but my eyelids were becoming heavier by the minute. During the day, the hot sun was beating on the Op and baking everyone inside, since firefights were so regular, we couldn't take our gear off and it made us sweat so much that if you stayed in any place for about five minutes, you'd be sitting in a puddle. I'd rather be drenched in sweat than be dead. We couldn't shave, brush our teeth, let alone take a shower, we looked like zombies. We smelled like a high school lockeroom that hadn't been cleaned since…..ever.

I got what I wished for and everything that came with it. There was a ringing in my ears that wouldn't go away, I alone had fired 2,000 rounds, I could only imagine what the count was for everyone else. I truely learned what the definition of tired was, I felt mentally drained and to top it off, I still felt pissed. I felt pissed because we were just sitting here again. We were waiting for them to come to us, we knew the area they were in, why couldn't we do a night operation and weed them out? Why did we have to sit here? It seemed as though we were still just sitting around. I hated the feeling of my life being wasted.

Re: Hector's Crusade

Everything depends on the roses in your hand
and the man giving to be a contrary man
society judges on first impressions
go out of your way to lay yours in ruins
-Hector's Crusade, 1st Canto

There was a part of the Pine Grove that was thicker than the other parts, including a road that turned around a corner, by the time we saw a VBIED (vehicle borne IED), we'd already be too late. From OP House, we couldn't see anything from over there. It was about fifty yards away to our 9 o'clock, the company commader posted two gunships there acting like a "mobile post," it would have to be manned with three Marines each. At this point, normally everybody would be pissed, but we actually looked forward to Post Mobile. The highest rank at any time was a lance corporal so as long as no one did anything stupid, you could do whatever you want. Since there were three others with you, one, maybe two could sleep, if not, then there was always an interesting conversation going on.

The number one killer of SpecForce Infantry was boredom and while we got our little taste of combat, a week later we were back to the boredom. Forced complacency was once again placed upon us, along with the bull**** speeches on how compacency can kill us. I gave up, completely. I had no hope anymore that I would get to kill someone. I felt like a failure to my Mandalorian bloodline, like I wasn't worthy to be born into a warrior culture. I felt like the Goddess I believed in hated me for not answering my prayers. I didn't even bother writing letters to anyone back home because wondering if anyone actually cared depressed me. I burned all the ones I saved, because reading them over and over again and me home sick.

I would read old letters from my ex-girlfriend, then stumble across the one that said it was "too hard" on her to wait for me. I didn't hate her for the fact that she broke up with me, I hated her for the fact that she sugar coated it. If she told me straight up that she cheated on me or was sexually frustrated or she met an interesting guy that had something I didn't, I wouldn't be as pissed. I was tired of being fed lies and having everything sugar coated to make me believe it wasn't my fault. I didn't need it here and I sure as hell didn't need it from back home. I would think of my friends back home. I pictured them in bars getting s***faced beyond belief, using sleezy pick-up lines to attract a woman that went from a 3 to a 10 after a few beers and how badly I wish I was with them. I  wondered if they wished the same.

I thought of the people in the free world. Did they even know we were here? Did they care? If you asked anyone in the galaxy about the NR, they would tell you they were at war with the Imperials in Ithor. They believed the lie that was fed to them by the media. The NR wasn't at war, SpecForce was. The NR was at shopping malls spending hard earned money on a fad that would last for a few weeks while b****ing how thier job didn't pay them enough. They would gossip about thier friends behind thier backs over a caf at a franchise coffee bar. I couldn't wait to hear someone complain about how hot it was or how they have to wake up at 9 in the morning to go to work just so I could tell them to shut the f*** up.

I was becoming a psychopath, a misanthropist. The only person I talked to anymore was Francis and he was on the same boat. The problem with most psychopaths is that they don't think thier crazy or have a problem. Since I was aware of my condition, what does this make me? This war had gotten the better of me. I felt like a psychological casualty. My mind was so empty it felt drained. This was suppose to be my Crusade, I was suppose to start fresh once I got back home. I felt like I was in a worse place than when I started. This hurt because I wasn't the only one. There was an entire generation of the best men in the galaxy stuck with me. We could of changed everything for the better and the worse, we could be forging history, instead, we were being wasted.

Re: Hector's Crusade

And so here it begins once more
least my mind start to sore
a transformation and declaration
of self realisation leading to destruction
-Hector's Crusade, 1st Canto

It was the middle of the afternoon at Post Mobile and Paulie, Chica and me were preheating inside a guntruck that obviously wasn't built for comfort. If you sat in the front, you could only move so many inches in any directions, this sucks, especially after five minutes when you get charlie horsed straight from hell itself or cramped anywhere else and can't move. I was on the gunner's turret that had more space than any other seat, the two back seats were second best because there was more leg room, With only three guys to a vehicle, we took up as much space as we could. By this time, we already took off our kevlars and unbuttoned our flak jackets, it was hot and we didn't care. If you positioned yourself the right way on your seat and gear, you could get comfortable enough to get the best sleep you ever had.

We were on post for about two hours and I didn't talk. While the other two guys were in my platoon, I didn't know them too well, nor did I want to. I didn't want to hear thier stories about fake bar fights and the humiliation they put made up girls through. Paulie was a drug addict before he came into SpecForce. Paulie looked like the bastard child of a bothan and whatever other ugly species it mated with. To say there were acouple of screws loose in his head applied that they were once attached to something, I don't think there ever was a something. My theory is the drugs took a toll on him or his mom did crack everyday while she was pregnant with him. Chica was a high school graduate from Nal Hutta going through a quater life crisis, that's the best I could explain it.

Once I heard the explosion and saw a giant flaming mushroom cloud infront of us, I already knew what happened. A VBIED had crashed into the barriers we set up and automatic gunfire came from the entire south towards OP House and the gun trucks. No one had to tell me to get my kevlar on and get on the turret. I had no clue where the shots were coming from, so I follwed the green blaster fire from OP House and aimed in on whatever they were shooting. The Imps started firing back, we returned fire. You either heard the low bass noise of an automatic grenade launcher, the deep drumming of a heavy blaster or firecrackers in a bucket from a blaster rifle. For what seemed like a good amount of time, there wasn't any silence. 200 round powercells didn't seem to last me long enough, I felt like I was reloading more than I was shooting.

Suddenly there was silence. During combat, one of two natural disasters occure. There is either fire or rain, always one, never both. This time, it was fire and a lot of it. I tried to keep my head low enough so I wouldn't catch a round, but high enough to look for the enemy. Chica was on the radio calling in everything that just happened, Paulie was getting more powercells ready. The barrel of the heavyblaster was smoking like a backyard grill. The hard, dry smell of heated metal lingered. I only moved a couple inches to the left and right and I was sweating, my heart was beating, I felt like I just finished a marathon.
"S***," screamed Chica, "T the rooftops."

I saw them and they were mine. Two Imps were running to the other side of a roof. I pulled the trigger back and held it hard. I fired first then sighted in. I wanted them, they were mine. My rounds hit the building first, then the Imps, I saw the green lasers of my heavyblaster passing through thier bodies. While they were far away, I saw the whiplashing action of thier bodies as they threw thier arms up and fell. I ceased fire and started breathing hard. My prayer was answered, my goal was accomplished, my Crusade was successful, my sins forgiven. I have a fresh start now. The firefight lasted the rest of our rotation. Another guntruck had to come relieve us so we could re-supply ours with whatever it needed. Burnt diesal mixed in with the smell of the metal. There were powercells everywhere, we'd have a lot of cleaning to do.

I was sitting on my rack later that night. I couldn't sleep, I still felt some of the rush from earlier that day. A thought crossed my mind. I killed two men today, what was the difference between me and them? They came from a far away planet, they had a goal in life that they needed the Imperial military to help them accomplish, they had a mom, probably a sister like I did, they probably had a girlfriend that broke up with them while they were over here, they probably grew up on heavy metal and action movies. Why were they trying to kill me? Why was I trying to kill them? It was because they fought under a different flag and for that, they were wrong and there was no doubt in my mind that they thought the same thing about me. So what made me different from them? I pulled the trigger first. Its funny, how much you have in common with the one your fighting against.

Re: Hector's Crusade

My fear of the people is why I despise them
they make me sick, I cough up my rum in phlem
not to sure how to act in thier presents
so I'll put to death my social attendance
-Hector's Crusade, 1st Canto

I felt different, not in a good way and not necessarily in a bad way. I totally got what I wanted from this war, but I didn't feel like I did. This was suppose to be a fresh start, my sins were suppose to be forgiven, they were suppose to be behind me. Today was suppose to be the first day of the rest of my life, anything else before this day didn't matter, only what happens from here on out. How was I suppose to feel? Was there suppose to be some message coming to me confirming eveything I believed? Actually, all I needed to do was believe my beliefs, I just felt something I never felt before and that should be more than enough. I was growning selfish and arrogant. All I needed was one kill, I got two, but it didn't feel like enough, how much would enough be? between the boredom, random occasions of combat and SpecForce, something, whatever it was, was going to claim whatever was left of my sanity before we leave this place.

"Your thinking too much," said Francis, "this is a life changing event, this war. When you go back home, you will one of the best men in society. You suffered, you were in pain, you sacrificed, mentally and physically. Without that, you would be nothing. Without you, the Republic that neglects us would be nothing. Today IS the first day of the rest of your life."

That was all I needed to hear, that was my message, a god did exist, whether it was an Ithorian one that the natives believed, a Force like the Jedis believed, a Goddess like I believed, something heard me and something answered my prayers. While I still didn't talk to too many people, I was in a better mood, anything that didn't matter, I truely let slide.

The streets of the Capitol were very narrow and large piles of trash were deposited infront of nearly every house. This was bad because IEDs could be easily hidden and not so easily found. The houses were no less than three stories high and all had access to the roof. Any street we turned down, the Imps had the tactical advantage for an ambush. There are many types of warfare; trench, jungle, desert, any combat veteran will tell you urban warfare is the most dangerous. Im not going to sit here and argue how it is, only for someone's logic (but lack of experience in the matter) to tell me otherwise, it just is.

You were so hot and exhuatsed and dehydrated that you couldn't even lift up your head. I once again prayed for an Imperial sniper to hit me somewhere, where it would do just enough damage to send me to a capitol ship's Aid Station for a few days and leave a scar, but nothing worse. Instead…….I got an IED explosion on the other side of the street. All I heard was the loud drum noise it made. The explosion was powerful enough to knock me off my feet, I lost conscienceness for a little while, all I could see was black. I had no clue how long I was out for. Before my eye sight was restored, all I could hear was firecrackers. When my eye sight was restored, everything was blurry. I could barely make out my surroundings. It was my squad leader, he was right next to me, screaming an order and I couldn't hear him at all.

Another IED went off from behind us. We were getting our asses handed to us. My squad leader pointed to our 3 and 6, we were caught in an ambush. Behind me, Paulie was on his back screaming at the top of his lungs. His entire left leg look like someone dumped  a bucket of red paint on it. I kicked the door into the nearest house and dragged him in. We practiced this a dozen times. Anti-ambush procedures, we knew what to do. All of a sudden, I was thankful for all the hours we spent training. In the back of the patrol, Hernan, the other heavyblaster-men, provided enough coverfire for the squad to move up to the house I stuck Paulie in. I provided cover fire as well and signaled everybody in. We secured the door and each of us got to a window to lay down whatever fire we could.

"Hey, listen up," screamed our squad leader, "QFR is on its way, were gonna bound back to the intersection where they'll pick us up. Paulie goes back first, Chica, get him on your back"

Francis wasn't with me. I'd feel safer if he was here, the guy's my best friend out here, I trust him. QRF came up. We could hear the low bass and heavy drumming of thier weapons on the gun trucks.

"Alright, lets go. T, Hernan, coverfire"

While the QRF vehicles lit up the roofs on the right side of the street, Hernan and I lit up the right side of the street. Chica, with Paulie on his back hauled ass to the intersection and disappeared around the corner. Without gear, a human being can clear 100 yards in dozens of seconds, but with over 100 pounds of gear and being shot at, you could be setting galaxy records. After Chica was cleared, one by one our squad did the same.

Hernan hit my shoulder, "your turn,"
"F*** you, you go,"

He hit my shoulder so I know to get up and haul ass in three seconds after he did. One….two….three. I got up and ran as fast as I could. I couldn't beleive my eyes, the guntrucks were leaving, they were leaving without me. "HEY" I screamed as I was running after them, in a matter of time, they were too far away from me to see me, let alone run after them. I still heard blaster firing, I had to take cover somewhere. I knelt down behind a corner and looked around everywhere. I was alone, did they seriously leave me behind? Was it on purpose? How long before they came back? Would they come back? I couldn't rely on that possibility, for the time being, I had to rely on myself. I saw a fire team of four Imps coming down the street, I had to take cover, somewhere. I waited for them to get close enough. I opened fire, then my powercell was out, I had no more, I was completely out of powercells.

The Imps were too close, I had to do something. When I turned around the corner, I thrusted the barrel of my blaster into one of them like a spear and swung at another. I was greeted with a blaster to the side of my head, I fell. My kevlar was removed and I was getting my face pounded in with two different fists. I felt my stomach being repeatedly kicked. I could taste the mixture of snot and blood in my mouth. I felt like a rancor had thrown me around in its layer for fun. I could see only blurs out of my eyes, I could only hear a ringing in my ears, I was too paralyzed to move.

Re: Hector's Crusade

Cower and fragile like all else
if not more than most all else
so to defy my dangerous swagger
I'll drink till Im madder and badder
-Hector's Crusade, 1st Canto

When I woke up, there wasn't a single place on my body that didn't ache. I didn't know it at the time, but the majority of my face was bruised, I learned that when I made the mistake of rubbing my eye. I could see clearly out of my right eye, my left one was blurry because I could only see out of a little squint from where it wasn't swollen completely. I didn't even know where I was exactly. I was in an empty room with one window too high for me to reach that smelled like dried urine. Everything was dark except for the beam of light that shined from the sun through the window. It was humid, the smell of urine was mixing in with the smell of sweat. My gear was gone, obviously my weapon, my boots. I was just wearing my cammie pants and green skivvie shirt. It was hard to breathe, I didn't know if it was from the humidity or if my lungs were bruised. A twisting and cracking sound came from the door and it swing open. The Imp that came through welcomed me with a swift kick in the face.

There was the stinging feeling of pain in my jaw that knocked me out for a few seconds. I was being dragged by my arms. I felt so hurt that I wouldn't mind if someone had hacked them off so I won't feel anything anymore. They sat me in a chair and binded my arms and ankles to it. A light from above was shining down on me. I tried not to move, it just hurt, everything just hurt. I wanted to die and when an Imp pressed the barrel of a blaster pistol to my lips, I was praying my wish would be answered. For a moment, I was wondering if the barrel of the blaster pistol was clean or not. My thought was erased when I was pistol whipped hard enough to fall to my side. At this point I was so hurt I could only feel a slight tingling. By the time I looked up at the Imp, I got a swift kick in the stomach.

I thought about my mom and what would be going through her mind when she would see me on a local news network being decapitated. It wouldn't matter to me, because that means I won't have to feel any of this pain or torture anymore. My mom on the other hand, I only imagine what a mother would go through watching her first born being executed. There was nothing important about me, I was just a grunt, a Lance Corporal. But I fought under a different flag and that was important enough for them to capture and torture me. But what did they want from me? Where they going to use me as some form of bait, or insurance, collateral, threat or maybe just as a punching bag? I didn't know what they wanted from and for some reason, I didn't care. I just wanted to die.

Days would pass, I wouldn't keep count. I didn't know if days actually went by or weeks. I wouldn't sleep at night, I would pass out from the beating ritual they put me through at least three times a day. Once one bruise or cut or some other injury was healed, another took its place. For breakfast, lunch and dinner, they were nice enough to feed me the leftovers of their MREs and I ate everything, even the cardboard boxes they came in. They were digestable, so I ate them, I was hungry, I was always hungry, my stomach always growled. I would watch insects and rodents roam around the room. A constant reminder that I’m trapped and that the lowest form of life in the galaxy has more freedom than me, so who was the real lowest form of life at this point, me or them?

I wondered why my unit hasn't rescued me yet. We were promised that if this ever happened, no one would rest unit that Marine was found, whether he was dead or alive. I guess it was just another one of their shallow promises. Were they even looking for me but hadn't found me yet? Did they even care or did they just leave me here to die? I overheard the guard mention he's from Corellia, I got a diabolical idea. I heard the lock on the door open. Same regular procedure, the only surprise was whether my face or stomach would get hit. Something different occured though today, I was blindfolded. I was being dragged, I didn't know where. Once I was dragged to wherever they took me, the beatings commenced with blaster rifles, fists, feet. I wasn't getting conditioned to the beatings at all, they always hurt. They always stung and tingled. It always felt like someone took a tattoo gun and was marking multiple parts of my body.

My hands where tied behind my back, my feet were tied. Someone pinned me down on my back. I felt water being dumped on my face. I felt like I was drowning. Its not that I couldn't breathe, I didn't have time to do it fast enough. The compressed feeling of water up my nose wouldn't go away. They were water boarding me and I couldn't do anything about it. Now I know what people were going through when they were drowning, I completely understood why drowning was the most fearful death. But at least they died and didn't feel it anymore. There was no way I could die from water boarding, I would have to suffer. They could of been doing it just for seconds, it felt like a lot longer. The blindfold was removed and I was dragged back to my cell. The guard threw me inside. With all the strength I could muster, I reached into my pants where I had a picture hidden. I made it obvious so the guard could see me.

"What the hell is that?" he said as he grabbed it and studied, "pretty girl……"
"She's my wife," I lied right through my broken jaw and bruised lips. I knew the picture of my ex would prove useful somehow. At least I got something good out of her,
""Where you from,"
"Corellia, Coronet…..she's……….four……four months………."
"….she's pregnant?"

I could only nod my head, I didn't have the strength to talk. He didn't talk, he just sat there and stuided it, I had his sympathy, I knew it, I was in, he was slowly going under my spell, he obviously bought the story. The picture was thrown back at me, he got up and left. I looked at the sun light on the floor. Using my own blood, I marked where the sunlight hit, now I know when the sun is at that point, it was his shift. Whenever blood, puss, snot or whatever fluid signifying bodily damage was crept, I marked that spot, I couldn't forget where it was. I could never rely on my own unit or SpecForce to get me out, I had to get myself out. I hated them and couldn't trust them, I was on my own.

Re: Hector's Crusade

What wanders and lurks deep inside
is exposed by many passes on the outside
even more hard to hide, that which is set in
I'll just cover with my lustful sin
-Hector's Crusade

More days had passed, I still didn't know how many though. A couple of days ago, I simply let go, I quit caring for good, nothing seemed to matter to me anymore. My theory of myself growing psychotic proved true. I lost my mind and I knew it, I knew it because I looked forward to the beatings. I saw them as a little break. I got to get out of this cell and instead of clenching whatever part of my body I thought was going to be hit, I just let it go loose and absorb the full power of it. I made everyday a game of seeing how much I could take. You learn a lot about yourself when you get your ass beat on a daily basis.

I didn't care about the world around me, I wasn't afraid to get into every one of my captors face. I convinced them that if they kill me, my mom is going to claim my military life insurance of 500,000 credits, they couldn't use me for whatever bait they wanted to, someone would have a lot of cleaning up to do after they painted the floor with my brains, I wouldn't have to go through this hell anymore and I was curious as to how much of this I could actually take before I killed myself. So if they killed me, the only person benefiting from it would be me. They said I was smart and that smart people usually are crazy, I couldn't help but be a smart ass and tell him that if I wasn't crazy, I'd be dead a long time ago.

I didn't care because I was hitting rock bottom everyday and every day I took more of it. SpecForce has a motto, "pain is weakness leaving the body." For the first time, it was more than just a recruiting poster slogan, there was actually some truth to it. While the beatings always hurt and always stung, every day I could take more and more before I broke down. The water boarding, being suspended by my feet, blaster whipped, a gang style beat down, two by fours to the side of my ribs. It took a while for anything they did to really hurt me. I’m not saying this to sound like a badass, I’m saying this because I had a plan and I didn't care.

Whenever the rays of the sun hit the blood, puss, urine and spit line I created, I got to know Alki a bit. He would tell me stories and I would tell him stories. I had the advantage here because I stood post before and I knew what he was going through, Imp or not, he's still human and still gets board. The only difference is the flag, everything else is the same. I was jealous of him, because one day I would kill him and he would get a quick ticket out of this place. These days were suppose to be the worst of my life. I hit rock bottom, I was growing in here, I was becoming stronger, I know what I’m capable of and I can be very dangerous, I was claiming my humanity.

I had gotten use to the dry smell of blood and urine, I was creating unique images in my mind with the cracks on all the walls and giving them interesting stories, I felt sorry for the rodents that would roam in and out of my cell. I felt sorry for them because one day, their pathetic rodent ass would just die. They would never grow as a rodent, never learn anything about themselves, they were missing out on the experience of a lifetime. They didn't even look different from other rodents, nothing made them special. Whoever or whatever killed them would actually be doing them a favor.

Re: Hector's Crusade

And as I feared, Im starting to rot
I'll come back to finish in a little lot
I ate the dirt in Ithor
opened my eyes after being so far
-Hector's Crusade, 1st Canto

I was mad, I was in rage. All I cared about was hurting was destroying. I didn't care if my mom would see me on a news network getting decapitated, I didn't care if SpecForce didn't come after me, I didn't care if I died in this place. One thing was certain, two kills definitely wasn't enough, I needed at least one more just to quench my anger. I thought about Naboo, I hoped someone looked at me the wrong way so I could gouge their eyes out with my thumbs. I wanted to run into the guy that was f***ing my ex-girlfriend so I could beat him to a bloody pulp right in front of her, I would make posters of her with the word "slut" on them and put them up everywhere, I wanted some college student that had everything handed to him ask me what it was like in Ithor. I would get up in his pretty boy face with my bloody lip and scars and give him a speech that would make him too scared to even s*** himself. I wanted to come face to face with my squad leader for leaving me behind so I could spit my blood in his mouth. I wanted to come face to face with my company commander for not coming after me so I could drive a vibrodagger through his throat and watch him choke on his blood.


 My imagination was running wild, I would write short stanzas of poetry on the walls using my blood and when I didn’t have enough, I would pick at a scab just to draw some blood. Self-destruction didn’t hurt me at all. The Imps did it out of hate,  I did it for the sake of poetry. I figured if I thought about destroy something beautiful, the least I could do was replace it with something beautiful. Saying I’m going insane isn’t a correct statement, but saying I AM insane is. The first step in fixing a problem is admitting you have one. I am a completely insane, self-destructive psychopath. The second step is actually fixing it. Here is where the problem is. I don’t want to fix it, its keeping me alive. So if one problem is keeping a bigger one from happening, then it’s not really a problem is it?

I would do workouts throughout the day. Partially out of boredom and to stay in shape. I would do push-ups, sit-ups, squats, leg lifts, whatever I could think of. I would do them until whatever part of my body that was beaten couldn’t do them anymore. With one bruised shoulder and the other cramping, you can only so many push-ups. Any stomach workout hurt after twenty or so reps because my stomach had any kind of visible and possibly internal injury you could imagine. I thought of my escape plan, I planned every step of the way and Plan Bs for them as well, sometimes even Plan Cs. But  I didn’t want to leave yet, I kind of liked it here. Alki was a good kid, I wanted to get to know him better before I killed him. It’s nothing personal, we just fought under different flags.

Then something happened, something went wrong. The sun hit the bodily fluid line I made on the floor and Alki didn’t start bull****ing with me. I counted to 300, meaning five minutes had passed and still nothing. Was there a different guard on post? Something was going down, I didn’t know what, but I just got a bad feeling about this. As much as I enjoyed my stay here, a gut feeling told me it was time execute my plan and if necessary Plan B and C. I screamed and screamed loud, I threw myself around the cell. The guard told me to shut up, I kept going at it. He said it louder, I needed to work harder. He slammed the door and screamed it, not working hard enough. Finally he opened the door.

There I was in the fetal position, shaking as if I was cold. He made the mistake of asking me what was wrong and grabbed my shoulder. I grabbed his wrist with one hand and with the other, I drove my palm into the chin of his helmet. He was hurt but not dead. I quickly got up and got behind him. Quickly throwing my arm around his neck, I gave him a blood choke, in ten seconds, he would be dead.

Ten…..he was gagging
Nine…..he couldn’t scream loud enough
Eight…..his airflow was cut off
Seven….his face was swelling with blood
Six…..he tried hitting me, he didn’t have enough energy
Five…..his grip was loosening on my arm
Four…..his mouth quit squeaking
Three….his hand slowly fell of my arm
Two…..
One…..

His head tilted to one side, I held my grip on him as hard as I could for five more seconds, just to make sure he was dead. The cammie trousers around my waist were loose, I lost a lot of weight here, there would be no problem for the stormtrooper outfit to fit me. I took off every piece of gear and put it on. I looked at the dead and naked stormtrooper and wondered if it was Alki. I never saw his face before, I didn’t know. If it was, his mother back in Correlia would soon be getting a visit from a Casualty Information Officer holding a folded Imperial Flag telling her how her son died bravely serving the Empire. It’s nothing personal, we just……you know what? We’ve been through this before. Now it was time for the next part.

Re: Hector's Crusade

Make it all and above, part of my charm if I may say
I'll see the skirts of the ladies up in sway
before I find the one that will save me
I'll embrace being in a lack of celibacy
-Hector's Crusade, 1st Canto

The post rotations were two hours, once the relief came, I was on my next step. A problem already arose, something I completely forgot, where do I go from here? I don’t know my way around this place. It shouldn’t be too hard to improvise. This wasn’t some giant base, it was just a house. My heart began pounding. All the bruises and cuts on my body began pulsing faster with my increasing heart beat. I just kicked off my plan and a problem arose, what if the rest of my plan would go wrong? I got back up plans, what if those go wrong? What would they do to me? Would they kill me on the spot?

No, I can’t be worrying about this now,  I’m in a disguise, that should definitely buy me some time for me to improvise another plan if I had to. All I needed to do now was just get out of this place. I was surprised. Yes I did worry, but nowhere near as much as I use to, I didn’t stress over things as much anymore. After getting your ass beat numerous times, you feel like you don’t have anything to be afraid of or worry about because you just experience the worst thing ever. I felt like I lost everything, what else do I have to lose? I’m free to do anything now. I should really send these Imps a little gift during the holidays. They’ve done so much for me.

When my relief came, I told him that the prisoner is asleep. He said it didn’t matter because they’re going to execute him midnight tonight. I went back down the way my relief came, it just seemed like the right thing to do. Someone that could have been in the place of leadership position told me to hurry up because we’re going on a patrol, a patrol right after I stood “post.” Looks like the Imps run things the same way SpecForce does. I didn’t care, I was getting out of here.

It was night out and we were in the city. I had no clue where we were, I was just trying to find the first opportunity to escape. I was close to the end of the patrol, only the tail end was behind me. Street lights lit up some parts of town, but most of it was really dark. I didn’t worry about IEDs, since the Imps were the ones that placed them in, they wouldn’t go into their own ambush. It caught my attention how the Imps were bounding across the streets, it was the exact same method we used. One was placed on the near side of the street keeping his eye down the road while the other crossed, he was relieved by the man behind him, who now kept watch and he crossed, this was how I would escape.

None of these buildings looked familiar, I didn’t recognize anything, how was I going to find my way back to base? I knew we had outposts placed all over the city, all I had to do was stay in the shadows until I found one. If an Imp found me, he’d think I got lost, if SpecForce found me, they’d kill me. I knew my next moves, I just had to execute them very, very carefully.

We came across an intersection that was completely dark, here was my opportunity. The entire squad stacked behind the corner and one by one started going across. Now was my turn, I was covering the corner, who would have been the last man hit my shoulder. I told him to go, I had it, he sat there for a second and I cussed at him and told him to go. Another thing Imps and SpecForce have in common, for some reason, whenever we are given an order, it will only click if the person giving us that order will cuss. Once I saw the last man hidden by the shadow, I counted to three and sprinted as fast as I could down the street. I knew what slaves felt like on their run for freedom, I knew what a man that just got out of prison felt.

I got to the end of the street and hid around the corner, the Imp patrol was still close, I had to get as far away as possible. I just ran as fast as I could run away from them. If a street had a light, I didn’t go that way, I stayed in the darkness away from Imps and SpecForce, because at this point, either would be a bad outcome. My feet hurt. They were bruised and weak. Every time they pulsed I just wanted to cut them off so I wouldn’t feel the pain anymore. It felt like the skin had peeled off and the dead flesh was rubbing against the muscle with every step I ran.

I went into the back of an alley and sat down with my back against a destroyed building that caved in. I think I was leaning against what was once a roof. I rested there and I just prayed, I thanked and asked for forgiveness and asked for everything to go well. I ditched the stormtrooper helmet and all the white armor, I took off the black skintight sweater and just kept the black pants on. Everything else was thrown away except the blaster rifle and utility belt with extra powercells, just in case.

I smelled the air. It was anything but fresh, it smelled dry and burnt, like how an oven smells when you’re cooking and you open it too fast. You smell that quick heat of the oven before you smell whatever you’re cooking. It was better than dried blood and urine. I didn’t have any way to tell time, but midnight wasn’t too far away, so it was only a matter of time before they saw the person sleeping in the cell wasn’t me. Would they come looking for me? That means they would have to risk getting into a conventional battle. If they were using guerrilla tactics now, they wouldn’t go back to conventional warfare. If they were going to kill me tonight, they no longer needed me, so either way it wouldn’t matter.

Re: Hector's Crusade

When tar stained soil lights on fire
I play God and fix this land to my desire
when crops bloom ripe for harvest
I swing my plowshare like I'm telling Death how to do his job
-Hector's Crusade, 1st Canto

I didn’t stop running that night. My feet stung with every step, but I didn’t care. It was well past midnight, I should be dead right now, but I’m not and running with hurt feet was a good alternative. A second chance was given to me and I took advantage of it. Occasionally, I wound stop for a quick breath, I didn’t know if I was going in circles or in zig-zags, I just tried to find something that I recognized. There weren’t as many houses anymore, the landscape was more open, there was some vegetation, I must be by the jungle, I ran for it. The jungle was West of the Capitol and took up a very large area, part of it was our AO. I had a feeling I wasn’t in our part and I was glad, I wanted to be rescued, but not by my unit, it was already established that they were unreliable and untrustworthy.

I knew the rest of the battalion had outposts out here and the battalion firm base was out here, somewhere. I tried to go in as deep as I could into the jungle, that way it would be difficult for me to be tracked. Walking was a good idea because if anybody, be they Imp or SpecForce would of shot first then ask why someone was running around in the jungle. The sweat was pouring off my body as if I spent the night in a sauna. My eyes were becoming heavy, I didn’t have to see them, I knew dehydration made them red. I was growing dizzy, another symptom of heat exhaustion. I gotta keep on going, I’m almost there. Where is almost? I’ll find it when I get there, I just can’t stop now. I didn’t stop, my heat exhaustion stopped me. The last thing I remember is my head tilting to one side and my eyes rolling into the back of my head, then everything was black.

I had no clue how much time went by when I woke up, all I knew was that it was dawn, the sun was creeping up, there was that grey muggy mist in the air that only shows up in the morning. Using the branches and limbs of the trees around me, I picked myself up and started walking. If I could hold onto a limb, I did, I was too dizzy to walk without assistance. My entire arm would twitch from the injuries, every pulse that went through it hurt me, bugs were getting fat from sucking on my open cuts and scars. While the bugs only made it worse, I was so weak I couldn’t even slap them off me. I could only take one step every couple of seconds, if I let go of a branch that was holding me up, I was done for.

Something was shining in front of me, it was red, it was obviously a light, but from where? That light was either my salvation or destruction. It didn’t matter to me, I was desperate and dying at this point. It would save me or kill me, it would seal my fate. You couldn’t be sure of how far it was and going at the speed of a Gungan’s mind, I went towards it. Whoever was standing post or patrolling saw me and told me to freeze, I did and raised my rifle holding the barrel. I came with fifty yards of what turned out to be an outpost, I was either in Heaven or Hell. The woods began to move and men with actual plants as camoflauge rose and aimed their weapons at me, there was three of them. When they told me to drop my weapon and get on my stomach, I listened. Falling to my knees, the heat exhaustion hit me again, I collapsed.

More time had passed, I was in a hospital bed this time connected to machines and medical droids working on whatever. My stomach was wrapped, both my feet from crotch to ankle, , my elbows, to make it simple, every limb and joint that could be wrapped or in a cast was. I was comfortable, I was actually comfortable. It didn’t smell like urine or sweat or blood. It smelt like plastic, I was in a hospital like area. Hopefully, I was on a capitol ship, which meant in a few minutes a hot nurse was going to give me a sponge bath and right after I was going to get a full meal just as hot. I wasn’t so lucky, I hoped for too much. I was at our Battalion’s Aid Station, those scouts that found me were SpecForce.

“You have two broken ribs,” told me the droid in its robotic voice, “bruised lungs, broken wrists, multiple head injuries, bruised jaw, minor brain damage, multiple cuts.….”
“Is there anymore?” I cut him off, I knew what hurt, I didn’t need him to tell me,
“Yes”
“Don’t bother telling me, I’m alright,’
 
What caught me by surprise is how much a bruise can hurt, I honestly thought some things were broken when they were just severely bruised. I saw the battalion commander come through the hatch. With his smile on across a clean shaven face and pearly white teeth, his rank perfectly aligned on his collar, his cammies looked like they just came from the cleaners. The only damage I could do right now was tell him to go f*** himself and go back to his air conditioned office with his illegal cigars from a planet not controlled by the NR.

“Son, you wanna tell me what happened,” he told me in his calm gentle voice that almost made me believed he cared,
“Why don’t you ask your fearless company commanders……..sir?”
“ I was lied to, I want to know what happened so I can punish and reward the appropriate people,”
“Punish and reward? I was providing cover fire, I was left behind, I was taken prisoner, I was beaten every day, I ate scraps of MREs, I was left on my own and I escaped on my own. No one came for me, you promised you would come for me, you stood in front of the battalion and you promised us, you lied to us. You lied to the men that stand your posts and follow your orders to make you look good, you lied to me, you never came for me. I want to kill you right now but I can’t even move.”
“Your commanders reported you as killed in action, that’s why I never came for you. Got your record right here and blood tests confirm that your you. I didn’t do what I promised because I was lied to and for that I’m sorry I couldn’t do anything.”

I saw a death certificate with my name on it, it creeped me out, I couldn't look at it and at the same time couldn't take my eyes off of it.

“I didn’t know, I didn’t mean to threaten you Sir”
“Don’t worry about it, I’d say the same. Listen, your too broken to be out here, I’m honorably dismissing you of your duties on this deployment, you’ll be going on a capitol ship to Coruscant soon. The Regimental Commander granted me powers to give you anything you want within reason…..”
“I want my honorable discharge from SpecForce, I want out,”
“Why?”
“The leaders of SpecForce obviously don’t believe in what they preach, their hypocrites, their cowards and I want nothing to do with them, I don’t even want to take a chance in another unit. You want to punish them, reward me, like that’s going to make up for anything? I don’t want medals, I don’t want awards of valor, I don’t even want whoever is responsible dead. I want them to live with what they did and as for me, I just want out.”

Re: Hector's Crusade

To make life simpler for all of us, I believe the correct term is “a long story short,” in the last month, the battalion commander signed my honorable discharge. The medical doctors in Coruscant saw my physically and mentally stable enough (key word, enough) to return to civilian life, I got a big welcome coming home by the Queen who knighted me the day of my returning as an award for my “duty and sacrifice.” I was worth 250,00 credits a year (whatever that meant), I moved my family into a nicer home, bought a speeder bike, living life up as a new noble.

Now I was expected to show up to the Queen’s court which consisted of the nobles around the the Theed area and they did what nobles do, saturate themselves in their wealth and status……………f***ing boring. I didn’t want to go to court, I didn’t care how rich this guy was or how rare this chick’s Alderaanian silk was. Some were so proper and obviously falsly modest that I really thought there was a stick up their ass. I hated this, I didn’t want to dress up and fight staying awake for hours. I wanted to go home and drink myself stupid, get fat off my mom’s cooking and flirt with every woman that caught my eye.

“Quit your b****ing,” said my mom, “make the most of it, if you don’t like it change it.” I finally understood now that mom ALWAYS knows best and so, I listened to her. I had a lot of work to do. I wasn’t a noble by birth, so now, I have an act to maintain.

SO…..

I spent a few credits buying nice black suits and dark fur coats, tieless was a better look for me, I got silver rings that I wore on every other finger and a black cane with a human skull on top of it. I even got tattooes covering up both arms and part of my neck. I wanted all eyes on me and I was willing to go out of my way of doing it. It wasn’t until the next time I went to court where I learned the most important thing I will ever learn in my life.

Her name was April and the first thing that caught my attention was the fact that she didn’t wear make-up and she didn’t need to, her green eyes were dark enough, the light complexion really made them stand out and her low cut dress showed off beautifully shaped and sized breasts (I never said big, perverts, I’m just insinuating that they were just right). I was dumbfound, I just smiled at her and she just looked at me. I felt like an even bigger loser when I lowered my head and walked away. Walking around saying “hi” to everyone made me feel more out of place, like I didn’t belong here and I didn’t. This isn’t the life I know, a freak accident happened and the next thing I know I’m nobility. The odd looks everyone gave when I greeted them made it even worse. I was thinking about quitting everything right then and there, you can only take so much humiliation.

“It was even discussed amongst the council that we are losing the war at Ithor,” I overheard one of the nobles saying, here was my chance.
“Actually, the Imperials are defiantly suffering, their struggling to hold the few positions they have now.”
He turned around to show his frosted pretty boy hair and adolescent face on a grown man’s body, “I’m sorry and you are?”
“I’m umm,” I can’t believe I forgot my own name,
“That white belt says you are a knight, it’s nice to meet you Sir Umm,” everyone laughed, my face grew red, I wanted to kill him.
“Yes, Im Sir Umm,”
He turned back to his group, “these country nobles are no better than peasants, why don’t you fetch me some more wine Sir Umm?”
“Go f*** yourself,”

And with that he turned, he had a foot on me and my eyes never left his, last time I felt like this…..

“That’s enough gentlemen, not here,” it was April.

I had enough, I needed a drink. Corellian rum, the silver kind was really getting a soft spot in my heart.

“It’s all fake, isn’t it?” said April, sitting down next to me, “my name is April and you are?”
“Telemachus, I mean, Sir……”
“Telemachus, I don’t care about your title, it’s all fake,”
“What’s all fake?”
“This, the clothes, that cane, it looks nice on you but it isn’t you, is it?”
“How did you know?”
“Because everyone here is fake, including myself,”
“So why confess to me?”
“I know your story, you went from rags to riches, like me, we know our own,”
“What’s your story?”
“….a secret…..you want some advice?”
“What?”
“Its not about being yourself, it’s about being your best self, keeping your best foot forward. Keep the look, it looks nice on you and figure out some way to show off your bright personality.”

I think she was hitting on me, when she said good luck and went to walk away, I followed, she stopped me, “no, never EVER chase, be willing to walk away, now smile…chin up…and do not chase.”

She said two sentances and already I learned everything I needed to know.

Re: Hector's Crusade

Black suits with white shirts were nice, I needed to go a step further. As much as humanity hates to admit it, a book is always judged by its cover and I wanted my cover to be interesting. I would wear suits that had exotic animal prints with silk shirts, dress pants and matching vest to show off the tattoos on my arms. Looking like a rock star wasn’t enough, people would expect me to know how to play some type of instrument, but I didn’t care to learn, I chose poetry instead, it was easier. I would lock myself in my room with a bottle of rum, a piece of paper and something to write with and whatever came to mind was written down with a rhyme. Some of it was good, some of it was crap. I took mom’s and April’s advice and I couldn’t be happier. I would read poems of famous poets so I could get some kind of inspiration, bawdy and satire were my favorite.

“……….make it all and above, part of my charm if I may say; I’ll see the skirts of the ladies up in sway; before I find the one that will save me; I’ll enjoy being in a lack of celibacy,” closing the book on my latest poem I read to the court, I genuinely felt warm when I heard their applauds. Almost overnight, I was somebody and life was good.

As time went, the arms of debutants were around mine as we walked arm in arm, smiling, with my chin up.

“When will we hear more poetry?”
“When I have more inspiration,” with that, I would give her one soft kiss, long enough to enjoy it, but short enough to want more, then, I would walk away, just like April said.

Poetry wasn’t the only way I would make myself known.

I overheard a woman saying, “I’m thinking of going to a palm reader…..”
“Palm reader you said, pleasure to meet you.”

For the next week, instead of scribbling down every witty and sexual comment I could make into a rhyme, I read all I could about palm reading. I’m not going to lie, I don’t know anything about it, I figured it’d be good enough if I just “sounded” like I knew what I was talking about.

With her upward palm in mine, I did my analysis, “you see that, that’s your life line, see how it goes so far, you’re going to live to about…80ish.”

“What else?…..”
I couldn’t believe this actually was working, “umm, you can’t hold your liquor…”
“Very true…”
“…you can be a good person, if you're given the chance,”
“Yes.”
“….and you're totally gullible.”
“Oh my God, you're amazing.”

She didn’t catch on to that, I dug myself too big of a hole.