Outlanders

A short story I intend to build into something bigger. It details my experiences, as well as the experiences of others I served with, during our tours in Iraq.

• Science fiction

								
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Inside of the bar tiny flecks of iron oxide, sand, and dust hung in the air.  No matter where you were there was a constant haze of particles waiting to attach itself to your skin and clothes.  It settled on every horizontal surface imaginable, and much like sand at the beach, found its way into every possible crack and crevice.  Nothing was safe.

The top of the bar had a layer of grime and filth caked on top of it.  No matter how many times it was wiped down, it seemed to remain, a stubborn reminder of the futility of it all.  A large stout man lay face down against the filth.  His muscled body was covered in a layer of fat that suggested a steady diet of beer and whiskey.  It sat, propped up on a stool, precariously balancing above the cesspool of a floor.  His face was plastered against the bar.  Strings of spit and vomit dangled from his lips, coagulating in the dust and creating pools of regurgitated pudding.

The air inside was stale, fetid and foul, filled with smoke, sweat, and an assortment of waste and fluids.  The place was a veritable shithole, but it was the only shithole in Utopia, at least the only one that hadn’t banned Griff, and likely wouldn’t given his current status.  Griff was what passed for law in Utopia, and when he was sober he actually performed his duties quite well.  Even inebriated he still managed to perform them to an acceptable standard, but just barely.  And at this point in his life he spent almost as much time drunk as he had sober.

The rest of the bar was barren, save for a couple of men performing the ritual of removing the refuse that stuck around from the previous night’s binging.  There was a third man, and he stood behind the bar wiping down glasses.  He couldn’t keep the counter clean, but he’d be god-damned if he served someone with a dirty glass.  He eyed Griff curiously, looking down at him with arched eyebrows.  He brought one hand from his task to scratch at his grimey beard, then rubbed it against his apron covered paunch, a slight heaviness setting in due to inactivity.

“Rough night, eh?”  The barkeep asked in his weird accent.  He wasn’t a colonist, like Griff was.  He was born here, or at the very least had spent the bulk of his youth here and grown into a man here.  Those that were born on Mars had the strangest of dialects.  A disgusting pigeon language that slammed Irish, English, Chinese, and various other languages together into a putrid bowl of alphabet soup.  His words to Griff were mostly English, but old timers like Griff had a hard time understanding it.  Their ears spent a good portion of their lives dealing with a single language, not the melting pot of many languages into one.

The large man grumbled, and he pushed his tongue out of his mouth.  It licked his cracked chapped lips, pushing at the rancid streams of vomit that clung to his face and slight beard.

“Water,”  Griff said, straining to push the words out of his mouth.

“Aye.  And a bath.  Nasty fella.  You stink.”  The barkeep’s words were loose and sloppy.  They were a soup sandwich inside of Griff’s ears.

“F*ck… Off…”  The only wods Griff could muster,  he was too tired, and his brain was in too deep of a haze.

“Hey, man.  Maybe slow down a bit.  Most of the old timers.  Most of them are dead, you know?  Maybe.  I don’t know, man.  Maybe take it easy?”  The barrkeep’s voice was a cocktail of sarcasm and concern.  There was some genuine care on display here.  

“Old timer?”  Griff asked, as he peeled his dried and crusted face from the dingy surface of the bar.

I’m only 45, he thought to himself.  But as he did he remembered that most of the people his age didn’t make it out of the war.  So many times he should have died.  So many times he should have joined them.  And now he is one of the few people left that can both read and write.  

He let his head sag back down, and rested his forehead against the bar.

“Okay, Griff.  Time to wake up.”  A small splash of icy water hit him in the back of the head.  He reflexively jolted upright.

“Christ!” Griff protested.  He turned his head left and right, waiting for the haze to clear from his head and his vision.

“Never know what that means, nor why you say it, old man.  But I laugh every time.”  The bartender went back to washing his glass as he spoke, a wry smile visible beneath his beard.

Griff rubbed his eyes and fell from the stool. It was a controlled fall that found him standing upright, more or less.  He looked at himself to assess the amount of damage he had done to himself and his filth-stained clothes.

F*ck.  He thought to himself.

“I need a shirt. And pants,” Griff said to the barkeep.

“Not your maid, Pops,” He responded, picking up another glass.

Griff then went about removing his leather vest and shirt from his heavy body.  He tossed it at the barkeep.  His hands went for his belt and pants when the other man interrupted him.

“All right, man, all right.  I’ll put it together.  The washroom.  We will get it in the washroom for you.  Already got the heater going for water.  And…”  His voice trailed off.  His eyes were fixed on Griff.  On his left arm.  He had seen it before, but only rarely, and every time he did it was the same.  

Griff’s left arm, and his leg, also, were much like Griff.  A relic of a bygone era.  Some sort of metal was grafted to the skin.  There was a type of connection that allowed his brain to interface with it.  For all Griff knew, it was his real arm, only it was stronger and more rugged.  Griff didn’t know the details of how or why it worked, he didn’t care.  All he knew was that it was a daily reminder of what he had been through, and all of the things he had lost.  There were a couple of old timers still around that knew a bit about his arm and leg, like Old Tom, and that’s who Griff relied on to make sure it all stayed repaired and functional.

“Take a picture.  It lasts longer, prick.” Griff grumbled, as he stumbled away towards the washroom.

Griff stumbled from the washroom, but in a much more controlled manner.  He was clean, with fresh clothes.  He had the look of someone that had just woken up, which was a big improvement.

“Whiskey.” Griff said, sitting at the bar.

“Man.  you really think that’s a great idea?”

“All right.  Water.  And whiskey.  Take the edge off, get rid of the headache.  Christ Mickey, just give me a drink.”

“Just stop,” Was the barkeep’s only response, though he was pouring a shot and a glass of water as he spoke.

“Cutting an alcoholic off cold turkey can kill him.”

Mickey stared at Griff.  He understood the phrase cold turkey, but only through context.  He also doubted there was any truth to it, but he passed the shot and the water to Griff.   He knocked down the shot then gulped the water down greedily.  

“One more.”  Griff said

“Hey, Griff.  You.  You said.”

“The water.  One more water.” Griff responded.  He spun on his stool, turning towards the doors of the bar.  He looked out through the cracked glass panes in the door.  Out there was a great big world.  Mars.  And all of the wonder and hope it had once promised, but it came with all of the horror and terror it delivered.  There was no life on Mars, at least that was the briefing he had received upon arrival.

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