Sweat beaded his brow as Matt scanned the horizon searching for the banner of the legendary forty-second legion. Leaning on his walking stick, he thought he spotted a small receding image of the blue banner. A large grin spread across his long slender face, his mother was coming home from the patrol. Matt, standing one hundred fifty centimeters tall, broke into a run heading to where he saw the sigil. Matt stopped dead in his tracks at what he saw, only twenty soldiers from a brigade of nearly five thousand strong. Matt slid down the hill to see if he knew any of the battle worn warriors.
One of the soldiers raised his m-27 at Matt when he slid down the hillside. Recognizing the young blond kid as a child of one of the ranking officers. Resting his gun on his side the old soldier motioned for Matt to approach.
"Matt lad I have some bad news for ye I'm afraid, on our patrol we were ambushed, ye're mother took a bullet strait through her throat. I... I am real sorry lad I woulda changed places with her if I coulda. They were just there so fast." The old soldier said to Matt holding back his tears.
"Corporal Wilaks what are you talking about my mom couldn't be dead that's not possible, is it?" Matt said with tears welling up behind his eyes. He had never thought his mom could be killed on a routine border patrol.
"I'm sorry lad, but she's dead I saw It with me own eyes, I wish I coulda been there in her stead but I could nae get there in time. I know she woulda wan'ned ye te have her amulet," Wilaks said handing Matt his mother's tear shaped, sapphire amulet. Matt's hand grasped the sapphire on his mothers amulet as Corporal Wilaks let go of the cord. "Lad all twenty of us are extremely tired an' don't have the energy to get to the town te tell 'em of the attack. We need you to take and go ahead of us and warn 'em that another attack is te be expected. You have to blow this horn when ye spot the guard towers, also take my pistol and I.D. and go to the barracks tell them the ambushers were Athairien."
After Wilaks gave Matt the horn, pistol, and golden I.D. card matt took off towards the town. Still trying to figure out what had just happened, Matt blew into the horn when he spotted the top of the guard tower. He continued with his mission to the barracks blowing to horn until he passed the guard tower.
Twenty years later
Matt Vertiale looked across the room scanning the newest arrivals, two males & one female, the males were obviously new graduates from Alkatrazz, the boot camp in the northeastern quadrant, the female however had a different air about her, though she was undoubtedly one of the most beautiful women matt had ever seen but there was something amiss about her. Matt quickly signaled Jason Wilaks to make all her orders on the house, who signaled that he would.
"Good day to ya lass, what'll it be?" Wilaks chimed at the beautiful young women.
"Double of scotch, please." the women said with a small smile.
"Now ye're my kind of gal, lass would ye like that a Willy's special or just a regular double?" Wilaks asked earnestly.
"Whichever is stronger, I'm guessing that you're Willy?" The enchantress said in a flattering tone.
"Aye that I am, one special double on the house, not my idea if ye're gonna thank someone it best be me boss." Wilaks said with a sly grin serving her with a special Willy's double of scotch.
Matt quickly signaled Wilaks to invite her to the V.I.P. lounge. Wilaks gave a broad grin in response. Putting the bottles he was holding away, Jason walked back to the woman.
"Well lass looks like ye've gotten invited to the V.I.P. lounge, the boss really mus' wan te meet ya. Go past the guards they won't bother ya." Wilaks said with a full-blown grin on his face, then turned and nodded at the two guards, who promptly stepped aside.
"Thanks Willy your drink is very good, my name is Rose by the way." Rose said in a flirting tone, causing Wilaks to mouth to her 'I'm too old'.
Smiling widely when Jason 'Willy' Wilaks signed to him her name is Rose. Matt stood up, wearing his mother's old captain uniform rank and all, and invited Rose over to his table. Rose's smile broadened when she, noticing the jacket he was wearing, saw his invitation. Rose walked over to Matt's table as seductively as possible. She took the seat to Matt's right, smiling politly at him the whole time.
"Hello, Rose my name is Matt Vertiale I'm the owner of this club." Matt said kindly, returning her smile.
"How could you know my name is Rose, we've just met Mr. Vertiale?" Rose said slightly uncomfortable with that fact.
"Oh, sorry Wilaks told me, Wilaks is the bartender that everyone calls Willy. He was Corporal Jason Wilaks at the beginning of the war." Matt said, slightly embarrassed.
"How did Willy tell you, OH I see you people have a sign language around here, so can you do anything other than say peoples names?" Rose asked with a touch of suspicion in her lovely, voice.
At that moment one of the two guards walked over with a small tray and two of Willy's special doubles of scotch. The Large man gave Rose and Matt a kind smile and said "Two specials of scotch sir."
"Thank you Paul, I believe that answers your question my dear." Matt said quietly as Paul left the table.
"Yes, that answers it very nicely. So how did you end up with this bar ad how did it get in a residential zone?" Rose asked Matt politly. her eyes sparkling with curiosity.
Matt opened his mouth to speak but before he could, Jason gave a loud whistle and shouted, "Closing time everybody out. Go on now back te ye're homes."
Matt motioned for Rose to stay; he turned around and signaled something to Paul, Jason, and the second security guard, John. The three gave him a nod and headed out together, singing a ballad as loud as they could, off key just to annoy people.
"Those three are the biggest pests in Mayanel, they do that because the can get away with it, and unfortunately for the rest of the population, they know they can." Matt said with a small chuckle "so tell me what is an Athairien doing searching out officers of Thaneia, in the heart of Thaneia itself."
Rose's eyes widened and she started to reach for her knife finding that it had been stolen from her, and noticing the gun that Matt pulled out from under the table, Rose sat back with her hands on the table.
"You're very smart, but you chose the wrong bar to try to pick a target Athairien. How stupid do you think I am? I have seen Athairiens before in fact, it was your people who orphaned me. You people killed my mother when you started this damn war. I was only ten years old when I got this place, and my mother's bloodied up amulet." Matt said his anger showing. Matt brushed a piece of his black hair from his face, still staring at Rose, who had a look of startled disgust on her smooth, exotic.
"We didn't start this war your people did, by ambushing our boarder patrol. My people tried to get you to explain your actions. However, you only let loose a volley of bullets at our heads. Why should I not try to end this war by killing off officers? I could kill off every single fucking troop you have." Rose shouted at him.
"You really think my people would start a war with yours, you had nothing we wanted if you did we wouldn't attack a little boarder patrol. Back when you people started this war we had over nine hundred thousand troops, you people only had one hundred twenty thousand troops. We could have taken any thing we wanted. Are your people really that fucking stupid? You committed suicide the day you attacked us."
"You arrogant fucking bastard I told you my people didn't start this war, yours did."
"AAHH fuck it, so if your people didn't start this and mine didn't, WHO did are going to tell me a bunch of people we've never seen or heard of did it." Matt shouted, all of a sudden he started to feel like a big stupid jackass.
"Hold on don't answer that I just realized how stupid we've been." Matt said in an honest tone.
"This whole time we've been arguing there has been a bomb ready to blow up across the street, I vote we knock over this table and hide behind it before that thing blows, we can finish this afterwards" Rose said look Matt strait in the eyes.
Not even hesitating Matt flipped the table over forming a barrier. A short time later, the bomb that Rose spoke of detonated. Matt looked over the table and saw the building across the street collapse. Noting the damage done to his bar as some scorch damage, and some loss of liquor, including all the scotch.
"You know you just blew up the rest of my bars scotch right?" Matt said flatly to Rose.
"Damn it why is it always the scotch that gets blown up with those bombs." Rose said looking a touch flustered.
"Damn, when you people say bomb you mean bomb, shit that totaled the building across the street, what was that?" Matt muttered quickly.
"Two ounces of XE-3 and a pinch of paprika" Rose said.
"Interesting recipe where can I get some, so what is XE-3 anyways?"
"A weak explosive, that is until you add a pinch of paprika. In combination they are very devastating."
"Gee you think I always knew paprika was evil." Matt responded putting the table back up "better get out our surprised faces, here comes the fire department."
A large hovercraft set down about three meters from the curb. The firefighters clambered out of the large vehicle and started looking through the rubble for survivors. They recovered the bodies of five small children. Rose lowered her head and started to cry, she knew that the building had been empty before she placed the bomb. Matt wrapped his arms around her. Standing at one hundred ninety three centimeters tall, he was able to see more than she could at one hundred forty-three cm. He knew she was supposed to be his enemy, that she was supposed to be of the merciless Athenians, but he felt the need to comfort her. They swaying motion of their bodies was calming to both of them. It' started to remind him of something he had locked away twenty years before, but he could feel it again, whatever it was.