The laughter died away and the room faded until it was only his small cell. His face still hurt, and for several disoriented moments he imagined the pain was from Twenty-Six' fist. But it was his jaw, not his nose which ached so badly. There was a reason for that. Thirteen shook his head, flinching away from the thought. He didn't want to remember. His hands found the numbers on the wall, he tried to trace them, his movements twitchy and distracted, but it was too late. The memories slipped in through the cracks, fragmented and violent: the taste of sharp metal in his mouth, clawing hands, the weight on his chest...
Thirteen gave a convulsive shudder, pressing his face into the wall. It was hot. Why was it so hot?
"Fuck, it's hot." It was his thought, but it was Zero speaking, his voice amplified by the comm in his helmet, earning him a sharp reprimand from the lieutenant. Thirteen's visor was starting to cloud and he longed to pull off his own helmet to wipe his face, but he didn't dare. They were nearly to the objective.
He remembered crouching at the edge of the trees, the unbearable stillness and waiting, and yet dreading the order to advance. The village had looked peaceful, as if it were asleep in the shimmering midday heat, but the moment they broke cover it erupted like a swarm of wasps.
The open ground before the village couldn't have been more than fifty yards, but it seemed to stretch endlessly. They had grown accustomed to wearing the signature white armor since Graduation, but this was their first time in action and Thirteen remembered how impossibly heavy and awkward it had suddenly felt, how stifling the helmets were, how the visor fogged up if you didn't have it on just right. He struggled gracelessly and half blind through the blaster fire, but he kept moving forward, kept firing. He ought to have been terrified, but all he could think of was keeping pace with Twenty-Six, just ahead of him. He was aware of figures falling to either side, of cries coming across the comms, of the storm of energy bolts streaking past them, but none of it reached him. None of it felt quite real.
They reached the edge of town, flinging themselves down and pressing tight against the mud walls of the buildings. Five-Oh had taken a hit, but he was alive. They left him there in cover, splitting into pairs and clearing the buildings one by one. There was something steady and methodical about it, in the midst of complete chaos, which Thirteen found reassuring.
They had just cleared their second, and Thirteen was crossing the street towards the third when Twenty-Six pulled him back hard, an inch ahead of a sniper's bolt. He fell back, flattening himself against the wall, his detachment shattering in an instant. It was like waking into a nightmare. He wanted to run, to crawl back into the building they'd just cleared, behind the solid, safe walls, but Twenty-Six was saying something to him, her voice sharp and familiar, filling his helmet. "Building across the square. Top floor. Middle window. I'll cover you." And then she was firing.
Thirteen didn't have time wonder if he was shaking too badly to hit the mark. He forced out his breath, pulling the stock of his rifle tight into his shoulder, and stepped away from the wall. His clouded sights found the building, found the window, found the shadow behind it and in the space between heartbeats he pulled the trigger. He saw a muzzle flash from the window and for a moment the whole world lit up with pain and bright white light and then it went dark.
He was lying in the street, Twenty-Six was leaning over him and had pulled off his helmet. She was punching his shoulder and shouting that he'd scared the living shit out of her.
"Did I hit him?" he asked, still half dazed.
"The sniper? Yeah." She shook her head. "You're one lucky son of a bitch. Tore up the whole side of your helmet."
"Think he tore up my head," Thirteen groaned, making an attempt to sit up.
"You'll live. Fucked up the side of your face, though."
Before Thirteen could respond, the lieutenant's voice came over their comms declaring the village was clear.
"Thank fuck," muttered Twenty-Six as Thirteen let himself sag back to the ground. Despite the pain in his head, he was grinning with relief.
After a brief hesitation, Twenty-Six pulled off her own helmet and dragged in a great lungful of air. She closed her eyes and just for a moment was perfectly still. Then she straightened, flicked a faint, conspiratorial smile at Thirteen before pulling on her helmet once more. "C'mon," she said, offering him a hand. "Wipe that stupid grin off your face and let's find the others."
x
They had taken the village and that with only a handful wounded and one dead. Not bad for a green platoon, their sergeant had said. One dead was nothing. One dead was a walkover.
One dead was Two-Oh-Seven-One. Thirteen stood staring down at the charred hole in his friend's breastplate. He kept expecting him to sit up. This was their first combat; they'd been working, training for this every day of their short eighteen years. Seventy-One hadn't even made it across the open ground, hadn't fired a shot.
But none of them wanted to think about that. Not even Thirteen, who always thought too much. It was their first combat, their first victory, and they had survived, they had won. It was a high like nothing else. It was electrifying, and everything he touched, everything he saw or heard was sharp and vivid and glorious. He wanted to tear off the heavy, awkward armor and feel his limbs moving freely, he wanted to run, he wanted to feel his lungs burning and his heart pounding, he wanted to feel the air and the sun on his face.
But such indulgence was unthinkable, and he stayed where he was, with the others, with Twenty-Six, joking and laughing as if he'd had too much to drink. He felt absurdly happy.