TEOTWAWKI (An Original Novel - Episode 48 )

everittdmickey (73)in #writing • 8 years ago (edited)

Xu’on’ng Cuong: The Demon of Cu Chi

The blackness was absolute yet I could see clear as day. Sufficiently advanced tech WAS magic. The point drones had encountered a group of VC duck walking my way. The tunnel was too short for VC to stand up in. It was either duck walk or crawl.

“They must have thighs of iron” I thought to myself. When the VC encountered the dragonflies, the scouts, in the tunnel they were not alarmed. Insects were not an unusual occurrence. It was, however was an excuse to stop. The men had stopped and turned to shine their lights toward the small departing, drones. They were pointing the lights away from me. I quickly found a low spot and crouched down in it. I used my shield and my Camo-fog for disguise. I had my sword and I was ready to use it in case the disguise didn’t work.

The soldiers stretched out their break by watching the dragonflies recede until the bugs had receded beyond the range of their lights. Then they had no excuse but to continue on. They didn’t see me. They almost stepped on my face they were so close. The camouflage evidently worked. They were within mere inches of me, I could smell mam nem on their breath but they never even knew I was there, they never twigged to my presence, they continued on. After a bit,I continued on in the other direction.

“Well that was kinda neat” I muttered to myself.

Much later the drones flew through a room that was much larger than the tunnels. It had several people in it. The wrong kind of people. The kind of people who had tortured and my buddies to death. I recognized them from the surviellance. It was time for payback. Payback’s a bitch. It was time for them to die. They were getting a better deal than what they had given my buddies. I was just going to kill them outright. I didn’t have time to prolong their agony. I had the drones play “Flight of the Valkyrie’ at high volume then douse d their light.

Then I hit them in the dark. I could clearly see everything and they could not, their eyes were still adjusted to the light that my drones had put out and even if there HAD been some dim light to see they wouldn’t have been able to. It didn’t matter, there was no light. I could see them by infrared, like a sidewinder, but they couldn’t see me.. The room was large enough that I could use the sword to good effect. I quickly, easily and silentlty began to lop off heads. They had no warning, never saw it coming, they just died. When I was done, the interior of the room was painted in gore. Everyone had lost their head but me. I scuttled away, following my drones.

“Feel better now?” The voice asked

“Somewhat. Those guys were involved in torturing my buddies,” I explained.

“I knew that.” the Voice said “Good job. You were very humane.”

So it went, for weeks. I would avoid contact when possible. Kill everything that breathed when it wasn’t. I carried on with no remorse.

I had never heard about Operation Cedar Falls. I was about too.

BoomBoomBooomBooomBooomBoom.BoomBoom

When I first became aware of it the noise was off in the distance but it was getting louder. I had no idea what it was. The walls of the tunnel I was traversing began to shake and vibrate. Dust and chips began to fall from the ceiling.

BoomBoomBooomBooomBooomBoom.BoomBoom

The ground throbbed to the noise, shaking harder, dust choked my lungs. Coughing in the dust, I activated the air supply system in my helmet.

BoomBoomBooomBooomBooomBoom.BoomBoom

The noise was significant now, deafening actually. I encountered panicked VC. They were terrified, for a short time. I couldn’t avoid them so I killed them. They seemed to almost welcome death at my hands, they were THAT afraid.

BoomBoomBooomBooomBooomBoom.BoomBoom

“ArcLite! That's the only thing it could be!” I grinned. Somewhere, in the sky high above my location, B-52’s were dropping thousands of TONS of bombs, on the underground installation. Somehow the Brass must have got wind it’s existence. In typical fashion, since they didn’t know precisely where it was they just bombed the hell out of the whole jungle. For once they got it right. The tunnel system was HUGE. It spread out for hundreds of miles pretty much under the whole jungle.

*BoomBoomBooomBooomBooomBoom.BoomBoom

My point drones flew through a much larger room, one full of coughing soldiers. There was so much dust in the still claustophobic still air that none of them noticed the swarm of drones. The VC were so distracted by trying breath that I forgo any attempt to create shock and awe, I simply killed them like fish in a barrel. I started at one side of the room and worked my way to the other. I was the grim raper. One of them sensed my presence and called me a name. The last thing he said before he lost his head was “ Xu’on’ng Cuong”

“Have you got any idea what that means?” I asked the voice. I didn’t slow down the least little bit. Every stroke of my sword removed heads or body parts.

“He called you a demon.” The voice said.

“Imagine that.” I said cheerfully. “I’m the demon of Cu Chi.”

I didn’t stop what I was doing just to chat. While I was conversing with the voice I continued to remove heads and other parts like a farmer reaping wheat.

BoomBoomBooomBooomBooomBoom.BoomBoom

The bombing continued. B-52’s can haul a LOT of bombs. They weren’t called BUFF’s for nothing. They continued on remorsely, bombing the Iron Triangle. I wouldn’t have minded at all, If I hadn’t been in the the middle of it.

Fragments of the ceiling and walls began to spall and fall to the floor. The choking dust thickened, blinding all and making it impossible to breathe without assistance. The ground shook even more, knocking all to the ground.

BoomBoomBooomBooomBooomBoom.BoomBoom

Larger and larger chunks fell from the walls. It became clear that it was going to collapse on top of me. Frantically, I hacked a hole in the floor. I dug a scaredy hole to hide in when the whole thing collapsed. Finally it wdas deep enough, and crawled in. I covered ot with my shield.