by Attila Orosz
That was unusual, guards never hesitated. They never thought twice before firing, in fact they never thought at all when firing at a target. It had been burned right into their brains, all their training was based on becoming so efficient in their duties that they no longer needed to use judgement. They could distinguish a target from its surroundings by a mere glance, and they fired instinctively; but his one looked undecided, and even hesitant.
Then he saw the gun lower slowly. Thoughts flashed through his whole existence, but he could not grasp them. He felt a sudden rush in his blood, something filled his body with heavy heartbeats. He jumped up from his prone position and bolted towards the man with the weapon. Even as an idea began to form in his head, urging him to stay down, his body was already in motion. He watched the guard turn in a sluggish movement, and in his mind he knew that he was much faster than that. His body did not seem to agree, and with what felt like slow, heavy movements, he pulled into a stop just as the guard turned to face him, raising his weapon at Alex’s head.
He was now looking at the bewildered soldier who was yelling at him something he could not hear. His head was full of competing thoughts, all seeking to manifest at once, telling him that he would die, and that the guard had not fired yet, while his subdued consciousness slowly gathered itself up and yanked his mind back into his head. The explosion, now.
But the muzzle remained silent, he was still alive. He tried to gather up his senses. What did he do that for? He could not recall. He saw the uniformed figure, unmoving before him, the dark camo of the border patrol, riot helmet with visor lifted. He was caught by surprise, he thought, could not even adjust his gear.
Seconds passed, but they felt like minutes. The guard remained motionless, apparently undecided. Alex froze into hesitation as well. He had not faced a situation like this since he had been working for the Humanitarian Underground Movement. He was a field operator, but his job was to remain hidden and undetected. He was not trained for this, he was not prepared for confrontation.
Something gripped his heart with an ice cold clutch. It was skipping beats now. In those pauses between two heartbeats, audible as the blood rushed through his skull in large quantities, there was a sinking sensation, bringing him closer to the edge of unconsciousness.
He gasped for air violently when he realised that he had stopped breathing. His head began to clear, the noises and the sights were rushing back, first blurred, then quickly turning into sharp reality. His memory returned, now he once again knew where he was standing. He had to act quickly.
The next moment excruciating pain took over his senses, with a cracking sound across his skull as an unstoppable force hit his head, bringing him down to his knees.
***
“Identify yourself!” yelled Peter at the man clad in the shades of night, now kneeling before him.
He had jumped out of practically nowhere, like a shadow, right in front of his rifle. Peter’s first instinct was to shoot, but he saw it was a white face. He had just spared the life of an illegal, he was not about to shoot a semi-legal white. Peter had no idea who the man was or what he was doing out in Zone-1,but he was determined to find it out. In order to ensure cooperation, he had hit the man hard in the head with the butt of his automatic rifle. The stranger was now kneeling before him, his mouth bleeding and looking as dazed as if he had just woken up from a nightmare.
“I said, identify yourself!” He hoped the emphasis on his words came through as intended. Truth was, he was not quite sure what would happen if the man refused to cooperate. He definitely would not kill him, and he could not quite think of whatever else he could do.
The man looked up slowly. He appeared to be in his mid-thirties, his face was carved with lines of hardness, rather than age. He looked heavy set, but not the military type, in fact he was a little overweight. His face was unshaven with traces of an unkempt light coloured beard. Tightly cropped blonde hair was now showing as his cap fell off after Peter’s blow. Wanting for a better way to counter his silence, Peter hit him again, this time with a closed fist.
“Who the fuck are you?” he yelled, with rising anger.
“My name is Alex Lewis,” replied the stranger. “I am a citizen of United North America. I demand to—” Before he could finish his reply, Peter’s fist cut him off.
“You will demand nothing, but tell me what you’re doing in an illegal zone! Are you aware of your situation? I should have shot you on sight!”
“I’m still breathing.” The strange man’s voice was unnaturally calm.
Peter was lost for words for a moment. He covered his confusion with another punch across the man’s cheek. It felt satisfying. The other spat blood.
“Are you a HUM?” asked Peter.
“No. HUM is an organisation. I am an HA.”
“Explain!”
“Humanitarian Activist, you idio—”
The next punch came out of custom, Peter was getting the hang of it. If he could not shoot the man he could at least maintain his superior position, and it seemed to work too. The man fell silent.
“You are required to cooperate. You are coming with me. And your little friend too!” said Peter after a moment’s hesitation.
“What friend?”
Peter nodded, while at the same time momentarily pointing his rifle at the illegal who was standing there with his mouth open, its eyes two bewildered circles, looking paralysed. The events of the last minute or so had obviously had their effect on it.
“And where do you suppose you will take us?”
***
Alex’s brain worked with its usual speed once again. He had always known his thinking was quicker than of most others, and this ability usually paid off in difficult situations. The guard had not shot them. Not only did he spare Alex’s life, but that of an African arrival too. Even if sparing the life of a white man found in the Zone was not considered capital misconduct, delaying to follow orders regarding someone the guards referred to as an ‘illegal’ was certainly punishable by death, and Alex was beginning to see how he would benefit from this simple fact. He tried to look as unaffected as he could.
“You are in trouble,” he said, forcing himself to talk in a calm tone. “You disobeyed your orders. You’re on your own now. Hit me if you like.”
“Shut the fuck up!” yelled the guard. He raised his hand for another punch, but then he seemed to change his mind.
“You know it’s true. You cannot stay here with us. And you will not shoot,” said Alex, doing everything he could to sound stoical.
His cheek was pulsing, and he needed all his self-control to restrain his temper. He was not used to being treated like this, and felt the anger of powerlessness rise in the back of his head, tightening his neck into a knot, yet his only chance to gain an advantage was keeping his cool.
“You are quite wrong there,” said the guard, raising his gun and pointing it at Alex’s face. He felt his heart weaken, but he resisted the urge to close his eyes. He will not shoot now.
Then the guard turned and aimed at the African. Alex turned his head towards him too. The man was kneeling now, obviously not knowing what would happen next. Alex frowned. See a kneeling man and what do you do? Join him!
The guard looked once again undecided. He aimed at him, then back at the African hesitantly, then finally lowered his weapon and remained silent. Alex felt the greatest relief. Direct danger was over. It was time to turn the situation to his favour.
“Have you ever killed a man before?” he asked the guard.
“No— I mean yes! But not like this!” The guard’s voice was that of a defeated teenager.
“Like what? You either kill someone or you don’t.”
“I shot at illegals from a distance, OK? But I could never be sure…” said the guard, his voice betraying insecurity. “Most of them died, OK? But I never shot at people!”
A thought flashed through Alex’s head. If he lunged for the weapon now, he would take the guard unprepared. He could
probably tie him up and leave him there to his fate. Then he would still be able to deliver on time, the tunnels were only a few metres away. He could run for it and still avoid the next patrol.
“You will be executed,” he said finally, quite against himself, “for helping us”.
“I am not helping you!” snapped the guard. “You are implicating that I am providing aid to illegal subjects on high security territory! This is an offence in itself!”
“Easy, man. You have not shot us. You are disobeying orders. Technically speaking, you are helping us. We are both still alive.”
The young man’s confusion was now sitting on his face.
“Yes, technically speaking…”
“What are you going to do then?” asked Alex.
Now is the time, just make him leave us behind.
“Get up and follow me!” said the guard in a suddenly decided voice. “And bring that as well.” He pointed at the African kneeling beside him.
***
Jumaane was kneeling beside the white man with the light hair, trying to keep his eyes as low as he could. He was sure they were going to be executed. When he saw the soldier hit the other man repeatedly, he knew where it would end. He had watched many executions in Africa. Militants sometimes came and took men out of the village to make an example of, usually those who failed to obey in one way or another, or did not pay up in livestock or crops.
He had no idea what the other two were talking about or what took so long. Executions were usually swift. There wasn’t any talking, only gathering up, kneeling them down, and shooting them in front of the whole village. There were a few occasions when ,instead of shooting, they slit people’s throats and let them bleed out slowly, but that was a punishment reserved for the worst offenders.
White men just seemed do things differently. He saw no knives or other sharp objects, and the soldier did not look as if he wanted to cut them up, so why all the fuss? Jumaane decided that white men were even worse than black militia. Those fighters killed when they felt necessary, sometimes even enjoyed it, but they rarely tortured people by making them kneel so long.
He was suddenly yanked onto his feet by the other white man, who a moment ago was still kneeling next to him. He said something to Jumaane in the same weird language they used between themselves and began dragging him into the darkness. The soldier went after them, looking around cautiously. Jumaane was prodded in the rib with the muzzle of the rifle, so he walked faster, the two whites following him.
Chapter Three
The guard had brought them into the tunnels, through the concealed entrance which he had used to come up to the surface earlier. Alex had seen him take off bits of his equipment and destroy them, discarding a head-mounted camera and a microphone before entering. He also took off his helmet, fired several rounds into it and threw it into the night.
All three men were silent now, not knowing what to say or do. They were sitting on the concrete floor of an underground room next to the entrance. It was small and windowless, with bare walls and no furniture, illuminated by two old fashioned neon lights not often seen these days outside of military store rooms.
The room had once probably served as a sort of porter’s desk, or guard room, but there was no way to tell, as the history of the tunnels was never officially recorded. They had been built by the original HUM, the legendary humanitarian partisans, who had taken underground operations quite seriously, and also literally by the looks of things. These tunnels had once provided shelter and safety routes for thousands of men and women who had been escorted away from the conflict zone, and into the DMZ beyond the lines. That was, of course, way before the wall was built. New Dawn, the small group of guerrilla anarchists who were resolved to undermine the white supremacist regime of the freshly formed United States of Europe, through smuggling in as many migrants as they could, dated back to the 2020s. HUM, the Humanitarian Underground Movement, grew out of this, with clearer goals of helping those they smuggled in across the border, and less emphasis on politics.
Those days, the US of E had just began to improve the four metre tall fence that had been previously built along a small section of the southern border of what once had been known as Hungary, extending it by several hundred kilometres in both directions. The fence had proven only partially effective. Border breaches became less , but they were still an everyday reality. A few years later an even greater construction project started, on a scale the world had not seen since the building of the Great Wall of China. By 2045 ‘The Wall’ was complete: An over 4000km long continuous border keep, with watchtowers every few hundred metres and virtually zero entry points, patrolled by men like this young guard, who was now making Alex’s life difficult.
He looked up at the uniformed boy, and asked him, “What did you say your name was?”
“I didn’t.”
The guard’s voice was defiant, but uncertain.
“Listen, if we are to work together we may as well make acquaintances,” said Alex.
“We are not working together!” said the guard, looking nervous.
Alex made no reply. Oh, but we are, he thought, otherwise both of us will be dead before sunrise. The difficulty was in making this young man understand that by staying alive he would not betray either his country, or his service. He had already done both. And the punishment for that was too obvious.
“You have no other choice,” he said finally, “they will—”
“Stop lecturing me about what they will do, OK? I am one of them, remember?” snapped the guard.
“Not any more. You are with us now.”
“Us? You, me, and who? That?”
The guard made a hand gesture towards the African, who had rolled himself up into a ball in one of the corners and was now humming quietly.
“Him,” said Alex grimly.
The guard did not reply.
“Listen now—” said Alex, but he was interrupted.
“No, you listen, Mr Save-The-Whole-Bloody-World! You got me into this mess, and now you will get me out of it! But first we’ll unload our cargo and travel as light as possible. I have enough difficulties staying alive, without a bloody illegal in tow.”
“I’m not here to save your ass!”
“Probably you will just have to!” hissed the guard between his teeth, and lifted his rifle in a threatening way.
Alex considered him. He did not look much more than twenty, his face still that of a boy. And he was angry. As angry as Alex himself used to be at that age, before it all turned into bitterness. He could understand it. He could perfectly understand it.
“Please, will you listen?” he said. Changing his tone worked like a miracle, the guard visibly calmed down.
“If we want to get out of this alive, we will need to cooperate. As for him… If you don’t like the idea of rescuing him, think of it as your ticket to the other side,” he said.
“Is that where you send them? Beyond the Zones?”
Alex said nothing.
“So tell me about this mighty HUM,” said the guard, not without irony.
“There is nothing much I could tell you. I’m just a field operator. I only make sure they arrive safely at the HQ,” said Alex. And there isn’t much I’m going to tell you, even of the little that I do know, he added to himself.
“So it’s true,” replied the young man.
“So what’s true?” asked Alex, although he knew perfectly well what the other meant.
“About the headquarters. You see, HUM is more like a rumour among the men here. There are never any arrests. No sightings, nothing. Many don’t even believe you folk exist. But you have just said there are headquarters, which means planned and centralised operations.” The guard fell silent, looking thoughtful. “Much like we have,” he added.
That was quite true, although only recently. Alex had been told that only two years before his own involvement, the HUM had been virtually non-existent for many years already, apart from the sporadic attempts by indivi
duals who had still kept the idea of humanitarian aid alive. When the wall was built, the people had stopped coming to Europe. The citizens could finally have a breather, and celebrated this by re-electing the extremist government, under whose rule the project was completed. Of course, keeping people out was not quite enough. Three years later, Europe was ‘purified’, meaning most of its non-European population was either deported or forced into ‘mandatory labour’, which was just a politically correct term for slavery.
Having provided what Europe wanted, the extremists were no longer needed, and in four years’ time the government was discarded as if it never had existed. Slavery was officially abolished, but the fate of people freed from mandatory labour remained uncertain. Still, the history books and the conscience of the European citizens were once again immaculately clear.
The HUM lost its meaning. There was nowhere to take people who, despite the wall blocking their way, started to flood the southern borders again. This time defence was better organised, and those who attempted to scale the wall were simply shot down. Soon the patrol forces declared a 1km broad forbidden zone along the full length of the inside of the border. They flattened every surface object, then burned the whole lot down with a chemical combustion agent. The process was then repeated several times each year, to kill any sprouting greenery. There was nowhere left to hide. Those who made it inside were soon discovered and discarded, and with the security tightening to a maximum this included unauthorised citizens of the US of E as well as any illegal immigrant.
But the HUM came back into existence when a middle aged Englishman called Crowley started organising the sporadic activists, built a headquarters and resurrected the organisation, making it operate with military precision. They began using the old tunnels again, which now served as transport routes for border patrol squadrons and supplies. They moved right under the noses of the patrols, smuggling people on the same routes that soldiers took to go and find them. They operated in the shadows and managed to save hundreds of lives each year.
