As my senses return, I survey the area. It is difficult to determine the death toll on the final day of the battle but there are signs of hastily made mass burials. Still many more corpses lie rotting in the sun. Thousands of spirits dance the mindless cycle of their last moments with me as their only audience. The Capitol building is a smoking rubble. In the distance, the portions of Lansing that still looked inhabited are fogged in smoke and haze. I can tell from the way the sun is blazing across the field that the temperature must be reaching an unbearable high today. My war allies and companions are long gone. I am alone. Leave no man behind is a marine slogan. Grimly I note that I am hardly a man anymore. I climb up upon the wreckage of a drone and take a moment to think.
I have lost so much in the last few days. My wife and friend Joe are both gone. The people who accepted me, Fast Eddie and the Society...gone. Yet I remain. I am not alive and yet I think. I can never again enjoy the taste of a good wine nor hang myself from a tree branch to end my torment. Certainly there is a price to pay for immortality. That price is madness. I could feel it coming on even before my wife was killed. I am no longer human. My last human act was getting myself and that little girl in my hometown killed. But, I have grown powerful. Each life that I took, each malevolent specter that I drained into oblivion has pushed me further away from what I was and more firmly into the realm of who I am. Who am I? I can no more answer that question than a child of four. What am I? Surely I am wise as Socrates, for I can see that I do not know anything. So what have I accomplished? Is Michigan free from tyranny? Is my nation back on the path of freedom? I have no children to dream for. Everyone I know is dead and gone. I am thinking that the best thing to do with a mythological beast like myself is to hide away in a cave far away from humanity and let the ages pass until sweet madness takes me completely for her own.
No! I have slept long enough. That was the one lesson my wife tried to pound through my thick skull. I may go mad, but no longer will I struggle with the slumber of inaction. Even if I act alone and fail completely I have to try to finish what I started. Revenge is only sweet if the victory is complete. But how do I, a single revenant, no more a man, tumble the dominoes that will achieve my purpose? I find that the enemies I have toppled no longer matter as long as there are enemies left who wish to continue sending my nation toward its doom. Somehow I must find a way to Washington D.C. If I can stop the President and his allies, states will find a way to do what we did here in Michigan. But how? I need new allies!
I allow a few more moments to pass in thought and decide before seeking new allies to find out if perhaps the Society left some clue for me to meet up with them. I return to the place where we first swarmed out into Lansing from the tunnel complex. The tunnels are gone. Either the weapons of war destroyed them, or The Society imploded the tunnels to hide their secrets from mankind. Whatever has happened my time with the Society is clearly at an end.
As I continue pondering and walking the field I hear the sounds of digging and scrapping. I see over by the mass graves a small group of people digging up the bodies and pulling metal scraps from the wreckage of the broken war machines. Looters! I can not blame them for doing what they can to survive. I decide to go talk to them.
The hysterical screams of the retreating people reminds me that in my haste, driven by the desire for human company, I forgot entirely about my appearance. In anger I think very hard about my form and find to my astonishment that I can manipulate my appearance. Using a small broken mirror left on the battlefield, I use the force of my will to give myself the lifelike visage of my former mortal body. Satisfied that I can fool people unless they feel my skin, I decide to find some locals, hoping to learn about the current state of affairs and perhaps gain some allies.
Walking for no more than ten minutes I hear the faint moaning of men in the distance. Curious, I head into the direction of the sounds. About two hundred feet away I see a cement bunker smashed in by the force of an ancient oak tree that has fallen on top of it, a victim of a pulse weapon. The tree trunk has completely blocked the entrance to the bunker and only a small shaft provides an escape for the pleas of help from within. I can tell from the bunker that it belongs to the enemy.
As I approach I ask, "Friend, how many are trapped with you?"
Through the air vent a voice says, "Ten men. Four severely wounded. We have run out of water and have had no food the three days since the battle ended. Please help us get out. Go back to Lansing and get my commander. He will bring equipment to break us out."
I view the area and notice a broken troop transport near the downed oak tree. Two of its wheels are missing and the windshield is blown out. There are several dead men inside dressed in Michigan infantry uniforms.
I tell the men in the bunker, "I am going to get you out. Get to the back of the bunker and find whatever you can to shield yourselves. "
Walking away from the protests and pleas, I realize that I must make myself look like them. I don a uniform from one of the dead soldiers...Corporal Rodgers. I chuckle to myself as a I devise a plan to get the men free. I pull out a tow chain and attach it to the front bumper guard on the troop transport. I attach the other end of the chain to the oak tree and secure the chain with pitons I found in the transport hold. I push a dead soldier aside as I step inside the cabin of the troop transport and turn the key. With a terrible banging sound the transport surprised me as it starts up. I shift the beast into reverse as smoke and flames start to drift up from under the hood. The sound of the engine straining is alarming. I soon realize the engine is far too damaged to pull off the oak tree and will soon fail. Quickly I exit the transport, get behind the beast and pull with all of my phantasmal strength. At first nothing happens, then I hear the metal fatigue from the back bumper as I pull with all my might. Focusing all of my power on this one moment I give a mighty tug from the rear of the transport and hear an explosion as I am thrown to the ground. When I get up, the transport is an inferno with deep black smoke billowing out of it but I can see the oak has moved enough to allow people to get out of the entrance to the bunker.
Before I can make it back to the bunker some of the men have pushed the door open and have emerged into the daylight. They look puzzled at the burning transport and then back at me. One of them says to me, "We need to make gurneys for the casualties. Two men have broken legs, a third has a broken ankle and Johnson, well Johnson is about to give up the ghost if we can't get him some help ASAP!"
I say, "Let me attend to Johnson. I'm a medic."
"Well then stop yapping and get in there corporal!" he says.
Yes sir! I say.
I come upon Sargent Johnson. I can see he has severe internal injuries. It looks like a house fell on top of him. I listen to his breathing and I can tell he has only minutes to live.
"The rest of you get out of this bunker and let me work! I say.
They carry off the other wounded men and give me space. I begin to wonder what I have gotten myself into as I find myself alone with this dying man. I must help him live! But how? I can see his spirit pulling away from his mortal form and sooth it back into his body with a gentle hand. Holding onto his spiritual hand I infuse it with energy and clear my head of all thoughts but the unselfish desire to help this man live.
Moments seem to have passed before I notice that Sargent Johnson is trying to sit up. "Thanks corporal! I don't know how the fuck you did that but I was a dead man if you hadn't come along. Let's get the hell out of this coffin."
Johnson and I head outside to the amazement of the men.
"Corporal Rodgers, you are a fucking miracle man son!", their leader says. His insignia says Colonel Martins. "Johnson, I thought you were a fucking dead man! Death aint gonna get you out of KP duty son. If you had listened to me you wouldn't have been french kissing with the grim reaper just now."
Martins orders two of the men to find water cans while the others finish the gurneys. After everyone has had a drink of water and a few pieces of beef jerky they load up the wounded and Martins orders a march back toward Lansing. As we march I notice several of the men whispering and looking back at me. I give them a sharp nod and they turn away from me and continue whispering. A few moments later and several of the men motion to each other in code. They set down the wounded men and suddenly six assault rifles are pointed at me. Col. Martins says, "Seems we got a fucking problem Corporal Miracle Man" You aint Rodgers. Tell me you ain't some sack o shit AWOL sandbagger Miracle Man! You got about ten seconds to clear yourself before you start sweatin bullets."
Johnson says, "Jesus! Don't shoot this man, he just saved my life!" Johnson throws himself in front of me.
Martins says, "You trying to piss on death twice today Johnson? Get the fuck out of the way and that is an order!!"
Thinking quickly I push Johnson aside and I say, "Sir, I don't fuckin know who I am sir. I woke up in some wreckage. My uniform was gone. Some looter probably cleaned me out. I seen Rodgers was dead and didn't need that uniform no more so I borrowed it until I can get new clothes and get my head on straight."
"Miracle man, you asking me to get down on my knees and jerk you off?" says Martins.
"No sir, that's the truth as best as I know it. Soon as I can remember I will tell you who I am." I say
Martins orders his men to stand down. "Miracle man if your story don't check out I will personally roast you on a spit and dump your carcass in Ann Arbor."
"My story will check out sir!" I say. Martins seems satisfied for now but he orders his men not to let me have any weapons.
We walk for a while longer and take a rest in a depression in the ground. While we are resting several men scout ahead and notice other depressions near. An image of Herb begins to form in my mind when one of them says. "Its the turtle! Sir it is heading southeast toward Lake Erie."
Martins says, "Johnson mark our position. We need to get these wounded men to base ASAP, find some reinforcements and recapture the beast."
I ask, "Col. Martins sir, how do you know the turtle is in enemy hands?"
Martins says, "I saw a bunch of the enemy thick as thieves rappel up the side of the turtle like something out of a fucking Star Wars movie!" For some reason the hatches were open. The turtle don't need many men, so I am sure it was overrun. We got to get that machine back in the hands of the good guys and kill those rebels!"
I nod silently and we continue our march back to Lansing without further incident. I have no idea what I am going to do now but I better come up with a plan quick!