Project Boussh: The Dark, Gory War By Josh Cochran Blood was everywhere. Even though it was long dried, I carefully watched my step to avoid placing my foot in it. It lay in dried pools on the floor and ran down the wall in long, maroon streaks. Red rivers had run in the mortar between flooring stones, creating a gruesome latticework at my feet. It even clung quite inexplicably to the ceiling in a few places. A crew was washing the gore away back near the stairs, but they hadn't yet made it this far in their efforts to clean up the evidence of last night's battle. In fact, the bodies of stormtroopers still littered the floor in front of me. Despite the air conditioning in this part of the High Palace being turned down as far it would go, the acrid scent of rotting flesh was beginning to fill the corridor. No doubt about it, this was the exact place I'd been looking for. In front of me lay the bodies of the first stormtrooper squad I'd eliminated. There was no mistaking the bottomless black hole in the back of the helmet of the trooper on the right, nor the ocean of blood in which he and his former comrades lay. I'd come in search of this very spot, but facing it now was almost more than I could bear. I was vaguely disturbed the night before at the entry wound in the back of the helmet and the bright red blood flowing freely from the front. Now the sight of it and the smell rising from it made my gorge rise. It threatened to relieve me of the small dinner I'd eaten after my conversation with Sci. I fought it back, unwilling to allow myself the relief it would bring. Unwilling to show weakness, even to myself. I'd come here to see if the battle was as bad as I remembered it, and found it to be far worse. My mind reeled at the thought that I had personally taken the lives whose remains were rotting before me. It'd been so easy and seemed so right at the time. I'd come to help people who needed it, and these people stood in my way. They were the enemy and just as easily eliminated as the enemies I faced in the air. They were invaders from another galaxy. Their deaths were nothing because they were nothing. Now, with their lives spilled out on the stone tiles around me, it no longer seemed quite so clear. The clean up crew arrived with stretchers to remove the bodies. They wore thick rubber overboots and medical gloves and their faces were covered with surgical masks. Unlike me they made no effort to avoid stepping in the dried blood. Their boots were already caked in it. They moved slowly and stiffly, and I realized it must have been quite a long day for them. The bodies had been removed from all the other parts of the palace I'd been through, and since this was the eleventh floor of the central tower I assumed this was one of the last places they would need to visit. Two of the medical corpsmen reached down to lift the body of the stormtrooper I'd executed at such close range. One slipped and nearly dropped the corpse, and the helmet fell from his head. The vacant blue eyes of the stormtrooper stared straight at me. What was left of his face was dark skinned and painfully young. He couldn't have been even old enough to drink when his life ended. When I ended his life. The moment lasted but a second before the corpsman recovered the body and lifted it onto the stretcher. He also picked up the shattered helmet and placed it none too gently back onto the remains of the head it had been meant to protect. The corpse's gaze lasted long enough, though. I realized as soon as I saw his face that he was no highly trained, professional Imperial stormtrooper. He was just a Mendellian conscript who'd been told to put on armor and carry a gun to defend his home from people attacking it. It was a familiar idea, since I'd spent the most important years of my life preparing to do the same thing. I'd seen the face of my enemy and he was me. Only through a supreme effort did I manage not to vomit this time. I found a clean spot and sunk to the floor, tears threatening to burst from my eyes. I fought them as hard as I could. If I could kill those people I certainly should be able to face their deaths without crying like a little girl. I didn't know what to think or do, so I thought and did nothing. I sat staring at the opposite wall for longer than I could tell. My mind tempted me with a million possible trains of thought. Self recriminations sprang up, as did deep sorrow, guilt, pity, and a deep hatred of myself. In the end I rejected them all and sat there exploring the deep hollowness I discovered in my heart. As I sat, the rest of the bodies were removed and the coroner crew left. Another crew came to clean the blood from the floor. The floor, walls, and even ceiling again their normal grey color, the cleaning crew also left. Both crews ignored me as I sat on the floor trying to draw myself into the smallest form possible and hide in plain sight from the rest of the world. I have no idea how long I sat there. In the back of my mind I knew it was quite a long while, considering the amount of work done around me. The cleaning crew had left the hallway almost insanely clean. Not a spot of blood or a black blaster burn remained in the stone passage to mark the events to which it played host. In my heart it was a mockery of the dead that the reminders of their death had been so easily swept away. I could shoot those people down in cold blood and within a few hours, a blink of an eye in the grand scheme of things, every trace of their passing could be wiped away and I could go on about my life without having to answer for my actions. In that moment all the pain and anguish that had been welling up inside me burst my heart. I fell the rest of the way to the cold stone floor and watched in detached fascination as a new puddle formed on the floor. Instead of dark red, though, this one was crystal clear and flowed unabated from my own eyes.