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SpineOut : June - July 2018
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Liane, Year 8 Loyola College Watsonia Vic It all started with a funeral. Michael had a vague idea as to whose it was; some guy from his platoon section. Some guy who had died in his arms, bleeding from the wound in his stomach. Michael didn’t care about the guy personally. He’d been ordered to attend this ‘celebration’ to take a break. Not that he wanted to. He would have preferred to be still out there, fighting for his country. The lines in the barracks were his home. They were a place where no one knew his past, where no one called him by his real name. He’d always hated his name. Michael Denson-Caleb. Major Michael ‘Frosty’ Denson-Caleb. That was his full title in the army, but people just called him Frost or Frosty. It was a reflection on his behaviour, a nickname he’d gotten from a sergeant at his first unit. Michael watched, emotionless, as the dead man’s sister was led away. The captain of the M-Force Unit, the special military group Michael was in, stood up. Automatically, the members of the team stood as well, all standing in front of the coffin in orderly fashion. Michael was at the front. He was the highest-ranking member now that the man in front of him was dead. They did a silent salute after the captain finished talking. Michael listened as the captain talked about how smart and courageous Gilbert ‘Happy Gil’ Barlos (he’d seen the movie Happy Gilmore 150 times) had been. How he’d taken more bullets for others than what could be counted on the captain’s eight fingers. It was interesting, listening to him talk, but Michael was still bored as hell. He longed for the cold metal of a pistol in one hand, the weight of his webbing digging into his shoulders. The section returned to their places, some men bowing their heads. Michael kept his up, watching as different people went up to the lectern to tell their different stories. Sometimes shallow ripples of laughter would pass through the crowd, all hollow, all forlorn. Occasionally a broken sob echoed throughout the hall. Michael didn’t care about this. He wanted to go home. He wanted to be useful. He couldn’t help the light sigh of relief that escaped his lips when he heard that the service was finishing up. There was a prayer at the end, but Michael didn’t care to mutter along to it. He’d never believed in God. He saw other men kneeling beside their beds, murmuring prayers, blessing themselves, reading their pocket missal with a flashlight under the threadbare blankets they’d been issued. Believing in someone you couldn’t see seemed like a lot of work for Michael, and he devoted all his will to work for his country, good old Australia. He knew exactly what he needed to do to be the best soldier in the army now. It all started with a funeral. SSHORT STORIES pine Out JUNE / JULY 2018 I t all started with a funeral
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