When I was thinking of Walt's reaction, I envisioned two entirely different reactions: the one I posted and another one where he would get supremely pissed (pardon my French). I decided to go with the former because I kinda see it as his last line of defense. He knows if he allows himself to get angry, there is a very real possibility that he'll go too far, so he's trying not to let himself feel that by laughing it off. We'll see if it works. ;)

"Ex-general Biggerstaff..." Adam said, with a twinge of curiosity in his voice. He still held Eve close to him, but now turned his head to look at Walt, oblivious of Nadine's presence. "Of all people, I would have expected a commanding officer to have shown less sentimentality over their crimes against their fellow man. Perhaps not all military 'suits' stew in the languorous illusion of their own power, and do have a loving heart after all."

"...and perhaps humanity hasn't tried to shamelessly destroy itself for the entirety of it's own recorded existence." The coldness was back. "You can't escape yourself. Consider the man before you the living testament to over a generation-worth of struggle, for a man to try and rid that bleak scar from his heart and soul..."
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The convoy of trucks raced along the road, hastily traveling towards the town. The troops were divided, half keeping the airbase intact, the other half heading to defend the village.

And yet, amidst all the chaos, one soldier had deserted his post. Hidden within the crowded throng of fellow soldiers, Zachary Addams didn't think twice about the air-tower, or the pleas of his friend as he had left.

The bombings were abrupt, the minutes of silence pierced by the explosions of the raiders behind and in front. It seemed like they were lessening in frequency in the town, as the tell-tale explosions and sounds of puttering engines in the skies above seemed more distant than they had before.

Very abruptly, the truck-- it's canvas covering the soldiers as they were crammed into the lining bench around the bed, the steady bumping along the dirt road --came to a screeching halt. The soldiers poured out. From there, things seemed to move in a blur.

Gunshots. Cries. Flame. Madness.

It was a miracle Zachery survived that initial assault. As the hours passed, neither side seemed to be gaining any high-ground over the other, and the aerial combat had long since left to the airbase, ending the threat of further bombings.

Another hour, or what felt like it, and the world went silent.
The sun began to set, and the initial coup had been repelled. A smashing first stage in the victory that eventually came. But there was still a day and a half before all enemy fighters were expunged from the land.

Zachery was still in the middle of the war. And it was war. Now that the defense line had been breached, the enemy had dispersed into the city, fleeing in panic or to gain the advantage in guerrilla tactics. He never knew, he never cared. All Zachery wanted, was to find someone.

"...take the forward flank, we'll provide cover and backup." Spoke the corporal to the unit of surviving soldiers, Zachery among those listening.
"Roger that. Blue company, move!"

Down the street, each building was routinely checked for surviving insurgents or militants. Occasionally, groups of the enemy were found, and for every handful that they managed to dispatch, a man among their squad was lost in crossfire.

Soon, Zachery was on his own as the divisions of remaining infantry forced him to split up,to cover more ground. It was careless, desperate.
Creeping in the shadows of the streets, he carefully but surely lived. Surviving, and continuing his duty as well. By now, until reinforcements arrived, surviving and following orders was all there was left.

But through the hopelessness, something shined through. The mechanical dullness in Zachery's eyes suddenly lifted when he realized where he was, and how close to her he had to be. Bound for a small schoolhouse tucked neatly at the edge of the town, Zachery was only three blocks away, which he recklessly covered as fast as he could.


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The schoolhouse was a old single-room building, with a playground in the yard of simple swings and monkey bars. It was a classic-style elementary school, the one where all grades had the same class, and all learned together.

The doorway was broken down, and several windows broken. The lessening light from the evening sky left it dark, hard to see inside from the shadow of the buildings that Zachery hid in. 'If there is anything... anything there, to let me know she is safe. First, I have to make sure that... that there are no enemies hidden within.'

Crawling along the ground, he was blanketed in the widening darkness, the sun leaving him behind the remaining buildings in the opposite direction. Still, the insides of the schoolhouse were dark and unlit, but no sure sign that it wasn't occupied.

Five, ten, twenty minutes passed as Zachery squirmed low across the ground, remaining as unseen as he could, until he finally reached the building. His heart beat, remembering visiting here once before with her, even talking to the kids once for her class about the war effort and how they could help; it was all showy, a softened game of sorts, to entertain them and educate them in the bare meanings of war, while leaving them their innocence on the subject of war and--

The air stank. It wasn't musky, but there was a heavy scent in the air, that grew stronger as Zachery approached the building entrance from his low position. His heartbeat thumped heavy in his chest.
Gripping his rifle tightly, he leaned into the doorway, into the darkness. His heartbeat steadily increased.
A scrapping sound nearly made him pull the trigger right then and there. And the smell, it was definitely from inside the building...
Putting caution to the wind, he pulled out an electric torch, a standard equipment utility tucked in one of the belt around his chest, flicking it on and casting the light across the room.



Small and large bodies littered the ground, the smell was...

...and in the far corner, a figure, huddled up and sitting facing away from the door, in the pool of...

...she was shivering violently, a knife in her hand. And Zachery's heart skipped a beat.

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The memories were fresh in his mind, tormenting him as they always had: a torturer towards a victim long since gone numb to the pain.
"I have trouble buying that a pup at your age was ever a leader... but I've witnessed worse. Children used as foot-soldiers, and as living mobile-explosives. Boys, with their voices still cracking, walking off into the sunset, to give that lonely letter their mothers receive years later the source for the following anguish. ...men, women, children, slaughtered indiscriminately: for fear of ambush, for fear that tactics we so despise will be used against us, while it is us that perpetrates these terrible atrocities, for the greater good, for need, for fun-- us, the great and enlightened 'human' race. Evie was...

"Heheh..Heheheheh... Ha! Have you ever pondered the meaning of the word 'inhumane'? Despite being spelled with the word 'inhuman', it's such a humanly characteristic; to cast aside your morals, 'just that once', over and over. ...the true ferocity of the human spirit is its capacity for destruction for the sake of a pleasure called 'justice'. What truly makes us different from beasts, who kill each other for a pound of flesh-- to take that life from one to further their own time and live another day; so instinctual --is that we lack that need. But we have toys, and an imagination on how to use them."


"In case you haven't been following my rant, General, I've become disillusioned. I've lived war since I was in my early twenties, for my old and for my now-forever nations. I mean it when I say that I have seen it all. There are very little surprises in combat left for me. Oh, OH! Th-that angel was a new one! To think that THEY DO exist, and yet we live this way! I would have KILLED to live in a world totally dominated by a force of order, under some divine power-- and yet that is the irony! We fight for justice and peace and order as soldiers, yet all the banners and gold medals... it is because of our struggle for peace that we continue this fight against our brethren.

"Mankind fights for what is right. What is right. Each man in the world has their own vision of right and wrong, and very often, it ends with the choice of 'them or not them'. Black and white. Right is merely what we fight for, against those who have a different 'right'. Who's to say what you have done is right or not? Who's to say what I have done is? Who is to say that angels are what is right?

"...but you regret it. You made ideals for yourself that, up until a point, worked best for you then. And when your heart couldn't bear the guilt, when your mind's psychosomatic limitations were wracked with stress, you changed your ideals. O' piteous soul, how tormented are you, that you must deny yourself your heart for the sake of... not letting anybody die, right? I've read you like an open book... You had no true reason to fight, and just like all the Tommys and Bobbies that rush to the battlefield, you never stopped to think about who's future graves you trampled over as you prepared their occupants to fill them... both 'them' and 'you'.

"How many lives have you slain, kid? The blood on your hands still not quite washed off? Can you account for all your men under your command, and for all those they too led into battle? Can you account for the sorrow of the families of each fallen soldier on any side? For the suffering the children and brothers, sisters and mothers had to endure when they learned that some monsters took their boys and husbands? For those friends and coworkers who suddenly have a gaping hole in their hearts that cannot ever, ever be filled? For those countless faces who decide to, in consequence of that ONE death, march off to the forefront with helmet on head and bandoleer polished bright? For those who go off to fight the 'menace' for their country, nation, leaders, democracy, dictator, friends, family, freedom or fallen? Can you account for the fact that it is those monsters that you had to fight in battle who so, too, strung a weaving web like your boys-- that you are the monsters in battle to their boys-- that the mirror is polished quite sharply as the tin soldiers march so willingly into the furnace!?!"

"On a single life, the hearts and souls of many countless people break--"
Adam ceased talking, panting slightly. The words suddenly felt hollow to him. 'Catharsis on the enemy,' He pondered absently. "...can you..." Adam said, but again stopped, at a loss for words after expending so many. He zoned out briefly, his mind wandering wearily, resting again and again on the woman who knelt before him, and on his students. 'Raidou...' "...No, not can you... will you account for the children, who have died... or were never given the chance of life... because you... stopped fighting...?"

((*torrent ends* I counted it as being over three pages long in a word processing application.
Guh, this is what happens when I don't RP for a while: writers buildup. XD))