Guards

Guards

Two guards on the door, just gotta take ‘em out and bingo, getting through will be simple. To get this far, four other pairs of guards would have had to be disposed of, not to mention slipping past the ton in the corridor. But then again the grenade would have done ‘em all; nice ’n easy. Guards are disposable. They are just there to be disposed of. Do they even guard? Not when they are disposed they don’t.

These are the things running through my mind right now. I know I know... I’m a mature man but I have an avid imagination, don’t judge me for it- You see, you and me, we are the guards by the door.

It’s a nice door too. Stainless steel, electronic and slides so smoothly its like... an ice-cube on ice. I’m standing on the right, when I say right I mean my right, for the potential attacker it would be the left. The door operating controls are on my side, they seem pretty fancy. Fingerprint scan, numbered pass-code, though even though it looks like a beauty its case seems rather flimsy. I could easily throw in a bit of muscle in and rip it off the wall; if I was the infiltrator, that is. You are standing on the opposite side, the left. We are both dressed identically, black outfit, dark tinted visor covering our faces. In fact, if I was the attacker I wouldn’t be able to tell us apart. We are both about the same height. Relatively well built, though I'd say you maybe a little better than me. Neither of us has any remarkable characteristics, not fat, thin, tall, short. Of course if you take back the visors you’ll see how different we really are, different faces, different hair colours, different eye colours. But you don’t take off the visors. That’s a big no, the boss wouldn’t be impressed.

She calls herself Velvet La Valle, a really intense name if you ask me, especially since all she does is run this powerful company from behind the scenes letting all the hired thugs do the physical work for her. Some of her more personal ones run all the errands; collecting debts, doing the shopping, making deals. I suppose you could say that we are ‘hired thugs’ too in a way, though I wouldn’t call us thugs. We just do our job, wear uniforms, I don’t even think either of us have reverted to violence of any form before either. Holding this gun in my arms makes me feel out of place, like I’m something I’m not; pretending. I bet you feel just as uncomfortable, you look pretty sleek but you’re quite quiet. I doubt you’d hurt a fly.

I know its a weird thing for a guard to be thinking these things, but I wont deny it. I am absolutely bored. My legs feel stiff, the balls of my feet aching. This room is so boring, its just plain white, metallic and clean. What’s on the other side of the door is much more interesting, but oh no, we have to guard the boring side of the door. No wonder I imagine such outlandish stuff.

The air conditioning suddenly stops working. It’s a subtle machine, delivered by an air duct. You don’t so much feel it as hear it go off. The noise, which had been presumed as background static, revert to silence. Awkward silence.

It’s only awkward because I’m making it awkward, sure. Why is it my fault that as soon as the subtle hiss of breeze stops it suddenly feels awkward. Surely there is something making it awkward. Guards don’t tend to make small talk while on the job; always silent, and staunch. I don’t remember any rules against it. Perhaps if it was something serious and relevant. I pluck up my breath.

“Did the air duct just go off?” My voice sounds muffled, filtered behind the helmet. It doesn’t sound like me.

You turn your head toward me. I can’t see your face but under the visor I can just tell there is that expression: Really? Isn’t it damn obvious it just went off. I bite my lip, luckily you can’t see that. I elaborate to justify my statement.

“Because that’s really unusual, this place is so efficient, something like that wouldn’t just go off unless there was some major malfunction.” This seems to grab your legitimate attention. You mumble something and step forward looking up at the ceiling. The grab the barrel of your gun and use it to tap the back against the duct. The first time the gun has ever come in use.

I step forward. “Wait,” you gruffly say, holding up your palm toward me. I wait and we both stand in silence. There is a soft ticking or rapping sound filling the air but it is faint, I can barely hear it. This helmet doesn’t help for listening.

“You hear that?” You ask very quietly. I make a decision and lift off my helmet between both gloved hands so I can get a better listen. Your concealed face once again turns to me and stares. It’s not like you haven’t seen my face before. Is my loosely-tied blond hair and gaunt cheeks really that surprising? I know in contrast you keep yourself looking neat, but maybe I just have something on my face.

“Yeah, I can hear it.” I say, mimicking your soft tone.

“You’ve...mmmfh,” I hear your reply, the words are still muffled.

“I’m sorry?”

“I said you’ve got a little something,” You say, gesturing to your cheek. I rub my my own cheek, feeling for whatever you are talking about.

“No, up a bit.”

“Here?”

“No..” You reach up to my face and try to rub it off. You don’t have to be so rough. You take a look then try again.

“Won’t come off.”

“What is it?”

“Smudge or something, soot, marker. Something.” You wave your hand, “forget it.”

I nod then dare a glance up at the security camera in the corner. The tapping grows louder.

“Right.” I soon say, sounding more determined, “Lets figure out what this is.”

I end up the one hoisted up onto your shoulders, being that I am just the slightest bit smaller and lighter. I fiddle with the latch to the duct and take quite a while trying to wobble it open. I try hard not to glance again at the security camera. Whoever is behind that will be having a good laugh. Maybe they will send reinforcements. But for what? As soon as the gratings is open I stuck my head up into it. I expect to see a square, crawlable-sized tunnel but instead it is a flat but round form of pipe and made out of a semi-clear white plastic. The lights shine through it, making the situation bright and blinding. I can’t even fit my head all the way in. The sound echoes right into my ears.

And then I see it, a sort of round-ball probe thing, rolling its way down toward me. I squeeze in my hand and manage to grab it. It vibrates in my palm then starts to make an urgent beeping sound.

I feel your shoulders wobble beneath me as you yell something out desperately. I hear a huge crack, a terrible noise and you fall away from beneath my legs, taking me down with you. We both land with a thump. I sit up, at the other end of the hall is a man clad in black and a nifty belt holding a hand gun. He looks so much like the agent I had always imagined to attack up. A realisation comes over me. The crack was the sound of his gun, I had never heard something quite like it before. The thing in my hand beeps more rapidly. I don’t think twice, I throw it right at the man. It explodes. He has been destroyed by his own device. I move over urgently to you and as I touch you my hands come back red. The source of blood is coming from your chest, but near your upper right shoulder. You are groaning.

The room is suddenly filled with our clones, each one marching in, holding a gun just like we have been trained. Velvet’s high-ranking henchman walks down the middle and investigates the exploded man.

He doesn’t care about us. He doesn’t care that I saved the place. He doesn’t care that you are bleeding out. It doesn’t matter to whom, our own side or the enemy. We are disposable.

We are just guards.