VICTIMS
AND CASUALTIES
“He did it in cold blood.” As if to say that I was as mindless as a
reptile, only acting on some monster like instinct. Another example of delicate language, in this
case, designed to convey that my actions were subhuman, or at least beyond the
rational, warm blooded virtues of modern men.
This label only works for killers of victims, of course. Killers of casualties
are to be filed under a different label, laminated with a moral acceptance, but
only if the killing is done in the service of god and country.
During
my shell shock vacation in France, I was a maker of casualties. I had a knack for turning blonde haired, blue
eyed German boys into hamburger for the worms.
I once kicked open a latrine door to find a pretty Nazi taking a shit
for Hitler. He put one hand out while covering his small fascist dick with the
other. “Nein, nein, ne…” I wiped his ass with lead and thought nothing
of the fact that he was armed with only a roll of toilet paper.
Turns
out he was an SS Sniper with enough kills to open a small American graveyard in
Normandy. I think about the endless
hours he must have spent, perched in a bell tower, or concealed on the balcony
of some French bakery. Never moving,
never giving up his position, even if it meant defecating in his uniform and lying
with the mess for a week. I don’t know
how or why he left himself so exposed and defenseless that day, but the outcome
would result in two makers of casualties, one dead on the shitter, the other
with a medal from Uncle Sam.
The
only thing that made us any different was the symbols on our sleeves. His just happened to be the one that meant, “Kill
this mother fucker!” Then again, mine probably
meant the same to him. It was his symbol
that made killing so easy for me. What
it stood for, all that it represented. I
figured that any man that would bare a fucking swastika must be a supporter of
genocide and a breeder of hate.
It
was this very symbol, the banner of all my war casualties, which would bring me
to take my first victim. It happened almost
thirteen years after the war ended. Enough time to make the thought of killing
a man seem hard again. Then, with the simple act of unveiling a greenish black tattoo
from behind a red paisley bandanna, I saw “Kill this mother fucker!” A fist sized swastika across his Adams apple,
might as well have been a target that read “Stab here.”
He
didn’t know it at the time, but he had just made himself as assailable as an unarmed
Nazi taking a shit behind allied lines.
There are days when I feel bad about the men I killed in war, but not even
one second of carving new breathing holes for that jackass brings me any sorrow
or guilt. I don’t know how I know this, but the bastard deserved every second
of it and I don’t regret turning him into a victim. If only I would have realized that by
sentencing him to death, I would be sentencing myself to something much worse.
****
With the judgments of man, Hell is
sure to follow.
