Glitches Ad Infinitum

Chapter One: Alpha, Bravo, Charlie, Delta, ect.

A hot, sandy dune in the middle of the desert surrounded a small urban slum bombed by the ravages of a very unspecific modern war. The nation of Apatheticistan. There were several American soldiers entering a large, multi-story apartment complex, all armed to the teeth.

“Alpha Ghost, come in Alpha Ghost…” a voice on a staticy radio could be heard as a burly white man dressed in desert combat gear stood beside five other identical and equally burly white men. They were all holding rifles and awkwardly bobbing up and down like they were stepping on hot coals or collectively busting for a piss.

“This is Bravo Shrapnel, come in Alpha Ghost…” could be heard again as the six burly white men stood around a small congestive dark brown hallway. Vague noises of Middle Eastern throat music could be heard inexplicably in the background though none of them seemed to notice.

“Alpha Ghost here, is your squad in position?” the voice finally replied. The man responded with a downplayed “of course, ready to breach, oorah!” His voice sounded like a sentient gravel driveway learned how to speak English.

“Get breaching’ Bravo Shrapnel, eliminate any resistance and remember to keep the VIP safe” the voice concluded. The burly white guy turned his attention to the center burly man, their faces marked with the exact same shaven head of hair and knuckle box skull shape. “Get these charges placed, Shampoo, we’re all counting on you”.

The man in the center responded with only a slight sway of his brow and soon walked towards a small ill-fitted flimsy looking wooden door. He began placing C4 charges around the crumbling drywall.

“Very good, Shampoo”. “Alright, everybody in positions marines, let’s win another day for democracy” the man said. He placed his free hand upon Shampoo’s shoulder before gesturing for the other marines to line up behind him.

“BREACH IT!” the burly white marine yelled, Shampoo promptly taking a small detonator out from his pocket and pushing the large red button placed upon it. The charges exploded with excessive force as the walls surrounding the flimsy wooden door blew up into tiny dusty pieces of fire and brown smoke.

Time itself seemed to inexplicably slow down as Shampoo rushed in with a large decorated assault rifle adorned with bright crimson camo to cunningly hide his weapon from the enemy should he ever fall into a volcano. There was a small etched signature in the metal that seemed to read ‘Xxg1zz4L1f369xX’.

Shampoo entered the room, weapon in hand and with the other marines following soon behind him. Much to their surprise there were no terrorists or even any suspicious looking brown people to shoot. There was nothing but dust and slow motion particles filling their collective blurring sight.

The slow-motion would not cease as Shampoo awkwardly swung his entire body from left to right to examine the area. He looked upon every detail of the empty room seeing only bits of minimal furnishing.

There were a few menacing looking assault rifles hanging from hooks on the walls along with a handful of empty picture frames. Lined along near a window was a large red flag with indiscernible scribblings that vaguely resembled nondescript Arabic writing.

There was very little furniture, only a small single bed adorned with spent shell casings spread across the dirty brown sheets. There was also a second flimsy door leading to another room as well as a single inconspicuous wooden coffee table flipped on its side drawing the marine’s attention.

The slow-motion finally ceased as Shampoo looked around the room, standing just outside the blown open entrance. “Um… Alpha Ghost, I think there may be a…” one of the soldiers attempted to speak over the radio.

He was quickly interrupted by the aforementioned inconspicuous coffee table. It suddenly started growing a large skirted black table cloth that seemed to carry it above the floor.

It rose from the ground, confusing and frightening the hardened marines to no end. They readied their weapons like confused monkeys while staring at some sort of threatening anti-gravity banana.

“What the hell is that!” one of the soldiers cried out as without warning the coffee table began to charge forward. The collective marines fired their assault rifles with all the discipline and accuracy of a drunken fratboy at a paintball game.

Bullets were disappearing from sight as they created only painted black spots in the wood that closely resembled bullet-holes. Despite their efforts nothing could cease the perilous assault of the menacing furniture.

The furious immortal coffee table charged directly at Shampoo. He was knocked to the ground with the magnanimous impact of well-varnished steady craftsmanship and blunt force smacking him across the head. The table suddenly grew arms cut from the same black table-cloth and swiftly took to opportunity it had created to disarm Shampoo.

The two wrestled for the weapon briefly. The table swiftly overpowered him and backed away, quickly holding all the marines at gunpoint.

“I’m only going to give you this one chance” the table said. “Let me walk out that door… uh, hole, whatever; now and nobody will get shot!” The table’s gun was directly pointed at Shampoo as he stood stock still in front of the rest of his squadron. He pulled out his tiny sidearm while the other marines stepped forward.

“No chance, we don’t negotiate with terrorists or their furniture!” one of the marines shouted as the squad let loose a second volley of ineffective assault rifle barrages. Shampoo fired alongside the marines, his pistol lost in the miasma of lead and loud noises, doing little in the way of actual damage other than to the nearest, unfortunate ear-drum.

Shampoo soon dropped his sidearm and pulled out his knife, the shining one-hit power practically glowing in his hand. He flung himself towards the table, the wiley furniture simply chuckling and stating “okay then” before firing the stolen weapon at Shampoo.

He died almost instantly as he fell back on a wave of flying lead. The table soon turned its weapon towards the other marines. “Last chance, um, again!” “Let me…” the table attempted to speak only for the marines to interrupt it once more with even more thoughtful negotiation.

“Keep firing, men!” the burly white guy yelled, the third wave of gunfire soon proving just as effective as the second and the first. “Fine then!” the table said before firing the rifle continuously with one arm. It was blind and without accuracy yet still struck every single marine and dropped them dead within seconds.

The table finally dropped the… table, revealing herself not to be furniture at all but rather a woman. She was a nameless Middle-eastern civilian with long dark hair dressed in a black hijab and garb.

After the firing ceased she darted her sight back and fourth in a twitchy manner. A sudden small burst of white lightning struck itself across her hand and with every spark she paid it wrapped attention.

“Again with this stuff…” she muttered to herself, looking at the bolts of mysterious electricity. Every surge of power seemed to be almost random to her, some creating a painful burning sensation while other times simply shooting out practically unnoticed.

The nameless woman looked over the disappearing corpses in front of her, her stolen rifle also vanishing soon after. “Holy shit!” she exclaimed as she looked back briefly at the discarded table.

She walked over to the blown open hole next to the wooden door and held her hand out. The white lightning sparked violently again and yet when she tried to push forward she simply couldn’t.

It felt like there was some sort of invisible wall in front of her. She held her hand to her chin. “A cage then…” she grumbled a little, ending with an exacerbated sigh.

The bodies disappeared one by one, slowly fading from her sight completely into distorted smoke. The bloodstains left behind marks of red splashes from where the bodies once laid.

“Guessing maybe they need to be alive or something…” she mumbled to herself or at least attempted to only for her attention to be drawn to the second door along the side of the room.

The woman could hear muffled gagging and yelling from the closet. She ran over to the flimsy door and opened it with an enthusiastic swing.

Inside the closet were two men. One had a grungy appearance and the other looked exactly the same only with a sporting curly beard and large scar across his face. Both of these people were tied up with thick white ropes and both gagged with an oily brown sock in their mouths.

“Almost got through this time” she said, the two men continuing to squirm and struggle against their bindings. “It was the table; in almost every firefight when those marines would charge in it would never break even when it got riddled with gunfire”.

“I picked it up and used it as a shield and even killed them” the woman exposited for her captives. Both men simply continued their routine of pointless struggle as she paid them little actual mind. “They always come back though, just like me, so I’m sure this victory is only finite”.

“Not a total success, but a success nonetheless”. “I can feel it, this time… I’m finally getting out of this place” the woman smiled with restrained breaths as she sighed steadily. “Something’s out there, or maybe everything’s out there, I just need to get past that damn door first”.

“Maybe I’ll find out why those marines keep dying and coming back”. “Why I keep dying and coming back”.

“No one seems to… you know, die”. “I remember being blown up, that isn’t something someone should remember”. “I mean, it’s blurry but… actually, each time it gets worse…” she continued, stopping in silence shortly afterwards.

“There are these little… shadows, you know” she continued talking to the metaphorical wall. “Memories without details, this whole world, this place, I feel like I’ve been here before”. “You know what I mean?” she asked, neither man nodding or even reacting.

“I know, It’s difficult to explain, and neither of you probably care” she said. “But really the two of you, kidnapping me and all, I feel like you guys are just as trapped as me, you know” she suggested.

“I mean, you’ve died, I’ve died, it’s really confusing, all of us are still here”. “It seems so obvious in retrospect and yet only now I’ve noticed, something has to be wrong here”.

She felt her own hand, rubbing her wrist gently as the white lightning slowly dissipated. “Every time I die, it all seems to slowly go away, I… I have no idea why” she stated. “Just a guess but if I die again I’m not sure I’ll remember any of this, so I’d prefer to not die like its routine”.

“Besides, it really fucking hurts regardless”. “I just need answers, and out there is as good a bet as any to find them”. “But I’ve broken my pattern in this… whatever the fuck it is, I might be able to go without dying at least once…”

“Don’t worry though, I’ll send for you two after I escape” she reassured, patting her hand on one of the men’s head and kneeling down. “But for now I just can’t trust the two of you, I know how you act”.

“…Get breaching’ Bravo Shrapnel, and remember to keep the VIP safe…” the woman could hear. They were the same voices of the exact same burly white men that blew up her walls heard clearly once again.

“So soon already?!” the woman smiled. “Alright, this is it, wish me luck!” she said as she shut the closet. The men inside writhed in panic and almost maddening perceived pain as they rocked back and fourth, struggling desperately against their bindings.

One of them soon managed to loosen his ropes but the woman didn’t notice as she simply walked away from the door.

The woman ran back to the center of the room noticing the coffee table back in its original location. The bloodstains from the dead marines were completely gone and the massive holes that her walls once had the tactful job of surrounding the front door were now unexploded.

The woman breathed with an excited shake as she grabbed the table like a shield and knelt down. She was suddenly caught off-guard however when just behind her the closet door violently swung open at the same time the breaching walls exploded.

Her attention was fractured and divided. She turned around briefly in shock to see the two men she had tied up rushing towards her. They frantically ran into their designated positions like an amateur stage production on cocaine ten seconds to curtain.

The bearded one violently wrestled the table away from the woman, bringing her closer to his itchy facial hair as he held her in place like a hostage. The second man grabbed one of the assault rifles off of the wall before turning around to face the miasmic cloud of dust and slow-motion filtering.

“No, I’m so close, don’t…” the woman attempted to plea, the white lightning on her hand suddenly sparking but then dimming as she felt her struggling energy leave her. The two men got into their positions, both smiling with a subtle expression of relief as the marines quickly entered the room.

Shampoo took point once again with his pimped out douche-rifle. The barrel pierced through the thick blanket of gun-metal grey dust and dog-shit brown environment of the unimaginative color palette fireworks display.

Shampoo aimed the barrel of the gun, a red laser pointer over-looking the skull of the terrorist much to the bearded man’s glee. “No… you don’t have to…” the woman said, panting with escaping breath as it became seemingly futile to struggle any further.

Shampoo took the shot or rather took the twenty-two shots. He sprayed his gaudy rifle across the room, bullets flying just overhead like a violent windstorm of lead.

The bearded man fell down in a splash of blood and exposed bones, his equally nameless friend following soon afterwards. He let off a few paltry token shots with his rifle, all of them missing seemingly on purpose.

The second man soon fell as the spray of never-ending lead reached his waiting smile, breathing a sigh of relief as his last breath in this life. The woman stood in dumbfounded surprise as she turned around, seeing the bodies of her ‘captures’ dead in a puddle of blood and gun-juice.

She shook with fear, she knew what came next after this part and she was not looking forward to it. She could feel her hands twitching nervously. Her palm was suddenly weighted and gripping something she dared not look at.

“The VIP is safe, it’s finally over Marines”. “Secure the perimeter” the head marine ordered; the other soldiers quickly following him as he slowly approached the woman, swaggering like an invincible American Hero. “So close… I was so damn close…” the woman angrily sighed.

“Are you alright, ma’am?” he asked with professional enthusiasm, the woman not responding as the Marine gently placed his open hand on her shoulder. His predictable expression showed itself. The routine, the story, the woman knew what was going to happen next.

“It’s alright, the terrorists are dead, and all the wars are over forever now…” the man said as the woman practically mouthed along with angry sarcasm in her unheard voice. “Wait a minute…” the marine stuttered as he felt an unusual bump upon her shoulder.

He could feel that it had several bumps along the sides, several small packets like tiny bags of sand collapsing in his fingers. He looked down, noticing a small detonator in the woman’s hand connected to a long thin black wire that ran up her sleeve.

The marine quickly pulled up his rifle, the barrel pointed directly into the woman’s eyes; she could practically smell the lead inside. Shampoo turned around, tearing himself away from desecrating the corpses of his fellow man, his rifle always pointed upwards. His attention was most definitely grabbed.

“…Why…?” she suddenly asked herself. “Why the hell should I pull this trigger…?” The white lightning returned as her eyes gravitated towards the invaluable coffee table mere paces from her feet.

“No… not again, never again”. “I won’t let myself die” she muttered, words turned to instinct. There was an unseen scar burning and scratching at her skin as she gritted her teeth in anticipation. The marine yelled with overdramatic gumption. The second inexplicable waiting burst of slow-motion soon overtook the room.

The marine screamed his line. “SUICIDE BOMBER!” he shouted, his squad falling to great attention. Every one of them looked on with sudden horror; Alpha, Bravo, Charlie, Delta, ect.

Next Chapter: Dying Desert