“Deserter.”

“Why is he still here?”

“I’d kick his ass if there were no consequences.”

“Can’t we just throw him away? Just like he did to us?”

Brad was met with hostility the moment he came back from running away to safety once things started to get a little too dangerous for his liking. In the military you’re always near death but Brad was the type to choose the way that would most likely let him live longer. He didn’t have a plan in life so when the military started recruiting and he was freshly homeless because his parents kicked him out, he wrote down his name.

That was all he had.

No achievement or anything remarkable about him. Maybe his height but the military was like a giant convention the way everyone towered over each other. He always made it a point to lay low and mind his own business. Sure there’d be instances of bullying but he always made sure to come out with bruises and proof that he too can give damage when needed. He didn’t win of course but the weak get bullied cause they let it happen. The black eye he got that healed in months let it known that he wasn’t going to stand around for his doom.

Nor was he going to let his infantry drag him down for what was his right. Yes he run away and left others to defend for themselves. It was war. Not a kumbaya where they are owed a human shield the moment they freeze up when guns are blazing.

“Look at you calling me spineless, behind my back.” He said, looking at all of them.

They glared back fiercely.

“Would you rather me show it to you, you jackass?” Brock stood up, fists ready but other guys were already holding him back by the shoulders.

“We’re already screwed enough. We can’t fight among each other or we’ll be punished.”

“We could get sent to detention, Brock.”

Detention was a place the guys referred to as worse than war. It was a place for disobedient soldiers to play pretend that everything was alright and that they didn’t want to destroying everything right then and there. Detention housed the most mentally unstable soldiers and being in it meant everyday was a battle without guns.

“We? Brad’s the one who abandoned us!”

“Well boohoo some of us were trying to do our job.” Brad commented, unwavering.

“And what job was that? To be a fucking coward?” Gage asked, stretching his arms fighting the urge to knock a man down.

Brad went to a cabinet, locked with a metal hanger on the handles. The guys were too angry to notice how the cabinet made sounds and shook. Once Brad slipped off the hanger, the doors opened up with a man tied and gagged falling onto the ground.

The guys looked down curiously at the prisoner.

“Shit is that Hitler?”

The man on the ground continues screamed and shook.

“They told you guys this was an important mission.” Brad crossed his arms. Surrounded by fucking idiots.

“Then why is a dictator in our dorm? Shouldn’t you hand him over to the general?” Malcolm piped up, not sure how important it was to kidnap a man who could initiate a war. Thousands of innocents lives have been destroyed because of his actions as day by day he grew more powerful.

“No, we’re going to do something better. We’ll send him to detention.”

Upon seeing the wide smiles of all the soldiers, the man on the ground stopped shaking feeling for the first time what it was like to be on the other side.