The Puppet- March Plotstorming Contest Entry

I entered this short story in the March Plotstorming.com writing contest. It has a bit of "Starship Troopers" influence and the overall idea has been floating around in my head for several months now. The contest only had the guidelines of 2000-4000 words, everything else was left up to the writer’s imagination. Enjoy.


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Title: The Puppet
Author: Heather L.
Word Count: 2059


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The world slowly crawled back into focus, blurry images taunting the wounded soldier as he lay dazed among the bloody sea of bodies. He tried to sit up and was driven immediately back onto the soil by a bitter pain that wrenched his body. The soldier pulled his helmet off and relished the cool alien raindrops that splashed against his face. It had been so long since he had been able to take a breath of real air. It took several moments for him to realize that his constant companion, the buzzing ruckus that penetrated his every thought, was strangely absent. The concussion from the blast must have knocked his neuro-sensors offline. Such a failure would explain why he was feeling pain instead of the usual cold sensation that accompanied battle injuries. He sat up, much slower this time, and surveyed the field around him. The soldier blinked to clear the thick, crusty ooze from his eyes as he counted the crushed bodies that surrounded him. A unit patch, covered in rapidly congealing gore, identified one of his fallen brethren. His fingers reached out, wiping the mess away from the tightly clenched black fist that was his unit’s insignia. Once an immortal band of vicious brothers, time and endless war had whittled away at the battalion and had left only the lone soldier to tell its morbid story.

Acrid smoke drifted across the bodies and the soldier breathed deeply. He had no idea why the scent fascinated him so. Perhaps it was because it was so different, such a change from the sterile air supplied by his environmental armor. The soldier pulled off a glove, dropping it beside him. He slid his fingers into the dirt; it was cool, moist, and wonderful. Grinning, he licked the residue off his fingers allowing the grit to fill his mouth and roll down his throat. The sensation was foreign and made him cough violently. His mouth and tongue were used only to the practical supplements that the scientists insisted were far better than the foodstuffs found on the worlds the soldiers had conquered.

Life hadn’t always been so dismal for the soldier. He remembered things; things locked away behind the buzzing electronic signals that controlled his every move, his every thought. A vision flashed through his brain as he sat soaking up the frigid precipitation. He remembered being a boy, playing in fresh green fields and giggling as he jumped into a pristine lake. The soldier smiled awkwardly, basking in the wonders of that nearly forgotten youth. How he wished everything could be that simple again! He cursed the day the recruiter had swooped into his high school class, medals flashing, regaling the testosterone-filled boys with stories of adventure and bravado. The soldier’s entire class had signed up that very afternoon, each young man more determined than the next to prove his worth in battle against an unnamed enemy. He remembered; he hated the faceless establishment that had bastardized his humanity. Images of boot camp swarmed into view; he remembered a grand time bonding with a thousand other men. He remembered his body becoming first lean and then strong, with muscles bulging insanely. The soldier leaned back, thinking only of how his body became tuned and amazing. Only years later did he learn what all the hormones had done to his once grand physique. As a young man, the soldier had never questioned why he and a few others had become so freakishly strong. He never wondered why he had been so aggressive, although he did regret the harm he visited upon others. It was only during his court martial that he learned what the experiments had done to his mind and body, perverting him into a grotesque and angry fiend. He was only a simple country boy, dedicated to what he thought was the right thing. His reward for service to God and Country; the option of death or submission to the Program. Oh, the youth had heard of the Program. He knew only that no one ever walked away from the stark building at the end of the parade grounds. Given that uncertain option over death, the young man cowed down to the mercy of the mighty. He hadn’t even been given a chance to say goodbye to his squad mates before two enormous masked figures escorted him through the grounds. Soldiers glanced at him as he passed, none staring too long lest they share his fate. His instructors looked forlorn at the loss of a student or perhaps more dismayed at their perceived failure.

He shifted, rocking his body against the unsympathetic earth. Memories rushed by as if a dam had broken in his mind. He hated the sensations those wretched thoughts forced upon him. He was helpless to withstand the onslaught and soon found himself wishing the damn neuro-sensors would hurry up and get back online. He didn’t want to remember those huge metal gates slamming shut behind him.

The first night in the Program had been horrible. The soldier was allowed no sleep, no food, no creature comforts. His new keepers herded the confused soldier from test to test until he could no longer stand the treatment and begged for mercy. When he refused to move any further, more masked soldiers beat him mercilessly with cracking electric prods. For three days and three long nights, the soldier was kept awake and moving. He was allowed no food, no rest, only relentless testing and poking and pain. By the end, the soldier’s will was shattered, his mind grasped uselessly for any strand of sanity. He could resist nothing. Seedy, dark characters abused him in ways not fit to describe. Nothing was sacred as he was tortured. He regressed, sinking to animal levels of behavior and ruthless defenses. Time had no meaning as his torment continued.

One day, the soldier struck back. Broken and tired, he lashed out and viciously slaughtered his most dedicated tormentor. The soldier licked his lips, remembering the taste of blood and flesh. No longer human, he tore out the throat of his faceless attacker. Months before, such savagery horrified him, but not then. No, he enjoyed violating that fiend. The broken soldier remembered waiting for his punishment, lounging in the bloody mess that he created. Somewhere, in the back of his twisted mind was a wish for the freedom of death. Luck, however, was a blessing that the soldier would not know. The scientists were pleased with his regression and allowed him the unusual pleasure of raw steak.

His real training began after that terrible day. He received so many injections daily that the scientists permanently attached ports to either arm. The soldier never asked what the glowing substances were and the scientists made no effort to explain what they were doing to him as they filled his veins. Some days, the soldier felt exhilarated and powerful. He attacked his drills with unimaginable vigor, smashing his way through barriers with bare hands and tearing apart the poor souls used as training aids. Those were the best times and the soldier embraced them as he would a lover. The dark cloud of sleep was all that tormented him; vile creatures crawled into his sleep periods every time the soldier’s eyes closed. Every night, the soldier visited terrible battlefields littered with a million corpses, each one reaching out for him. He bathed in pools of blood and ate the rotting flesh of the bodies around him. For weeks, the soldier and his companions shared those fetid visions, screaming out from their cages. The soldier eventually chose to remain awake, sleeping only when exhaustion forced him to.

There was a time that the soldier would have been dismayed at the thought of women serving in any military function. No longer really even human, the soldier no longer cared about sexuality. All creatures around him were either a strategic benefit or unworthy of life. Female soldiers in the Program received no special treatment, no segregation from the masses. Their bodies were modified, female organs removed to negate the inconvenience of their monthly bodily functions. Artificial implants more than corrected any deficiencies in the women’s physical strength. Like their companions, the female soldiers of the Program were nothing more than aggressive, furious shells waiting only for the order to kill.

The soldiers in the Program remained secured, separated from the mainstream soldiers and controlled because the scientists knew these particular specimens would kill everything in sight. The unit trained for three long, brutal years. Their collective teeth gnashing, the battalion sweated and bled on the training grounds, their vicious cries terrifying the soldiers in the surrounding camp. Time passed slowly and the soldier knew only the things given to him, pain, sweat, and the vicious dreams that haunted him.

Finally, a blessing arrived wrapped in the metallic blanket of war. The battalion received its deployment orders, sent into the unsuspecting world to root out an enemy from its bristling nest. Each soldier was loaded into a crate that was barely wide enough to contain the enormous body. Each soldier rendered unconscious for travel like a vicious animal. The soldier remembered waking in the dark, clad in his battle armor and anger. A five hundred strong, the battalion swept though the fortified position and killed every living being. Their vicious tide was unstoppable and even allies succumbed to their brutality. It was after that harsh lesson that every soldier in the battalion fell under the control of the neuro-sensors.

The soldier remembered the agony of the first interface; the will of another wrapping around his brain like cold, dead fingers. His controller was a youth, not more than thirteen. A normal human would have been horrified at such corruption of the nation’s children. The soldier knew better. The soldier knew that young minds, not yet touched by the stress that grew with age, were the most vicious in battle. He knew from experience that brutal punishment rewarded resistance to the controllers. His master ordered him forward, despite a devastating injury. The soldier resisted, not out of spite. His body teetered on the brink of collapse; he was physically unable to continue despite his inhuman strength. Yet his controller, a thousand miles away, demanded that the soldier continue. A flood of adrenaline coursed through his veins, adrenaline and blinding pain. The soldier obeyed and wallowed in a bitter ocean of fear; never again did he resist the power of his controller.

Time passed and many enemies of the Program fell to the heavy hand of the battalion and their controllers. With that passage, the enemy became smarter and slowly began to resist the crushing mass that had once been undefeatable. Encounters began ending with casualties within the battalion; each outing resulted in fewer soldiers returning.

One day, the remnants of the battalion found a new home in a run-down barracks on the edge of the encampment. They listened and shuddered as blood-curdling shrieks pierced the night air. Their role diminished with each battle. Once proud and indestructible, the battalion fell by the wayside, relegated to scouting missions and cannon fodder. Newer, harsher warriors emerged from the shadows and grasped the reins of battle. The replacements were perfect in every way, bred in the confines of a test tube with every control mechanism genetically engineered. Failures met with extermination before they were ever born and the weakness of the human element disappeared before the might of science.

The soldier’s head snapped back as currents of electricity probed his brain; his controller searching for him, no doubt. He inhaled deeply, enjoying the last breaths of fresh air before his memories faded away. Muscles twitching with massive amounts of adrenaline and the soldier grimaced in agony. Once again, his freedom disappeared and he felt compelled to don his battle helm. Green lights flickered, piercing his eyes and filling his brain with tactical information. His controller was far from done, hell-bent on proving that he was good enough to control a new model soldier. Propelled by the audacity of another, the soldier rose and grasped the nearest weapon he could find. Hormones racing through his battered body, the soldier no longer cared. No longer did he remember his boyhood or his life. Grimacing, the puppet moved towards the sounds of battle.