Saturday, April 24, 1937.

1000 hours.

Town Barracks.

We spent hours trying to come up with a good excuse to avoid escorting the convoy, but we drew a blank. Well, I drew a blank. Camarada came up with hundreds of ways, but almost each and every one of them involved some sort of bodily harm.

"What about I stab you in the foot?" he said as he twirled his trench knife between his fingers. "That ought to do it."

"Pass," I said. "I'll like to keep me intact."

"Then, what about a punch to the jaw? You hit the floor, go limp, the whole show."

"Denied."

"Why? That keeps you intact," said Camarada. He grabbed the knife and threw it straight between his feet. I could feel some sort of sick pleasure steaming from him when the knife got right next to his feet without actually touching it.

"No bodily harm," I said. "Why don't I try and knock you down?"

"You couldn't knock me down if you could. I'm solid, like the Soviet Union. Can't break my iron curtain."

"I could probably stab it in the foot," I said.

"Pass," he said. "Why don't we break Abarran's fingers? He is young and will heal quick."

"How does that even help?"

"I don't know, Sebas. I'm just throwing ideas out there."

He then threw his knife down yet again, this time clipping a tiny part of his boots. He licked his lips in victory.

"Anyhow, I doubt we can get out of this one," I said. I remember thinking that I could somehow slip through camp, but ever since the incident with the airplanes the whole place was on high alert.

"Our only bet is to finish the assignment quickly," said Camarada. Hope being the keyword.

They were sending three other squadrons with us that day. One of them was Santiago's, the other had two of the Lieutenant's goons in them, likely to keep us in check.

It all felt weird. Too stiff, or too formal. I couldn't help but feel there was something wrong in the air, something more than usual. The two goons kept stealing glances at us.

"What's with those two buffoons?" asked Camarada.

"Don't know, but I don't like how they're looking at us."

They weren't just some random goons. I couldn't recognize them as the same goons that had taken Torito the night before.

"Hey, Sebas!" said Santiago out of nowhere. I could've sworn I saw him at the other side of the camp a few seconds before. "Got a cig?"

Of course, I gave him one. He earned it enough.

"You shouldn't give those away," said Camarada, sizing Santiago from top to bottom.

"Hey, Mikolas, right?" said Santiago. He patted his body several times before finding his matchbox. "You're pretty famous around here. Word is you can clip the wings of a butterfly with that rifle there. How true is that."

"Just find me one and I'll show you," Camarada said with a smile. And just like that, he felt for Santiago's charm.

"I like it! I'm a bad shooter myself. Glad I'll be traveling with such a legend."

"I do what I can," said Camarada. "For the glory of our motherland."

Santiago took a drag from his cigarette and left the smoke rise with the wind. "I wonder how much time this will take? I'm not a morning person, and I've already lost more than enough sleeping hours trying to figure out where all those people went."

The monsters. Under us. That's where they were.

"Any news on that?" I asked.

He took a deep drag, letting the smoke build up inside him. "No. People just vanished without a trace. Gone with the wind."

As if to punctuate his point, he released a tower of smoke, only to be blown away by the wind.

"Just like that," he said. "But again, we just began the search a few hours ago. We don't want this to blow over and cause a panic. Market day is in two days and we need the supplies."

Every Monday, people from the surrounding villages would take their wares--often foods, like vegetables and grain--and would sell it on the town square. With traditional supply likes cut because of the war, that was the only way people could have fresh food on their table, military included.

If panic took hold of the town, then the Market day would surely be canceled. No food, no survival. Panic breeds panic. It couldn't come to that.

"Shit happens," said Camarada. "Maybe they escaped town? Escaping towards Bilbao. That's what I would do."

"That's the working theory," said Santiago. "The top brass thinks that the people who attacked you on the bridge were townsfolk trying to escape. It is the easiest way to escape town, after all."

I took a hard swallow. "Yes, that seems correct."

Santiago took one last drag. He watched the cigarette slowly consume in the wind before releasing one final tower of smoke. The whole thing took a few seconds, but I felt many emotions coming from him. Expectancy, nervousness, and hope.

"Yes, it is," he said. Instead of putting it out against the ground, he only flicked it away. "Well, I need to take a piss. Thanks for the cig, Sebas. Mikolas."

And with that, he left us two alone yet again.

"That was weird," said Camarada.

"And informative," I said. I must admit, I had forgotten about Market day.

"I saw something during the attack," I said.

"What attack? The planes? They didn't attack us."

"Well, I saw something during that scuffle. A monster."

"In broad daylight?" he asked. "Shit."

"It was hiding between houses," I said. "I think it was Tuerto."

"Do you think he is hunting us down?"

"I doubt it. But if he was out there it must mean there are other as well. They're getting bolder. I'm willing to bet there are new disappearances being reported right now."

"This is bad," said Camarada. He always had a perchance to state the obvious, which, to be fair, is a quality most us humans share. But he took it to the extreme.

"It can get worse," I said. "If those things are still around during Market day, they could wreak havoc."

"This is bad", repeated Camarada. "Very bad. We should have a plan B to stop Market day if we can't stop the beasts. How will we stop the beasts, anyway?"

"That's not my problem," I said, perhaps a bit too quickly. "My involvement ends once we get the map. The rest is on you."

Camarada didn't say anything, but he nodded in his stiff, ceremonial way. I was glad he wasn't one to push things.

"I still think we could break some of Abarran's fingers," he said with a rare, almost sadistic smile.

"Stop," I said.

We didn't talk anymore after that. It could've been half an hour, or an hour later, when a cart rolled into camp while pulled by an old, sickly mule. The cart had several wooden boxes stacked one on top of the other, all half-covered with a green tarp.

"Time to go," said Camarada.

We grabbed our stuff, and after gathering with the rest of our squadmates, we were off. Or so we thought.

"Wait," said one of the goons. "We need to deliver another thing."

He disappeared into one of the tents, shortly returning with a man tied by the hands and a long rope.

The man had a split lip, and both his eyes were swollen shut. He was almost unrecognizable, but there was no doubt--it was Torito.

"The brute tried to escape this morning," said the goon. "We persuaded him of that. Now we need to escort him to the frontlines."

"I escorted your mother yesterday," said Torito. He didn't lose his spirit, even while beaten down.

The goon kicked his legs, which have up under him. "You like being on your knees, coward?"

"Your mother is," he said. That earned him a punch. I saw two of his teeth fly out.

The goon grabbed him by the collar and tied him to the back of the cart. I tried to approach him, but the goon pushed me back.

"No one gets near", he said.

There was no way he could see me with those eyes, but somehow, he did. "Sebas?" he said.

"Torito," I said with surprising softness in my voice. Something about seeing him shivering and weak struck me deep.

"Got the map?" he asked.

I was ashamed to say no. In fact, I didn't say anything. But he understood the silence.

"I see," he said.

"Move," said the goon as he pushed me.

Our quad took point while the goons took the rear, leaving Santiago's squad in the middle. We began to walk through the woody path that lead to the frontlines.

"I wonder how being in the battlefield feels like," said Abarran. His eyes almost shone with anticipation.

"Hell," said Guillermo between his teeth while his lips held a crumpled cigarette.

"Have you been there?" asked Abarran.

"Yes. Not something I would recommend, but everyone picks their poison. You have every right to die however you want."

"You seem to have come back in one piece," said Abarran.

Guillermo didn't answer, merely presenting his right hand to Abarran, showing a missing middle finger and only half of his thumb.

"Nevermind," said Abarran. "I'm sorry. I couldn't even think about living without a finger."

I immediately looked at Camarada. He had that sadistic grin again. Somehow, I liked him more when he was stoic.

Santiago began to whistle some dumb tune, mostly to pass the time as the rest of us trudged forward.

It all felt...odd.

I could hear the drums in the distance, but they didn't diminish or faint. It was fixed on the horizon, all around us.

It didn't wane or changed. Always there in the distance. It made me feel tense. I could feel eyes pierce me in the back of the head. That might've been the goons. They didn't take their eyes off me the whole time.

It all went down when Abarran began singing.

"Adios, ene maitia, adios sekulako.
Nik eztit beste phenarik, maitia, zuretako,
Zeren uzten zutudan haiñ libro bestentako..."

"What's that?" asked Guillermo.

"Just an old song my mom used to sing to me for I slept," he said.

"It sounds like gibberish."

"Don't call our language gibberish!" said Abarran. "It's a beautiful song of goodbyes and love. I can almost hear my mom singing to me."

"You're a kid," said Guillermo.

"I'm not! And I can't help but sing. I can actually hear my mother sing to me, as if calling me home."

I knew what that was, and I pitied him. Such a green youth being stripped of her mother. It fed into my uneasiness.

There were monsters in the woods.