Tuesday, March 10, 2009
Short Story

Michael had his leg pinned down by the burnt log, and his other leg was of no help after taking a bullet wound to the knee.
Michael had a rifle by his side, and an Irish soldier on the other side, also pinned down by wooden beams, except half his body was immobile, and it wasn’t wait down or up, but sideways.
“Why don’t you want to shoot?” The Irishman asked.
Michael looked up to him, “I won’t have anyone else to talk to me if I did. After all, that’s why you aren’t shooting me too, are you?”
The Irishman chuckled, “actually no. It’s because I don’t have a firearm with me, but come to think of it, yeah I wouldn’t shoot you. Your name is Mike?”
Michael nodded, “for a half-crushed man, your eyesight is quite good.”
“Well, there aren’t many names that start with ‘M’ and have 7 letters in them.”
Michael smiled, “what about you? You have a name?”
“My name,” The Irishman laughed, “My name’s Michael, too. If I could lift my arm I’d show you my name tag.”
Michael smiled to himself, “You name’s Michael? What a small world we live in, we got to have new names for ourselves now.”
“You’re from the British Army?”
“Yep,” Michael replied, “You are from the IRA, aren’t you?”
“Needless to say,” The Irish Michael replied, “you know why you’re fighting with us?”
British Michael shook his head.
The Irishman continued, “Me neither, I guess that doesn’t matter, does it?”
The British soldier asked, “It does matter, I mean…we need to know what we’re fighting for before we fight.”
“No we don’t,” the Irishman laughed, “Mankind has always relished in fighting, no matter the reason. We always find a reason to fight, even if it’s over a drop of stained water.”
“We can’t do anything to stop conflict then?”
Louder laughter came from the Irishman, “We can, if the world unites under one competent ruler, who knows what is right and wrong, who can work 24/7, who understands everyone on earth.”
Suddenly there were sounds coming from outside, they were of British accent, shouting for survivors.
Michael shouted, “OVER HERE!”
The rescue squad shouted their reply, and footsteps were heard.
Michael asked, “Where can I find this kind of person?”
The Irishman replied, “There should be a few places in London, look for the buildings with the crosses on them.”
The British rescue squad came in, and the first one who was in there asked, “Hey, who you talking to? You better not go psycho on me now.”
As they proceeded to remove the log on Michael’s leg, he stared at the place where the Irishman lay.
Or used to lay, just a few seconds ago.

Labels: Short Stories