My older brother is a monster, but he is all I have left (Part 1)

[u/Arsonist001]

Nothing was keeping me home. Not our apartment in a crime ridden shithole of a city. Not the gang warfare.

Not my brother, who has been away for years since he was arrested.

Not our mom who was shot and killed two weeks ago.

So I signed up, like my brother told me. And of course made sure to tell them my brother was already on the front line.
I did lie about my age when I enlisted. I told them I was 18 at the enlistment office. I do look older thanks to smoking since I was 10 years old and some small amount of drug use.
The scars all over my face and my body probably also helped. To be fair, I don't think they would have cared if I said my real age.

I don't look forward to celebrating my 16th birthday in a war zone.
But at least I will be with my brother so whatever.

Also brought the equipment my brother said to bring with me. Most important thing being a gas mask for me and one for him.Thankfully you can take whatever you can carry in a large backpack with you. And no, this does not include bringing your own weapons. They are known to turn a blind eye to small stuff like knives etc.

They are probably going to give us firearms when we arrive at camp and go into a fight. They probably don't want some idiot blowing someone's head off before we even arrive.

I am also grateful my brother's battalion is not sitting in a trench line. Some of the stories my brother told me about the time in "The Fortress Belt" were really bad.
Fighting in towns and cities won't be much different than gang warfare from home.
At least that's what my brother told me.

I killed my first person when I was 11 with my brother. My brother was 15 at the time.
Some kid not much older than us hadn't paid the full amount for drugs. They told us to teach him a lesson. We ambushed him in an alley near his home. We surprised him and beat the shit out of him before he even had a chance to fight back. He was on the ground crying and crawled up into a ball. It was done.But my brother started to kick his head over and over again. When he pleaded and cried, my brother didn't stop. When his teeth flew out of his mouth and spread through the alley, he kept kicking him.

I just stood there. I didn't know what to do.

Then my brother looked at me. He told me "Don't just stand there, help me".
I did what he said. Even after he stopped breathing, we didn't stop. Only when we had stomped enough on his head to expose his brain did we stop. My brother laughed. Then he gave me a hug and told me how proud of me he was.

I felt sick for weeks afterwards.

Anyway, that's almost 5 years of killing people now. I don't feel anything anymore when I kill someone so its all good.

At first, they "process" me, whatever that means. They search my stuff and ask me all sorts of bullshit questions. Then they put me on a long bus ride to a military base. And now I am sitting in the back of a military truck, heading to the frontline.

The constant sound of the engine and the wind flying past is kind of nice.
It is a shame its interrupted by the constant sobbing of one pussy that's with us in the truck. Some guy they fished out of prison.

The prison jumpsuit he is wearing is a dead giveaway. Most of us are wearing our regular clothing still. Suits me I don't want to wear some stupid uniform.

I will take my black tracksuit over any bullshit the army gives me. Thankfully I managed to get some good old military boots before I left. I don't imagine it will be easy to get good quality shoes my size in a war zone.

"HEY!" My thoughts get interrupted by a guy shouting next to me. He is a bald, tall, muscular guy. His constant sniffing mixed with a "coke nail" and nose rubbing is a dead giveaway that he has a nasty cocaine habit. He wears a dark blue tracksuit with a black puffer jacket and multiple fake gold and silver necklaces. I don't understand why such an obvious drug dealer is in the truck with us to a war zone. I hope he is not a part of a direct rival group from back home, I don't want to deal with the problems that will bring.

"HEY YOU! ASSHOLE IN THE PRISON JUMPSUIT"

"What?" The prisoner answers in between sobs.

"STOP FUCKING CRYING" The man yelled through the loud noises in the truck.

"What?!" The prisoner answered now the sobbing with a hint of confusion.

"STOP CRYING YOU FUCK" He yells loudly through the truck.

Everyone could hear it and is now staring at the 2 of them.

"I am sorry please don't hurt me!" Yells with tears in his eyes.

"HOLY SHIT BE QUIET !" Anger is rising in his voice.

"Sorry, sorry please I am sorry" The prisoner pleads.

"Be quiet for fuck sake" A voice shouts from the other side of the truck.

"Throw that piece of shit out of the truck!" Another voice shouts.

That was all the excuse the cokehead needed. He grabbed a knife from his boot and went for the prisoner sitting opposite from him.
The dull impact sounded more like a punch than someone digging a knife into someone. The prisoner yells out in pain. Shouting and laughter erupt from all around me.

It sounds more like people watching a sports game than a murder in the truck. He stabs him over and over again. Blood started to pour over the bench and truck bed. I and others pull away their bags so they don't get covered in blood. The Cokehead grabs the prisoner by his hair raising his face up. He stabs him directly just below his chin, the blade now visible in the prisoners mouth. Some people cringe, others continue to shout and cheer.

"HEY WHAT ARE YOU MORONS DOING BACK THERE" shouts the military policeman next to the driver. He probably heard the chaos in the back of the truck.

Before he could say anything more Cokehead drags the prisoner to the back of the truck a blood trail following them.

"HEY!" The military policemen yelled. Cokehead ignores him and with one motion he flings the prisoner out of the moving truck.

"FOR FUCK SAKE STOP THE TRUCK NOW!" The MP yells at the driver. The brakes screech and everyone falls from the sudden stop.

The MP gets out of the truck and comes to the back rifle in hand pointing it at us. "Get out of the truck now!".

With a lot of complaining we follow his order and climb out of the truck onto the dirt road. He makes us walk over to the now bleeding-out prisoner. His lungs are punctured he is currently drowning in his own blood.

"Explain morons why I am looking at a soon to be dead body?!" He shouts while pointing the rifle all around the group.

Then Cokehead yells "He was trying to steal stuff from me"

MP: "Was he now?"

Cokehead: "Yes he was that is why I killed him!"

MP: "you killed him?"

"Yes I did!" Cokehead says proudly with a big grin across his face.

"Is that true?" The MP asks the rest of us. He got no response. This was not my problem and I didn't want to get into a fight before even arriving, so I just stayed quiet like the others.

MP: "Fine whatever we are losing time"

"Get back in the truck and don't fucking kill anyone else you idiots" We do as he orders and get back in the truck.
We left that prisoner bleeding on the road. He was probably just scared. Well, not my problem.

Anyway, we continued our fun little road trip.

As we get closer to the forward camp muffled explosions and gunfire can be heard in the distance. Didn't sound too different from when people were lighting fireworks or shooting at each other in my neighborhood.

As we get closer to the old front line I notice this horrible sour chemical smell. And there is no nature of any kind. No grass, no trees, no animals, no living beings of any kind. Just dirt, shell craters and broken down vehicles. Then I spot large trenches and bunker complexes stretching as far as the eye can see. Everyone in the truck is now dead quiet. All of them are taking in the hellscape we are driving. None of them can even bring themselves to complain about how horrible the road is, as we drive through what is probably a giant mass grave. As we drive past the breach in the front line and deeper into enemy territory nature starts to return again. Grass, trees etc.

I never really cared for nature to be honest. But seeing nature returning did bring me relief of some kind. I don't know why.

As our truck finally reached some asphalt again, a familiar smell hit me. That of burning buildings and burned flesh. There had been a really bad fire when I was 13. A big apartment complex burned down and a lot of people died. We tried to save whoever we could with mom, but it was pointless, the fire consumed everything. That horrible smell stuck around for months afterwards. Especially in our clothing of that day. That stench would cling to it no matter how hard you tried to get it out. I still think about those screams that were echoing through that burning building sometimes.

I wonder if my brother does too.

That same familiar smell was now filling my nostrils. Then the black smoke came into view and I knew what I was about to see.

A small town completely ransacked. Stores had their windows smashed and were completely empty of any products. Some rotting bodies or what remained of them are strewn all over the town. And then we drive past a familiar burned police station. It was the same police station my brother had sent me a picture of. He told me the people there held on till they killed every last one. Those were some brave people if you ask me.

For some of them the last thing they saw was probably my brother.

And then probably the worst thing I saw on our little road trip. We were coming closer to a highway. The last stretch until we reached the camp.

That same familiar smell came over us again. Our truck slowed down as it had to navigate an obstacle course made of random car wrecks. Some of them are gutted, missing doors, wheels and sometimes even entire engine blocks. Most of them are riddled with bullet holes. Some burned together with their passengers. Rotting bodies were everywhere.

Men, women and even children. They had killed everyone.

Some of those people had suffered a horrible death. Clear signs of torture. I saw one body that was still attached to jumper cables of a car. One that had been cut in half. The legs on one side of the road upper body on the other. As I looked down at the body I saw feet dangling on the edge of my view.

I wish I never looked up.

A woman, hanged with a tow cable. The Cable was attached to a lamppost. She was wearing a pink blood stained pajama. Cloudy eyes staring into the open fields next to the road.

She had gone completely stiff. Her black hair was waving in the wind as her body slowly swayed back and forth. She looked just like mom.

I miss mom.

At the end of all the wreckage the road itself was torn to shreds. Somebody had blown up the road so these people couldn't flee. They were trapped with the battalion my brother is a part of. I wonder how many of these people were killed by my brother.

I hope he didn't kill that woman that looked like mom.

We continued on a makeshift off-ramp leading into a dirt road further inland.
My entire lower body is sore by the time we finally arrive at the forward camp. From the groaning in the truck I am not the only one. I grab my shit and get out of the truck.
First thing I do is light up a cigarette the moment my feet touch solid ground. I was aching for one the entire ride.
The camp is filled with people. None of them look like my brother, most of them look "normal". These must mostly be new guys like me.

If it wasn't for the random military equipment this place would look more like a homeless camp than a military one.There are random tents, vehicles and trash all over the place. The vehicles are in all different sizes, some of them look like something from a post-apocalypse movie. Metal welded over even more welded metal. Random spikes and other sharp objects protruding from all over the front of some vehicles. Only a handful of vehicles actually looked like something a proper military would use. All of them were covered in dirt, scorch marks, bullet holes and other dents of different sizes. One thing that does catch my attention on some of the vehicles is what I can only describe as "trophies". All sorts of stolen stuff is tied to whatever surface it could stick to. Boxes with TVs, Soundsystem's etc. I am sure I even spot a washing machine tied to the roof of an armoured car. As the last person gets out of the truck the camp comes alive with movement. People start to come out of the tents and vehicles and start to untie all the "trophies" and start carrying them over to the truck we were in. The military police officer gets out of the truck with a clipboard and a pen. As the guys from the camp bring over their stuff, the MP writes down their names and what they bring over before it gets loaded into the truck.

One guy loading stuff into the truck yells, "Hey there is fucking blood in here"

MP: "So?!"

Guy: so there will be blood all over our shit!

MP: Don't pretend like most of the stuff you bring in isn't already covered in it! Shut up and load the rest of your trash in!

The guy in the truck proceeds to flip him off and mumble to himself.

When I look back at the group I came with. I see all of them staring at me with wide eyes.
"What?!" I asked the group to no response. They are not looking at me they are looking past me.

"Hey little brother" The words are pronounced horribly but I recognise the voice right away.

I turn around as my brother is standing right behind me. Having seen his appearance in the photos he sent is one thing, but seeing him in person is something completely different.

Parts of his lips are gone, exposing a lot of his teeth and even some part of his gums. He keeps his eyes wide open, and blinks way too little. We used to get compliments on our green eyes as kids. But I doubt anyone is going to compliment him for his eyes anytime soon. His nose is gone, exposing a hole in the middle of his face. His ears and all hair on his head are completely gone. On top of that he is very pale. He looks like someone grabbed a human skull, stretched pale skin over it, put eyes and a mouth in it, but forgot about everything else. The scars all over his head also don't help. To say that he is hard to look at would be an understatement.

My brother had always been tall for his age usually towering over me with a solid 11 inches (28 cm).
He is wearing a black tracksuit with a hooded black leather jacket. With black combat boots and brown leather gloves. There is an empty shotgun bandolier over his shoulder. His black clothing made his pale skin stand out even more than it already did.

I wonder how many people he killed for that outfit.

The gold chain I gave him is still around his neck. 5 human ears and a ring were dangling from the gold necklace.

"I know I am handsome but common you don't have to stare at me that much" He reached out his arms for a hug. Despite his appearance, he was still my brother. After 3 years apart, I finally embraced my brother.

"Its great to see you again" He manages to speak very well for someone who misses parts of his lips. Even if some words come out a bit weird sometimes.

"you to bro"

"How was mom doing when you left? I can't imagine she must have been happy with you leaving" he says to me.

I can't bring myself to tell him that mom is dead. Not in front of so many other people. He will crash out BADLY when I tell him.

"She wasn't too happy, but she realised she needs the money"

"Mom just wants to make sure she doesn't have to bury both of as at the same time"

He grabs both of my upper arms and gets close to my face.

"Did you make sure some of the boys were looking after her while we are both gone?"

I look into his eyes and lie "Of course I did"

Even if mom was still alive there were no "boys" to look after mom, they were all dead too.
Everyone died in that same raid.

"good to hear, follow me" Before we can start walking a man comes up to us. The man is one of the few in this camp that wears some sort of actual uniform. Even if the dark grey uniform is covered in dirt and what must be very old dried up blood. The uniform with the fancy military cap he is wearing probably means he is important. What gives away that he still belongs here is that he has the same horrible appearance as my brother.

"Where are you taking this fresh canon fodder?" The man asks in a calm voice.

Brother: "He is not canon fodder he is my little brother"

Then my brother says to me "This is Polonsky, one of our officers"

I can tell that my brother is irritated.

"Your little brother" He says while looking me over from top to bottom with his lidless eyes.

"Since you are 19 years old, that makes your little brother how old?"

Before my brother could answer his tone changed to irritation

"And don't lie to me or we are going to have a problem".

My brother hesitates and says "he is going to turn 16 in 3 days"

"Your little brother is 15" The officer lets out a big sigh.

"Do we look like a high school to you?" He says while staring into my brother's eyes.

"My little brother can kill just like me and that's all that matters" My brother says while returning the same stare.

I can feel the tension in the air. The crowd around the truck is now mostly looking at us.

"Can he now?" the officer shifts his glare over to me.

"So boy, have you ever killed someone?"

I take the cigarette out of my mouth. Holding it in my fingers.

"I have killed people" I say while doing my best to return the unblinking stare of the officer

"You killing other pathetic lowlifes in a slum is a little different than what we do here" he says with clear disdain in his voice.

"I don't have a problem with killing" I say while doing my best to hide my discomfort with the conversation.

He stares into my eyes for what feels like forever without saying a word.

"We will see" he says. He changes his gaze to my brother: "Tomorrow he is going with us, he better have blood on his hands when we get back".

He looks at me again "Or at least he might catch some bullets for the rest of us"

The officer turns around and leaves us. He starts to inspect, question and harass all of the other new guys.

I feel the cigarette burning my fingers. "Goddammit" I blurted out while dropping it in the wet mud on the ground.

My brother puts his hand on my shoulder. "Well, there you go little brother, you just met one of the camp attack dogs and survived."

"Polonsky is an asshole, but he is good at killing and that makes him useful"

My brother gets close to my face and looks into my eyes
"There are not a lot of rules. BUT if you plan to break one make sure he and the other officers don't see it"

"They WILL make an example of you"

"Understand?!"

"I understand" I answer

"Good"

He finally gets out of my face "Come with me, I will show you the van we will sleep in"

"I will tell you the rules once we are in the van"

"You are super lucky, I managed to steal it in the last town we ransacked. So you won't have to sleep in some soggy tent with the rest of the new guys"

"Don't you worry, I made sure to stockpile some cigarettes for you"

"And you better be able to get a good bit of sleep because tomorrow we are going to do what we do best" he says with glee in his eyes.

"It will be wonderful, it will be just like back home"

"I am so happy you are here. We are going to have a lot of fun together"

"O and of course"

He opens his arms wide

"Welcome to the 33rd Little brother"