The Military's Hidden Scars
The soldiers armed with military rifles, bulletproof helmets, and ammo belts looked haggard. Dark circles hung under their eyes like they hadn't slept in days, and their pupils were shot through with red veins. Some stared blankly into space, while others flinched and trembled violently at every loud noise. I walked naturally down the street, scanning their name tags. 'I want information. Is there anyone whose name screams "likely to snitch or desert"?' Unfortunately, no. Just ordinary names. That left eavesdropping on the smokers' chatter as the best option, but because of the virus, none of the soldiers had pulled their masks down to smoke. I'd tried asking directly once, but the results weren't great.
"Hello. Would it be alright if I asked you something?"
"Huh? Ah, no, I'm sorry."
"Couldn't you just tell me a little about the situation? My younger brother went into the army and I can't reach him. I'm worried something might have happened, whether he's eating properly..."
I'd even invented a nonexistent brother to build some rapport, but the soldier avoided my eyes and shook his head firmly. It looked like his mouth had been sealed shut tight. I turned away, adjusting my mask. The more they hid things like this, the more convinced I became that the military had problems. What those problems were, and how big, that was what mattered.
Scenarios ran through my head. 'Have a lot of them been infected by the virus? Did they end up shooting their own? Gun accidents?'
And then, as if on cue, an opportunity to dig up information arrived.
"Krrraaaagh!"
A crowd had gathered. One of them suddenly turned. It was the guy haggling over a big handful of cigarettes. Without warning, he lunged at the other person and sank his teeth into their neck.
"How dare you."
The people reacted with practiced familiarity. They swarmed in an instant, beating the zombie to death with whatever weapons they had. Then they casually swiped the cigarettes and food from both the dead zombie and the victim. A common sight in the apocalypse.
But one soldier watched the scene with massively dilated pupils, then stumbled backward and quietly slipped away. I followed him. All the way to the first-floor bathroom of an empty building.
From inside the bathroom came the sound of the soldier crying, trying to muffle it. He was clearly fighting to hold it in, but choked sobs leaked out from behind the stall door.
'If I kill this soldier here, I could get his gun... No. What would I even do with just one gun?'
In a situation where the military's movements were already suspicious, acting on impulse would cost too much. The way they were handing out combat rations and gauging people's reactions felt like they were testing the waters for entering the city.
Knock knock. I rapped on the stall door. The sobbing cut off like a choked breath.
I spoke kindly. "It must be really hard, right? The military's tough enough as it is, and now this situation on top of it. It's okay to cry loudly. Crying honestly is better for your mental health."
Crying was important. It expelled bad emotions like waste. A kind of emotional cleansing. Plus, it put him in the perfect psychological state for me to approach on purpose.
"If there's something difficult, you can talk about it. It's not good to keep it all bottled up inside. They say shared sorrow is half the sorrow, right?"
A brief silence followed. I stared quietly at the stall door. Would this work? Most people would avoid revealing psychological weaknesses, but the other party was already mentally broken, and his only social experience was the military. He was young. It might actually land.
Luckily, it did. As if a door in his heart had opened, the bathroom stall door swung open. A baby-faced soldier with puffy eyes sat on the toilet, looking up at me. I summoned the gentlest expression I could manage and put it into my eyes.
The soldier poured out his words like he was collapsing. "It's... it's too hard."
No formal speech? Good. A mind not yet fully broken by the military, a will resisting oppression. Excellent material for an informant.
The soldier, whose rank insignia marked him as a private first class, wiped his tears on his sleeve and began rambling as if talking to himself.
It had been fine in the early days of the zombie outbreak, he said. At most they just restricted leave, made everyone wear masks, and disinfect. The only real complaints were the usual soldier gripes. But as time passed, as the virus spread, as soldiers started turning one by one, things got serious.
"They locked the infected in an empty barracks. It was right next to ours. Every night we'd hear them screaming, scratching at the doors. I still hear it. The sound of fingernails scraping against the nailed-shut wooden door..."
The soldier absentmindedly dug at his ear with his fingernail as he spoke. The scratches were deep, like he'd been doing it for more than a day or two. I listened in silence. I had to let him talk. Interfering now would be bad.
"During roll call, at meals, during daylight disinfection, anytime. People started changing. Soldiers, NCOs, officers, it didn't matter. The number of zombies locked in the barracks kept growing, and the sounds, those sounds..."
Virus transmission. And it was spreading among people who lived and worked together every day. The contagion rate was obviously horrific, and the aftermath couldn't be ignored. If you could hear the infected screaming right next to you so loudly you couldn't sleep...
Eventually the military gave up the building, he said.
"Orders came down to use the barracks as temporary holding facilities. Soldiers were told to pitch tents on the parade ground. That was the day we were setting up the tents. My senior..."
The soldier's hands shook violently. His cloudy eyes stared down at his trembling hands. He clenched them into fists.
"We were installing the tent. My senior suddenly turned and tried to kill me. He was such a good person. Before I knew it, I'd swung the shovel. Just like that. Just like that."
So he'd killed him. I thought suddenly. Suppose the military attacked zombies. What were they supposed to do with soldiers who'd turned? Kill them? Then what happened to the morale of soldiers who'd shot their comrades? But if they only killed civilian zombies, how would civilians react?
Unless a cure was developed, the fight against the I-Virus was ultimately a fight against other people. Soldiers against soldiers, survivors against survivors, person against person. The victim of that fight was sitting right here.
The soldier lowered his head, tears streaming down. His mask was soaked through.
"I killed him. With my own hands. I... I..."
"That must have been incredibly difficult. You've been through a lot. Thank you for your service."
I pulled myself together and carefully chose my words. I still had so many questions. Self-diagnostic kits, reorganized units after personnel losses, stories about protecting infrastructure or safe zones. Even if the soldier didn't know everything, I might get some clues.
But the soldier seemed trapped in his own world now, staring into space and muttering to himself.
"Those people who died like that. They're probably still buried in the ground. No, they're right beside us. I can hear them. The ones locked in the barracks who starved to death."
"...They starved?"
What the hell was he talking about?
"The ones they abandoned. The sound of them screaming... Ah."
I tilted my head, looking down at the soldier. He clutched his bulletproof helmet, curled into a tight ball, and began to sob.
"There was nothing I could do. This isn't right. It isn't right."
He was in no state for conversation. I simply let my imagination run wild.
A reorganized military unit that had gathered the remaining healthy troops, excluding the infected. Forces deployed to protect infrastructure or sent to the front lines. And those left behind. Since they couldn't maintain every unit, some bases would have been abandoned entirely. And in some places, when they gave up on a unit, they must have abandoned the infected soldiers along with it.
A scene flashed through my mind. Infected soldiers screaming from behind barred windows while others moved guns, protective gear, food, and supplies. People starving to death in the barracks of abandoned bases that looked like haunted houses.
I quietly backed away.
'Twenty percent? Looks like way more than that got infected.'
The relatively sane soldiers had been sent to critical points to focus on defense and facility maintenance. I thought I understood why this unit was slowly entering the city. The ones left in the rear. But with logistics cut off, they were probably starting to look for their own way to survive.
A dangerous military. An army that had left infected fellow soldiers to die, soldiers with broken minds, a military facing resource depletion.
I hurried back to the street, leaving the crying soldier behind. I didn't suggest desertion. A weak human like that would fail the looter screening anyway.
"Kim Dain. Good timing. The military side seems to have something to say to us."
When I got back, the old man was looking for me. The combat ration distribution was already over, and the street where people had been trading had cleared out. I looked around. The Police Chief, Rider Zero, firefighters, the evangelist elder, doctors, archers, and representatives of the various survivor groups living on the streets were all still there.
A chill ran down my spine.
'Massacre? Are they planning to wipe out the loudest survivors? Smoothly swallow the city and evolve into a warlord faction?'
Soldiers with poor mental states kept glancing our way while holding their guns. A faint sense of intimidation. No survivor failed to feel wary, but those who'd fought for survival every single day bared their fangs in return. The venomous look that said if you kill us, you die too.
The Police Chief held up his radio, glaring at the soldiers.
"I don't know what you're thinking by coming into the city. But the moment you try anything funny, it's war."
The police had the ability to make that threat real. They had the police armory. With reserve force weapons and ammunition on top of that, they could organize plenty of troops to oppose the military. It wouldn't even be difficult. There were more than a few people who'd completed their mandatory military service.
"If the military gets any funny ideas, we'll all have to work together."
"We've still got plenty of Botox left..."
"Let's see how things develop first."
Everyone looked at the soldiers with suspicion. How should I put it? Fundamental distrust? Dislike? It felt like they couldn't view the military itself in a positive light. They seemed unable to let go of the suspicion that the army would evolve into warlords, oppress people, and plunder.
Maybe it was the wariness of the weak. No matter how much a survivor polished their own weapons, the military, whose main job was combat, was terrifying. If they clashed head-on, who would win?
'This is seriously scary. They wouldn't actually massacre us here, right?'
I shivered as I observed the soldiers again and fortunately concluded that wasn't the case. It wasn't a combat formation. It was a return formation. They were checking personnel and loosely gathered in one place. Looking again, their gazes seemed directed more toward Rider Zero, who had taken off her helmet.
Around that time, an older-looking captain appeared.
"Yes, I'm the company commander. I've come as the representative of the remaining forces near the city."
He didn't look in great shape either. Or maybe all soldiers just looked old. The Police Chief stepped forward aggressively.
"What's the military's goal here? You've been quiet until now, and it doesn't look like you're here for zombie extermination. Food must be just as scarce for you."
"I understand your wariness. Warlords, domination. I know what the citizens are worried about. But that won't happen."
The company commander let out a deep, exhausted sigh. He looked at the survivors gathered here.
"Let's be honest. If the military pushed in, you wouldn't just sit still, would you? Concrete cities, local resistance, vicious terrorism. We have no intention of taking on those risks."
That was also true. Turning the city into an enemy would make things difficult for the military too. Head-on battles weren't the only part of combat. That was probably why the military was showing as cooperative an attitude as possible.
"We're the same as you. Supplies via the roads have been cut off, and we're people barely surviving day by day. We just want to survive, like all of you."
"...You have no intention of plundering?"
"We won't. We don't even have the mental energy for it. And soldiers shouldn't do that anyway."
The company commander continued his rambling.
"Even though they're soldiers, the troops are all just green kids. It's pitiful that they were forcibly conscripted, but we can't just let them starve to death, can we? Just treat us as neighbors. That's all."
The people exchanged glances. Some seemed to accept it positively, while others, like me, couldn't let go of their suspicions. Reputation management? Or the first step toward causing chaos? I couldn't tell if those words were sincere, and there was no way to know how things might change later.
But the conditions they offered were too good to refuse the military outright.
"We'll soon begin clearing out zombies. From marts to shopping districts. Of course we'll claim the remaining resources there, but you'll be safer too."
Zombie clearing. The following conditions were decent too. A market where the military guaranteed safety, linking up with surviving farmers on the city outskirts to continue agriculture. In the end, the people of the city decided to accept the military for now. In truth, they couldn't refuse. They lacked the military power.
The people simply watched the soldiers with suspicion and caution, observing the situation slowly. I too stared quietly at the company commander.
'The military... Can I use them? Will they be helpful to me?'