Last Thoughts Of A Traitor

• Branda Newton, Grade 10
• Short Story
• 2011

The lock clicks in that muffled way, made when someone is trying to be quiet. Damn, they’re early. And not particularly friendly early either. As in deadly early. As in ‘someone lives, someone dies here’ early.

Damn again. These are some highly incriminating documents.

Handbook, handbook. I exhale deeply, as loudly as I dare. Remember: “In all situations keep calm. Above all, a worthy Elitesman is always calm,” think, think... hmm?

Yeah that’s me. ‘Elitesman’, cool huh? You hear about us on telly, read about us in the papers, dream to be us when you’re young. Most people grow out of such a wild, crazy, ruthless dream but we refused. It was an intoxicating world that’s different now.

What the public don’t see is the training. It’s gruelling if you’re lucky and a nightmare if you’re not. And the Qualification Rounds. Even worse. And not just hand-to-hand combat against a six and a half foot bear of a man after a ten k march in soggy, damp, bleak conditions.

Or dismantling a hydrogenated formulacide bomb in the hold of a small dingy aircraft carrier with the French Prime Minister, his latest mistress and 72 other lives in your hands; but yours doesn’t count as we discover in training.

There are things in this world worth dying for. Things so big, things so important; things so, so... bloody worth it we would and will.

And so we do: IQ tests, aptitude tests, compatibility tests, physicality tests as well as providing blood, hair and urine samples for hundreds of other tests.

You may scoff, but we really truly believe in this, our conviction is convincing. A Sudoku might be all it takes to save sixty thousand people. Ever heard of Jimmy Recard and the Tokyo Terrorist a few years back? Of course you have, he scoffed and now is in the navy.

See the thing is being an Elitesman is just that. It’s like being the hippest, coolest square on the block. The fastest cars, sexiest girls and the most explosive weapons. James Bond, eat your heart out.

But even though you train against guerrillas, terrorists and some of the most psychotic, delusional nut jobs at the business end of a Kalashnikov, the deadliest enemy could be your own Combat Training partner. Or your bunk mate. A guy in your unit. You’re always on the lookout for any trace of treachery, a hiss of deception, a whiff of betrayal.

One guy, Jack Holsford, was killed when getting up to pee one night, right after the Parisian bombings. You don’t muck around.

A head appears. You exhale audibly, recognising that thick blonde hair anywhere, not to mention her ‘signature scent’ (for this month anyway) Estee Lauder’s Sensuous. “Ah Meg, after a few years being my partner you should have learned –” you begin but don’t quite finish.

The woman named “Meg” exits the room with the receding sound of her confident ‘click clack’ing heels and leaving only a whiff of perfume behind.