The Man

• Jessica Innes
• Short Story
• 2020

There he was, touching the moon with his blackened rotten fingertip. His eyes glazed over in glory for he had finally achieved what no one else could. He whispered the secrets of the world into the speckled nothingness, his lips cracking open with each move they made. The man’s monitor sharply beeped into the dead silence, he smiled with agony.

They had finally come for him.

The sound of landing footsteps did not make him turn around to face the end that he would surely be. The sudden change in atmospheric pressure from his helmet being quite rudely removed caused his ears to ring. The mans lungs burned with searing hot pain, almost as if someone had poured an acid down his windpipe straight to his lungs.

The young soldier finally saw the true face of the man that they had been hunting for so long and no amount of training could have prepared him for the face that he would see. The man looked as if he should have died long ago, his face ashen grey, no amount of that pinkish colour that indicated life left on his skin. His hair of what left remained, brittle and whiter than his face. However, the solider could not stop looking at those terror inducing lips. The man’s lips no longer contained their colour and spots of black littered them, showing where the skin had died. Blood constantly poured from the broken skin; the young soldier wondered how much pain the man could possibly be in.

The man looked into the youthful green eyes of the young soldier and clutched his golden necklace with a tight resolve. The man felt his life go to black, even blacker than the never-ending space around him. Soon he fell, his body being caught by the young soldier on a barked order from his supervisor.

The young soldier nodded to his comrade to confirm that yes, the man was finally dead. However, his fellow soldier stepped forward, a gun pointed to the man’s head. The sound of the gunshot did not echo through the space but faded. The mission complete, the young soldier released the man from the cable anchoring him down and let his dead body float away. The soldiers watched on, a shallow victory brightening their deadened eyes.

Today had been a success, but why to the young soldier did it not feel as so?