NANOWRIMO 2007 [2nd installment]

Upon his arrival, he had the urge to write. Not to continue his challenge of fifty thousand words, but just so he could lay his thoughts down on paper for his future reference. He began with two words that he often heard accompany the topic of a marine sharpshooter; pink mist.“I used to hear it over and over, in movies, on television interviews with marines come home. It’s a phrase that is so very obvious as to it‘s meaning, yet it allows you, forces you to think. The movie Jarhead was the first place I heard it. The quiver less, highly trained voice of Jake Gyllenhaal, proposed the subject of the sight. I don’t remember the exact quote, but it was something to the affect of ‘the grunt dies for fifteen thousand poorly placed rounds;the sniper dies for that one, perfect shot. One shot, one kill. I wanted the pink mist’.”Unbeknownst to him, Adam had in fact recalled the saying exactly, further proving his ambition and subconscious need to become a scout sniper for his beloved country and marine corp.. he continued to write:“I also watched the news a lot. It seemed, that no matter where in the world our soldiers were they were always under fire, never to help anyone in need lest their adored b52 bombers had laid siege to the territory hours prior. The news casters and reporters would always have this sort of, dazed look on their faces whenever informed of the current situation overseas. It amazed me how shocked they looked to hear the same report that had been divulged by the previous interviewee, almost as to say ‘you mean you’re not the only one out here with the same opinion?!’. Really, how out of line is it that marines and fellow marines all have the same lack of sympathy for every dead, Arab insurgent with an AK-47 at his side, whom seconds earlier decided that he would take their lives? Is it really that unheard of, that two men can no longer have matching opinions? Or was it their job, for propaganda purposes of course, to react accordingly so that the population that just now decided to tune into the progress of their country to see how their freedom is being protected with life after life, could too see the same overused expression?”It was fake, all of it, he knew this and he longed for the interview he might get where he would let the world know what it is like over there. He wondered what he would say. He knew that the reporter would start off with some dumbass question like “do you have confidence in your president?”…“can I say no?”, he would say. That is truly all that would need to be said. It wasn’t an answer of no, just an answer that would make people think, make them realize that it is going to get him in deep ‘s’ if he talks down about his Commander In Chief. He was to sign all of his rights away along with his stacks of release forms and enlistment papers and he knew this too, but being as clever as he was, he knew there would be a way around the censorship.