In Continuum.

Murmurs and Whispers

A random memory of the good old military days came to me last night, while I sat in bed in the middle of the night and heard the neighbor upstairs arguing for the millionth time since they moved here a couple of days ago. Even on a weekday night, they get no rest and peace from each other, always reaching for each others' throats. I remember when I was younger, I peered into their bedroom from my balcony and saw the man hitting the woman. That argument ended with the door slamming and the woman left next to her bed, crying softly into the night. Clearly, I was being a peeping Tom and a voyeur. But in the middle of the night when you hear the sound of a woman sobbing in the dark, you can't help but wonder if it is merely a part of your own imaginations.

I remember that night, when the rumbling in the vehicle drowned out all thoughts and our helmets knocked against one another's. Inside the vehicle it was pitch black, save for the green and orange light at one end of the vehicle, blinking every time somebody talks over the intercom. It was a little past midnight at that time, and there was a gloomy cloud hanging over the heads of the boys because the idea of digging holes in the ground and sleeping in it wasn't very appealing. We started thinking about the hour of the night we'd be digging, then about the sand flies and the sweat involved in doing so. I heard a sigh coming from behind, but figured it was probably the voice in the back of my head agreeing with my woes. A long night awaited us at the destination, and we weren't too excited as the ramp fell quietly in the dark and we stepped out into the shady gloom.

We inspected the area, and the area where we were supposed to start digging was a small grass patch on the side of the road. On the other, a muddy grassland that reached out into the horizon, with the perimeter closest to us lined with a tall row of trees, save for the opening that faced the grass patch on our side of the road. We were supposed to guard that opening from possible 'enemy' attacks, and hold them until we are given the green light to fall back. At midnight, the boys cared too little about the enemies or the mission at hand. We grabbed our backpacks and digging tools, along with a few cans of soft drinks and a box of pineapple tarts, and waved the vehicle goodbye as the two red lights disappeared around the bent.

We had a great night outfield that day, because there were no superiors around us and we were in a remote corner of the training area. We decided to have a little picnic before the work begins, and we talked and chatted over a shared bottle of soft drink and a dozen pineapple tarts. With a candle burning in the middle of a circle of five, my section had a great time hanging out with each other before the work and toil started. But of course, all fun must come to an end and it did. With the cover of dark, we took off our equipments and started digging our holes in the ground, all the time mumbling and cursing under our breaths. I for one, was wondering what I did to deserve this, and the last good meal that I had in the comfort of my home. The steaming soup, the fragrant meat and vegetables...my stomach growled. I was hungry again.

It was a little past two when we all finished, and one of us was supposed to keep watch while the others rested. We worked at one hour shifts, and I was the first leg of the guard. While others fell asleep under the trees and in their own private muddy holes, I stared up into the starry skies through the crown of the dark trees above, and dreamed about the outfield ending within the next minute, and then the next minute, and then the next minute. But the end never came, and I counted the hours down till the time which the enemy were supposed to attack us. Four hours approximately, and there we were snoring like pigs in the night, how ridiculous. I played with the light switch of the watch that I borrowed, and watched as the time ticked by slower than ever. The forest was growing darker and quieter, and the shine of the moon reached only the top of the trees but never penetrated. The road led from one bent to another, and no cars or vehicles came throughout the night whatsoever. And because of the silence that overwhelmed me, I fell softly asleep on my guard and drifted off.

There was a shuffle of feet, then the breaking of twigs. I woke up startled, and checked the watch. Fifteen minutes into the next guard, I must have overslept. I sat up in my hole, and the opening on the other side of the road that led to the grassland was there, with no signs of the enemy. I checked the watch again, and it was merely fifteen minutes past three in the morning, the enemy weren't supposed to be here yet. But there I sat, quietly behind the bush and heard the sound of people whispering from the other side of the road and the sound of trees being brushed aside, twigs breaking under the weight of a dozen men marching through the woods.

Panicked, I crawled my way to my sergeant's hole and woke him up. He thought I was merely joking with him until we quietened down, and we heard the sound of a bunch of men in the woods before us. We woke everybody up silently while the sound kept coming from the other side of the road, and were ordered to stay in our holes until we SEE the enemy. Our guns were cocked, ready to fire, and there I was in my own hole and smelling the moist earth when from behind, a twig broke and I turned around.

In the shadows of the trees, the sound from the other side of the road came to our side too. Branches broke behind us, voices spoke to one another in the night and the shadows grew darker and darker. I stared in between two trees, and I thought I saw a figure stepping out from between them and stared back. I couldn't see the person's eyes, but I could feel his stare on me as I heard the sound of a bottle cap being uncapped. I gripped my rifle and was ready to fire anytime, but he just stared at me with much wonder from the cover of the shadows. Then, as swiftly as the sound came, they disappeared.

I crawled over to my sergeant again, and he told me that he heard the same thing too. So the section - the five of us - crawled out of holes and proceeded to the main road itself where the lights were. But because we were so convinced that the voices were from the enemy, despite the fact that it was 4 in the morning when we were supposed to be sleeping, we came up with plans to draw the enemy out.

First up, I pretended to urinate on the other side of the road where the opening was, just so that if the enemy notices my existence, they might open fire on us. I strolled to that side of the road, and pretended to be urinating. But the sound from there kept on, with the soft murmurs from the bushes of people talking remaining constant throughout my act. I scrambled back to where the boys where, and I told them that the plan failed. To the second plan we went.

We filled a Sprite can with sand and threw it into the bushes. We heard it surge through the night and and crashed through the branches and trees. The voices stopped for a while, and we thought that that was it, they were going to emerge and attack us. But after a moment of silence, the voices resumed and we were left at the side of the road, puzzled and confused. Deep inside, we were scared as hell because we knew what we were hearing were real voices, and not just the sounds of the woods. We even threw our firing sticks onto the road that made loud noises. But they never appeared throughout the night, not a trace of them at all.

The sunlight came eventually, and neither the source of the voices or the enemies came at all. We remained at the side of the road until the morning, and the lot of us were exhausted because we were supposed to have slept for at least four hours or so. But there we were, tired and freaked out by the incident of the night. But neither of us reminded one another about it, and laughed it off because when the lights came, everything just sounded plain ridiculous. But I still remember the way the figure stared at me in the shadows, and whatever it was, it freaked me out.

There, a little creepy story of mine. I won't say that I SAW anything, but the fact that I didn't made the experience even creepier. After all, the only thing one should fear is their own imagination. I'm not too sure if the sound and the figure were merely part of my imagination, perhaps I was too tired to differentiate between a shadow and a silhouette of a man. But whatever the murmurs and whispers were, they happened. They really did.