Black Tulip

From: Kandahar, Afghanistan.
To: Elbasan, Albania.
July 27th, 1988.

privet sestronka

The engine rumbled and roared with diesel-fueled rage as the truck drove up the poorly paved dirt road. I was sweltering in the damn desert heat, I could hardly swallow or even breathe. The heat was that intense. I felt like my soul had been sucked out of my body. As the immense heat sapped my energy like a man draining a tree of its sap, it was awful.

The truck’s cabin was filled with a horrid and suffocating cloud of dust and exhaust fumes. If it wasn’t for the windows we would have died of carbon monoxide poisoning long ago. We should’ve been more worried about the fumes and not the Dushman. My lungs burned like I had swallowed a mouthful of habanero seeds. I hacked and coughed, trying to get the smoke and dust out of my godamned lungs. It was killing me.

I was forced to attack another supply convoy today. The trip was quite rough, to say the least, and the heat was searing. I could hardly breathe through all the smoke and sand.

The ride was bumpy, to say the least, every single part of this car and thing inside it rattled and shook. It seemed like the truck could fall apart at any moment and we’d be stuck in the middle of the desert. With hardly anything other than a few radios for communications equipment. Not that I would be able to say or hear anything since all the noise is screwing with my godamn tinnitus.

I tried to focus on something else by tapping on the floor with my feet. Only for it to stomp on an old pack of cigarettes and sandwich wrapper. The sound made my ears scream. But that was nothing compared to the pain I felt when a certain fucker turned on a small cassette player.

“Godamnit!” I shouted in pain, letting go of my rifle and putting my hands over my ears. “Turn the music down, right the fuck now!”

“I can’t hear you, man!” The driver yelled back.

“You heard me, Ivan! Your piece of shit!” I screamed, Ivan laughed as the music got louder. My heart skipped a beat as my knuckles turned white and my face went beet red. I was shaking with rage, trying to raise my body temperature so I could incinerate everyone with my rage.

“I SAID TURN IT DOWN!!” I roared, slamming my balled-up fist against the radio with so much force that it smashed the front of it into numerous pieces.

“What the fuck, Roman!” Ivan yelled in anger, he wasn’t happy about his good times not rolling.

Me and my comrades were at it again. We were all shouting at each other about the radio and Ivan's poor taste in music. I wish his last conversation with anyone or anything didn't have to end like that.

“My ears already hurt enough you stupid piece of fucking shit!” I replied, “I didn’t know that it was causing your ears to hurt you damn prick!” He screamed with delusional indignation.

“Bullshit! Bull-fucking-shit! We’ve debated this before asshole, you’re the one who decided to be an ass and rape my ears with that stupid music!” I ranted, my voice cracking and breaking as I coughed and groaned in pain.

“The hell it is! My music isn’t stupid, you’re the stupid!”

“What the fuck’s a stupid-!?”

Ivan opened his mouth to shout once again, but that wasn’t to be. A bullet screeched by, tearing through his throat causing blood to pour out of his voice box. He slammed on the breaks as fast as he could, and the truck skidded to a halt as Ivan applied pressure to his torn open throat.

Ivan is dead. He was shot in the throat with a Pakistani-built 7.62×39mm bullet. I remember the sickening gurgles and the gasps for air. It looked like a waterfall, a blood fall.

Many more bullets whizzed through the air. Some smashed through the windshield and back windows, I grabbed my rifle and opened fire in the general direction of the dushmen. Jamsheed jumped out and ran towards a large boulder, armed with an old RPG. Vasily covered us with the DShK mounted on the back of the truck.

I tried to remove Ivan from the truck but a hail of bullets slammed into his torso, sending him face-first into the steering wheel. More bullets came my way prompting me to bail out and run for cover. Firmly gripping my rifle I sprinted towards Jamsheed, I collapsed next to the disgruntled middle eastern man. My heart was going faster than a Shelby cobra on adrenaline and steroids. Sweat poured down my brow by the bucket-full, burning my eyes as it mixed with the dust, tar, and petrol that coated my face.

Everything went to hell in a handbasket faster than the speed of light. Bullets whistled a tune of pain and suffering, slamming into the dirt with the grace of death. If Vasily wasn't on the machine gun, we would all be on a black tulip inbound for Moscow.

Every nerve in my body was on fire, I could hardly function as my ears rang violently and my vision blurred heavily. Debris flew as many shells and bullets slammed into the dirt, the shells exploding in a cloud of nearly molten metal shards and hot gravel and dust. The dust caused my lungs to scream in agony. I hacked and coughed trying to get the dust out of my body. I couldn’t see or hear anything. I could only see blurry splotches of light or silhouettes and hear the hellish chaos of war.

My eyes burned like the fires of hell, sharp stabs from a molten knife directed at my damned eyes. My excessive sweating caused the concoction of various things to flow into my eyes. I just hope that I don't go blind.

Eventually, my vision somewhat came back to me as I removed a large amount of the tar from my face and eyes. Only for me to turn around and see a group of tanned men on horseback barreling towards us. Thankfully, Oleg managed to suppress the bastards with a machine gun. Our luck was finally turning around when Jamsheed annihilated a small group of dushmen armed with mortars.

“You two! Follow me godamnit!” I ordered as I sprinted back to the truck. My feet pounded against the scorching hot gravel and dirt, my heart pounding like a piston against my frail ribs.

Adrenaline made me go faster than a fucking airplane. Bullets whistled past me, I couldn’t hear them over the adrenaline and tinnitus. My skin was blistering and sizzling in the hot Afghani sunlight, hot enough to fry an egg. My hand wrapped around the seering hot handle to the passenger side door, the metal boiling my reddened flesh. It flew open as the car beeped and rang because nobody was wearing a seatbelt.

I pushed Ivan out of the driver’s seat and started the engine, the bastards tried to hit the hood with a shell. In exchange, Jamshed fired another rocket which sent the mangled corpses of two Afghani kids flying. Oleg hopped into the passenger’s seat as Jamsheed jumped in the back.

I slammed my foot onto the pedal and drove towards those mujahideen bastards. I wasn’t able to hear much of anything due to the intense ringing. However, there was one thing I could hear, and that was my teeth grinding into dust and my knuckles turning bone white.

The rage burned my chest like hellfire as I sped down the road like a bat out of hell. A hail of gunfire was thrown at us but the truck could take the hits and dodge the rest. The mujahideen tried to fall back but we continued to pursue and assault them. Violently. Very, very violently.

I took control of the wheel soon after we fought back the waves of dushmen. Mujahideen. Terrorists. I chased after them, we ended up killing two children in the process. I can still remember the look of horror plastered on both children's faces. The sound of their bodies hitting the floor and being crushed by the truck wheels. It was awful.

We managed to wipe out most of the godamn bastards, leaving only a few severely wounded men. As well as some disarmed and isolated Afghani children behind. Vasily pointed the giant machine gun at the group of men and children. I quickly got out of the driver’s seat and pointed my rifle at the group. I ordered them to lay on their stomachs and have their hands flat on the ground. And they obliged.

We quickly cornered the bastards and surrounded them. There were only wounded men, women, and children left. The rest fled like cowards. Leaving mostly defenseless people behind to get killed. Cowardly bastards.

I motioned for Vasily to search the prisoners, Alexi to stand at my side, and Oleg to switch to Vasily’s position as the truck gunner. They all followed my demands. Vasily ran over to the small disarmed group of wounded men and children. His gear rattled and made noise as he ran across the hot desert sand.
He patted down every each and one of the prisoners, confiscating many objects. Many knives, handmade pistols, Shotty grenades, and such weapons.

He continued his way down the row of people, eventually, he was left with only a single child left to search. The child looked to be no older or younger than seven years old, he was covered in soot and hot sand. Scrapes, bruises, and burns covered his frail form. Vasily reached down to check his hands, for some reason the kid had his hands balled up behind his back. Which alarmed vasily, but he didn’t want to scare the kid, so he grabbed a hold of the wrist.

The kid’s eyes flashed with fright and anger. He immediately retracted his wrists and kicked Vasily in the stomach hard, right in the spleen. Vasily fell over like ten pounds of shit in a five-pound bag. The kid stood up and pulled the pin on a grenade that was hidden in his hand and threw it at Vasily.

Vasily, he's missing one of his legs and the other is hanging by a quarter of a tendon. Some Afghani child hid a grenade in his hand, I tasked Vasily with searching the prisoners. I crippled my friend, Besjana. I mutilated him! He's now on crutches because I ordered him to search the captives. And I murdered a child in the process, nay, I gunned down a child.

I levied my rifle and fired at the small child, and so did Alexi, Oleg, and Jamsheed. We peppered the child with numerous hails of gunfire in our blind rage. Our outburst caused us to ignore Vasily and piss off the prisoners. They promptly started to run in the other direction or right at us. All hell broke loose soon after.

One of the men grabbed onto the upper receiver of my rifle and punched me square in the nose with enough force to break it. Blood poured out like a waterfall and I struck him with my elbow causing him to keel over. I slammed the buttstock with enough force to shatter his lower jawline. He managed to dodge one of my blows and kick me in the stomach. The pain was sharp and it took the air out of my lungs like a damn vacuum, I dropped the rifle as the pain was too much to handle. The bastard punched me in the teeth, knocking out a tooth.

As he stood up, he reached for something in his long white robe, I was too dazed to do much. Until I saw something shine in the light above me, I looked up to see the bastard holding a large hunting knife. He tried to bring it down onto my throat psycho-shower style but I used my arm to block the blade.

We struggled for quite a bit, but the stalemate was broken when I finally managed to strike him in the solar plexus with my knee. He fell onto his knees as I twisted his arm and hit him in the jaw with my elbow. Knocking out several teeth. I ripped the knife out of his hands and stabbed him in the eyes with it.

I killed a man too. I've killed many men, yes, but this one grabbed a hold of my gun and punched me in the face. He forced me into a situation where I had to kill him with my knife. It was unholy, it was torturous, and I am a monster for participating.

He shrieked in pain and terror as I mutilated both his eyes. But the screaming soon turned to gurgles as I stabbed the knife through the side of his neck. Bloodshot out like a water fountain as I jammed the knife into his throat repeatedly. Slashing and stabbing ferociously like a psycho all the while he thrashed around
On the ground. Kicking feebly as I mutilated him with his blade. Tears tried to come out, but his eyes were far too damaged to do anything but bleed. Eventually, the gurgled screams and the thrashing stopped when I jammed the blade deep into his chest.

The man stopped moving, his eyes bulged out of his sockets. I pulled the knife out of his chest. The action made a sickening sound and sprayed my jacket and face with blood.
Blood was rapidly pumping out of his chest like a water faucet. A quiet croaking noise came out of the man's throat as he finally passed on.

I. I can barely write this. I stabbed the man's eyes out with his knife, Besjana! I am a monster straight from hell! I ripped his fucking throat out with a hunting knife and mutilated his face. Tearing and slashing like a madman on cocaine, the screams and cries haunt my soul. I haven't slept a single hour in the last week, every time I try I relive all the blood and fright. As I tore his throat and face open with a godamn hunting knife!

The blood in my veins was still boiling even after the bastard died. Everything was in pain. Including my damned soul. There was a large dark purple and black bruise right where he kicked me. Right in my kidney. The pain was so intense that I seethed from lightly rubbing the bruise. I could hardly breathe or move as every breath felt like a sharp hot knife was getting stabbed into my lungs. My jaw and nose dully ached in pain as blood poured out of my face.

I could barely stumble onto my knees, let alone two feet, but somehow I managed to stand up through all the burning anguish. I wheezed as I swallowed a mouthful of dust. The hot sand burned the inside of my mouth, throat, and even lungs. But my mind forced my body to continue forth through the pain and anguish.

I searched the general area for my rifle, I found it lying on the gravel a few feet away. I stumbled over to the weapon and bent over, I seethed in pure, unadulterated agony as my chest and backlit on fire. Every nerve ending, every muscle fiber, every organ, and piece of bone was screaming in pain. I could hardly grab the gun and stand up without screaming. I barely managed to retrieve my weapon without passing out, I threw it over my shoulder and collapsed on the ground.
The hot sand burned my rear but I didn’t give a damn.

My body was wrecked by the fight. Both of our blood had stained each other. There were dark purple and black spots from where he struck me. My ears are ringing as my head dully aches and vibrates. Blood coated both of my hands, giving them a distinct smell. My face and arms were covered with scraps and slashes, I had been stabbed in the stomach twice and once in the shoulder. Nowhere direly vital.

I looked over towards the prisoners, only to see that none remained, except a few gunned-down corpses. They were trying to lift a badly crippled Vasily and place him in the back cab of the truck. A red rubber tourniquet was tied around his right leg, the left one was destroyed leaving only a disfigured stump behind. The sight would have caused me to gag had I not borne witness to similar sights many times before. It’s a shame it had to be Vasily though, and not some worthless army conscript who just arrived.

Nothing else happened this damned day. I’ll be lucky if I can even sneak this letter to you, sestronka. Yes, I know that word is not from our language, but I would rather write in the language I’ve used for the past five years. Then one I have hardly heard of since at least the seventies.

Dosvedonya, sestronka, don’t tell anyone where I am. Tell them I am dead, or in neverland. Just don’t tell them I’m in Afghan, besjana.

Your little brother, Rahid ibn Hadid.

Author's Note

~~To the seven people who disliked the story almost instantly. Can you give me criticism, please?~~

Edit 5/15/22: Holy fuck there were a lot of errors. I fixed them, though, so no worries. Now I understand somewhat why the story got heavily disliked.