Culture

The last Mccain supporters are caught on tape.When the man shuffled around the corner, I knew he was infected. It was
his eyes-flooded with black as though they were bleeding ink. And like
most infected, he was slow. Before he could swing his axe, I braced
myself and trained the laser sight of my pistol in the center of his
forehead-a third, red eye opening in the middle of his black-shot stare.

After
I pulled the trigger, his head exploded in a spurt of gore. A fleshy
tentacle rose from his torso, twisting towards me before splitting open
like a spindly, fleshy flower. Later, I would see even more grotesque
things. Small, winged leathery imps climbing from men's backs,
sloughing off their carcasses like costumes. Giant centipedes
slithering out of men's destroyed heads. Dogs peeled apart like figs,
the strands of their bodies groping towards me.

Locked, loaded and dancing to the rhythms of your machine gun.After the attacks, our leaders tried to reassure us. "They started this
war," we were told. Our enemy was "threatening the peace of the
universe." Our leaders declared that "the time for diplomacy is past."
It was up to us to "get it done." We were assured that the first wave
of our assault would deal "decisive blows" to the Helghan forces.

But
when we arrived, we found that their forces were far from blown apart.
Helghan soldiers are everywhere. Their glowing red eyes emerge from the
gloom of their disfigured cities. They peep through the scrim of dust
that blows across their deserts. "Red eyes!" someone from my squad
yells. And we all turn and fire on the crimson targets.
The
Helghast are decent fighters. They adjust their position to flank me as
I move. They yell "Shit!" when I throw a grenade into their midst. But
I'm learning how they think. If I keep my scope trained on a spot where
I just saw a Helghast's eyes, they will reliably pop up again. And if I
kill one Helghast, another takes its place. It's not that they're
unintelligent. They're just predictably intelligent.