Little Black Submarines – The Black Keys
1.
“Erik!” a voice called him, getting lost and out of time.
Strange dots appeared in Erik’s vision, little black dots. One of them got closer and closer, growing and engulfing the man.
When he realized, he was inside what seemed to be a submarine. In the control panel there was an old man sitting, pressing buttons and pushing levers.
“Hello,” Erik said. “Where am I?”
The man didn’t answer anything.
“Hey, old man. Can’t you hear me?”
The man looked towards Erik, only enough to show that his face was a mess of facial hair, and then returned to the previous position.
“Hey! What is happening here? Where am I?”
As the man said nothing, Erik tried to touch him, only to find he couldn’t do it: his body didn’t obey his mind whenever he tried to get too close to the man. Not knowing what to do anymore, Erik sat in the chair beside the man’s chair, and looked through the glass.
They were inside a strange tunnel, with holes—maybe other tunnels—on its walls. The man pushed a lever and the submarine leaned to the right, entering one of them, and, when the tunnel ended, they were… floating… over a hill?
“Wait,” said Erik. “I know this place.”
Under a tree at the top of the hill, there were two figures, and one of them was Erik himself.
2.
The other person was Erin, Erik’s girlfriend, with her long curly red hair, and that place was where they used to go to be together. Getting closer, Erik could hear what they said:
“Why will you go to the war?” she asked. Oh, it was such a beautiful voice! “You’re a pacifist.”
“First of all,” he began, “I won’t kill anyone. I’ll try to save whomever I can.”
“And…?”
“They are weak, Erin”, he continued. “If we do it right, we can even make them surrender. It would be the best for all of us!”
“But they are savage, Erik,” said Erin, in a worried tone. “They can be brutal when pressed. If something happens to you, I…”
“Nothing will happen to me, darling,” Erik interrupted her with a brief kiss.
“Please come home,” she said, embracing him. “Be here to see Cole coming to this world.”
“I’ll make this world a better place for him to live in.”
Cole! Erik would be a father soon!
The old man pushed a lever again, and they began to get away from that place. If I could have done it in a different way…
Before he could tell it, the submarine was already in a tunnel again.
3.
The new place was also familiar. Erik wished it wasn’t.
He and his comrades were inside a trench, under enemy fire and firing back. Only a bunch had survived, and dozens of corpses were lying among them; some killed by bullets, other by disease.
“These men are crazy!” said Rodrik, Erik’s brother. “Can’t they see they won’t win?”
“They are like wild animals,” said Erik. “When an animal can’t run anymore, it fights like a demon.”
“Where is the rest of the ammo? I’ve run out of it!” said Mark.
“There isn’t any more ammo!” said Sal.
A scream on the left. Leon was shot in the neck!
“Please, Leon!” said Erik over his fellow man. “Don’t leave us!”
But it was too late.
Now it rested only Erik, Rodrik, Mark, Elda, Frilla and Sal. Other units were attacking different enemy bases, trying to crush the enemy into pieces as fast as they could, but those six were all alone in that place.
“It seems there is only one man left!” said Elda. “He’s running, but he seems to be hurt!”
“Let’s go after him,” said Frilla.
“I’m out of ammo,” said Rodrik.
“Leon too,” said Mark.
“Do someone has any bullet left?” Sal asked.
“I do,” said Erik.
“What are we waiting for?” said Elda. “Be fast or he will escape!”
And before Erik could say anything, they were already chasing the man through the battlefield.
4.
They reached the man faster than they imagined. He fallen down, probably because of the hurt leg, and before he could get up again, Erik and his companions had surrounded him. Now the man was crouching, trying to look to everyone at the same time as they were getting closer.
“A cornered animal,” thought Erik.
The hand of the man grabbed something in his belt.
“He’s armed!” said Sal.
“Shoot him now, Erik!” said Elda.
But he didn’t do it. How could he kill a man? A cornered man?
The men rose up faster than anyone could imagine, and sliced Elda’s throat.
“What are you doing, Erik?” Rodrik screamed.
And only in that moment Erik pulled the trigger, taking down the man.
He threw the gun away and grabbed Elba from the ground, but it there was nothing he could do. Elda was dead.
5.
“Can't we stop this?” Erik asked, while they entered a new tunnel, but the old man didn’t answered. He closed his eyes, but everything was there too, even in the inner darkness of his eyelids: the submarine, the old man, the memories. There was no escape.
The place now was the last place he remembered to be in. Behind a fallen tree, he, his brother and his friends were again in a battle. But that time it would be different.
Erik was feeling guilty. Guilty because he let Elda die. Guilty because he killed that man. Guilty for all of his comrades who had fallen on his side. Why so many people have to die?
He took a little piece of white fabric from a pocket, tied it up to the tip of his rifle and pointed it up. It was an offer of peace.
Suddenly, the enemy stopped the shooting.
“It worked?” Erik asked, coming out from behind the tree.
“Wait, Erik!” said Rodrik, but it was useless. Erik was already in the middle of the battlefield.
A man was coming from the other side. He also had a white piece of fabric in his hands.
Peace, thought Erik. No more death!
Something glowed under the fabric, but, for Erik, it was nothing. There would finally be some compromise.
They now were face-to-face.
“Erik,” he could hear his brother scream.
The man stretched his right hand, like in a handshake. Erik didn’t think two times, and reached the hand of the man.
The fabric fell down, showing a knife in the left hand of the man. Pulling Erik close to him with the right hand, the man hit his stomach many times. Then all the shooting began again, the man was shot in his face, and Erik fell down.
“Erik!” a voice called him, getting lost and out of time.
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