I passed out quickly after the king left. In my dream, Mom was dancing out in space. I loved sleeping here, because it was like I had Mom back. Not the Van Jones Syndrome mom. My mom, just as she was. Her short hair was back, and she had this dress. It was the color of the universe. It was hard to explain, but seeing it made so much sense. I opened my eyes and saw the Milky Way. Like the actual Milky Way. I was on the cushions. The sky twinkled immaculately. I don’t think I’d ever seen the constellations so clearly. Right then, I had the sense of never wanting to leave that moment. It was everything. I had Mom back, and I had the entire universe.

I star-gazed for a few more hours while night turned to dawn. Before I got too comfortable, I heard the door open. I looked and saw Big Ass, and he looked especially serious.

“Yullah,” was all he said before he disappeared. The Taco was waiting. I was still in the back, still sandwiched in the bitch seat. Beardo and Turban were more stiff today. They seemed like bodyguards now. We started to travel winding roads with weird supply roads that were carved out of the mud. A giant tractor clearly cut these roads into two tire trenches you rode like a train on a track. The drive was quiet.

I finally saw something new. Normal people, cattle (sheep I think), a few kids running around wearing soccer jerseys. Mostly men with guns. There were some vehicles, and machinery scattered all over the place. It seemed like these “used-to-be farms” were just lawns for equipment now. There were cinderblock encampments across the whole landscape: war machinery, canons, machine guns. The equipment was huge. One of the machine gun’s bullets was grenade sized. The round was… actually the same size as the bullet hole in the Taco’s passenger door. I looked down at the car’s center console and noticed the plastic was burned. It was at the exact height as the bullet hole. Shit son, if someone was sitting there, they really got it bad through the legs. They might have lost their balls too. And their ass. Little flecks of maroon-colored dust rested in the crevices of the console. It was old and crusted with dried blood from the shell ripping through someone’s lower half. Shit son. Someone got cut up in this car.

Great billows of smoke bloomed in the distance. Forming a single cloud, the smoke swept across the landscape as the largest single thing in sight, aside from the ground and the sky. The Taco was off road, trekking the dust. I could see the real machines of war. Tanks were riding this area. Men were scattered in the sand, around the tanks, some only feet behind the sides of the war machines.

Our ride came to a halt, and the doors opened. I was on the move out the left side, towards Turban. I’d need a catchier name for him. When we got out, I noticed my shoes; the Joe Madden slippers Mom bought me. They wouldn’t last in this terrain.

Turban was moving me along by the cuff of my arm, sternly. What gives? I thought I was supposed to be special. I flailed, and Turban smacked me upside my head. Hard. It wasn’t fair. These ISIS guys were hot and cold.

We walked onward, across burned-out holes in the ground. Shells kissing the burn-holes. I was in a war zone.

A random spurt of blood laced the ground, salted with sand and pebbles. I made sure my sneakers didn’t touch the blood. Through the soles of my shoes, I could feel every edge from the bullet shells.

Then I saw a head. The eyes were fresh, unadulterated by decay or blood loss. I mean, the thing didn’t have much blood left. There was a great stain from the neck, almost two feet in diameter. But the eyes were still moist. He was staring down at the ground, but up. Mouth closed as far as I could see. Hair in a general mess about his cheeks. He was young. He didn’t have any facial hair on him, and as far as I could tell, the trend around here was: Grow Facial hair. Fuck shaving.

Damn. Homeboy couldn’t have been 17. He was down for the count. Donezo Ferrari. He was out. Dead. Eliminated. He had no body. There wasn’t one anywhere in sight. How far away was the rest of him? What did they do with the rest of him?

I remembered that thing about guillotines. Your head is chopped off and you have a full 15 seconds before the lights go out from instant decapitation. What were his last 15 thoughts? Did he move his eyes? Did he look for something on the ground?

This wasn’t real. Like this was all fake, put here for some artistic reason. Humans didn’t do this to each other. I was transfixed by this head, and looked back, but Turban was toting me along. It wasn’t too long ’til I saw an arm lying about. This arm was too black to be the headless horseman’s hand.… Well, horseteen’s hand. Of course humans did this to each other. They do, don’t they. They’ve done it since… since.

He toted me past burning tanks and jeeps. They had bodies inside, and the hot air reeked of rotting compost. I puked in my mouth—tasted like last night’s chicken—and swallowed it back. We passed live tanks, roaring with some 100-decibel engine, and then out a little farther, and a little farther. Then we went over a sand bank, past a burnt jeep and into a great expanse. Out in the expanse were more fires. Smoke billowed out of those tanks, and soot painted the sky a heavy dark grey. A great wide prairie of death stared me in the face. The tanks were different. There weren’t any black flags on them. Enemy tanks? Are they my enemy or my friend? Frienemy?

Nothing but burning metal now. The ground was crunchier out here. Baked by the sun.

I felt nothing for the soldiers. I didn’t know who they were. I’d heard of them. I’d seen exactly one Frontline special about them. Now here they were in front of me. Dead. Slaughtered from the looks of it. There were a few buildings in the distance that were clearly crumpled by cannon fire.

We stopped, Turban and I, him halting me, and just standing. He held out a palm to the sky, as if to say, “behold.” He was rambling on saying god knows what. He wanted me to see the greatness. All I saw were a couple of burning garbage piles, and dead people.

I looked at Turban’s turban, and noticed that the colors matched the background behind him. Then he changed. His eyes weren’t friendly. They were cold and dead. He would rather see me burn in a pit than continue babysitting.

The wind picked up, and sand sprayed into our faces. It reminded me of the Oregon coast in the winter with all that salt and sand hitting my face.

His checkered turban scarf now made plenty of sense. He was doing just fine against this wind. I, on the other hand, was keeping my smart mouth shut. Nothing is worse than crunching sand down with your teeth.

“ALLAHU AKBAR!” came out from under the scarf. Turban pulled his pistol out from his holster and cocked it. I stared down the barrel. Just me and him.

“ooOO,” was what came out of me. I had just enough time to freeze up and forget how to use my arms to block the bullet.

A sound snapped through the air, and blood splashed on my Cape Cod shirt. It freckled my face. Warm to the touch, and wet. The blood flew up, like a popped pimple.

A mighty thwack rushed out from the air. It sent me straight to the ground, right on my ass. I caught my torso with my hands, legs straight out on the ground. We both hit the deck.

Turban was down. His body lay next to mine, our legs touching. He had a lop of blood fresh out his chest. A great hole was dug into his lungs. I could see the beginnings of ribs, but it was all just meat. Still, still meat, dug into a still, still body. His brown and green eyes were still looking into mine. I was the last thing he saw as he drifted into whatever was next. The shock and shame was priceless. Turban died at my execution. ISIS was so confusing.

Turban was gone. Donezo Ferrari. Do you get 72 virgins if you don’t execute before you die?

I had unlimited access to his bullshit Glock. Goodnight, fuckface. I’ll see you in hell, schmata. I smiled, knowing that this piece of garbage was gone. Wiped from the Earth. Unable to terrorize anyone else. He was dead and I was alive. And that was the only difference between us now. And it felt good. For about 2 seconds until I realized what happened. Thank you Fortnite.

I was still in sniper range. Shit. I didn’t know if I should stand up or play dead. Did they know I was not ISIS?

Oh shit. I had to get out of there. Oh shit. Time to go.

Another whiz slammed into the jeep next to me and Turban. My ears rang. I felt the wind whip past me. Okay, now they were trying for MY chest. I lunged forward, heart racing, and ripped the gun out of Turban’s hand. He really had a grip on it. Another whiz slammed. The wind knocked me a little. Not enough. I yanked once more and loosened it enough to go. Got it! I crawled back behind the jeep. Behind cover, back to ISIS. They were the only ones who could protect me. And damn, wasn’t that a shame?

Big Ass and Beardo ran toward me with their AKs cocked. Then they spotted me, like they’d spotted a ghost. Beardo turned to Big Ass and yelled at him in Arabic. He then aimed out and started ripping his AK across the prairie of death. Big Ass sprinted right for me. He ran like such a queen, but he sure ran fast. He hesitated when he realized whose gun I was holding. I looked at him and knew what happened. Then I just looked up and said, “Your friend’s dead.” He reached me, and instantly pushed me along, back down the bank. Beardo followed, ripping more and more slugs through the air. I couldn’t hear anymore whizzing as I walked back into familiar territory. Past the burning corpses, and the tanks, and the war cannons, and the severed head. Back to the Taco, behind a very worried Big Ass. I kept a solid grip on the gun. My death sentence gun. If they wanted to kill me, they would need to do it quick.

In 7 seconds, the Taco was moving. I was in the back. They didn’t even try for the gun in my hand. Whatever they’d planned failed, but it sure got me more space in the back seat. I held the gun the entire time, and I was smiling.

On the inside. I felt like maybe, just maybe, I had a parent waiting for me back home. The King.

Judging by how Beardo and Turban were yammering to each other in the Taco, someone was in trouble. If I was gonna survive in this place, I’d have to keep this gun ready to shoot. I’d never even shot a gun before. I hoped it wouldn’t be too different from Fortnite.