[ IP ] You do what you got ta do

I had heard stories about people like us. I just never thought I would be one. Apparently, they've been around since forever and ever. They do n't know... we, we do n't know why we do it, or why we do it more than once, or how we do it. We do n't know if we enjoy it. Do we... enjoy, hurting people? 
 
 Johnny told me about one. A soldier with him around the time of the Fall of Berlin. There was a group of German soldiers in one of the still standing buildings, they just would n't leave. They had sustained fire for three days, and there were no confirmed hits. Tough sons-of-bitches. They refused to surrender. Bodies were piling up, and the brass wanted progress. Heavy ordnance - rockets, mortars, even bangalore torpedoes - nowhere to be found. Reinforcements were on the way, but Sarge was desperate to beat the Russians to the Reich Chancellory. It did n't matter in the end. 
 
 We were camped out behind an embankment, waiting for word over the radio about help, but none came, until we heard that the next squad a few blocks west would come help us. They show up, normal guys who have n't had the chance to shave or bathe in weeks, just like us. They shared their cigarettes with us, asked how the killing was. We told them the situation. 
 
 One of them, he was n't like the rest. He looked normal, see, but he did n't... he did n't feel normal, not at all. Like a cheap Chinese copy of the real deal. He was an older fellow, probably hung around for the last months of the Great War. Chemical burns on his face, old gas mask still hung around his belt. 
 
 `` Ok,'' says their company sergeant. `` Ok, you -'' he points to Mike, the heavy gunner `` - open up on the front. J is gon na sneak around -'' he points to the old timer `` - and take care of it.'' 
 
 We did as he said. We covered Mike as he set up, he covered J as he ran up to the side door, bullets racking the blown out windows and gaping holes in the side. Coal Kettle helmets, all safe in their cement fortress... until J got to em. 
 
 Mike let off when he got in. We heard em' yelling from across the street. It did n't take long at all. 
 
 That's what I thought about, standing across the street from the old Terrence Bookstore. J had done what he did because he had to, because he was told. And now I'm doing this... because I need it. I feel like I have to have it. 
 
 I put on a pair of dark glasses. Mike and I light up cigarettes. We hope nobody hears the click-clack of magazines snapped into place, of rounds being chambered. We cross the dark road in the pouring rain. A patron is walking calmly out of the store, laughing, cig in his hand. He bites it in two as my fist meets his jaw, knocking him to the floor. I kick open the door and enter, tightly clutching my weapon. 
 
 An upbeat swing record is playing, out of place for a quiet bookstore. Few people are here... it's not really a bookstore, but the infamous hangout for... for somebody? 
 
 I gun down two armed guards before their guns are out of pocket, bullet holes staining red their pressed white shirts. A few books take the collateral, spilling pages into the air. Mike heads to the Fiction section, I head to non-fiction, opposite directions. 
 
 
 More guards pour out of the stacks, taking shots at me, missing. They go down as well, taking a few encyclopedias with em'. 
 
 It's not long before I reach my target, seated in an easy chair in back, gun at the ready. 
 
 `` What are you doing?!'' he demands of me, the last demand he makes of anyone. Soon he is ventilated just like his men. 
 
 In the silence afterward, I notice that the record has changed from an upbeat song to a rather... somber one. I quickly make my way back to the car. Mike follows.
