A Bullet Story

On bullet serial numbers: http://www.factcheck.org/2009/01/ammunition-accountability-act/

Yannick Rinel , according to Google research, is a somewhat popular choice of name for boys in Congo.


Bullet 53672 was ejected in the hot, humid, and generally miserable jungles of the Congo. Of course, the weather was of no concern to the bullet, seeing as it didn't even have the time to sweat before hitting its stop and final purpose. One could say it was a fine bullet with a beautiful performance. And it did its fine job ending up in Yannick Rinel's head, just above the left brow. Before coming to rest, 53672 made multiple trips across the dome of the inside of his skull. If one were to trace curves through the different points of deflection, a very nice set of circles would turn out. This had the effect of stewing Yannick Rinel's brain into a fine mush, and it was like strawberry-flavored apple sauce pouring out of his head after he fell. Now this all sounds very graphic and atrocious, but the thing is, Yannick Rinel was much less than human before the bullet hit him. He looked very ugly and mangy standing there in the brush, with his tongue hanging out, panting, and heaving. His dirty pores, his oily cheeks and nose, and the splotches of mud on his face - all of it showed clearly in the heavy light of the Sun. His eyes no longer seemed the luminous brown jewels given to him by his mother, but they stood dark in the sockets like two burntout coals. The heat and the battle had flattened the great arrangment of his thoughts and memories and dreams into one hollow, flat note. He only stared dumbly when the prostrate beasts with faces - familiar and vaguely human - waved their arms at him to get down. He forgot why there was a rifle in his hands. He couldn't recall what he was fighting for. He even lost the idea of who he was or why he was living. So when 53672 pecked his skin, no bother or grief was to be had. Yannick Rinel just saw an explosion of white heat behind his eyes and then he licked the ground. After that, there was no longer a man to consider. Only silence and decay.