The Fog of Wharr
 by Sean Kavanagh (c) 2015 
My mum had warned me to keep away from the recruiting posters. 
It was hard, as they were on walls all over the city, but you got to know roughly where they liked to stick them, so you could avoid them.  It was harder when you were with your friends or drunk, but I always seemed to cope.
I’d only popped out of the apartment to get some groceries for my mum, but as I walked back to the brutal concrete towers of our estate, I turned a corner on my usual route and was suddenly face to face with a poster that hadn’t been there before. 
I stopped.  I tried to look away and make myself believe I hadn’t seen it, but that didn’t work.  Someone told me holding your breath helped break the hold it had over you, but it just made me feel giddy - and it didn’t help me look away from the poster. 
But it was more than a poster – that’s what the rumours always said.  Just one look….
Finally I had to let out my breath, and found myself staring at the recruiting poster, resigned to its presence. And there it was: a metre square of smart paper, with a big picture of Earth’s hero ‘General Wharr’, his finger pointing out of the poster right at me.  Below, the text: “YOUR planet needs YOU!”. 
The poster flickered for a moment.  General Wharr looked, well, I could swear he looked different for a second, somehow…not right.
The poster was beginning to make me feel drowsy now, it flickered again, but this time I didn’t see anything odd, or if I did, I tuned it out.  As I got more and more drowsy I started to think things that I never normally thought: Why hadn’t I signed up?  Earth was clearly at war. My planet, and it needed me, and here I was buying vegetables and soya concentrate for my mum to make us dinner. It was my duty wasn’t it? To fight for the cause…for our cause?
I put the bag of groceries down and stepped closer to the poster. Compelled to do so. Up close I could feel the hairs on my arms almost crackle, but now my eyes were firmly fixed on the poster.  It flickered again, now displaying a new caption: “YOUR courage, YOUR sacrifice, will bring OUR victory!”
I felt empty.  What courage? 
Not like….my brother.  Tom.  How had I forgotten about Tom?  Killed by the enemy, dying out there, fighting so people like me could be safe?  Had I buried the grief so deep that Tom had vanished from my day to day thoughts?  But he was back now.  And I could feel the…anger towards the enemy.
Thank god we had General Wharr to lead us!
My hand, like a reflex, raised up and touched the poster.  As I ran my fingertip[s over its smooth, papery surface, I noticed the white feather tattooed on my left hand.  How long had that been there? I pulled my sleeve down to cover my shame.  I didn’t want anyone to see that I was a ‘White Feather’: a man who refused to fight for his world.
What would my brother Tom think of me?  His decaying remains off somewhere on a battlefield whose name I couldn’t even pronounce.
The poster flickered.
General Wharr’s gaze seemed even more fierce, his purple eyes (had they always been purple?) asking more questions than any words could.   Below him, the slogan simply now read: JOIN NOW!
Yes, I should join now.
I should show the enemy what Tom meant to me, what everything on Earth meant to me.  I was no White Feather.  Around me I noticed columns of smoke rising from the ruin of blocks on my living complex.  How had I missed them before? The work of the bastard enemy.  Was I so blind before?
The slogan had changed again. It simply said: NOW!
I walked away from the poster, leaving the two bags of groceries on the ground and slowly began to walk.  I was going somewhere, I wasn’t sure of the destination, but the route to get there seemed clear. 
I walked, dazed, for half an hour, finally reaching the door of the recruiting station.  I felt a little nauseous, a little dizzy. The posters had…
I looked down at the White Feather tattoo on my hand, then up at the dour concrete bunker with its banner: JOIN! FIGHT! WIN! GLORY TO WHARR!
The door opened and a skinny, palid man stuck his head out.
“Will you come in comrade? Will you join the desperate struggle?”  He was looking at my tattoo.
I nodded and went in.
Inside the recruiting room was bland, full of furniture that was decades out of date.  Wooden desks.  Leather chairs.  On the desks only paper, no technology of any kind. 
“You’ve decided to answer The General’s call”, smiled the recruiting Sergeant.
“Yes, the….I saw the poster,” I mumbled.
“We’re lucky to have The General. Without him, well, defeat and ignominy would be upon humanity already.  He’s an inspiration.” The sergeant looked up at another poster.  I followed his gaze.  There, as always, was General Wharr, his bright purple eyes the same colour as the tentacle that pointed out.  Funny how I’d never noticed that before, but that was OK.  The General was fighting for us all.
“So, you want to enlist?” said the sergeant.
“I think I should,” I replied hazily.  “The enemy…” I stopped talking, embarrassed, I couldn’t remember the name of the enemy.  I could distantly picture them.  Different.  Alien. Cold.  Humankind’s eternal foes.  At least that’s what I felt.
“Yes, the perfidious enemy.  They’d have Earth for their own.” Agreed the recruiter.
“They are the enemy.” I said automatically. All doubt now locked down deep in my mind.    “I feel that now.”
The recruiter smiled and pushed forward a sheet of paper.  It was official looking, full of clauses and caveats, but the black line at the bottom where I was supposed to sign was very clear. He handed me a pen. 
“Both copies,” he said cheerfully.
“Yes, if course, sign both copies.  That is the proper thing to do, right?”  I looked at him to answer my question. The recruiter looked more serious now.  He tapped his lips in thought, then met my gaze.
“Remember Tom? Remember what they did to Tom? Does that deserve a reply?  General Wharr can give you the chance to send them that reply!” The recruiter’s voice had steel in it now.
The poster flicked.  General Wharr stared. The slogan now: SIGN OR SHAME?
I signed.
I signed up for the war against the foe.
I signed up for victory.
I signed up for Earth, for General Wharr.
For Tom.
As I left the recruiting station, I paused feeling a little dizzy still. I leaned against the wall to take a few deep breaths. The ‘White Feather’ on my hand…vanished.   I could hear the chatter at the other tables, as other lads talked out their concerns to the other recruiters. Dozens of tables.  Dozens of tables.  But clearly I could hear them saying to each man: “Remember Tom?  Remember what they did to Tom… “
Somewhere, a poster flickered.