He Who Kills Monsters

A Story by felioness

There was a war going on in a place called Vietnam ...

Barren to the untrained eye, life thrives in burnt ochre hues and sun-bleached desert skies where cacti stud the landscape and stretch the eye. Tall Saguaro stand sentinel to these lands stained in bloodshed. where stories lived and died. Some forgotten, others ignored, but many remaining ingrained in history like carvings on hard New Mexican rock. I am Apache.

The word “Apache” is from the Yuma word for "fighting-men" and from the Zuni word meaning "enemy." We are the people whose hearts thud to the tune of the warrior's way. Apache boys are taught to be warriors from the moment they walk. Honour is held in high esteem. My forefathers lived, fought and died within a code of honour. I follow the tradition despite the injustices put upon my people by the modern world. My name is Bly...Apache for “high, tall.”

My people speak of a legend called The Mescaleros' Prophesy. It says when the world was made, the Killer-of-Enemies put the Apache people down in the vicinity of White Mountain. Then, only Indians lived scattered over the country. White men had never been seen. But the people of long ago said a time would come when only white men would live in this country. They said the Apache would cut their hair and they would become indistinguishable from the white ones. Then the end of the world would be at hand. I looked around me and saw it had begun. Youthfully naive, I believed I could single-handedly postpone the prophesy by refusing to cut my hair. I wore only clothing made by the women of my tribe; donning soft deer-hide, or tunics and pants made from white cotton and embroidered by their skillful fingers.

In October 1970, I turned eighteen on the night of a Blood Moon and had a dream. In this dream I was approached by the Killer-of-Enemies. He told me I must sacrifice my hair to rid the world of an evil monster. I asked the Killer-of-Enemies if this monster was a threat to my people. He said the evil threatened all people. I asked if my hair would grow back. Staring at the sanguine moon he replied, “That is up to Tobadzistsini.” I woke up knowing what my dream meant. Tobadzistsini is the god of war. The war in Vietnam was in full swing and I was now old enough to enlist.

Flying across the ocean to my battlefield, I was reminded of other oceans crossed for war. I could almost hear my father’s voice relating stories about my great-grandfather, who not only fought in world war I, but returned to raise ten children. He spoke of his own father, decorated with the Purple Heart, whose bones now rest in French soil. My father fought in Korea. With my resentments pushed aside I would also fight for freedom. It is the Apache thing to do. I am a warrior and monsters await me.