The aardvark is ready for war

by James Blinn

Aardvark is a tactical jet crewman on board an aircraft carrier steaming to the Persian Gulf War. Nicknamed after the gas masks he and all combatants carry, Aardvark is a virtual warrior in the world's first virtual war. Sardonic and borderline, a camcorder voyeur and cathode ray tube assassin, he wears his aardvark mask constantly and tries to filter reality through digital or video screens at all times. In his incendiary narrative of the voyage from San Diego to the Gulf, Aardvark shows us the warping effects of his shipmates' slow realization that they have come not just to deliver death, but to risk death themselves. Through increasingly surreal daily training exercises and two phantasmagorical shore leaves, Aardvark sees violence, drunkenness, and sheer military lunacy embraced with heroic abandon. As the ship nears its destination, Aardvark finds his private mission going horribly awry - but there is still hope he can salvage everything with the right photo op.