by Dan Decker
He was closer now, perhaps just right outside the tent.
I controlled my breathing, making sure each breath was as shallow as I could possibly make it. The seconds seemed to take forever as a gust of wind blew through the tent, lighting upon my sweaty face and giving me a breath of fresh air.
Bullets cut through the canvas right in front of me.
I slid backward as silent as I could while wondering if I had somehow given away my position or if he had just seen the movement of the wind and assumed it was me. Either way, I needed to move fast. I moved through the crushed tent as more bullets came in, still focused on the spot where I had just been.
Can he track me?
I hated to part with my watch because I needed it at night, but maybe I had to, at least until I was safe.
My hand moved down to the latch, but I hesitated.
I didn’t know that my watch had given me away. It might have just been the wind and a lucky guess that made Jeffords pick that spot. I needed more evidence before I ditched the one tool that I knew kept me alive at night.
I continued my crawl through the tent while my wounded shoulder screamed at me. Slowing my pace as much as possible, I worked my way towards the regenerator room after I got to what had been the hallway. The regenerator had been knocked onto the floor and crushed, almost as if the lurkers knew what it was for. It was not going to be in working order anytime soon.
Poor Sampson. Things might’ve gone different for her if she’d been prioritized.
I was soon at the end of the tent, right by the exit.
“You’re still alive,” Jeffords said. “Want to know how I know? I can see your heartbeat. Come out and take your punishment like a man. It’s time for us to end this.”
14
He knows that I’m still alive, but does not know my exact location. It appeared that there was something to my instinct to suspect my watch. I thought again about taking it off but waited, deciding I might want to fake my death after another round of bullets.
“Come out, come out, wherever you are!” Jeffords fired another burst into the tent, but it was on the other side and I was in no danger.
I slid out the exit, feeling like I was moving at the speed of an ant. Once I was outside, I laid where I was as I brought up my rifle, intent on jumping up and firing a shot at him the next time he spoke, trusting my ears to pinpoint his location. I clicked the selector back to single fire, both to preserve my ammo and to mitigate the risk of killing him by accident.
I would not kill him, only to have them not believe me afterward. He could say whatever lies he wanted when they came, but if he was alive, they would have very little reason to kill me too.
“What if I told you how to get back to your wife and son? Did you know that I can check on them?”
The more he spoke the more assumptions I started to make, which was dangerous. As much as I wanted to infer that this meant they did not know I had found the Bible, I could not afford to take that risk.
I have to assume they have seen everything I’ve seen and can even read my thoughts.
Jeffords might not have that capability, but somebody here probably did.
If they want to play God, why not act like Him too?
“I’ll make you a deal—”
I sprung up, aimed high and fired. Jeffords still had his gun aimed at the middle of the tent, so I took him off guard. If it had been my purpose to kill him, I could have easily done so. My bullet sent him down to the ground and now our positions were reversed.
I stayed up.
He was on the other side of the tent across from me. I could no longer see him but knew exactly where he had gone.
As the seconds ticked by, I could hear sand and gravel moving as he crawled on his belly. The wind added to the noise, making it difficult to know which direction he was going.
“Jeffords, how about we throw down our guns and we end this man-to-man? You suggested that earlier, seems like a good idea to me.”
I moved six feet to the left, careful with each step to not make any noise to keep him from knowing what I was doing. I had just assumed he would pop up after I spoke but he did not.
“If I thought I could trust you, I would do that but I figured out what you were when you put me in jail. You’re a lying, thieving maggot who doesn’t deserve the fair shake I’ve given him. No, the only way forward is to finish this little game of ours. Only one man is walking away today.”
I kept moving. I paused when I got to the corner of the tent and could have sworn I saw the tip of his hat for just a moment. My next several steps were done slowly as I waited for Jeffords to take a shot at me.
The sun was now at its zenith and it must have been at least one hundred and twenty degrees outside. Sweat covered my whole body. I waited, aiming for the spot where I’d seen Jeffords’ hat.
“Have they told you?”
Jeffords’ voice came from several feet forward of the place where I had last seen him. I did not understand why he kept talking, but he probably hoped his words would have a psychological effect on me.
My finger toyed with the trigger of my rifle and I wondered if it wouldn’t just be better to end this here and now.
Jeffords was a significant problem, it would be nice to have him out of my hair, I just did not know what those above him would think of the situation.
If I had known Roth was still alive, it might have been one thing, but I had to assume she had died in all of this too.
I could easily see them just not wanting to deal with it and ordering my death.
“Have they told me what?”
Jeffords laughed. “I knew you would. I knew you’d talk to me. You can’t help yourself. You have to know. That’s what drives you. You can’t live with uncertainty.” He laughed some more. “Your wife remarried. She had three more kids. Your son died in a tragic car accident. She even had plastic surgery and looks nothing like what you remember.”
I didn’t respond, but his words were having an effect on me. I doubted any of those things had happened, but I remembered Sam.
Sam.
The thought of him creeping on my wife at my funeral. Pretending to be a friend and the shoulder to cry on. Worming his way into—
Taking a deep breath, I sighted my rifle on the spot where I believed Jeffords to be and slowly started to depress the trigger, thinking that perhaps I had been misguided in my thoughts before and that I just needed to put an end to the man.
“We were saving that little gem. If you haven’t figured it out by now, we like to keep our soldiers on their toes. That helps them do what we expect them to do. They obey orders better, especially after we break them.” He chuckled. “That’s what they ordered me to do to you. They wanted me to break you. To rip you down and build you again for our own purposes. I don’t know how they managed to miss the fact that you and I had a prior history, the day you said your name it felt like I had just found the golden goose. The man I had been thinking about for twenty years while rotting in jail had been dropped in my lap on a silver platter.
“I thought about knifing you then and there, but I knew I was up next in the rotation and that I was going to be your drill sergeant. I knew that I could get to you. I knew that I could have my revenge and still have my life here too. That was one of the things I learned in prison. How to be careful.” Jeffords laughed really long about that one and I almost pulled the trigger, surely if I sent three or four bullets his way, one of them would get through the canvas tent and whatever other obstacles might be in between us. It took every ounce of my resolve to keep my finger in place. He was trying to goad me. He was trying to make me angry. I knew all of this but his words had their intended effect. Not because of what he was saying, but because of this insane situation and the fact that he been trying to kill me ever since I had woken up here.
If I kill him, maybe I will finally have some measure of peace.
I shook my head and thought of Ava and Ricky.
They wer
e why I could not do that.
I was still here because I had to know what happened to them. I had to do whatever I could to help them.
“I thought I had finally succeeded when you jumped into the ravine. Unfortunately, because they watch what I do, I had to make sure you at least had a chance to survive, so I gave you that. Barely. Somehow you managed to take advantage of it. It’s better that it works out like this. I would much rather kill you myself than watch you die in an accident.”
Twenty years. Did he say twenty years?
Had he really been in jail for twenty years?
It had not been that long yet at the time of my death.
None of it made any sense. Nothing he said added up.
“Your wife moved away from where they buried Ricky. She never even visits his grave.”
“How long did you say you were in jail?”
Jeffords laughed. “I knew that would get you. I knew you’d latch onto that. I knew you’d wonder. If I’d been in jail for twenty years, how had it only been a couple since your death? It’s a strange thing, time, a really strange thing indeed. There are some that believe time doesn’t even exist.”
I took a step forward. “Are you ready to do this? Let’s just have it out, man-to-man. No weapons. Just you and me.”
“What kind of fool do you take me for? There is no way I would do that. They made you the size of a great ape. I’d be foolish to try such a thing.”
“Stand up and we’ll finish this, enough of the chitchat. Enough of this talk. Let’s just get this done.”
“Because you can’t handle the truth? Oh, Earl Anderson, there are so many more things I need to tell you. I want you to die knowing the full truth of everything. Your wife’s next child was named Andy. Then she had a daughter named Sophie. And another son named Jeff. She never even told them about Ricky or you. It’s just like neither of you ever existed. She has completely moved on and you are no longer even in her thoughts. Her husband, is nothing like you. At least not like you were back there. He’s a big burly man who takes good care of her.”
“You can dispense with the lies. I don’t believe any of them.”
“Don’t you? You know that some of what I’m telling you has got to be true. You’re smart. You know that this story of it only being a few years since your death doesn’t add up. I had to get through twenty years of appeals before they could finally execute me. That’s what you’re thinking, isn’t it? Your wife is now old and gray, living alone with her husband, thinking of her living kids and never thinking about the past she once had with you.”
“Yeah, yeah, I get it. Come up and we’ll finish this, just as you want.”
“Not yet. You are trying to skip all the best parts.”
There was a movement to the side of me and I turned, bringing my rifle over, thinking that Jeffords had somehow played a trick on me.
I nearly pulled the trigger when I saw that it was Roth.
She had a rifle aimed at me.
15
My heart was in my throat and for a moment I thought she was going to shoot me, but she hesitated. She didn’t say a word. I had aimed my rifle at her. Perhaps it was just a precaution that she had done the same.
I held it off to the side, aiming towards Jeffords’ general direction. Once I did, she pointed hers towards Jeffords as well.
She brought a finger to her lips. Then she made a rolling motion with her hand like she wanted me to keep asking Jeffords questions.
“What are the best parts?” I tried to make my voice sound as tight as possible, so he thought his efforts were succeeding. I could almost hear his grin when he answered.
“I can’t get to that right away, now can I? No, what if I told you everything I just said was a lie? What if I told you your wife is still alive and that she’s been mourning for you every day? Even made a little vigil that she put up in the alley where you were killed. That would be what you’d want to hear, isn’t it? That’s what you would expect. She and Ricky stop by once a week to leave flowers.”
I glanced over at Roth while Jeffords spoke, but I could not tell by her facial expression whether any of this was true. She slid forward on her feet like a hunter sneaking up on a deer. Another couple steps and I figured she would have the drop on Jeffords.
“That is what I expected.”
I tried to make my voice sound like I was choking up, like I was close to tears, because I wanted Jeffords to get on with it.
Roth was now five steps away from having a clear view of him.
“Well, that was true. It did happen. Like four years ago. Ricky is still alive, but he was in an accident and lost both his legs.”
Roth took a final step. “The game’s up, Jeffords. Drop your rifle.”
I tightened my finger around the trigger, thinking that if Jeffords were about to make a rash move, I was in a solid position to take him out.
There was a long silence before Jeffords stood. He was several feet further along than I had predicted. He held his hands out.
“This is not what it looks like, General.”
“I believe I heard you confess to attempted murder, is this not the case Sergeant Jeffords?”
“I was told to get Anders trained to go into the battle quickly, one of the components of my training is psychological.”
“Did you order him to jump into a ravine before training him how to fly?”
Jeffords looked at me. “Ask him yourself but he’ll probably lie because he hates me.”
“I’m not playing this game with you, Jeffords. I’m tired of your insubordination. I’m tired of you needlessly sending soldiers to their death. And I’m disappointed to learn that you have used your position to seek vengeance. I know what you were before. Most of the rest of us might be killers, yes, but none of us are serial killers who killed just for the fun of it. I gave you the benefit of the doubt, hoping that a new body would mean a new man. It appears that was not the case.” She motioned with a rifle. “Kneel.”
“And why would I do that?”
“You are under arrest.”
“You’re not really going to do that.”
“You’re right. This is wartime. I don’t have time for that.”
Roth pulled the trigger.
16
Jeffords must have anticipated what she was going to do because he twisted when she pulled the trigger. He fell to the ground, probably in part because he had been hit by the bullet. I was already running around the side when Jeffords brought up his rifle.
“Shoot him, Anders,” Roth screamed, as she fired again, right into his chest.
Jeffords fired, but it went high and only served to make Roth angrier.
I didn’t pull the trigger.
I moved until I was right next to Jeffords’ body, kicking the rifle out of his hands. I did not stop until it was a good ten feet away.
Roth approached while keeping her rifle trained on Jeffords, as if she expected him to get up and start moving despite the fact that his chest had been torn open.
Is she going to bring up my refusal to shoot him? I wondered.
“Check his pulse.”
It was a strange order because there was no way he could still be alive, but I did as she asked and leaned down, touching his hand and felt nothing.
“He’s gone.”
“Let’s hope he died fast enough.” Once I was clear, Roth fired five more shots into him, including one into his head. There was no way he could have survived.
“I think you got them.”
Roth fired one more. “Let’s hope so.”
I was taken aback by her strange actions, but did not comment. My goal was to get into her good graces and get off of this planet, not annoy her with a bunch of questions.
“Looks like Regina is going to have a mess on her hands.”
“Excuse me?” I asked.
“Nevermind. Really good job out here soldier. Good work.”
Roth walked towards the south side of camp.
&
nbsp; As I followed after I noticed the transport’s engines still burned but with far less fuel than they had before Jeffords had started taking potshots at me. With one final look at Jeffords, just to convince myself that he was really gone, I followed after her.
I had hundreds of questions and wondered if it might be safe to ask a couple, but one look at her face told me that she was not in the mood to answer any of them. I followed in silence until we were twenty feet from camp.
Roth brought her watch to her mouth and pressed a button. “Open up.”
I waited, expecting the sand in front of us to shift to reveal a secret underground garage, but nothing happened.
“This is General Katrina Roth. I am up on the surface, the lurkers have all gone and it’s time for us to get out of here. Open up.” She released the watch button. “It’s bad enough those idiots tried to escape with the lurkers still on hand, don’t tell me that all of them left too.”
When nothing happened, I looked at Roth, expecting an explanation, but I did not get one.
“I have to do this myself. I am surrounded by idiots.”
She walked until she was standing in the middle of the red sand. I thought she was going to do something again with her watch, but then she called out something that sounded like a specific keyword and a hologram appeared. She stepped up to it and pressed several translucent buttons.
A door opened in the ground, revealing an underground hanger.
17
A ladder allowed us to descend into the deep underground bay. After climbing down, we got to a concrete floor that was made with the ever-present red sand. A large crack ran down the middle of the hanger and the two remaining transports had been positioned so that they were on either side of it.
Was this crack made when the ravine opened up right after my arrival?
The hanger was spacious, far more spacious than I would have expected, considering the ground’s instability. Even though there was much to look at, I kept returning to that crack in the middle of the floor, wanting to know how stable this place was.