by Ray Gorham
The fire at David’s feet popped, and he felt a coal bounce off his pant leg. He pulled the canvas back to check the fire, then grabbed a piece of wood, knocked a chunk of snow off of it, and carefully set it on the fire. Sparks danced upwards, and he waved them away with his hands while watching the tiny embers die in the cold wind. On nights like this, the fire was the only thing that made the lookout post bearable. He couldn’t complain too much though, because he’d volunteered for the assignment, and he did like that he didn’t have to sit around and talk with the old men in the house, or walk twenty plus miles each night.
So far there had only been three nights that David hadn’t had to make the climb to the outpost: twice, when it was snowing too hard to see anything, and once, when the temperature was ten below zero, and it was highly unlikely that anyone would attack under those conditions. As David watched the fire to make sure the wood caught, his thoughts drifted back to Amy. She was fifteen years old and a year ahead of him at the Catholic High School. Her hair was dark brown hair, her eyes brown and very pretty, and she was more shapely than most of the girls her age. She was slim, like everybody else these days, but not so skinny that she looked unhealthy. Her hair had been pulled back in the standard ponytail, and she had smelled really good, a pleasing combination of soap and good perfume.
The piece of wood caught fire, and David arranged the canvas back over the hole before picking up his binoculars and training them back on Clinton. Amy had described where her house was, and David thought maybe he’d found it. In the light of the full moon, he could see smoke coming from what he thought was the Carpenter’s chimney. He smiled to himself, trying to imagine what her house looked like inside.
A twig popped somewhere behind him in the trees. David spun around, startled by the sound which was amplified by his fear of being ambushed, or, the more likely event, being eaten by a bear. He put his gun to his shoulder and aimed it towards the woods, leaving the binoculars swinging from the strap around his neck. Unexplained noises were pretty common, something he should be used to, but they never ceased putting him on edge. He waited cautiously, but heard and saw nothing, so turned back around.
He trained the binoculars on the road just west of Clinton and continued to scan towards Missoula. He could see a figure walking on the Deer Creek side of the river, one of the militiamen on their rounds. He knew they were militia because most of them walked the same path every time, despite instructions to the contrary. The militia house came into view, along with the bridge, the trees and rocks below him, the road on the south side of the river, and a strange, dark shape. He swept past the object before its strangeness registered, then quickly swung back, trying to spot what had caught his attention, but it was right at the point where trees obscured the road.
He climbed out of the foxhole, ran a few steps west, and refocused on the road below him. Just as David zeroed in on the shape, it seemed to break apart and move towards Deer Creek. He only had an instant before the trees blocked his view again, but it had looked like a group of people. He wasn’t positive though, because he’d seen it so briefly. It could have been deer, geese, or even some of the abandoned dogs that were packing together.
David’s heart pounded as he stared down at the road. He swept the binoculars further west then back to where the trees blocked his view, but saw nothing unusual. He grabbed the gun he had been issued, an AK47, and four thirty-round magazines, and ran west along the ridge, trying to find a better vantage point.
Tripped up by a rock in the darkness, David fell to his knees, dropping his gun and bruising his shins. Recovering quickly, he picked up his weapon, ran a few more feet, and aimed the binoculars back down on the road. What little extra bit of the road he could see was empty. Directly below him, he knew there was a plywood sign, painted with a warning:
Guarded community!
Do not approach after dark, with weapons,
or in groups larger than three.
Violators will be considered hostile.
Similar signs were posted on the bridge, on the far east end of town along the river, and south of the Shipley Ranch, facing the old gravel road coming down from the mountains.
David ran back towards the trench. He looked through the sights of the gun and found the truck hood that hung between two trees in the backyard of the militia house. With limited communication, if the lookout couldn’t give a warning in person, their signal in the event of an emergency was to shoot the hood hanging in the yard. David had made this shot many times during training and knew that the hood rang like a bell, audible all the way to the far end of the community. He’d also been reminded many times that when he shot it, there would be fifty-three militia members running his direction, ready to fight.
David swore under his breath and lowered his gun, all thoughts of Amy long fled. He heard a sound, maybe voices, and froze in place, terrified that people were coming up across the top of the ridge. He waited, straining to hear anything that was out of place, but heard nothing. He ran down towards the militia house, crouching low and carefully avoiding making any loud noises.
He’d taken this path dozens of times and knew it well, but it had never been this dark, and never under this kind of stress. Part way down the hill the trail led south, away from the road, so David cut north, off trail, towards the road. It was dark in the trees, but his eyes had adjusted enough to the moonlight for him to be able to jog, dodging branches and rocks as he ran. His heart raced, both from the running and from the fear that what he’d seen was something threatening.
A thick cluster of trees lay ahead, and he slowed to push through it, sliding through the branches as silently as possible. He was almost through the trees when his left foot fell out from under him. David clutched for branches as he began to fall, realizing, to his horror, that he had emerged through the trees at the top of a fifty-foot cliff, a sheer drop to the rocks and boulders below.
He grabbed desperately for the branches, branches that scraped at his face as he fell, his left foot sliding over the edge, his right leg still on top. His momentum carried him forward and downward, and he gasped, panic stricken, as rocks and pinecones tumbled down the cliff, bouncing with echoing cracks off the boulders below.
As he continued his slow motion slide over the precipice, his right hand grasped a fat tree root curled tightly around a weathered rock, and his right leg wedged between a tree trunk and a small boulder, bringing his fall to a halt but still leaving him dangling precariously over the edge. He let out a deep breath and opened his eyes as sharp pains shot through his right leg. Terrified, he held tight for a second, then used the root to carefully pull himself back up, finally rolling back over the edge into the trees, with sweat rolling in cold beads down his forehead.
He groped in the darkness for his rifle, which he’d dropped near the edge. His right hand bumped against the barrel, and he snatched it up with hands shaking so hard from the near fall that he could hardly get his finger on the trigger. He edged back towards the cliff top, this time much more carefully and slowly. From this new vantage point, he could see the militia house to his right and the road down below, and he watched the road, searching for movement.
Something shifted in the trees below, and he leaned forward, tense, only to see a deer scamper off towards the river. David waited and watched for what seemed like an eternity. His rapidly beating heart had slowed, but his bruised leg throbbed, and the chill of the winter night was beginning to work its way through his thick, sweat-soaked jacket. He shifted side to side on still shaking legs and swung his arms back and forth to get the blood flowing. Finally convinced that it had been a false alarm, David was about to retrace his steps back to the top of the hill when he definitely saw movement by the river. Looking harder, he saw spotted two figures crouched low and trotting towards the bridge. He scanned the road directly below and saw two more figures moving stealthily towards the militia house with what appeared to be weapons in their hands.
David brought the AK47 to his s
houlder and turned to shoot the truck hood to warn the others and bring the rest of the militia to help. The words his dad had said to him the first night he went up the hill echoed in his head. “You’ve got our lives in your hands, Son. Don’t let us down.”
The hood had been hung so that it was directly facing the nest at the top of the hill. Now that he had run back towards the house, however, his angle to the target was considerably different, shrinking the target size in half, despite his being closer to it. He looked down at the road. The men there had paused in a ditch to talk; he couldn’t see the men by the river. David took aim at the hood and pulled the trigger.
The perfect silence of the late evening exploded with the gunshot, the sound ringing so loudly he was sure the dead would rise from their graves, but there was no ringing warning from the truck hood and how far the sound of the shot had carried he didn’t know. David fired again, aware that the sound and the flash would alert the men crouching in the ditch below him that he was there. Again there was no ringing of the hood.
“Dammit!” David whispered. He glanced at the window of the house where he knew a guard was posted and saw movement and a rifle sticking out. At least they’re on alert, he thought. He aimed again, noticed a flash from the rifle at the window, then rocks and pine needles exploded in the dirt just behind him as the pop of the weapon reached his ears. “Damn! Damn! Damn!” he exclaimed to himself, realizing he was taking friendly fire, and that the sound of weapons this far away wouldn’t be enough to rouse the community.
David scrambled ten feet further up hill, saw another flash from the window, and heard the bullet hit a tree close to where he had knelt just seconds before. Once again he took aim and pulled the trigger, and once again he missed his mark. Another flash from the window of the house was followed, almost immediately, by a flash from the side of the house. One of the shots hit a few feet above David, but the other zipped by close enough for him to hear it whistle past before bouncing off a nearby rock.
David dropped to his stomach and edged forward to look over the cliff. The men hiding in the ditch appeared to be looking up at him, then they started crawling out of the ditch, back in the direction they had come from. David realized the gunfire was scaring the intruders off before anyone in the community found out about them, and with his luck, he’d be killed by his own militia before he could alert them.
Adrenaline coursed through his body, making his hands shake again. He again took aim, but this time at the figures on the road, who were much closer than the hood and seemed to fill the scope of his weapon. Another shot sounded from the house, with the bullet crashing through the branches above his head. David took the forward shape in his sights and began to put pressure on the trigger, then paused. His mind raced. That was a real person down there, someone who felt pain, someone who had a life and a family. David had killed countless aliens, Nazis, zombies, and gangsters on his Xbox, but this wasn’t a video game. This time they were real.
Another shot rang from the house, and the bullet struck below him on the cliff. With hands still shaking, David looked through his gun sight, aiming dead center on the man’s chest, and pulled the trigger. The gun roared, but he was used to the sound, and it no longer fazed him. He quickly recovered from the kick and drew the sights back on the men now scrambling back to the ditch. Calmer, he pulled the trigger again and saw his target fall while thinking to himself, “I’ve just shot a living person.” It didn’t seem real.
The second man pulled his wounded comrade into the ditch, and David took aim at him and fired. The man screamed and fell to the ground. The scream made it real. David pulled back from the edge and began to cry.
He’d barely retreated from the edge when a volley of gunfire erupted, and the air above him came alive - bullets spinning by, ricocheting off rocks and trees, branches falling. It was as if World War II had erupted on a Montana mountainside. David wiped his tears on his coat sleeve and crawled further from the edge, knowing the cliff protected him from the incoming fire. He climbed to his feet while trying to stifle sobs of fear and grief and ran downhill, crouching low, searching for another spot, knowing the darkness and the trees made him as safe as he could hope for.
He stopped twenty yards downhill, crawled back to the edge, and looked down. Two shots came from close to the river, the flash of light exposing the shooters’ positions, but they hit far from David, and returning fire would have just given up his new location. He focused on the militia house and saw guns sticking out of the upstairs window and a figure on the porch, crouched behind a barricade. He glanced down at the hood and saw that it was facing him. Blinking, he looked again. The hood was hanging from only one rope and had turned so that he had a square shot.
David quickly brought his gun to his shoulder, took aim, and pulled the trigger. Ring! The sound of the bullet striking the target was more welcome than anything he could ever remember hearing. He fired again. Ring! The hood slowly spun around, and David waited until just before it squared up and fired once more. Ring! Fresh tears came to his eyes and blurred his vision, but this time they were tears of relief.
Gunfire continued below, and David shrank down low to the ground, but no more bullets screamed overhead. He waited for two minutes before looking up again. Men were running towards the militia house from the direction of town. Someone shouted commands. Voices were shrill.
The figures in the ditch were shooting towards the militia house now, and David heard glass break. He could see that they were trying to work their way towards the river, but moving slowly, neither able to help the other due to their injuries.
As David watched, he saw more flashes of gunfire from the river area. The trees and bushes were thick there, and providing excellent cover. Undeterred, he took aim at a spot a rifle’s length back from the flash and pulled his trigger as fast as he could, until his weapon was empty. He released the empty magazine, jammed in another thirty rounder from his jacket, and looked back at the river. Gunfire from there had stopped, but he wasn’t sure if it was because the target had been hit or was moving, so he watched and waited.
David was starting to feel the cold again when he saw movement. A lone figure emerged from behind the trees onto the ice where the river was frozen over, dark stains marking his footprints as he attempted to reach the far bank. David shuddered as he once again shouldered his weapon and lined up the figure in his sights. He could see that the man struggled to walk, and knew that he had probably caused the man’s injury. This didn’t feel anything like a video game. This was real blood, suffering, anger, terror and guilt, all mixed together. This was more awful than anything he could imagine.
The man was halfway across the river when he suddenly turned back towards the shore he had come from, then stopped. David grabbed the binoculars that still hung from his neck and pressed them to his eyes. The right lens was broken, so he closed that eye and watched the man through one eyepiece. The man pushed at the ice in front of him with one foot, found it stable, then moved carefully ahead, repeating the process.
David knew what the man was doing. The ice on the river was thick at the shore, but the further out you got, the more the water underneath carved out thin spots. The week before, David had stepped out a few paces onto the ice to retrieve his hat that had blown off, and the creaking of the ice had sent him scrambling for the edge.
The injured man moved a little further, testing the ice as he went. From his perch, David could see that the militia was gathering at the garrison. Close to twenty people were there, and they likely weren’t aware of the person on the ice. David looked back at the man, grabbed his gun, and took aim, but it was hard to shoot now that the fear and adrenaline were gone and no one was shooting at him.
Just as he was about to pull the trigger, the man slipped and fell. He tried to rise but lost his footing once more. His movements became more frantic and uncoordinated, and David realized that the man was slipping on wet ice, ice that was thin and breaking up around him. David could see the urgency
in the man’s movements, then a dark line appeared in the ice beneath him, widened, and the man’s legs dropped into the water. He clawed at the ice, frantically trying to pull himself out of the water, but each time he started to escape, more ice broke away, and he slid back down again.
The scene hypnotized David. Tears ran silently down his cheeks as the man’s arm movements became slower and slower and his life drained slowly away. Finally, after a couple of minutes, the movements stopped altogether, and the body was slowly pulled from the ice by the current, disappearing in the darkness of the river.
A heavy shudder ran through David’s body, and he noticed how really cold he was. The wind whistled in the trees and blew on his face, making him shiver violently. With the threats gone, he stood, backed away from the edge, and headed back to the trail, numbly picking his way around rocks and trees, intent on heading head back to the lookout post and the warm fire he hoped was still burning. Just as he got back to the trail, he heard footsteps moving quickly in his direction.
David quickly hid behind some rocks, certain he was going to have to face at least one more person fleeing from the militia. He readied his gun and waited as the person drew closer, then saw a dark shape run past him up the hill, breathing hard and moving fast.
“Stop!” David shouted, his finger on the trigger, ready to shoot. “Stay where you are!”
The figure stopped, raising its hands. “Seahawks!” a man shouted.
“Dad?”
“David?”