by Kuhn, Steve
The prepping took some time, and while the men worked on the cord, Boyd began tirelessly putting some finishing touches on his ghillie suit. It reminded me of how we made those half-assed ghillie suits all those months ago at the house with Kate and Hope. When he was finished, he tested it by lying facedown on the ground. It was truly astonishing how he blended in, undetectable. Now, if he could just keep his nerve as he crawled along. Surely he’d be stepped on at some point, and he’d just have to remain completely still. I wasn’t convinced it would work.
He only had to move across an area the size of a football field, but it took him all day. In fact, we were about to give up and figure out another idea when Stank noticed the green smoke pouring over the mountainside. “He made it! That stutterin’ son of a bitch made it!” he half hissed, half shouted.
Hicks called the order to blow the cord, and the ground shook beneath our feet. In the distance, towards the valley, dust and red mist spewed into the air, signaling that we had at least proven the concept. We wouldn’t be able to determine its actual effectiveness until we gathered the courage to drive into it. Well, it didn’t just work. We fuckin’ parted the sea like some fake-ass, sin-soaked Moses.
The dry earth was now moist and muddy with the blood and fluids from the bernies that used to stand in that place, so much so that our tires spun and threatened to get us stuck. Carcasses were strewn everywhere, and some of the bottomless torsos still feebly reached at our vehicles as we passed, growling uselessly. We crunched over limbs, bones, and hunks of dead meat until reaching the other side, where the smoke signal had been released.
We found Boyd there, what was left of him. He was covered in bites, missing huge chunks of his flesh, and his legs looked like ground beef. He never even bothered to free himself of the rope that attached the det cord to his ankle. I guess he figured he’d just blow up with the rest of them since he was chewed up so badly. The grimace on his torn face told us all that he was in a tremendous amount of pain when the concussion of the blast turned his insides to jelly. Scrawled in the dirt in his own blood were five words that summed up Boyd’s heroic departure today. ‘I didn’t run this time.’
Boyd’s cleared our path to Fort Bragg and the colonel. The final obstacle between us has been decimated. I’m coughing blood now, and I don’t have much time left. We have to hurry.
Entry 163
I woke up.
I can’t believe it, but I actually woke up. Kylee sat cross legged on the floor of D-Prime’s trailer, cradling my head in her lap. She stroked my hair with her left hand and clutched the pistol in her right, ready for me. I wished I hadn’t regained consciousness at all, though, now that it was over.
My joints had that feeling like they needed to crack, but they refused. Instead, they ground against themselves when I moved and flexed them. My eyes were dry, and the color had drained from my irises almost completely. What was once a pleasant mix of greens and browns was now a mottled hodgepodge of yellowing black and grey, like old newspaper. It didn’t affect my vision much, but it felt like I was staring at a ghost when I looked in the mirror. I’d stopped sweating finally, even though my fever persisted, and my mouth was dry, tasting of rotted meat. I couldn’t keep food down, and even water made me heave. The end was near. I again wished it would have taken me while I slept, but once more my nightmare reality had punched me awake to face more horror and experience more death before my own was allowed to arrive.
Lilly offered me a weak smile. “Shouldn’t be long now, Dext,” she said softly. Her hand in mine felt like ice. Was I burning up that badly? I smiled at her and told her I loved her once more through cracked lips.
One of the Kilo boys must’ve been driving D-Prime because Seth and Nick were there, too. They were having a spirited game of rock, paper, scissors’ to decide which one of them was going to die today. They made me smile, those two. They managed to keep their senses of humor amidst all this bullshit. They were lucky that way, being able to balance cold realities with warm amusement when there was time for it. I hoped they would stick around. Lilly still needed to learn how to do that.
Nick could be heard saying, “Ready? One, two, three, shoot!”
Seth formed his index and middle fingers into a mock pair of scissors, but Nick wasn’t keen to play by the rules. Instead, he flashed his middle finger, flipping Seth the bird, and added, “Fuck you, pal. I ain’t dyin’ today.”
Not to be outdone, Seth protested. “No way! I call shenanigans. No one said fucksies were allowed this round!”
Nick corrected him with a tut-tut and informed him, “Correction! As per the official Vegas rules, fucksies are indeed a legal course of action when the odds are as shitty as they are right now. In fact, I would have allowed not only fucksies, but also dragons, slingshots, and ninjas.”
Seth shook his head in disgust. “You bastard! Fine, best two out of three. But I want a ruling on Pokémon, too.”
Nick stroked his chin before deciding. “I’ll allow only Charizard and Squirtle—nothing more!”
This went on and on, getting even more complicated and bizarre, until I finally just stopped paying attention to them.
The trucks came to a halt before long, and the remains of our group came together in a sloppy huddle on the single road leading into the town of Fort Bragg. I gave pause to count our numbers as Hicks angrily shouted at the men, “Form up, you shit sacks! Take a little pride in yourselves!”
There were thirty-six of us now, counting our crew—all that remained. We stood in six tight lines, heavily armed and packing every single round of ammo we had left, evenly distributed among us. Big Stank, with his filthy uniform and imposing physique, stood beside me holding our banner. On an old broom handle, he had attached the flag of our once great nation with its glorious stars and stripes hung inverted to signal distress. I felt it was a fitting banner to carry into this fight.
With the fortified town in our line of sight, barricaded by multiple rows of chain-link fences and barbed-wire coils along the ground, Hicks addressed his men.
“We have our orders. We know what we have to do here today. Some of you are probably thinking that these orders are bullshit, and I can understand that. We’re making an assault on a heavily fortified target, outnumbered and outgunned… low on ammo and provisions. Shit, we’re low on everything. Ain’t that what you’re thinkin’, boys? Well, I disagree! We ain’t low on heart! We’re devil dogs, Goddammit! We ran The Gauntlet, and we emerged victorious! We parted the Goddamn Dead Sea, and we made the choke point our bitch! And so, today we honor the men that fell to make those victories possible by hurling ourselves headlong into the fight once more—to put the power back into the hands of the good guys, to topple a tyrant drunk with power and remind him just who the fuck’s in charge in this motherfucker, savvy?”
There were cheers amongst the assembled men. I found that shocking, despite Hicks’ spirited words, because looking at what we were about to face had me worried for every single person around me. Lilly clutched her rifle as she stood next to Kylee. She fixed an icy stare at the road ahead, and as I held her hand in mine, I nudged her to get her attention.
I mouthed the words, ‘You okay?’ to her, and she gave a tight-lipped nod.
Kylee caught my eye. Her face was still swollen from crying on and off, but she stood there, strong, with her back straight and her eyes to the front—a soldier at heart, a fighter. How I envied her.
Seth and Nick were to my right—Seth, with his arm still in a sling and a gun in his good hand, and Nick, with his kukri in one hand and his pistol in the other; both were standing casually as if waiting for Hicks to finish so they could get down to business. Those two dysfunctional fuckholes would never know how much I’d come to like them. They were family now, too, just like the others.
All of them, my family. Their names floated through my mind at that moment: Junior, Bizzy, Wyatt, Trey, Fool, Rebecca, JC, Murphy, Hook, Alyse, Cutty. It was almost funny that I had little memory of my life be
fore this.
Hicks’ speech came to a close, and he broke us into three squads. The plan was for us to create a distraction by running an unmanned vehicle into the row of fences to draw their forces to the commotion. We would run a second unmanned vehicle in the same manner into the opposite side once the panic broke out. Hopefully that would create disorganization in their ranks and have people scrambling to find the source of the attack. That was when we’d strike.
We would run D-Prime right up the gut and crash into the compound with the remaining truck full of our forces behind it to gain entry into the town proper. Once in, squads one and two were to break left and right respectively, killing anything that wasn’t civilian, while the third squad swept their command post for the colonel. Hicks urged everyone to keep their groups tight, their aim sharp, and to conserve ammo as much as possible. Each man had a couple grenades, which were to be used only if a squad was truly fucked.
Shit. I’m stiffening up. It hurts to write anymore, but I’ll try and finish this before time is up. I can feel my heart slowing down now, and my teeth have started to clench between bouts of bloody coughing. I guess it can’t hurt to admit that I’m straining to see the page through my own tears. I want to have time to say good-bye to the others in person.
We didn’t know they had the area in front of the compound mined. After the first vehicle, with its gas pedal held down by a large stone, crashed through the first rows of fencing, it exploded into a giant fireball, spewing metal and rubber into the air. The commotion inside the town was easily visible as small groups of soldiers scrambled into makeshift fire crews to douse the blaze and gunners took up firing positions. They unloaded in our direction.
The second Hummer, off to our right, was fired upon instantly but still managed to barrel through the fence lines completely before slamming into a building and toppling five or six men from the rooftop. Those that survived the fall writhed on the ground in agony with broken backs or whatever.
We were all packed in the vehicle behind D-Prime as a lone driver hurled the immense tractor trailer through the entrance and into the town square. From out of nowhere a rocket-propelled grenade whizzed into the trailer and exploded, flipping D-Prime on its side. It slid across the ground in flames as more of the colonel’s men scattered like roaches to get out of the way. They failed. Their bodies were smeared across the concrete like melting crayons as D-Prime scraped to a halt.
The actions were furious the second we bailed out. The two squads broke off from ours and began firing on the colonel’s men while trying to find cover. Hick barked at them, “There’s no civilians here! Kill everything!”
Grenades were already exploding, and my ears were ringing, immediately drowning out everything but the gunfire. I saw Nick go down screaming as he hit the corner of the command post. Seth lost his shit and grimaced as he shook of his sling, fighting through the pain, and forced his wounded arm to do his will. He shot no less than six men and tackled a seventh, stabbing him violently in the neck and face before regaining his footing to reach Nick.
With bloody cuts on his face and neck, Nick was pulled to his feet by Seth. He shook his head to clear it and told Seth, “I told you I wasn’t dying today. Just a little shrapnel is all.”
Seth dusted him off a bit and said, “The day ain’t over yet.”
Nick looked Seth over and asked him quickly, “You good?”
Seth nodded and answered, “Shouldah niggas, son. I gotchu.”
They moved off further into the town towards the command post, leaving me, Lilly, and Kylee slightly behind. I heard one of them shout to us on the way, “We’ll clear a path. Protect Lilly!”
That pretty much went without saying, but Lilly didn’t need protection today. At one point, she was grabbed by a man in an army uniform, and it was unclear if his intentions were to get her out of the line of fire or to do her harm. No sooner had I swung my pistol around to take aim did I see Lilly stomp on his instep. He reflexively leaned down to clutch at his foot when Lilly whipped the butt of her rifle into his nuts and watched him collapse into a heap. I thought she would leave it at that, but now that they were eye to eye, she gave him a sharp chop across his neck to lay him flat before pressing the barrel of her rifle to his face and squeezing the trigger. His brains painted the concrete.
I turned to find Kylee lying on the ground holding her side. I felt the color leave my face. Her hand came away bloody, and I dropped to a knee to inspect her wound, tearing away her clothing. A bullet had found its way under her vest and had torn through her side. There was no time to field dress it. We had to get her outta there.
She growled through her teeth, “Motherfucker! I’m fine. I’ll be all right. It’s through and through. Let’s go!”
I helped her to her feet, and we pressed further toward the command post. That was the first time I saw him. Kylee pointed to an older man across the yard. He was wearing army green, and his rank said it all. The colonel was in our midst.
Somehow, Big Stank had gotten separated from his assault team and was now pressed tightly against a wall, looking out across the carnage in the square. Bodies were everywhere, but all were survivors of the military’s first faulty vaccine, much like the Kilo boys. They were surely dead where they lay ,but lucky for us, they weren’t turning. Stank fired a few rounds at some guys retreating in front of Hicks, but he had his back to the colonel. I couldn’t get a shot due to holding Kylee steady, and I watched helplessly as the colonel stalked up to Big Stank, pressed his gun to the back of his head, and coldly pulled the trigger. Lilly took a shot at him, but it went wide right. Colonel Lang ducked his head and took off down the street.
Kylee snapped, “Dext, leave me here. Go get him.”
I argued for a moment, but she smacked me on the back of the head. My teeth clicked. She told me, “I’ll. Be. Fine. Now go!”
I didn’t make it ten yards.
Hicks rushed into me, bowling me over, along with four of his men. He angrily shouted, “We gotta go! Head for the mountains!”
I was about to tell him to fuck off, but then I saw why we needed to go…
An Abrams tank was lumbering up the far street into the square firing its machine as it went. It was destroying everything in its path and cutting the remains of the Kilo assault teams literally in half with its fire. The turret spun slowly in our direction.
I’m not sure what happened in the moments that followed because my mind hazed over in the blast, but I know it fired on us. The building that was once the command post collapsed into a pile of rubble as Hicks, Lilly, Kylee, and I scrambled to the outer edges of the town. Seth and Nick were found off to our left taking cover between a few shanty houses, and they joined us in our retreat to the hillside.
The gunfire continued behind us as we scrambled up to higher elevations, running like whipped puppies. We had failed. The colonel held his ground, and the compound, while horribly damaged in the attack, remained.
We lost.
We lost everything but our lives.
When we were well clear of the conflict, my attention turned to Kylee. She fell to her knees, bleeding enough to worry me. One of Hicks’ four remaining men tended to her and began dressing the wound. He told her, “You’re damn lucky. All it took was skin and some fat. If we can control the bleeding, you’ll survive as long as it doesn’t get infected. Unfortunately, the only way that’s gonna happen is if we get the fuck outta here and do it soon.”
Hicks was already on top of that. He was frantically fidgeting with his radio and cussing up a storm. “C’mon, you piece of fucking shit! Work, Goddammit!”
Lilly stood with Seth and Nick, watching the events unfold like a trooper. I was so proud of her. She was a survivor. She’d be all right. I knew it. I could close my eyes and know in my heart that she’d be all right, especially after what happened in the hour that followed.
Hicks’ radio crackled to life, albeit distorted, and as he rattled off some jargon I didn’t understand, the reply finally ca
me. “Hicks? That you? Jesus Christ, where the fuck have you been?”
Hicks spat on the ground and sarcastically replied, “You’ll have to excuse me, sir. We’ve spent the last few days in a Goddamn valley dodging bernies, blowin’ shit up, and generally trying not to get our asses chewed off. Forgive me for not being able to check in. The only reason I got you on the horn right now is because we’re up higher than we’ve been in a week.”
Thigpen crackled over the radio, “Status report. Did you reach Bragg yet? What’s your position? How many men do you have left? Tell me everything.”
Hicks’ eyes turned red with rage. “The mission is fubar. Target is still active. Our forces have been decimated, and if you have any bright ideas, now would be a good fucking time to make a move. We are well and truly fucked. I got one man ill, one injured, one child, and six able-bodied.”
He went on to spew some coordinates that made no sense to me to pinpoint our position before Thigpen told him, “Listen up, Hicks. Something has come to light in the last day or so that you need to be very aware of. Now, you may not like what I’m about to tell you, but if there’s any honor left in your old bones, you’ll trust me just one last time. Can I count on you to do that?”
Hicks scoffed off the mic then keyed it up. “Well, that depends wholly on what it is you’re about to say now, doesn’t it?”
Thigpen’s voice was firm as he replied, “I got an interesting call yesterday, and I’ve been trying to get hold of you to pass this along before you even made it to the target. I want you to stay where you are. Don’t move an inch from that spot. A recent turn of events has gone in our favor thanks to an old friend of those people you’ve been runnin’ with. The cavalry is on the way. We’re coming to extract you.”
Relief washed over us, and Seth and Nick shared a hug with Lilly. Kylee squeezed my hand and offered an encouraging smile as she forced herself to her feet.