by Ryan Walker
Previously on mostly flat terrain, Randall soon found unexpectedly himself running downhill. Failing to slow his pace, he tripped on a small log and crashed to the ground, before rolling towards the bottom where he was stopped by a tree.
Randall immediately picked himself up. He had accumulated a handful of scrapes and bruises but nothing that could hinder his ability to press on.
He recovered his AK-47 on the ground when he could hear the voices of men shouting “I think he went this way!” and “Go north, we’ll head south!” and “Keep your weapons at the ready, he’s armed and dangerous!”
Butler’s forces were closing in. Randall cursed himself for having wasted time by tripping on the log.
Constantly looking down to see where his feet were stepping, Randall ran on down the slope until he came to a small creek, only a couple of inches deep. On the opposite side of the creek was another slope, this one heading upward.
Randall leapt over the creek and began climbing and running uphill as fast he could. Already exhausted and sweating under his clothing, the overexertion he was putting himself through was getting to him. He wouldn’t be able to keep this fast pace for much longer.
The moment Randall reached the top of the new slope, he turned to look behind him.
Atop the other slope he had just come down on the opposite side of the creek, a party of around a half dozen militia members led by Gale appeared.
Randall immediately hit the ground and crawled behind some brush for concealment. He didn’t think they had seen them.
Through the brush, he watched Gale and the militia members scan the surrounding area before cautiously proceeding down the slope towards the creek with their weapons at the ready.
One man tripped on a log just like Randall had and was sent crashing down towards the end of the creek, losing his grip on his weapon in the process.
“Watch your steps, it’s steep,” Gale frustratingly said in a hushed voice.
The party reached the creek and began to cross, heading in his direction. Within a minute or two, they would be at his exact position.
Randall kept himself calm and his breathing shallow as his brain debated his three options. One, he could reveal himself and open fire. He could at best take down at least one or two of them, he knew, before they would gun him down in turn. Two, he could remain hidden where he was behind the brush and hope that they wouldn’t find him. Possible, but also unlikely.
The third option, Randall decided, was risky but also his best: to create a distraction.
Carefully, Randall set his AK on the ground and picked up a rock within arm’s reach.
Turning quietly to his left, he raised his arm and threw the rock with all his might down the woods, creating a large cracking loud that echoed throughout the trees.
“He’s over there!” one of the militia members called out and pointed to the left of Randall’s position where the sound was coming from.
“Let’s go!” called out another.
Randall grinned. Through his position in the brush, he watched as the militia members instantly began running down the creek to where he had thrown the rock. It was just too easy.
“Wait, wait!” Gale called out. “Stay in line!”
But it was to no avail. All six of Gale’s eager militia members had already galloped away down the creek in the direction of the noise, needlessly creating noise through splashing in the water as they went, and then disappeared around the bend.
Gale stayed where he was, incredulous. Randall watched him. What was he doing?
Then, instead of following the militia members, Gale stepped over the creek and began climbing up the slope towards Randall’s position.
Dammit, Randall thought to himself.
As Gale continued to ascend the slope, coming up on Randall’s right side Randall slowly and silently started to crawl back behind a tree to the left to keep himself concealed.
Gale glanced briefly around, Randall’s Colt 1911 .45 in his hands, before continuing the ascent.
Randall glanced at the AK-47 laying on the ground. He thought about picking it up and taking aim to shoot Gale right then and there. It would be incredibly easy…but the report from the gunshot would no doubt attract the other militia members over to his position.
Randall also thought about how he could do nothing and just wait for Gale to move on. Perhaps that would be the wisest move. In fact, it would be the wisest, he knew!
But there was also an anger burning inside of him for Gale. There was anger for the fact that Gale was wearing his trusty leather gun belt with his knife and gun. There was anger for the fact that the Compound had conquered his grandparents’ cabin and that he had no idea where his family was as a result. And most of all, there was anger for the fact that he knew there was at least one member of his family who was dead, and that it might have been Gale who had fired the fatal shot.
In that moment, Randall decided that he would not show Gale mercy by letting him pass, even if it meant risking his own life and limb.
Without another moment of hesitation, he rose from his position and charged Gale head on, around fifteen yards away from his position.
Gale saw the incoming blur that was Randall out of the corner of his eye and swung around the .45 to respond, but it was too late.
Randall crashed his body hard into Gale’s and both men went tumbling down the ravine towards the bank of the creek. Gale lost his grip on the gun and it landed in the mud.
Randall regained his footing first and wasted absolutely no time in continuing his relentless attack.
Grasping Gale by his jacket collar, he lifted him up off the ground and then flung him hard against a nearby large cedar tree.
THUMPH!
Stunned by the force of the blow that directly impacted his back and head, causing immense amounts of pain, the dazed Gale saw multiple Randall’s coming for him.
Randall pinned Gale against the cedar with his left arm while his right instinctively reached for the KA-BAR knife that was sheathed on the left side of the gun belt.
Gale struggled, but Randall managed to free the 7-inch blade from its sheath, and the moment he did, he plunged it deep into Gale’s gut!
Gale hollered as the frigid pain shot throughout his entire body, but Randall muffled the noise by placing his hand over his mouth.
“This is mine, by the way!” Randall sneered.
He unbuckled his gun belt from Gale’s waist, and it dropped to the ground.
“Who was killed in the attack?!” Randall asked. “Who was it?! Who did you kill?!”
He slowly released his hand from Gale’s mouth to allow him the chance to speak. Half of the knife blade was still embedded in Gale’s abdomen and Randall’s fist was tightly locked over the grip.
Gale groaned in pain and refused to say a word.
“WHO?!” Randall pressed again, pushing the blade in a little further.
“Robert, Robert!” Gale finally cried out as the pain grew more intense. “It was Robert!”
It hit Randall like a stone brick. He gritted his teeth as he mercilessly twisted around the blade in Gale’s abdomen. Gale cried out and Randall muffled his mouth again.
“Who did it?!” Randall continued. “Who?! Answer quickly if you value your life!”
Gale grinned and coughed up blood. Despite the fact that the knife that had pierced his torso was sucking the life right out of him, it gave him cruel amusement to see how evident it was that the news of Robert’s death had clearly affected Randall.
“I did,” Gale taunted as he coughed up more blood that sprayed across Randall’s face. “I killed him.”
“NO!” Randall screamed impulsively!
He pulled the large knife out of Gale’s gut and then plunged it in again. And then again. And again and again. All in a rage as he imagined nothing in his mind but all the things that he, Thomas, and Robert had done when the three of them had grown up together. The memorable camping trips they had gone on, the strenuous and
yet exhilarating mountain hikes, the thrilling ATV and motorcycle rides, the trips to the shooting range, and the serene summer evenings fishing for perch and bass outside of the cabin. Randall had always treated Robert as if he were his older brother.
Blood drained out of Gale’s body and he crumpled to his knees before Randall. Randall looked at his knife in his hand, the black blade dripping in blood. He couldn’t believe what he had just done in his fit of fury. Who had he become?!
His face perspiring and pale as death, Gale’s eyes rolled up to meet Randall’s one last time.
“I…lost…a brother too,” Gale managed to say in between deep, wheezing breaths and more coughs of blood. “Now you know how it feels.”
Randall looked down at the dying Gale on the ground, instantly feeling immense regret for what he had done to him, when he heard the calls of the militia members in the near distance.
Without hesitation, Randall recovered his gun belt, 1911, and AK-47 from the ground. He ascended the top of the slope and disappeared right over the edge just when Mitchum and his militia members appeared around the bend in the creek.
* * *
Butler and his group of militia members sweated hard as their legs carried them through the woods towards the direction of Mitchum’s calling voice.
“Lewis, get up here now! Lewis, over here now!”
Butler’s heart was accelerating not from his running pace but from his worst fear that his gut was telling him was about to come true.
Rounding the same bend in the creek, Butler looked ahead and spotted Mitchum and around fifteen other militia members standing in a circle around something or someone next to the water.
Butler caught up and forcefully pushed his way through the crowd, shoving a couple of people to the ground, when he saw what they had gathered around.
Gale was dead. His eyes were glazed over in death and his mouth left gaping open in horror. He was laying in a muddy puddle of his own blood. There were at least five punctures in his jacket through which the blood was seeping from the stab wounds.
Butler’s didn’t breathe. He didn’t blink. He didn’t move a muscle. He just stood there and looked, as if he knew long ago this would happen.
George and his group of militia arrived next, splashing their way through the creek.
“Dad, what is it?” George asked.
Butler turned his head to face his son with a solemn and yet serious look on his face. It was a look George had only seen twice before…once when his mother had passed away, and once more when they had first received the news that Gerald had been killed.
“What is it?!” George’s voice wavered as he began to push his way through the circle of militia.
Upon seeing his older brother lifelessly sprawled out on the muddy and gory ground, George immediately screamed at the top of his lungs.
Randall listened to the echoes as he continued running through the woods.
TO BE CONTINUED
