by Devon Ford
~
Dan swept onwards, knees bent in his customary crouch, rifle butt pressed into his cheek as his eyes scanned wildly around with the barrel an extension to his vision. Sweeping the gun left and right as he went, the shadows to his right burst into the light.
The gun was shoved painfully into his face, his attacker with one hand on the barrel to prevent it swinging his way. The gun was attached to Dan’s vest on the short sling and with the sidearm on his left side he tried to keep control of the rifle with his left hand grasping the angled grip on the barrel. He dropped his right hand from the trigger guard and swept it under his left armpit to withdraw the Walther from its holster, but his attacker had seen the deliberate movement and instinctively knew it was a weapon grab. Finding his right wrist clasped in a vice-like grip, his muscle memory kicked in and he splayed the fingers of that hand out as he turned his wrist to break the grip.
His attacker recognised the feeling of his grip being thwarted and threw his left elbow into the stock of the rifle he held, following the distraction blow up with a change in footing and a knee aimed upwards into the solar plexus.
Dan dropped his body weight, sensing that the kick was coming on a cellular level. The knee connected, but it made a direct hit onto the base of two spare magazines for the assault rifle, prompting an involuntary sharp intake of breath as the pain registered.
The two grappling men slammed heavily into the wall, face to face with an assault rifle between them in disputed ownership. Only then did Dan clearly see the face of the man.
Leo, le chasseur, offended to the very depths of his soul by the gall of this man, this invader, snarled in his face.
“I owe you this, Englishman,” he growled, just as he brought his head savagely forward into Dan’s face.
A crunching noise sounded and hot blood poured over their hands as Dan’s nose popped like a water balloon. His eyes stung in sudden, temporary blindness, his ears still rang like a bell and an overwhelming wave of sickness added to the pain as he feared he would drop.
Vomit gurgled in his stomach and threatened to fountain upwards. He felt the pressure on his vest release and, just as Leo had known before, he believed with utter certainty that he withdrew to bring a weapon to bear on him. Releasing the rifle, still blind and on the verge of unconsciousness, he reached for the knife on the front of his left shoulder and whipped it downwards ready to drive it up under the bastard’s ribs and put him down.
His shout of rage began to sound as he began his upswing, punctuated terribly by a flash of pain as Leo’s knife penetrated deep into his own body, just outside of the protection of the vest.
Dan’s knees gave out, and the cry of rage twisted into a strangely muted gasp of unimaginable agony as the weak upward thrust with his own knife merely reached Leo’s waist and scored a deep wound. Looking up, Dan saw his own death coming in the form of Leo’s hand coming forwards, horribly faster than his own could move, reaching for the grip of the shotgun protruding from over Dan’s right shoulder.
Dan saw this. He knew it meant his end; his brutal decapitation by his own weapon.
Just then the sound of claws on stone tapped on his mind, culminating in a snarling, roiling impact of such savage ferocity. His eyes were closed, but he felt the sudden emptiness, felt the concussion of the heavy hit before him as Ash, it could only have been Ash, took the man bodily to the ground a clear three paces from him. The agony he felt intensified as Leo kept hold of the knife and tore it from his body as he was swept away.
His pained relief evaporated when the piercing sound of a yelp of pure agony cut the darkening air like a siren.
NOT LIKE THE MOVIES
Steve stood stock still, eyes closed, waiting for his recurring nightmare to become a reality.
He had achieved his goal. He had freed the population from oppression and he was happy to go into the night now; it saved him from having to face the things he had done and the pain and suffering his master plan had caused.
The shot rang out, but he felt no pain. No violent impact his mind associated with the bullet hitting him, ripping into his flesh, snapping his ligaments and breaking his bones before tearing through his internal organs and leaving him to die in bloody ruin.
The shot sounded loudly. Deafeningly in the close confines of the now crowded town square.
Steve still felt no effect of the shot which he knew would kill him, and he dared to open one eye.
He saw Richards, clutching his left hip just above the bone, and staring in horror at a man on the ground before him.
One of his own men.
Only it wasn’t. Benjamin was injured, fatally with three bullets in his abdomen, but his final act was to rid the world of the madman he had tried to overthrow without bloodshed. His plan had cost him his soul, having killed innocent people – something which burned his soul every day and made him wish for it all to end - and worst of all it had now cost him his brother.
The last thing his mother had said to him, her final words, were to look after his little brother, because he always got into trouble when Benjamin wasn’t there to watch over him.
Only he had got in trouble, and now he was dead. So was Benjamin’s plan to free the people living under fear of capital punishment just to serve the maniac’s egotistical vision of the future. He just wanted everyone to get on with their lives, to live together, and dreamed of a day he wouldn’t have to do the things he had done before he realised it was all big, fat load of shit. There was no master plan; those who still survived had to work together or they were doomed.
His final act, seconds before he died, was to put all his remaining strength into the trigger of his gun and fire. One bullet, followed by another, followed by a third. His hands held no more blood to work the trigger or hold the gun up any longer.
Benjamin bled out and died; not happy by any possible stretch of the imagination, but feeling like he had accomplished one small thing in his life.
~
Richards staggered, shocked that he had been shot when he was the one holding the gun. He aimed it at the bastard which he knew, all along, right from the very beginning, was responsible for this ungodly mess. The second bullet hit him in the right thigh, dropping him to the ground and making him kneel at eye height with one of his most trusted soldiers. Questioningly, not understanding the first thing about what had happened that night, he stared into Benjamin’s eyes and began to mouth the question, Why?
The muzzle flashed a final time and the bullet entered his face just below his left eye, fountaining blood and bone out behind his left ear and ending the year of the Major instantly.
~
Steve couldn’t believe he was alive. Finding Lizzie hugging him tightly, he squeezed her back, kissing her hair, before disentangling himself and taking the steps two at a time in slow motion to stand on the steps.
“Everyone, drop your weapons,” he shouted, hands held aloft, as the sounds of metal touching concrete sung out faintly all around him.
“From now on we are all on the same side,” he yelled, seeing more confusion than gratitude on the assembled faces of guards and cogs alike.
“What do we do now?” shouted a faceless voice from within the crowd.
The question stumped Steve entirely. He simply hadn’t through that far ahead.
He thought for a moment.
“We tidy all this up,” he said, waving a hand over the bodies and carnage their revolution had caused, “and tomorrow we start fresh.”
FINAL ACT
Leah gained the top of the steps just as she saw Neil fall back clutching his left arm. In the failing light she could already see his face turning pale as he tried to shimmy backwards across the rough stone ground using only his legs.
A noise to her right made her turn and raise her rifle, breathless from the dizzying climb and scared of the bloodbath she had run into.
Ash, the climb showing no evidence of having exhausted him, waited at her left ankle for orders, seeming desper
ate to get in the fight.
“They’re dug in,” Neil gasped as Adam dragged him away from danger.
“I will end this!” boomed the accented voice from Leah’s right.
Pietro strode past her, thrusting the compound bow and an arrow towards her wordlessly. She took them, without question, and watched as the Russian threw a burning oil lamp onto a pile of bedding.
Gathering up the blankets, seemingly oblivious to the burns he was suffering he stepped around the corner where Neil had just been wounded and threw the blankets though the open aperture of the barrack room. Stepping smartly back untouched by the flurry of shots which answered his sudden appearance, he threw off his prized wolf pelt to escape the flames creeping up his body.
Pietro then fell backwards like a felled tree, landing heavily on the ground Neil had just occupied. Smoke billowed from the room and four men burst out to escape the flames caused by the accelerant.
Leah dropped the bow and raised her rifle, emptying the magazine into the men until they all lay still on the stone, bleeding and twitching. Leah dropped her rifle, still breathless, and ran to Neil’s side.
“I’m okay, chicken. Check on Russian Pete,” he said through gasps of pain.
Leah nodded and turned away.
She stared into Pietro’s glassy eyes, a bullet hole evident on his forehead. The dying sun glinted red and orange from those eyes, making the terrible tragic and beautiful all at once.
A shout made her turn. Picking up the bow she ran to the other side of the ramparts and into view of a sight she dreaded.
A man, as scarred and dangerous as Dan looked, only with a hatred and malevolence she instantly feared, stood over her adoptive father who had been driven to his knees and plunged a knife into him, just as Dan thrust weakly upwards with his own blade.
Ash, needing no instruction and feeling the fear and emotion of the moment more than anyone, threw himself forward, hitting the man with such force as he had never employed before.
Man and dog tumbled end over end and Leah’s only reflex was to raise her weapon and kill the man.
Only she wasn’t holding her weapon, she held the unfamiliar bow and a single arrow. With an instinct she would never have believed she possessed, she nocked the arrow and drew as far back as her small frame could manage.
The man, terrifying in the failing light, paid her appearance no attention as he drew his hand upwards, spraying blood as he withdrew the blade from Dan’s body, kicked the dog brutally and turned ready to drive the knife into Ash.
She drew back, not realising the sheer effort she exerted into pulling the string, and loosed the arrow unthinkingly.
The arrow flew on faith. On instinct. On pure adrenaline.
It hit Leo in the flesh of his left shoulder, and without the strength of the bows original owner it stuck there instead of driving through flesh and sinew to sever the man’s spine.
Horrified, in sudden agony, Leo froze. He turned and followed the reverse trajectory of the arrow protruding from his body, to find himself facing a child. A girl.
He hesitated just long enough for Dan to rise, steady his feet, and drive his fist into the neck of le chasseur.
Choking, bleeding from the arrow stuck in his left shoulder and the knife wound in his left flank as well as the chunk of flesh missing from his right forearm from that damned dog, Leo staggered backwards.
The back of his knees hit the low wall at the furthest rampart. One second he was there, the next he was gone; tipped backwards over the wall and into the darkness below.
Leah dropped the bow and ran forward, sliding breathlessly to the stones beside Dan. Ash whimpered tragically to her right but her concentration was focussed solely on stopping the pulsing gouts of blood pumping from the top of Dan’s shoulder and rushing through her fingers as she pressed down hard on the wound. His eyes began to roll back as consciousness slipped away.
“Don’t you dare!” Leah snapped. “You can’t go anywhere yet.”
Dan’s eyes closed.
JUST DESSERTS
He was amazed that he had survived the fall. He was bleeding from half a dozen small wounds from both the plummeting ride from the wall’s edge and the fight which preceded it, but finding a soft landing amongst the rock-strewn ground only solidified his narcissistic belief that he was protected by some divine power. It hadn’t occurred to him that the soft landing was courtesy of the seven broken bodies he had ordered to be dumped over the walls there.
The hunter would live to fight another day; he would regroup, recruit and return to take this citadel on the coast which had so nearly defeated him. Only the town hadn’t beaten him; it had been that damned man and his dog and the girl – a girl!
That knowledge stung him the most. Being bested by another skilled man, a hunter not too unlike himself, but for a girl to draw blood from him hurt his pride more than the collection of open wounds and likely fractures which currently made his progress so slow and painful.
In his confusion from the blows to his head and the impact of the earth, he had fled north east, further and deeper into the mountains and away from safety. As the sun sank deeper behind him he penetrated higher into the wild hills where mankind held no dominance in today’s world. He was badly hurt, he realised. He couldn’t take stock of the blood loss or the mechanical injuries to his back, knee, shoulder and hands. If he could see himself, he would be amazed that he still functioned; but adrenaline and anger alone kept him animated.
Had he been fully alert and capable, he would’ve first noticed the silent shadows flanking his halting progress from the higher ground long before he did. When his fogged brain finally acknowledged the peril he was in, the terror threatened to rob him of all his remaining strength and resolve. He, the hunter, had stumbled straight into an ambush and now suspected he would find lethal enemies on all sides. His only chance of survival now was to find a defensible position and survive the night.
The lead wolf, newly appointed by the process of succession after the death of the previous alpha at the hands of a terrifying Russian, owed his new status to his size and sheer aggression. A vicious and fearless hunter, he had little opposition when he took control of the pack. Now his lips curled back from bright white pronounced canine teeth as he first confronted tonight’s meal. He and his pack hadn’t eaten for two days, and the emptiness in his belly made his natural savagery that much more razor-edged. He stood squarely in the path of the stumbling creature, widened his stance and issued a blood-curdling snarl with the intention of causing it to take flight. When it ran in fear and panic, they would follow it mercilessly and run it to ground where they would gorge on the warm flesh. The alpha would eat first, forcing every other animal in his diminished pack to wait until he had had his fill before allowing the others to take their turn according to hierarchy.
Seeing the huge grey and black dog blocking his path Leo froze, momentarily terrified that the unkillable bastard and his cursed animal had found him. He knew they hadn’t, he was sure he had killed them.
Or had I? he thought.
He could no longer be certain of anything in his pain and fear. Reaching for the weapon holstered on his right hip he froze again, this time in greater fear that the gun he had expected to be there was gone; lost in the fall, probably, and miles behind him. Scrabbling at his pouches and pockets like a deranged smoker searching for a cigarette lighter after a long flight, he found only his torch and a knife to be of any use. More snarls and growls now rippled out all around him as the other wolves tried to startle him into running.
Fire. I need fire, that will scare them away, he thought desperately, only to try the torch in place of flame. The wolves shied away from the bright light which split the night, but only to preserve their vision and not out of any primeval fear as fire would inspire.
For Leo, the fear was far worse.
Instead of the light scaring the animals away it served only to illuminate them in all their savage and beautiful glory. As the torch beam fl
ashed left and right, innumerable pairs of eyes reflected the beam and all were fixed intently on him. Flexing the grip of his weak right hand to better hold the knife, he guessed that he must have broken something in his hand or wrist, as the strength of the grip was far less than he expected to have. How this distracting thought penetrated the smothering blanket of fear was beyond him, and he dragged his thoughts back to the primal need to survive.
Run. Find safety. Hold them off.
He ran, which sealed his fate.
He made good ground at first, moving faster out of terror than he had been before. His initial break gave him confidence, thinking that the wolves would try to hold him there and misunderstanding that their confrontation was designed solely to make him run in panic, to wear himself down to near exhaustion. His elation at breaking free soon evaporated when the snarling and growling shadows rapidly caught up with his shambling progression and kept an effortless pace as they snapped at his heels, herding him easily towards the higher rough ground.
To him, it felt like hours. He ran as fast as he could, stumbling and slipping but the terror and adrenaline rush kept him from losing his footing entirely. To fall would be to die, so he didn’t fall. All around him the sounds of excited yapping and barking swum in the night air and added to the horror he was experiencing,
In truth, he ran for less than five minutes before the alpha decided that this particular prey would not require a long chase, and his burning stomach dictated that he sped up the process. Looping in behind him, he checked his pace for a few long strides to match speed and time his bite perfectly. Sinking his elongated canine teeth into the soft flesh just above the knee, the big wolf bit down hard and held on as a shriek of shock and agony tore through the night. The high-pitched squeal of the creature continued as he hit the ground hard, rolling both of them over and over until they came to rest. The wolf had not released the pressure of his bite by one ounce, and still held onto the now mangled and bleeding limb. The thing he had brought down still shrieked, and sat up to raise another limb intent on bringing a shining object down on the wolf’s head. Only then did the alpha release his grip and spring forward with an impossible speed brought on by bloodlust and hunger. The shining object dropped from the hand as the wolf’s jaw snapped shut on the throat of the creature, instantly stifling the scream and replacing it with a gargling, choked keening noise as the body went rigid.
