After the Fall: Catherine's Tale Part 2: The warrior's fight for survival begins

by David Nees

  As he spoke, they heard the engines of the vehicles coming down from the ridge.

  Chapter 15

  Leo decided to charge around the next switchback. The snipers had moved to new positions when he had hit them with the machine guns and mortars. This time he decided to risk not stopping. He had to get down off the dirt road.

  He lowered his head and accelerated as he tore around the exposed corner, gravel and dirt flying out from the tires. He wrestled with the steering wheel to keep the pickup from sliding off of the road and down the embankment. If the snipers were going to shoot, speed was his friend; he couldn’t go slow. But this time no shots came. The other pickups were roaring right behind him. He heard a loud bang as one of the pickups careened off a boulder on the side of the turn. And then they were back into the cover of the trees. Maybe they had killed the shooters with the mortar rounds. Leo felt a rush of relief. They had to be getting near the bottom. Soon he would be starting his vicious run through the valley.

  The three pickups were going at a furious clip, slewing back and forth on the rough dirt road. They dodged the rocks bulging out of the roadbed as best they could, bouncing over the others with the men in the back holding on for dear life.

  No more stopping, he thought savagely. He kept the accelerator pressed down. The pickup careened around the next corner and Leo slammed on the brakes as he saw the trucks blocking the road ahead. The pickup behind him rammed into the back of his own, slewing him to the left. He glanced back in a panic and saw the third truck just managing to stop without hitting the second one. Before his truck came to a stop, Leo dove out of the cab. He knew this was an ambush. The men in the back were thrown in a tangle of tumbled legs and bodies.

  Suddenly furious rifle fire erupted from both sides of the road.

  There was nowhere to go but they had to move. “Out!” Leo shouted as he ran in a crouch towards the rear truck. His men jumped down from the pickup beds but were exposed to the deadly crossfire. One dropped like a sack of laundry, and another fell and hung slumped over the bed wall, the back of his skull blown open. The screams from the other side told the same story. Leo heard the two M60s start up on the other side of the truck, the downhill side.

  The worst place they could stay was in the middle. “Downhill!” Leo roared, dodging between the second and third pickups. He ran crouched low, bringing his rifle up and firing blind, hearing bullets slamming into the pickup behind him. He passed bodies, looked to his left and saw more. Maybe half of his remaining fifteen men were already killed. The two machine gunners were fanning the trees as they ran into them, suppressing the shooters there. His men followed, firing their M16s and screaming. They dove into the cover of trees on the downward slope. Leo saw a valley defender break from behind a tree trunk ahead and dash back into the brush. They were pushing the defenders back with their superior automatic rifle fire.

  Over here they had some cover from the shooters on the other side of the road. But the shooters would follow in seconds. Leo kept running and firing. The men who had made it into the trees were doing the same. They paused under cover, fired, and moved forward as they continued to drive the defenders down the slope. They were staying in better order than Leo would ever have expected. The ambush was half reversed. As Leo moved downslope, adrenaline pounding through him, the image of the carnage back at the road rose up in his mind. Where had all these men come from? He had estimated that the valley had less than half a dozen men to defend it. Now there seemed to be twenty or more men, all armed and seemingly all good shots.

  He heard a machine gun start up behind him, uphill. Leo almost stumbled in shock. The defenders had a machine gun.

  It was firing in short bursts, spraying the woods in an orderly pattern. Bullets tore through the leaves. Leo dropped behind a huge log and knew the lightning charge was over. He saw his men vanishing from view ahead of him as they dove for cover. Anyone caught without the protection of a substantial tree at his back during one of the bursts was in danger of being taken out.

  Leo risked a look back around the bottom of the dead tree. He could still see the trucks, his own and those blocking the way, and he watched as some of the defenders began to cross the road. They would attack his men from behind, his men could no longer run ahead, and the shooters downslope would just now be realizing that they could turn around. He and his men would be caught in a pincer with no way out.

  The defenders only had to be careful to not shoot their own men. Leo could only hope that they would do that.

  He opened his mouth to get his men to keep moving forward—it was their only chance to avoid being slaughtered until they found a place where they could somehow turn the whole battle around—and then he realized that he had no way to do that. The rush had been spontaneous, a result of panic. With fire coming at them from both sides, no words would get them to stand up and advance. With that realization, he knew the attack had gone all wrong. It was doomed.

  He did not hesitate. He made a decision. He was not one to fall on his sword, to die for his commander when the fight was futile. His decision made, he began moving. He carefully worked his way to his right, angling back up the hill, until he thought he was to the rear of any of his men. The firing intensified. The noise meant that he could move faster as he moved even further to his right. He began to circle back toward the pickup trucks. If he could get to the rearmost one, after the uphill defenders had crossed the road, he could escape back over the west ridge.

  Once he left the woods to cross over to the pickup he would be exposed. Could he make it? The shooting intensified even further. Men were screaming. He knelt behind a tree at the edge of the road. He heard a machine gun thundering away behind him.

  They’ve all crossed over into the woods. Maybe he had a chance.

  Leo got up and sprinted across the bark road to the last truck, leaping over the sprawled bodies. He jumped into the cab, twisted the key, the engine roared to life, and he reversed it with all four tires spitting dirt. He drove backward up to the blind turn as fast as he could go, spun the truck around at the corner, shifted gears, and was tearing up the two-track when the first defenders got back to the road.

  “Let him go, whoever it is,” Jason said. “We probably can’t catch him, and I don’t want to waste time trying. We have to find Catherine and Bird.”

  “Let’s hope they’re alive,” Clayton said.

  “How are we going to find them?” Tom asked. He had just come up from the slope below and given Jason the body count.

  “That’s the question,” Jason muttered.

  “You kill ‘em all?” Clayton asked Tom.

  “We got five prisoners. They surrendered.”

  “Not sure I’d take prisoners,” was Clayton’s response.

  “Bring them up here, on the double,” Jason said. “They may know where Catherine and Bird were positioned.”

  Tom called down the hill. More of the defenders were coming up, and after a couple of minutes, five men in militia uniforms were dragged and shoved up to the road. Tom oversaw tying their hands behind them and had them sit down on the side of the road.

  Jason went to them. He focused on the largest one, a stout bearded man with the stunned look of defeat in his eyes “You ran into some snipers. Where were they shooting from?”

  “What you gonna do with us?”

  “Hurt you if you don’t answer me. Where were the shooters? Where did you encounter them?”

  The man frowned. He looked as if he was struggling to gather his thoughts. “They shot at us at two places. They hit us two or three times…I don’t remember how many.”

  “Where? Where did they hit you?”

  “On the corners. Where the road turns away from the ravine. It’s exposed on the turns.”

  “Which ones?” Jason shouted.

  The man’s face pinched in concentration. “The second one coming down from the ridge, and the others after that.”

  “How far back up is that?”

  “I do
n’t know. We didn’t get fired on for the last two, I’m sure of that. What you gonna do with us?”

  Jason ignored his question.

  He grabbed Clayton and headed to the second militia pickup where it sat mashed against the one ahead. “Tom, get the men together and bring the captives down to the valley road. And clear this road. From what this guy says, Catherine and Bird had to be to the left, across the ravine. We’ll drive back up to try to find their position. If we can locate them, we’ll have to get all the way down to the bottom to climb up the slope they’re on.”

  Chapter 16

  Catherine and Bird listened to the gunfire below. There was a lot of rifle fire, and Catherine thought she could make out the sound of a machine gun. It seemed strangely harmless so far away. She did not hear any mortar fire.

  Finally everything went quiet.

  “You think they won?” Bird whispered.

  “Don’t know,” Catherine said. “I’ll go back with my rifle and spotting scope and see if I can tell what’s happened.”

  Bird nodded. He had little strength for words.

  Catherine ran through the woods. Their last sniping position was uphill. She heard the sound of a single truck roaring up the hill. It sounded like it was moving fast. The sound faded. She ignored her fatigue and jogged through the trees and brush, pushing uphill, her breath coming in harsh pants. The sniper rifle slapped hard across her back. She desperately hoped they had won the battle. She had to get help for Bird. She had tried again to tighten the bandage, but blood was still seeping out from under it.

  She came out not far from where they had last shot at the trucks. She could hear another engine approaching. She knelt quickly and studied the road through her spotting scope. There was a pickup truck racing around a lower switchback, heading uphill. It looked shot up. It wasn’t one of the valley pickups. She thought it was one of the ones they had been shooting at earlier. It disappeared into the trees.

  She waited. The truck reappeared at the last switchback where she and Bird had fired on the convoy. It stopped. Two men got out. They were looking in her direction. It was Jason and Clayton.

  She jumped up and waved her arms. At first the men didn’t see her. Frustrated, she unslung her rifle and fired a shot in the air. They saw her instantly. They waved, and Jason cupped his hands around his mouth and yelled something that she couldn’t make out. She swung her arms in a circle to indicate they should come to her. They stared. “Bird’s shot! He needs help!” she shouted. Frantically she pointed back to the woods and swung her hands, beckoning them to come. Finally Jason and Clayton jumped back into the truck and it turned around and sped off downhill.

  Catherine ran back down through the trees to Bird.

  He was lying where she had left him. Her shirt was fully soaked with blood.

  “Bird, they won!” she exclaimed.

  He looked at her with dim eyes.

  “Come on, Bird. We got to get down off the ridge. They’re coming to help. You’re going to be okay.”

  “You go,” Bird said, his voice now more weak and hoarse.

  “No. I won’t leave you. We’ll get you out of here. You’re going to be okay.”

  “I don’t think so.” He looked down at the bandage. “Lots of blood. Too much.”

  “No! You got to get up. Help is coming. You have to hang on.”

  Catherine gently slipped her hands under Bird’s armpits and started to lift. “You help me, Bird Early. Don’t you quit. You aren’t a quitter!”

  Bird groaned, but he struggled to gather his legs under him. Soon Catherine had him on his feet. She pulled his right arm over her shoulder and they began to stumble down the hillside. Catherine kept searching for the easiest terrain. Bird was not going to be able to climb down any rocks.

  As they worked their way down she tried to keep Bird talking, keep him focused.

  “I’m sorry I got hit. I messed up,” Bird said.

  “No you didn’t. It could just as easily have been me.”

  “Glad it wasn’t you. I like you. Wish I had a girl like you.”

  A wave of anguish rushed through her. “You’ll find one. She’ll help you get better and you’ll have a long life together. You just hang on. We’re going to get you some help.”

  After a while they heard a shot below them. Catherine shifted her hold on Bird enough that she could get out her 9mm. She fired two shots in the air.

  “They’re coming,” she told Bird. They began to struggle downward again. After ten more minutes they heard another shot, closer this time. Catherine immediately fired two more rounds.

  Then she felt Bird sagging. She began shouting, “Here we are! Hurry! Bird’s been shot. He needs help.”

  Bird’s legs gave out and he sank to the ground with a groan. Catherine guided him down, and he lay back on the sloping ground. She knelt down next to him and took his face in her hands.

  “You hang on, Bird. Don’t you give up.” She had tears in her eyes as she spoke.

  Bird looked at her with sad eyes. “I’m tryin’. It hurts some.” His eyes began to lose focus.

  Catherine held his head firmly in her hands. She put her face close to his and began to exhort him again. “Don’t quit. Don’t you leave me,” she shouted into his face. Tears streamed down her cheeks. She turned from Bird to shout out, “Over here! Hurry! Bird needs help!”

  It seemed to take far too long until there were shouts nearby, and then Jason, Clayton and two of the clansmen came into view below. They ran up to her.

  “Are you okay?” Jason asked.

  “It’s Bird. He got hit by some shrapnel. He’s bleeding badly. Please don’t let him die.”

  Clayton shouldered in past her and bent over Bird. She almost toppled backward.

  “Bird, you hear me?” Clayton shouted.

  Between Jason and Clayton she could see Bird nodding.

  “We got to put pressure on the wound,” Jason said to Clayton. “He’s lost a lot of blood.” Catherine felt a stab of guilt. The two of them stripped to the waist and they doubled their shirts across the wound, pulling them tight around Bird’s lower torso. Finally it looked as if the flow had been stopped, or nearly so.

  After a moment’s consultation, the four men knelt down beside Bird. Clayton was at his head, Jason at his feet, and the two bearded clansmen knelt beside him, one on each side. The two men laced their arms under his torso and clasped hands. Clayton supported Bird’s head and Jason took his feet. They gently lifted him up. Bird’s face was pale, but he made no sound. The four of them began to carry Bird down the ridge. Catherine carried Bird’s rifle as well as her own and went ahead of them, pushing branches out of their way.

  She asked once, “Did you get Leo?”

  “No,” Jason said.

  “No?”

  “Tom checked the bodies. Didn’t see him. Someone took off in one of the trucks. Maybe Leo.”

  The going was slow and painful. Bird grunted whenever the men stumbled on the uneven ground. Finally they came down onto the flat ground. The paved road was only a short distance away. Ahead they saw a cluster of pickup trucks, two of them looking well shot up. The rest of the fighters were waiting for them.

  The four men gently laid Bird down on the grass just short of the asphalt. He was barely conscious. Catherine leaned the rifles up against one of the pickups and went back to where Bird lay. Clayton carefully tugged the makeshift bandages to one side. The shrapnel had torn a deep, jagged gash in his side. It was no longer bleeding much, but, looking at it now, Catherine realized it was much deeper than she had thought when she had been hurrying to bind it up on the slope. She thought she could see organs inside the wound.

  “You think the shrapnel’s still inside?” Clayton asked.

  “Only way to tell is to probe the wound,” Jason said in a low voice.

  “You do that?”

  When Jason answered, he sounded uncertain. “He’s pretty weak,” he said. “But, if there’s metal in him, we need to get it out.
It could keep cutting him inside.” He looked up at someone in the small crowd and said, “Get me some water. I need to clean my hands as best I can.”

  The crowd shifted. Jason gently loosened the layers of cloth and pulled them completely open around the wound. Catherine looked at Jason’s large hands, dirty from the fighting and scrambling he’d done. “Let me do this. My hands are smaller and cleaner.”

  Jason looked at her. She could feel the dried tears on her face, but she wasn’t crying now. She felt a stubborn will gather within her.

  “Can you do this?” Jason asked her. “You’ve never done anything like this before.”

  Catherine responded, “Have you?”

  Jason shook his head. “Go rinse your hands as best you can,” he said quietly. “Then just reach in. You can move things around gently. If you find metal, you have to be careful to pull it out without cutting him more.”

  Catherine nodded grimly. She struggled out of her coat and laid it behind her, heedless of the onlookers. Someone above her handed a deerskin water bag, and she splashed water over her hands and then rubbed them together, flapping them dry in the air. She turned to Bird who was looking at her. “I’m going to check for metal,” she told him. “If there’s any inside you, we need to get it out.”

  Bird gave a weak nod. “It don’t hurt now. That’s odd.”

  Catherine took a breath and held it. She moved closer to Bird, leaned over him, and put her right hand to the red tear in his side. She slowly worked her fingertips into the wound. Then her fingers. He was so warm. Her hand was partially inside when she felt something hard and twisted. She looked up at Bird. “I found some.”

  “Be careful,” Jason said close behind her. “Don’t yank and don’t force it.”

  Catherine grimaced. She gradually slid her fingers around the metal. “I got a grip on it.”

  “Go slow,” Jason said.

  She nodded. Her mind was focused on what her hand felt. Everything seemed magnified to her hand’s touch. She only belatedly realized that she was staring into Bird’s eyes. Now she saw him as if for the first time. He was staring back at her. “It don’t hurt,” he said. “You doin’ a good job.”