Fifty Falling Stars

by Wesley Higginbotham

  “Thank you, baby.” Leesha said. “If you hadn’t we both know you would have been sorry.” She said with a smile.

  “This won’t be a joke, Leesha.” Kirk cut in. “You stay with me and do exactly what I do and do everything I say. Got it?”

  “But I want to go with Clay. Doesn’t it make…”

  “Got it?”

  “I just…”

  “Got it!?” Kirk said again.

  Leesha nodded and Kirk continued. “You can’t go with Clay because of that little trivial bullshit you just pulled.” He could see she didn’t understand. “This is not about some lover’s stroll or you getting to spend time with Clay out in the woods. This is serious. If the shit hits the fan and we run into something like we did back in Owensboro, you have to be able to take orders from those of us who know better than you.”

  “And just who would that be?” Leesha said, getting a little hot.

  “For this mission, I’m in charge. If something happens to me, then Clay’s in charge. If something happens to him, Jimmy’s in charge. If it comes down to just you, you get back here and get the rest of the family as far away from here as you can. Got it?”

  Anger flared in Leesha’s eyes. Kirk had never spoken to like that before. He may have been like this with Clay or Jimmy, but she wasn’t going to take it. Who the hell was he to start giving her orders like that? Before, he had led the group by making suggestions and getting general agreement from the rest. Sure, it had been fairly easy, especially since Tara had died and left Scott emotionally damaged; but this was blunt, hard direction. A smartass reply rolled to her tongue as she wondered why the hell Clay put up with this shit. That thought stuck her. Why did he put up with it? She visualized what Kirk had just said. What would she do if Clay was shot? Would she stay with him or would she put the demands of the family above the man she now knew to be the love of her life? As she pondered this question, the anger left her. Maybe that’s why Clay put up with this. He trusted Kirk and thought he knew what he was doing. He hadn’t led them wrong yet. She half suspected they would have been dead weeks ago without him. She nodded.

  Kirk softened his voice. “Don’t worry. As you get better at this and get a little more experience, you two will work together fine. Right now though, like that semi-playful comment you just made, you probably won’t obey him the way it has to be. You two are close. Sometimes that closeness in one area gets in the way of another. We don’t know what we’re going to find up there. We could be stepping into a whole different world, and in that world, you have to obey him as a soldier, not argue like an equal in your personal life. Once you two get all of that straight it’ll make you stronger. But for now, it’s better to keep you apart. Got it?”

  Leesha didn’t like it, but she agreed. As Kirk laid out the atlas on the ground and knelt beside it to go over the plan with the team, he noticed Clay grinning. He went over the terrain and the plan. Within minutes, the staggered group walked through the hills toward the town. Kirk let Clay take the point. Jimmy took second, following about thirty yards behind Clay. Kirk and Leesha followed another thirty yards behind. Kirk explained the staggered formation concept to Leesha as they went.

  “Troop movements usually staggered their soldiers ten or so yards apart. The main reason for this was explosions and ambushes. The soldiers up front would hit, and hopefully spring, the ambush before the main body of troops got hit. The ones in the back could provide cover fire and help the ones up front. It gave a better chance of survival. The other reason, the explosives, was so that if a soldier hit a landmine or had a grenade tossed at him, the distance between troops would minimize the damage done by the explosion and fewer people would get hurt. Understand?”

  “Makes sense. So, why have you got us so far apart?”

  “We don’t have as many people as a normal unit would. We don’t really have to worry too much about explosives. I doubt any of the townspeople around these parts had any grenades, much less landmines. We’re so spread out because we need the guy up front to trigger any ambushes as soon as possible. It’ll give us more time to react.”

  “But that’s Clay up there. Isn’t that dangerous?”

  “Yes. And if I wasn’t training you, that’s where I would be.”

  “So, what do we do if there’s an ambush?”

  “Well, Jimmy would take cover and return fire, hopefully suppressing the enemy’s will or ability to fire back. Clay, if able, would find cover and return fire. We would hopefully be far enough back that we can sneak around and flank the ambushers.”

  “What do you mean ‘flank’ them?” Leesha asked.

  “You see,” Kirk used his hands to gesture and explain the imaginary troop positions, “the enemy would have a lot of fire where everyone can aim at the target. If we can move to the side and change the angle while they continue to hold their position and fire or are pinned down from Jimmy’s fire, we can make it where only one or two of them can fire at us because their buddies will either be in the way or they’ll get shot. We, on the other hand, get advantages like being able to concentrate our shots on a smaller area and the possibility of hitting multiple people with fewer shots. Hell, we may even get lucky and have a bullet or two pass through one guy and kill the dude behind him.”

  “Pretty smart.” Leesha agreed. “So, how are we supposed to spot an ambush or an attack?”

  “Well, you start off by avoiding good ambush spots. Stay out of low-lying areas, trails that force you close together, open spots in the woods where there isn’t a lot of stuff to take cover behind, and open fields if you can help it. Besides that, you look for signs and screen the brush.”

  “Screen the brush?”

  “Yeah. You’re going to see the asshole who steps out and starts shooting at you. It’s actually going to be pretty hard to miss him. So, you don’t spend your time looking in the open areas. Instead, you try to look through the bushes and trees and whatever else. If you just glance over a section of bushes, like that over there, you’ll just see the bushes. But, if you look closely at what’s behind the leaves and twigs and shit, you might catch a boot sticking out of the bottom or the dark outline of a person or suspicious lump, or maybe even a flash of metal. That glimpse can give you a split second advantage, time to hit the deck or find cover. When the shit hits the fan, that slight advantage could save your life, and that of our little team here.”

  “I see.” Leesha said as she stepped over some dried branches. Kirk was pleased at how well she had taken to moving quietly through the woods. “Kirk, I thought all of this commando stuff was supposed to be hard. All of this seems pretty easy.”

  “It is pretty easy. It gets a little more complicated when you factor in different types of weapons and a couple more formations to better utilize those weapons, but even that’s not that hard. We don’t have any of those types of weapons anyway, and I doubt whoever we encounter will either.

  “The hard part about all of this is maintaining the focus. It’s easy to take a short walk through the woods and do all of these things fairly well. The trick is to keep it up after hours, days, or even weeks of doing it all the time. Then, when the bullets begin to fly, holding on to that focus, knowing what your part is, and how to best help the team. Anyone can do the mechanics of this, but holding that focus, that core of what must be done when you’re getting shot and shit’s exploding all around you or you’re wounded and half of your team is dead or dying and it’s up to you to flank an entrenched enemy or provide cover fire, that’s when things start to get though. All the specialized training they put us through was about that. They beat the shit out of us while we went through drills like this. All to weed out those that didn’t have or couldn’t get that level of focus, that centered place where we instinctively did whatever needed doing to get the job done and the team to safety.” Kirk sighed, reminiscing on his training days and first missions.

  “Unfortunately, we don’t have the time or ability to build up any of that with you guys. You’re
just going to have to get it on the job. I hope we can avoid anything like that, but if we don’t, remember your focus. That’s how you get things done out here and how you get out alive.” Kirk looked up to where Clay had just topped the hill they were climbing. He signaled a stop. Jimmy echoed his hand gesture to Kirk and Leesha.

  “Why are we stopping? Are we there?” Leesha asked.

  “Not quite, but this is where we quit talking. I’m going up to take point. You’re going to shadow Jimmy. Got it?” Leesha nodded. She followed him up to Jimmy’s position and took cover behind a tree next to Jimmy. Kirk kept walking to overtake Clay’s position.

  Kirk saw the town of Burkesville in the distance as he crested the hill. He motioned for Clay to advance to the south end of the town and make observations from a distance. He signaled Jimmy up to his position as Clay left. “Jimmy, you two stay here and cover us if anything goes wrong.” Jimmy nodded and Kirk took off toward the north.

  Some twenty minutes later, Kirk edged his way into a small clearing a little over half way up the hill to the west of town. He raised his rifle and looked down on the town through the scope. Most of the town seemed to be deserted. There were no fortifications or roadblocks around the town. The main reason that Kirk wanted this scouting expedition was to see how the locals had faired. The town was in a defensible area that looked to be surrounded by descent farmland and had a good water supply from the river. It was far enough out of the way that it shouldn’t have been hit with refugees. Kirk had hoped to find a tiny bit of America surviving here in the hills of Kentucky. What he saw depressed him. People moved around, walking from one place to the next. Even at this distance, Kirk could see that they were starving. Their soiled clothes and even their skin seemed to hang loose. Their steps were sluggish and erratic. Most were disorderly and unkempt.

  Kirk scanned the town and saw that some farming had been attempted. The tractors sat motionless in the fields, statues embedded in time now that they had no more fuel to power them, monuments to shortsightedness destined to rust with the passage of time. No cows or other animals populated the fields. Kirk assumed that whatever livestock there had been, had long since been eaten. It seemed that without proper preparations, even what should have been a defensible paradise in the midst of a country gone to hell, wasn’t immune.

  He scanned to the south and could make out the bridge across the river. It sat too close to town for Kirk’s comfort. While he couldn’t be sure, he guessed that only a couple of hundred people lived in Burkesville, too many to slip past. Crossing here would be risky. Kirk knew what would happen if they were spotted. These desperate people would rush them, at first begging for, then demanding, then trying to take their food. He couldn’t let that happen. He would have to stop them, and that meant shooting them. He had no desire to fire on these suffering souls, but neither could he help them. He and the family would have to take the bridge a couple of miles south of town and leave these poor bastards to their fate. He lowered his scope and made his way back to rendezvous with Jimmy, Leesha, and Clay.

  As night began to fall, the family made camp half way up one of the small mountains on the south side of the Cumberland River. Scott, Sherry, and Lucy made a fire and prepared a stew of dried squirrel meat, thistle, wild onions, and clover. Clouds filled the sky and threatened rain. Clay and Kirk set up the tents while Jimmy went out hunting.

  Jimmy returned right before dark. Today was one of the few times that he returned empty handed. The group ate their dinner as Clay told another one of his stories. This one was the comedic ghost story. Clay amazed Kirk when he just invented these stories out of thin air and made them so interesting and funny. He wondered if the man had always been this creative and funny or if it was a coping mechanism he had developed after the world had come crashing down.

  When Clay wrapped up the story, the family broke up to find their tents. Kirk took first watch. As the fire died down, he decided to take a stroll to the top of the hill some two hundred yards to the south. He had made it about half way when he heard someone following behind him. He knew it was Sherry. Kirk was glad that she hadn’t requested to come on one of the scouting missions. He loved her, but she sucked at moving quietly. He wondered if a three-legged rhinoceros could make as much noise as his new love.

  “What are you doing, hun?” He asked as she approached.

  “I just didn’t feel like sleeping while you are up and about. I thought I’d keep you company during your shift. Besides, we will be alone here in the dark woods.” She let that hang in the night. Kirk could hear her sexy smile in her voice.

  Kirk stepped up to her, embraced her, and kissed her. When they broke apart, he said, “That does sound like a good way to pass a guard shift, although it might be a little distracting.”

  “So, where are you going out here in the dark?” Sherry asked.

  “I just wanted to see if there was anything to see from the top of the hill.”

  “What do you think you’re going to see up here? It’s so dark; I don’t know how you’re going to see anything.”

  “Just thinking that if there’s another group like us, in the area, I might be able to see their campfire in the dark. Not everyone has the sense to dig a Dakota hole and hide their fires. I’d like to know if we’re not alone out here.” Kirk grabbed her hand. “Come on, let’s see what we can see.”

  They walked to the top of the hill. Even with Kirk’s guidance, Sherry still found a way step on every twig and make a lot of noise. As they crested the hill, Sherry looked up to the sky. “Oh my God, Kirk. What is that?”

  He followed the silhouette of her pointing arm and saw what she was talking about. Through the gaps in the hills to the north, the low-hanging clouds burned with a low orange light. “I’m not sure.”

  “Do you think it could be some town on fire or something?”

  “It could be, but you’d think we would see some smoke or something going up into the clouds.” Kirk frowned. “It looks almost like the lights from a city that you used to see in the distance as you approached it along a highway at night.”

  “Lights? Do you think there’s some place out here with electricity?”

  “I don’t know. Just because we haven’t come across one yet, doesn’t mean that there’s not some place that got things working again.” Kirk paused. “I guess we’ll find out tomorrow.”

  Kirk woke the family up at first light. He wanted to make a fair distance today. They might need to do a good bit of scouting before they crossed yet another river that they should run into today. The strange light’s they had seen last night worried him. While his head told him that the lights reflected off of the clouds were town lights, he didn’t let his heart have that hope.

  Shortly before noon, Kirk led the family as they topped another mountain. He suddenly motioned for everyone to get down. The family found cover. Clay low crawled up to Kirk’s position where he had ducked behind a tree. “What’s up, Kirk?”

  Kirk pointed to the south. Clay rose up and saw white clouds floating across a blue sky above the green mountains of northern Tennessee. Nestled in the valley below and contained in a horseshoe bend of a river, rested a town. Hundreds of people went about their business farming or cutting trees or a hundred different activities. “What is this place?”

  Kirk retrieved his road atlas and identified where they should be and the name of the town. “According to the map,” Kirk said, “this is Celina.” He raised his rifle to look through the scope. Clay did the same. Kirk called Clay’s attention to several of the town’s features. “Man, look at this place. The road over the bridge is blocked off fairly well. Looks like there are fifteen to twenty guards manning the wall. We can probably assume that the other roads are just as well guarded.

  “Check out the open fields around the town. They’ve all been plowed and worked. Shit, that one to the east looks like it’s already sprouting. I like the defensive fencing making up a secondary defensive perimeter.”

  “What?” Clay a
sked.

  “You see the big wooden X shapes with the pointed ends?”

  “Yeah. They don’t look like much.”

  “Well, they’re not intended to be another wall. They put those out to keep people from rushing the town center if the outer barricades get breached. They won’t keep people out very long, but they’ll slow them down so that the guys manning those interior fire positions and makeshift guard towers will have a clear line of fire to shoot at anyone trying to cross over them… Clever.”

  Kirk paused as he continued to scan. “Check out the building to the southeast.”

  “The white house?” Clay asked.

  “No, the construction in front of it. What does it look like those men are using?”

  “Son of a bitch!” Clay exclaimed as he looked over to Kirk. “They’re using electric power tools. This place has electricity!”

  “Either that, or they have enough gas left that they feel building a barn, or whatever that is, is worth wasting the fuel.”

  “What do we do?” Clay asked.

  “Let’s get the family back under cover and out of sight. We’ll let them know what we’ve found and discuss our options.” Kirk turned back toward where the family had taken cover and motioned for them to retreat. As the rest of the family pulled back several yards, Kirk and Clay turned to follow.

  Clay looked at Kirk as they walked. “You thinking of trying to get in there? You know, make contact?”

  Kirk frowned. “I don’t know yet.”

  “Why not?”

  “If you had a place that fortified, supplied, and organized; would you just let anyone in?”

  Clay thought for a moment as they walked. “I guess not, but I’m not sure. I still think it’s worth a shot.”