The Last Full Measure

by Trent Reedy

  Cal was behind me. Some guys up on a catwalk fired. My leg burned. Cal shot back with his rifle, dropped a guy from the catwalk. He pulled the rifle slung on my back and put it in my hands. I ran all over the place, shooting anyone with a gun. One shot. One kill. Move.

  The bastards could shoot me. I didn’t care. I didn’t want to live. At the door to one cage, I shot off the lock, threw the door open. “Come on!” Cal did the same at another cage. Women poured out of the cages. I heard Cal shouting directions to the buses. Six Brotherhood soldiers ran into the big room from the far door. I screamed and fired and sprinted at them. Firing. Firing. Firing. Three of them dropped. I was out of rounds. One woman prisoner slammed into one of her former captors. Her teeth sank into his throat, and she jerked her head to the side, ripping flesh and spraying blood. I understood her furious shriek as red blood ran down the brown skin of her chin. I hit the button to drop a mag while I pulled another from my pocket. My left shoulder screamed with fire inside. I emptied half my new mag into the last two Brothers in the room. The door was open and we ran.

  “They’re pinned down!” Cal caught up to me.

  Up ahead, a dozen of the enemy had good cover in a ring of junked cars. Our people couldn’t get to them. I could. These were the bastards I’d needed JoBell’s help to shoot. They were here. She was not.

  They saw me when I screamed at them. Some of them fired at me, but I shot round after round after round, sliding into their circle over the hood of an old Pontiac Grand Am. Cal was behind me, cutting them. One raised his hands to surrender. I felt the squelch as I shoved the barrel of my rifle into his eyeball. I pulled the trigger and the back of his skull blasted into a red spray. I turned, shot another.

  Someone pushed me up against the side of a minivan — one of the Brotherhood with his hands on my rifle. An Asian girl yelled as she swung a fist-sized rock into my attacker’s head. He fell to his knees. She crashed the rock into his skull again and again, taking him down. One of the Brotherhood called out from the ground as he held his gut, which Cal had slashed open. I felt the crack of his spine as I stomped on his throat.

  Then Becca was beside me, tears in her eyes. She put her arms around me, saying something, but I pushed away from her, my fingers smearing blood on her cheeks. Sweeney tried to take hold of me too. TJ and Kemp grabbed Cal, but he broke free and ran up to me.

  “Come on, Cal!” I shouted. “We gotta kill ’em! We’ll kill ’em all! Come on! We gotta move. We gotta keep going! Let’s go!” The ground wobbled, and I stumbled.

  Cal’s eyes were wide and wild. Then they blurred. He grabbed my head. “There ain’t no more. We got ’em all.” He was crying. “End of the line.”

  —• is why the Brotherhood of the White Eagle exists! For you! Think about your lives under United States domination. How many of you felt fulfilled? How many of you felt as if your work were truly meaningful? How many of you felt that anything you did would be remembered when you were gone? What did life under United States tyranny bring you? Endless dissatisfaction in your useless quest to get more of their dollars. The indignity of debt and dehumanizing work for too little pay or recognition.

  The old world is gone! And it falls to this generation to build a new and better one. The members of the Brotherhood of the White Eagle have risked their lives again and again in pursuit of the shared glorious future of all of Idaho. We did this not for our own reward, but for you!

  It is not enough to live off the scraps from the United States’ table. We will not be their dogs. We will rise up. We have dedicated every spare inch of our land to growing food, to pasture for cattle. We must all work together to make our fields thrive, to feed each other, to feed ourselves! The work will be hard. The Battle of Spokane has been won, but the wolf is still at the door! The United States will return, and the war is difficult, but always keep reminding yourself that someone has it worse than you.

  All of us have done so much through this challenging struggle, but more is expected of some. It is not enough to simply believe in our great new destiny. So far I have limited membership in the Brotherhood to a select group of men. I have done so to spare you as much as possible from the dangers that always loom over such a monumental struggle. But we must act now before it is too late. Beginning today, we are asking all interested men to join in our fight to protect our home. We are opening membership in our forces to all young men over the age of fourteen.

  The Brotherhood calls upon all of you to fight! If you were alone, what would you be in this world if your wages and your debt were the only things you considered to be your community? You owe this to everyone! I expect every decent Idahoan to join our cause, because the generation of today, right now, is the bearer of Idaho’s destiny! •—

  —• The Israeli military has faced the toughest fighting in its modern history, losing control of almost all of its northern territory, from the Golan Heights to the northern edge of the West Bank. Soviet and Chinese leaders promise full nuclear retaliation if Israel uses nuclear weapons in its present conflict. •—

  —• There are now an estimated four million refugees living in filthy camps across Pan America. These camps don’t have enough food, clean water, waste disposal, or security. In many camps you have starving people suffering from cholera, typhoid, and dysentery, while a growing number of criminal elements are luring desperate women and girls into sexual slavery. •—

  —• Joining us today in the WGN studios is Dr. Dennis Pierson, an expert in epidemics and immunization, who will talk to us about outbreaks of diseases that have long been under control in most of North America. Doctor, why have these diseases returned, and is making a deal with Atlantica our only solution?”

  “The reason for these new outbreaks is quite simple — and no, General Vogel isn’t our only hope. He’s nobody’s hope. Look, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta isn’t the only producer or supplier of vaccines and medicine. There are other places around the Pan American territory that have stockpiles or can produce pharmaceuticals. The problem is the United States built up its transportation and distribution systems organically, over the course of over two hundred years, and that system has now collapsed. The materials used to manufacture drugs and the facilities in which they were manufactured are now spread out across fourteen different countries, many of which are at war with one another. To make matters worse, the useful medications that remain — the antibiotics, the pain medications, even the immunization doses — mostly go to the military. If they do reach civilian hands, they are understandably hoarded by doctors who want to save them for the patients who need them the most. That just creates an enormous segment of the population that is largely unprotected.

  “The situation is a little better here in Liberum than in some of the other new countries. We’re witnessing major problems with disease in the Southern Alliance of America, Appalachia, and even in parts of what remains of the United States. But treating and preventing diseases is an area where, I think, if we don’t have more cooperation among the nations soon, we’re going to see devastating health consequences, possibly pandemics. Bacteria and viruses don’t care about politics, borders drawn on some map, or the war. More needs to be done to bolster our medical community before it’s too late. •—

  —• Groups of farmers are forced to take up arms and stand guard over their fields or herds as desperate people attempt to steal whatever they can to eat. In Dakota and other new countries, there is very little legal framework in place to prosecute crimes or enforce anti-theft measures, making the law of the gun increasingly the deciding factor in who gets to eat. •—

  Cold on my arm. JoBell looked down from above me, her hair hung down around her face. But her hair had changed color. Dark brown. And some gray. “JoBell?” Fire burned in my shoulder. I screamed out, “JoBell!”

  * * *

  Lights moved past me. Crying people. A weird shape blurred around next to me. I could kind of see she had arms. “Jovell.” Mouth wouldn�
�t work.

  “It’s Nicole.” A woman’s voice echoed. “You’ve been shot. Sleep.”

  “Dunwanna wake up.”

  * * *

  “Can we get him something for the pain?”

  “The morphine he’s been given already represents a good-sized portion of our entire supply. He’s stabilizing from the blood transfusion. He’s going to have to tough out the pain from here.”

  * * *

  “ … be pissed if he misses it.”

  “We can put off the funeral, but we can’t wait to bury her. The body … it’s not good. We have to bury her today.”

  * * *

  “… have been me.”

  “You don’t mean that.”

  “She was so much better than me. She was honest, and good, and a better friend to me than I ever was to her,” said Becca.

  A sharp ache began to throb in my thigh and shoulder. When I opened my eyes, I stared at log rafters above me. A few oil lanterns hanging up there cast a faint light and weird shadows down on wherever we were. I dragged my tongue over the sandpaper roof of my mouth. “Wa —” I tried to speak. “Water?”

  “He’s awake,” Becca said.

  My shoulder burned like hell as I turned my head to see her. She was propped up on pillows on a cot, wearing a puffy bandage around the right side of her chest and shoulder.

  Sweeney stepped up beside me. I must have been on a table. “How you feeling, buddy?”

  I closed my eyes and let out a breath. “I hurt like hell.”

  “Join the club.” Becca pointed to her chest. “I never had much up here, and now I’m gonna have a nasty scar for the rest of my life.” She looked down. “But maybe now isn’t the time for jokes.”

  “Cal wanted us to get him when Danny woke up.” Sweeney started for the door.

  “No, you stay,” Tim Macer said. “I’ll get him.”

  I looked over at Macer. His cheek, neck, and shoulder were bandaged. A few spots of blood showed through. That blood. And the sad look on his face. A memory flashed through my head. I was running. Shooting. And Tim carried her on his back. Her legs dangling limp behind him as he carried her. That was a dream. A jacked-up, terrible dream. I always had bad dreams.

  It was so quiet in the room. Why was it so quiet? Mr. Morgan had propped himself up on his elbows from where he’d been laying on his back on a cot. His right leg ended in a bandaged stump just below the knee. How had this happened? It was probably a dream. Maybe I was still dreaming.

  “S-Sweeney?” I couldn’t hold back the first shakes of a sob. “Whe-where’s … Where’s JoBell?” The guy blurred in my tears. When I wiped them away, I could see tears in his eyes too. “How’d I get here? Where’s …” Sweeney grabbed my good shoulder and leaned down over me. He was crying. My body tensed. I couldn’t breathe. He didn’t have to say anything. I knew. “Oh God. Eric. Oh please. I’m not …” I gasped in air. “I’m not supposed to … be … alive.”

  Careful of my bad shoulder, Sweeney hugged me. His sobs shook my chest. “No!” I screamed until I had no air. “No. No. No. Damn it, no. JoBell. Please, Jesus, no. Take me instead.” I could hear Becca sobbing from where she lay. “What the hell … w-was the poi-oint?” I gasped for air again. “What did we do all this for!?”

  Cal came in. “Brother, I’m so sorry.”

  “Hey!” A sharp voice cut in. Dr. Nicole pushed Cal and Sweeney away from me. “What did I tell you? Stay back.”

  “He just woke up,” Cal said.

  “Did you even wash your hands?” Dr. Nicole asked. “No. You want him to get an infection? You want to lose him too?”

  “You should have left me there to die,” I shouted at Cal. “There’s nothing left for me. Everything’s gone. E-everyone’s dead!”

  “We’re here, Danny.” Becca spoke through sobs. “You got us.”

  “With you all the way.” Cal was weeping too.

  But I didn’t want Cal. I didn’t want Eric Sweeney or Becca. I wanted my JoBell back. But she was gone. I’d gotten her killed. JoBell … I need you. I’d called to her, and she’d come running, and she was shot and died.

  “It should have been me,” I said. My leg and shoulder throbbed. Maybe it could still be me. I reached over to my left shoulder, grabbed my bandage, and yanked hard.

  “Damn it!” Dr. Nicole was by my side in a second. I pulled the bandage harder. Heard it rip. My fingers clawed over stitches. If I could get ’em out, I’d bleed. “I worked all night getting you fixed up,” Dr. Nicole said. “You’re not gonna — Sweeney, help me!” The two of them pulled my hands away.

  “No!” I shouted. “Leave me alone. Let me go! I don’t wanna …”

  “Danny, please,” Becca cried.

  Sweeney and Cal had hold of my arms. Dr. Nicole put me in some kind of headlock. Something cold and wet dabbed my neck. Then I felt a pinch. After a while, she let me go. My head slipped sideways. Floating. Falling off. My mind spun inside it.

  * * *

  Daylight filled the room. I tried to sit up, but my arms and legs were tied down. My head sloshed around when I moved, though, so I stayed down.

  I thought I could see a girl sitting next to me. For just a moment, with my blurred vision and the sunlight shining on her hair from behind her, I thought it was JoBell, like maybe she was still alive. Or maybe I’d died, and she was greeting me in Heaven. Then I remembered all the things I’d done and realized this couldn’t be Heaven. “Jackie?”

  “Yeah. It’s me. I’m here for you. We’re all here for you, Danny.” She spoke quietly. Like a river. Like when we spent the whole day on the river and we found that little beach. I remembered the sunlight sparkling on the water, in a million little flashes of light, and JoBell’s perfect body as she whipped her wet hair back and smiled at me.

  “Too much drugs,” I mumbled.

  * * *

  When I woke up, it was still daylight, but the light wasn’t shining in on me the way it had been before. Posters with equations and formulas told me I was in the math cabin. My arms and legs were still tied down. My shoulder and leg burned, feeling like they were stabbed from the inside. My headache throbbed. I tugged with my arm, tried to raise my leg. Nothing. Some kind of Boy Scout had tied me down good.

  Cal spoke from my left. “You tried to tear out your stitches.”

  “She’s really dead,” I said. Tears stung my eyes.

  “Danny, I …” Cal’s voice trailed off. I don’t know what he was going to say. It didn’t matter. There were no words to make it right. No kind of comfort to push back the pain, to stop the movie clip of her death from endlessly playing on loop in my head.

  “Who else?” I asked.

  “What?”

  “Did we lose anyone else?” I asked.

  “Maybe we should talk about this when you’re feeling better,” Cal said.

  “She’s dead, Cal! I’m never gonna feel better. Did we lose anyone else? How did I get here? What the hell is going on?”

  “Everybody else in Pale Horse made it.” He looked down.

  “What happened to Tim Macer?” I asked.

  Another voice came from my right. “One of those bastards cut me pretty bad. But I’m okay.”

  I turned my head the other way to see Macer sitting in a chair, holding a ragged old magazine. The kid looked a lot different than that day before the Battle of Boise when I gave him a ride in the Beast. “You got her out of there,” I said. “Thanks. I was … kind of out of my mind.”

  Tim made a little bow. I think it hurt him to nod. “I know it won’t fix anything, but I grabbed her rifle too.”

  “In assault three, Clay Ratcliff took a head shot. Chase Draper —”

  “Oh no,” I said.

  “Chase went out like some kind of action hero. There was this woman, a prisoner, you know? She was hurt, trying to get away, couldn’t run. Chase ran out there, picked her up in a fireman’s carry, and ran like hell back for the bus. They say he took four bullets, but he got her to safety. He d
idn’t make it long after that.” Cal stood up and started pacing. “Mr. Morgan lost the lower part of his right leg.”

  “Damn. That sucks,” I said. “Anyone else?”

  “Mr. Grenke was shot three times in the back while he was getting Mr. Morgan to safety.” Cal paused for a moment. “Skylar Grenke was way out in the open, trying to help a prisoner or just returning fire. I don’t know.”

  “Damn. Skylar too.” The Grenkes would be out of their minds with grief.

  “No,” Cal said sadly.

  “What?”

  “Crocker pushed him out of the way. He was hit twice. They say he just screamed and ran at the enemy, shooting five or six of them before they finally took him down.”

  “Sergeant Crocker,” I whispered. If Major Leonard had somehow survived his injuries from the US drone attack in Washington, and if Specialist Sparrow was alive somewhere, that would mean only four of us were still alive out of my whole National Guard company. “Crocker was always such a dork. A sci-fi nerd screwup at drill.”

  “War changes people,” said Tim Macer.

  I nodded. “Sergeant Crocker was one of the best.” My nose itched and I tried to scratch it, forgetting I was tied down. The ropes bit into my wrists. “How many prisoners did we get out of there?”

  They told me that our team had completed the mission. We’d taken out every Brotherhood guy at the camp. We’d even stolen some useful stuff like ammo, food, fuel, their radio equipment, and some generators.

  They told me the stories of some of the people who were now living with us too. A man who’d been on a chain gang for over six months had been reunited with his wife, who’d been locked in that warehouse. The woman who’d bit through that scumbag’s throat had managed to protect her daughter the whole time they were prisoners. A couple white guys who’d been yanked from their apartment in the middle of the night after they’d complained about how the Brotherhood distributed supplies unequally couldn’t stop thanking us for their freedom. I guess the woman who had pulled that Brotherhood guy off me to smash his head in with a rock had come to check on me a bunch of times. The former prisoners said that a lot of other people had fought so hard against even coming to the slave camp that the Brotherhood had killed them in the streets. Everybody had made sure to remember them and the prisoners who had died fighting to help set the others free.