by Ian Daniels
“I don’t get it,” Danielle voiced.
"Yeah man, we were in a damn war zone, I think I can manage," Blake said defensively.
“It's different here. You guys were part of an infrastructure,” Clint attempted to fill in the blanks. I could see that Blake didn’t want to listen to his explanation so I jumped in.
“Remember how you told me about riding out on that Blackhawk to recover a stuck rig on your first tour?” I knew he remembered it because he had told me how that was one of a handful of times when he was truly scarred for his life and felt completely on his own while over there.
“Yeah…” he invited me to continue, waiting for the pieces to fill in on what Clint and I were driving at.
“Well you had maintenance crews and pilots to get you there, security to watch out for you, supply to keep you going, and a cafeteria to come back to when you were tired and hungry… all that is on you now. I know I know, you’ve done this before,” I said holding up my hands to cut off the predictable objection. “It’s not like this is something new, it’s just different then what you’re used to.”
“I’ve been out hunting a few times on leave; I’m not totally out of it.”
“I know, but it’s not hunting, it’s combat hunting. It’s understated and discrete and a thinking game. We are all on our own and have to execute like it."
"What do you mean?" Danielle asked again, still trying to bridge the gap between theories.
“Well for the most part you guys saw the shock and awe thing; rolling noisily down Main Street to intimidate the yokels. You get spotted by a sniper and you have a platoon and medics available, and worst case, you just blowup the building he's in with an air strike."
"Well obviously we don’t have all that here," Blake rolled his eyes, still resistant to accept the differences.
"Just figure it this way, the military has moved into what I think the current buzzword is Full Spectrum Operations. Meaning that every unit has to be able to do everything from peace keeping to counterinsurgency to high intensity operations... even though they won't be able to give you the time or resources to learn to do any of them particularly well. Right?"
"Well that’s not quite right, or at least I disagree a little, but keep going I guess," Danielle objected.
"Specialized troops aside, the ground troops whose job it is to fight, are supposed to now do house clearing, then get thrown into negotiation, relations, call in strikes... all while having their own MOS to specialize in. Everyone has so much happening on top of the fear of screwing up and bringing down the chain of command or lawsuits, all that hampers a lot of aggressive action.
"So all you're saying is, we have to do all that, but better?" Danielle asked
"The point is, it's just us four here," I interrupted, beginning to tire of the conversation. "It's easier for us to do it better, but you have to think like it. You better know why you're doing what you're doing, because it's just us here. You are all you've got.”
"Hey, no chain of command sounds good to me, no accountability except to ourselves, I can live with that," Blake proclaimed happily.
"Good enough," I sighed. "You remember how to recon then?"
"Yeah, I follow your lead and try not to get bored."
He was just filling me with joy and confidence.
"Okay, we’re going to go do a big circle and be back here by nightfall." I was ready to get going.
Blake and I loaded our backpacks and I got out a nice scoped AR15 that I had pieced together for competition a few years ago to loan to Blake so that he would be properly armed. I had chosen for myself to go with a heavier hitting gun and caliber, dusting off the M1 Garand from its place in the back of my gun safe.
"Wait, what about the truck?" Blake asked quickly before we set out. "Should we go try to see if we can figure out where they took it?"
"It's still where we left it." Clint stated from his now normal spot at the radio desk.
"Why? Because of the flat tire?" Blake obviously thought the notion was too ridiculous to put any value into it.
Clint noisily jingled the keys in the air in response.
"Alright, but it's not that new, they could have hotwired it."
"Sure, but even then they wouldn’t get too far. I wired in a switch under the dash that cuts power to the fuel pump and hit it when we jumped out. Unless you know its there, you'd have a hell of a time finding it," Clint explained.
Passive as well as active car alarms had become standard fare for us over the last few years. Along with a few simple deterrents, like a pit bull in the front seat, it would ensure your car and all its parts stayed relatively intact if you had the need to park anywhere for any length of time.
An hour later, Blake and I were out on our makeshift patrol. Everything was going relatively well, all things considered. There was some sporadic traffic on the main back road that we paralleled for a while. We spied a few families going on with their normal lives at their houses, kids playing in the backyard and the like. One couple looked to be packing up their car and a little tow behind trailer. Another family hoping not to lose all hope... after having lost hope. I smirked at my truthful and sad little joke.
Without really thinking about why, I marked on the map I was carrying which houses still had people living in them. I had known about the few empty ones already as people had slowly abandoned their homes, unable to sell them even at a loss in the fallen market, electing instead to take the loss and move in with other members of their families. For the last few years it was more and more common to hear of multiple families living in one home, but to see it happening virtually in our own backyard made it very real, especially for me who now had less of a family to speak of.
We had been out hiking around, looking over things for over five hours now, our route taking us in a circular path that would eventually lead us back to Clint's truck. Blake groaned some, but for the most part we had stayed quiet and undetected. We took enough breaks to not get worn out and we ate enough food to keep our energy and concentration up. The weather was cool and gray, and it thankfully hadn’t rained on us yet. Yep, everything was all going well right up until those two chicks tried to shank me.
After sitting over an intersection of two roads for a time, we were on our way back and only about two quick miles away from where Clint's truck was waiting for us on the same gently winding, desolate stretch of road. We were maybe tired, and hadn’t seen anything all that threatening all day, so maybe our awareness was a little lax from what it should have been, even so, as Clint had taught us both as kids a long time ago, “You always hunt your way back to camp.”
As usual, we were walking off to the side of the road. It was easy to move quietly over the ground, damp from the fall frosts. Because of this, the forest was basically dead quiet, so the sound of a car door slamming shut on the otherwise quiet road was all too easy to make out. Both Blake and I stopped in our tracks, trying to get a bearing on the sound and the accompanying voices. They were female, just far enough away that we couldn’t pick out specific words. With a look and a shrug, Blake and I continued forward slowly until we could get a better read on the situation.
“I’m telling you, no one is coming.”
We finally were close enough to hear and see the conversation between the two young women. They were maybe in their late teens or early twenties, and what I would call “inappropriately” dressed for the weather.
“There’re a couple hours before it gets dark, someone might still come by,” the other one countered.
“This isn’t going to work, let’s just go home,” the first girl complained again.
“If we… wait, did you see that? Something moved over there.”
In the late rays of sun that were cutting through the clouds, one of the girls had managed to see Blake as he continued to move around, ultimately casting a shadow out onto the road. He realized it at the same time that I did, and in his effort to shrink down and hide, his foot fell out from under him onto
a stick that broke with a muted crack.
“Somebody’s up there…” I heard one of the feminine voices clue in on us.
Crap.
I gave Blake a quick “What the hell?” look, and stepped plainly out onto the road, headed in their direction. We were found out and had only two options, run, or see just what was going on.
“Stay out of sight and cover me,” I covertly spoke into the little radio microphone clipped to my jacket.
“Car trouble?” I waved, trying to look and sound as friendly as possible, walking nonchalantly over the short stretch of road.
“Yes, can you help us please?” one of the girls purred.
“Maybe, I’m not much good with mechanics,” I half lied. Honestly no matter what was wrong with their car, I knew there would be very little I could do to fix it out here. Also though, something just didn’t seem right.
“Not exactly dressed right for the weather are you?” I stated and they giggled.
They both had on tight fitting jean pants that rode low on their hips. The taller of the two wore a faded crème colored tank-top under a light zip up sweatshirt, although it was currently unzipped and pulled back. The bottom of her tank top stopped before her jeans started, allowing a ribbon of white skin to be shown off. The other girl had on a mostly unbuttoned flannel shirt that was loosing the fight of trying to contain a generous amount of exposed cleavage. The tight fitting clothes combined with the weather gave a few obvious visual indicators that they had been out in the cold for a while now, if you know what I mean.
Along with their dress, their makeup and hair was done just a little too much and without gloves on, I could see their fingernails were painted and well manicured. They were decent enough looking young women, not exactly the cheerleader type, probably more likely to have hung out with the emo or punk crowd.
“You don’t happen to have any food do you?” the one with the cleavage filled flannel asked, raising her voice an extra octave.
The scene was simple enough. Two naive young women stranded on a semi rural road...so what was it that was out of place? I thought I was probably just imaging things until I walked past the windows of the car and glanced inside. As I went toward the open hood, I quickly caught sight of jackets, hats, gloves, and a few bags stuffed in and around the seats. What I really noticed was the bags had been packed to leave room enough for a driver and three passengers.
“Sorry, I’ve been out hunting all day and haven’t seen a thing,” I said as I casually un-slung the Garand from my shoulder, letting it point downward and rest non-threateningly in both hands.
“Well there’s definitely a problem here…” I said without really looking under the car hood and scanning more past the two girls at the surrounding area, and keying my radio microphone at the same time.
“You’re telling me,” a slightly high pitched male voice came from the far side of the road.
“Two guys at your ten o’clock, twenty yards, armed with… oh you’re going to love this… a sword and a crossbow,” Blake’s hushed voice said into my ear.
Sure enough, from the bushes covering a drainage ditch on the far side of the road, two figures were emerging. I backed up a step in time to see one of them slightly struggling with a branch that was holding him back from making his smooth entrance.
They were a threat and I did turn to meet them head on, but I hadn’t yet raised my gun. In reality, I was very guilty of downplaying the danger that these two could be to me, even with their retro sci-fi type weapons. It helped knowing that Blake had them squarely in his scope too.
The skinny guy with long hair, complete with a brown cape and hood, had a cheap mail-order crossbow on his shoulder. His partner, the overweight nerd sporting some very stylish glasses and what was probably an overgrown bowl cut, was blocking a clear shot at me as he walked in front of his skinny companion.
“Look guys, I don’t want any trouble,” I said as a fact when they seemed to be looking more for a scared plea. As soon as I had seen them, I was able to put all the pieces together and figured out the situation right away. They were probably the picked on outsiders and nerds at school, and now they were looking to be the bullies themselves. The problem was, they didn’t know how to be.
My confidence and lack of fear seemed to throw them off. The fat kid’s face flushed angrily and he started yelling.
“Drop everything you have! Lay that gun down and hand that pack over or we’ll kill you!” he threatened.
“Guys I’m telling you, this is not a good idea,” I implored sternly.
“Shut up!” he screamed at me, still reading right out of the comic book playbook of How to Control a Hostage.
“I’m just saying this is not going to work out well for anybody,” I again calmly tried to resolve the situation. This was stupid, pointless and I knew it could quickly get out of hand.
“Yeah and why not?” the taller girl interjected arrogantly. The tension was starting to boil up, but I didn’t feel like we were on the knife edge just yet, so I kept going, easily keeping my composure.
“Because believe me, I am the last guy you want to try this with,” I said cold and quietly. “You all need to understand that this is not a game, and I am not playing. You keep this up, and someone is going to die. Your best bet is to drop this right now and go home.”
I knew they wouldn’t. Even dorks have pride that can overcome their good senses.
“I said drop your shit right now!” the fat kid yelled again and took another step in my direction. Just a little closer and I would be in range of his dumb, but still deadly, fantasy sword. Of course that would put him in range of me, and if they kept this up, I would turn a lot more violent than a cheap thin piece of metal and the nerd holding it could ever imagine, but I still didn’t want that to happen.
“You know what being dead is? It’s not just dark or quiet or black, it is not existing. Think about that for a second, you will stop being,” I tried getting through to them again.
“Only one that’s going to die here is you if you keep talkin’,” The fat kid said in his worked up state. Over his shoulder I could see his skinny friend was having doubts. His eyes were darting from side to side and he looked pale. Well, pale for a basement dweller anyway.
“Let’s just do this and get out of here!” one of the girls said from off to the side.
“Kid is cutting the angle, get some space so I can keep a clear lane,” Blake spoke to me through the radio.
“Look, let’s everybody calm down,” I backed up slowly, staying painfully careful to make no sudden movements with my hands that were still holding the heavy rifle. I really didn’t think these kids fully knew how bad this was, and I was still hoping to talk my way through it. There was no way I wanted to hurt them over something as dumb as this was shaping up to be.
"I'm not kidding man, drop your shit or we'll drop you!" the fat kid said and glanced over his shoulder to the one with the crossbow who followed him up with a squeaky "Yeah!"
“Good…” Blake coached my movements. “Now how much more of this shit are you going to listen to?”
He was right; it was time to find a way to get out of here.
“So who's the brains here? Who came up with this genius plan?” I looked at each one of them quickly. “And what next? Keep robbing people who have nothing more than you do until… what? Is this going to get you somewhere in life where you can be retarded kings and slutty queens and not have to worry about the jokes and ridicule ever again?”
I wasn’t ever exactly a bully, but I did know how to aggravate people, and even when I was younger, guys like this I could piss off in my sleep.
“Is this going how you thought it would?" I pushed them. "Is your Lord of the Rings wet dream coming true? Who the hell do you think you are doing this, huh?”
Aggravating a group of people intent on robbing me was strangely ironic as I insulted their intelligence.
“I’m Robin Hood bitch!” the fat kid exclaimed.
&n
bsp; “Would everyone just shut up!” the chick with the big rack yelled again.
“I don’t care if you are Robin Hood’s bitch…” I purposely mis-stated, ignoring the girl.
“Look we’re…”
“Quit pissing them off for a second. I’m moving closer,” Blake’s voice in my ear interrupted my thoughts.
“And you two are supposed to be what, the distractions?" I continued on. "Reel them in and then let the boys take over? Bet you think you're real good at getting guys to do what you want them to."
“It worked on you didn’t it” The less chesty girl sounded insulted.
“Eh, you’re not even one of the good looking emo girls, just one of the poor frumpy ones that can’t hang out with the cool rejects.”
“Hey!” the rail of a semi pubescent youth with a crossbow came to her defense.
“Oh don’t tell me you’re hitting that. Naw, you're probably just her brother or gay friend... or at least that’s all you’ll ever be to her.”
I was hitting raw nerves now, just waiting for one of them to initiate a fistfight so I could put them on the ground without permanently hurting any of them.
“In place, twenty yards and up at your three o’clock,” Blake came back over the radio again.
Turning to the skinny little wannabe archer, I took a huge gamble. “Do you even know how to shoot that thing? I mean, can you hit anything with it?”
“Of course I can!” he exclaimed, pulling the trigger and placing a miniature arrow into a six inch thick tree a few feet off the road.
I couldn’t believe he actually fired his one shot at a freaking tree and not right into me, but he was smart enough to be reloading already and I knew time had just about run out.
“You guys want to see a magic trick?” I asked the little group, changing gears from out of nowhere.
“SHUT UP!” the fat kid screamed at me.
“Blake,” I said out loud and immediately a window of the car poked and splintered with the impact of a high speed bullet traveling through it. The sound made all four of them jump. I had been hoping to scare them into submission; instead it had the reverse effect and escalated things out of my control. That was just my luck.
