by A. S. Hames
“It’s good to know where we are,” he says. “It could prove useful if we ever do decide to escape.”
I nod. I’m not sure why, because my senses feel out of step.
“Dub, your escape idea?”
“There’s no point, Jay. We wouldn’t get far. I was just thinking it through. I will escape soon though.”
It’s not long before we cross a narrow lane and head across another scrubby expanse. Does Von actually need this much exercise? Because frankly, I don’t.
And then it hits me.
“Dub? Are we escaping?”
“What?”
I stop dead still.
“We are, aren’t we. We’re actually escaping right now.”
“Well, what did you think we were doing? Going for a romantic stroll?”
I’m confused and scared. “I don’t want to escape. We’ll be shot.”
“We’ll be shot if we stay – by the enemy when we reach the Front. Now come on.”
He sets off with Von, who’s happy to go with him, but he stops when he sees I haven’t moved.
“Come on, Jay.”
“I don’t want to die any more than you do, but at least we have a chance on the Front.”
“How can you know that? You got friends in high places? Someone who’s going to protect you?”
“I’m just saying the Front doesn’t mean certain death for everyone.”
“You’re wrong, and I don’t see why we should die in a stupid war.”
“It’s not a stupid war, Dub.”
“No? Then why’s it being fought by stupid kids like you and me? You won’t find any real leaders anywhere near any action.”
“I’m not going, Dub. I have to do my duty. Like my brother.”
“Ha!”
“What do you mean, Ha! Ax gave up getting married to volunteer at a time when we weren’t being asked.”
“You are so dumb. You know nothing about your brother.”
“What do you mean?”
“Never mind. If I ever went back home again, you’d be a teacher and I’d be a farmhand working for next to nothing – ready to be ditched when I’m not needed.”
“What did you mean about Ax?”
“Forget it.” He comes back and hands me Von’s leash. “Don’t tell anyone I’ve gone.”
“Lie to the colonel, you mean?”
“Yes, lie.”
“I can’t.”
“Crap,” Dub says. There are two guards with guns up ahead. They look like regulars.
“We must have reached the edge of the next camp, Dub.”
“Hey you!” one of the regulars calls. “Where do you think you’re going?”
I wave. “It’s alright. It’s Jay-Ruth Two-Five and Dub-Gray Six-Seven. We’re taking Von, Hero of the Nation, for a walk.”
“You’ve walked far enough. Take him back.”
“Yes, we will,” I say.
As we turn and make our way back, Dub huffs.
“So much for me being lucky.”
“They didn’t shoot us, Dub. That’s lucky.”
“If we’d moved faster…”
“If you’d told me what was happening, I wouldn’t have come at all.”
“Dumb and useless. You’ll be dead before you know it and I’ll be dead alongside you. That makes me even dumber than you.”
Although there’s plenty of anger in him, he goes quiet. I don’t think we’re friends anymore, not that we ever were.
Just short of the tents, I’m happy for Dub to go on alone.
“I thought I might have a practice with Von,” I tell him.
“Doing what?”
“Sitting, fetching, that sort of thing. It might help us on the Front.”
I take out a cookie. Von licks his lips and sits perfectly without me asking.
Dub scoffs. “Wow, the war’s as good as won.”
Sometimes, I wish I could control Dub with a cookie. Then I wonder what he meant about me knowing nothing about my brother.
Back in the tent after dark, I lay awake trying not to listen to boys fidgeting in their sleeping bags. Just a few days ago, I was showing off to Ma how well I could teach multiplication. Now I’m in a tent many miles away, while she either hides in the forest over the river or…
“Hey, officer?” It’s Tallboy. I sense a prank so I don’t answer. “Hey, clever girl, take your hand out of your panties and listen.”
I find this southsider disgusting. It’s clear to me that the world would be a better place if he were shot through the head early on in our first battle.
“What did you think of the latest whisper?” he says.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“The whisper that we have no more guns. Only, I heard yours has one bullet and it’ll blow up if you fire it.”
“It’s a temporary weapon,” I point out. “It’ll be replaced with a working rifle soon enough.”
“You don’t believe it then?”
“I never listen to whispers. They’re a poisoned river.”
“Oh, not more book-quoting. Yawn, yawn, bloody yawn.”
I find this kind of thing absolutely unacceptable. These southsiders would very likely think nothing of questioning the Leader’s integrity. Okay, so Ma called him a liar and I protected her, but that’s different.
Isn’t it?
Anyway, I’d bet a meat and potato pat these southsiders’ parents call the Leader bad names every day. In fact, I decide to find out. Of course, it requires cunning to broach such a subject.
“I never thought I’d fight for the Nation,” I say. “I never thought I’d get the chance.”
There’s a silence which I can use to press my investigation further.
“Are you proud to serve the Nation?” I ask. I’m looking across at the surly southsiders, willing them to say no.
“What’s it to you?” Tallboy says.
“I’m sure we all know people who mutter bad things about the Leader.”
“What kind of bad things?” Smallboy says.
“We’ve all heard them,” I say. “How about you tell me what you’ve heard and I’ll tell you what I’ve heard.”
“How about you shut up?” Bone Boy says.
“I’ve heard stuff,” Dub says. “I’ve heard there are people living in the forest over the river. Deserters. You heard that, Jay?”
“No.”
I hate telling lies.
“I have,” Taff says. “I haven’t seen any though.”
I need to change the subject.
“Anyone know Mr Nine-Zero? Anyone had him come poking his nose in their affairs?”
“Me,” Taff says, which surprises me. “Pa reckons he bribed a town official to get a stake in our cinderblock business.”
I’m curious. “How did he get a stake, Taff? Did he have figures on paper?”
“Yeah – not that we’ve ever seen them. He just said he could increase production by thirty per cent, which is impossible.”
My heart sinks.
“That first year he was involved,” Taff says, “Pa found Mr Nine-Zero trading blocks on the side, with Pa picking up the cost of making them. By the time we’d sent the required number to the regional store, there were hardly any left to sell. You remember how skinny I was last year?”
I do. “Why didn’t you report him?”
Taff snorts. “He knows the Leader.”
Dub snorts too. “You’re a soldier. If you ever get back – kill him. It’s the only way.”
Is Dub serious? It’s hard to tell.
“What are you looking at?” he says. “You gonna quote the Leader at me?”
I remind myself to never tell Dub I have a certificate for coming top of my year in reciting the Leader’s quotes.
“So what’s the bad thing you heard?” Tallboy asks.
“That the Leader is a liar,” I say. “What have you heard then?”
“Who said it?” Dub asks.
I wince. I c
an’t go into that. Not here.
“I’m more interested in what the southsiders have heard, Dub.”
“Is that so?” Bone Boy says. “Either you tell us who called Our Blessed Leader a liar or I’m gonna report you for protecting an Enemy of the Nation.”
I gulp. This could turn bad. “I’ve already reported it,” I say. “To the Town Guardian just before the Representative came.”
“Really?” Dub says. He seems shocked. “You actually reported someone?”
“You’re a liar,” Tallboy says. “If a soldier informs on an Enemy of the Nation, they don’t get money, they get a commendation ribbon. So why wasn’t there any say-so about it?”
“Well, the Town Guardian must have thought… well… he probably decided to take no action.” I know this sounds completely unbelievable.
“We’ll go see Colonel Five-Five in the morning,” Tallboy says. “I’ll tell him you’re protecting an Enemy of the Nation and you can tell him your cruddy little pile of lame excuses, you stupid, crawling liar.”
My heart is racing. I feel faint.
“For a soldier, it’s instant execution,” Smallboy says.
“That’s right,” Bone Boy says. “They take you out the back and shoot you through the head.”
I don’t know what to do. Panic takes me. Sickness takes me. What have I done? WHAT HAVE I DONE!
10. How To Survive in Battle
BEN
I sink into my sleeping bag with an urge to have Jay squeeze in alongside me. I wish the desire would go away and haunt someone else. I like her manner. I know she’s strong. They say that’s the mark of a man, that he knows plenty about women. I think about me and Jay married with three children. We’re messing around by a stream. The sun is shining…
I’m glad I’m tired. I’ll be able to get straight off to sleep instead of imagining us trying to create another child. I hope Jay is at peace too. And Kim. I wonder how she’s feeling right now.
JAY
I sink into my sleeping bag, wishing it would swallow me up. I try to think what to tell the colonel in the morning. I need to get out of this mess.
Everything used to be simple. Schoolwork. Farm work. Now my head is churning. It’s a suicide mission. Mr Nine-Zero. The Town Guardian. Ma in the forest. Ax somewhere awaiting rescue. A woman scuttling down Main Street with my secret in her head. Her purse! With blood money in it! The lane where the town ends and the fields begin. Mrs Nine-Three’s long brown cardigan. Von and me on the Front. Dub escaping. Essie shooting a prisoner. Ma!
No!
I must get back to the here and now!
Okay.
Okay.
Okay. So Tallboy’s going to take me to the colonel. What if I say that I reported the Enemy of the Nation to the Town Guardian who ordered an execution? The colonel might want to radiophone the TG to confirm it and would ask me for details of the EN and their crime. I’d have to reveal, in front of Tallboy, that it was Ma who called the Leader a liar and that I didn’t know what to do so I told Dub’s grandpa and he never reported it, but a nosy woman did.
That would land Dub’s grandpa in big trouble.
Okay, so if I don’t want Dub to stab me, I could leave his grandpa out of it. Only I’d have to say I told the nosy woman direct. But what if they asked her? What if she said I was telling Dub’s grandpa and neither of us was going to report it?
I’ve lost my place in thinking it through.
Okay, so what if I told the colonel I ratted on Ma? No, because a quick check would throw up the question of why the TG paid reward money to a nosy woman for the information. And wouldn’t Dub and the southsiders give me an impossible time for having my own mother executed, assuming I was allowed back to the tent and not executed or jailed myself for being a liar or assisting Ma in avoiding execution.
Right, so what if I insisted that any southsiders be removed before I revealed the horrible truth to the colonel? He might say no. Then what?
I’m so consumed by all these terrible possibilities that I… I almost miss the fact that the southsiders are laughing.
“You are so gullible,” Bone Boy says, barely able to wheeze the words out, such is the grip of his cackling.
I have a lump in my throat and a headache. I hate them so much I could almost risk firing my rifle at one of them. They are such… such… argh! Please let this day end.
An hour passes and I’m on my back staring at the full moon shining through the thin canvas. Despite my decision to focus on the here and now, I’m thinking of Ma in the woods. Perhaps she’ll be spending one final night there before heading north. There are far-flung settlements up there based on unlicensed hunting and fishing. There are also armed outsiders – redcoats – but it’s a danger that ensures you’re beyond the reach of the Nation.
But those redcoat men. Would they see her as I do, as a mother? Or would it be like in the film?
I block the thought and turn over. The tent is cold and draughty. It’s not like my bed at home, warm and secure. But I’m surprised to see Essie in my room, with a gun, pointing at me. He shoots! My elbow! I try to run.
“What’s the matter with you?” Dub hisses. “Go to sleep!”
It’s my sleeping bag I’m struggling with. Essie seemed so real.
I turn over again. God, I hate sharing a tent.
Morning comes too soon for the others, but I’m up and out of the tent early, taking Von to do his business. It’s good to get away from them – Taff excepted. Taff is alright. Okay, so he’s not someone you would rely on in a life or death situation, but he’s damned good at tent-sharing.
Von doesn’t hang around. He’s done what he needs to do and now he’s off sniffing after whatever came this way during the night. A fox? A rabbit? A squirrel?
After a longer than anticipated walk, we just about avoid being late for breakfast. For me, it’s potato and lentil broth, a slice of bread, a few berries, and cookies, which I save for later. Von has more pink meat and plain oat rusk, which he gets through in ten seconds.
As we’re leaving the mess tent, the southsiders stroll up, having finally bothered to get out of their sleeping bags.
“Eat fast or not at all,” a sergeant tells them.
This amuses me, although I draw the line at laughing.
“Alright, wolf-handler, move away, thank you.” The boy telling me this is a very short Pinedale volunteer who looks no older than eleven.
My puzzled expression must register with him.
“Uneducated kids who demonstrate leadership qualities can get promoted,” he says.
Surely that doesn’t apply to babies giving orders to leading troopers like me.
“Come along,” he says. “Keep moving. The parade ground is that way. Don’t stop, thank you, come along, and do keep that wolf in order.”
I find I’m doing as he says, which annoys me. Except there’s a beefy drill sergeant up ahead waving us on, so now I can’t break stride and it looks for all the world that this tiny, ridiculous young fellow from Pinedale is in charge of me.
BEN
The Forbearance-Pinedale group has gathered at the parade area, standing to attention in drizzly rain in front of Colonel Five-Five, Lieutenant Three-Two, and four sergeants. From what I’ve seen, some of us have single shot rifles, some have mid-size double-bore assault guns, and some have six-shot handguns. About one in every eight of us is unarmed, which makes me wonder if the army is having a problem with weapons.
I’ve got myself in the rank behind Jay and Von, and I can see the wolf is keen to explore.
“Sit,” she tells him. “Sit.”
It’s only when she bribes him with half a cookie that he follows her orders – and that brightens my mood.
“Right,” Colonel Five-Five says. “Stand easy and caps off. We don’t wear them in battle.”
I remove my cap and tuck it in my left side pocket.
“Troopers, let me welcome you to your temporary home. I trust you rested well last night because tod
ay will be busy. As you know, we’re up against a disorganized but nonetheless dangerous enemy. The Northern Division of our army is fighting on the Northern Front, while the Southern Division is fighting on the South-Eastern Front. That leaves the Central Division, of which you are now a part, to fight on the Eastern Front.”
It surprises me that we volunteers from the north of the Nation should be providing numbers for the central division. Why don’t the central lands provide their own soldiers? That said, I’m fascinated by this setting out of the arena of war.
“Unfortunately, the Eastern Front has moved into our territory and it is our job to push it back. With your help, we are confident of achieving that objective. It could well be we push the enemy so far back that we overrun him and defeat him in a final battle that will coincide with similar pushes on the Northern and South-Eastern Fronts. In short, the Nation’s total victory.”
The sergeants lead us into a big cheer and plenty of applause. I go along with it but, even to a new boy like me, that kind of total victory seems an unlikely outcome. It’s far more likely we’ll all be killed.
The brutal, permanently irritated Sergeant Seven-Nine steps forward and raises a hand to silence us. “This morning, we undertake a hunt and kill exercise. The objective is to hunt down the enemy and shoot him dead.”
While I’m trying to work out how that might happen, Jay raises her hand – which is dumb, because Sergeant Seven-Nine narrows his mean eyes and draws his baton. I gulp on her behalf and hope Von growls at him, but he doesn’t.
“Sergeant, my gun is faulty,” Jay says. “I won’t be able to kill anyone.”
She lowers her hand and I hope she’s not in trouble. Thankfully, Colonel Five-Five waves the sergeant back.
“Faulty weapons will be replaced,” he says.
Sergeant Seven-Nine returns his attention to the assembly.
“Although we have millions of blank bullets for this type of practice, experience tells us it is character-building for new volunteers to make the noise of gunfire themselves. You will be limited to six shots. Make them count.”
The sergeant points his baton at a Forbearance boy called Essie, a Pinedale boy called Tai, then at Jay, and me.
