PART FOUR
A twig from the dried brush snapped loudly in the still, late hour. Gabriel Audaz opened his eyes in a startled instant. He didn’t breathe. That was probably for the best. The first breath he had taken had been more painful than he was ready for. A sharp, stinging ache clawed at his lungs and chest, making his breathing shallow and staggered.
A silver coil of rancid smoke from a thin cigarette snaked its way through the desert air near Gabriel. He tried to ignore it to not stare at the smoldering butt of paper and foul tobacco held between the dry lips of a man Gabriel could barely discern in the late night darkness. The battle in the air had ceased some time ago. The curtains and trails of smoke had faded to nearly transparent traces, leaving the twinkling stars in the freezing, pre-dawn sky.
Gabriel’s ears burned in the awful silence of the war weary landscape. Even the dying fires in the distance seemed to exist without any kind of noise. There was only the sound of the strange man breathing as he walked slowly through the dry brush. Gabriel’s heart pounded with a racing drumbeat in his chest. The man’s slow march was leading him away one gradual step at a time. He was scanning the dark around him, leery of any movement.
Where are the others, Gabriel thought, struggling not to panic. He didn’t want to tremble or flinch any more than he wanted to feel the reeling ache in his chest and side. Why is there no gun fire? Am I the only one left? Gabriel inhaled as slowly and gently as he could manage. The smell of the man’s cigarette was finally fading.
Wait, Gabriel thought as he quietly exhaled, wincing in the pain of what he was certain were broken ribs. He remembered the soldier from the sky. Suddenly, Gabriel realized he couldn’t completely feel the ground. His head, neck, and the top of his back were in the dirt. Cold sand had turned to matted mud in the sweat-damp hair extending past the rim of his helmet and down to his neck. The rest of Gabriel’s body was splayed across the unmoving torso and legs of someone else-the paratrooper who had fallen into Gabriel’s parachute.
Gabriel managed to move his hand, just slightly, before he froze once more. A near-silent gasp escaped his lips. A spray of dust brushed against his face. More twigs snapped in the dark. The loud movement was much closer than before. Gabriel’s heart beat was fast it was more like the vibrations of a jack hammer than a rhythmic pulse in his body. He thought at first the man from before had quickly circled back around. The figure that appeared out of the dense, cold night didn’t quite look the same. Gabriel could barely see him and he wasn’t about to strain himself to gain a better look. The stench of sweat unwashed for weeks or longer reached out like a malicious entity from the heavily garbed man. Gabriel could still hear the frozen plants breaking under the man’s feet. His gait was uneven, one leg limping behind the other.
The man stopped a step away from the spot where Gabriel was laying as still as the paratrooper half underneath him. Gabriel kept his eyes away from the hints of firelight stretching through the night from unknown places. He tried to hold his breath, inhaling and exhaling quickly when he thought the man had turned away. Over the raging stampede of his frightened heart, Gabriel thought he could hear the man mumbling. He felt the man brush against his boots as he took a few cautious steps into Gabriel’s field of view. With his eyes almost completely closed, Gabriel still saw the man’s lips moving hurriedly. They were barely visible within the wiry, greasy nest of facial hair twice as long as the hair on Gabriel’s head.
Is he praying or simply talking to himself? Gabriel couldn’t tell. He wasn’t sure if it mattered. Is he an enemy soldier or just some wandering tribesman? In the fleeting glimpses Gabriel managed, he could see no rifle or pistol in view on the man. His thick robe of hastily and inexpertly sewn fuzzy, matted patches or dirty, sweat-stiffened tunic showed no evidence of any kind of hidden firearm. So is this man checking closely for signs of life or is he looking for someone or something specific? Gabriel couldn’t answer these questions. All he could do was lay there, atop the corpse of his fellow soldier he wasn’t sure he even knew. All Gabriel could do was pray he would survive.
Still mumbling in a language far from English, the wandering stranger crouched down near Gabriel’s feet. He was out of Gabriel’s limited range of vision. Gabriel would have to move in order to see him. Moment’s later, Gabriel realized he didn’t have to move to know what was happening.
A calloused hand of thick, red fingers slapped against Gabriel’s left foot. It was a probing glance of skin against boot. Gabriel tried not to flinch. He felt his toes curl which made his heart leap into his throat. The man’s slurred mumbling continued unabated, Gabriel’s lack of lifelessness still apparently unnoticed. Gabriel wanted to swallow. He needed to swallow. His throat was on fire. Saliva was pooling in his mouth. He didn’t dare risk the movement of muscles he feared were too easily visible.
The thick fingers tapped along the top of his boot, searching for signs of life and the knotted laces keeping the heavy shoe on Gabriel’s foot. Gabriel could feel the dry, icy breezy teasing the beads of sweat collecting on his skin. How much longer, he wondered to himself. How much longer before he realizes I’m not dead?
The bearded stranger found what he was looking for. Gabriel could feel the fingers going to work undoing the loops and knots on the top of his left boot. Every nerve and muscle in Gabriel’s body was as tense and tight as a board. He knew things could get out of hand at any moment. He was going to need to be ready. Gabriel managed the will to move his fingers, bending and flexing them as subtly as he could. He felt the dead soldier’s belt under the cold tips of his fingers. Gabriel was looking for a weapon or anything he could quickly use as one.
The laces on his left boot were nearly untied. At the same time, Gabriel stretched his fingers out a few more centimeters. His eyes were looking around, scanning the edges of the cold, hellish landing spot. He spotted his dusty rucksack and rifle tangled in the nearby brush. The mumbling stranger tugged on Gabriel’s boot. On pure instinct, Gabriel tried to counter the motion, jerking his foot back toward himself.
In that same moment, the man stopped mumbling. Gabriel knew the game was up. He lifted his head, his eyes instantly drawn to the distant firelight glinting off a small, sharp knife the man had snatched with a hunter’s speed from his belt. Gabriel looked at the knife intensely, then up at the eyes of the man holding it. Their gaze was locked for only a moment, each of their hearts beating like mad. The stranger shouted something, a garbled warning perhaps. Gabriel could barely hear it through the thunderous thudding of his pulse against his eardrums.
The man raised his arm, the knife hanging for less than a second above Gabriel’s foot before the it was brought back down, the wool-covered arm moving in a blur. But Gabriel was already in motion. The padded tip of his boot connected with the man’s bearded chin with enough force to send him sprawling backwards. Gabriel felt the stained blade graze his leg, the fabric of his pants sheering under the razor edge. It missed carving into his flesh by the width of a hair.
The momentum of his defense had sent Gabriel rolling to one side and off his fallen peer. The old stranger was trying to recover in the dirt nearby. He was moaning loudly, crying out for help. Gabriel sat upright on his knees. He glanced at the man and then at the ground. He saw the knife at the same time as it’s owner, listing sideways where it had landed, tip-down, in the sand.
Together, the two men lunged at the same spot. Adrenaline was boiling in Gabriel’s veins as he collided with the older man. Neither reached the knife. They wrestled and fought feverishly, trying to pin or strangle the other before getting overpowered. The old man kept up his shouting, his groaning, rasping voice breaking through the silence around them.
Gabriel managed an advantage he thought he could hold. But a cloud of sand and pebbles peppered his eyes as he swung down with his fist. He slumped backward and off the flailing man, trying to wipe the stinging debris from his eyes. A rock cracked against his helmet with surprising force, sending Gabriel crashing to the ground. He tried to recover as quickly as he could, rolling onto his back before the man could attack again. It was too late. He was on his side when the bearded man leapt. The dirty blade glinted in his hand once more. His rasping voice bellowed noisily above him as he moved his arms in a swift, tight arch.
Suddenly, a sharp crack pierced the night. The older man straddling Gabriel’s body stiffened, his voice dropping off as he choked on a desperate breath he could not take. Gabriel felt a strange warmth on his face and neck. In the dark, he hadn’t been able to see the fine mist of blood that had erupted from the man’s chest. He had been shot, the bullet traveling fast and hot in the late night.
The dirty knife plopped against the dirt, the strength in the man’s fingers going slack. He was dead before he toppled over into the sand. Gabriel was stunned. He lay propped on one elbow in complete surprise and confusion. The sound of the brush beyond his small landing site grabbed Gabriel’s attention away from the dead stranger. Gabriel moved urgently, the hilt of the knife tucked tightly into his sweaty grip as he tried to sink into the shadows around the scene.
The man who had been smoking the cigarette appeared out of the darkness as if the night itself had given him shape. He stopped in the stirred sand between the two bodies, the dead paratrooper and the freshly shot stranger. Gabriel watched him carefully, trying to know when to move. Gabriel knew he would only have one opportunity to strike. The man had a rifle. Gabriel had a knife. He had to make his effort count.
The hunter crouched down, examining with surprise the body of the man in the long, wool tunics. Gabriel knew this was it. The rifleman’s back was turned, not all the way but maybe just enough. There was no counting to three like in the movies or books. Gathering his strength and courage, trying to ignore the racing, reverberating beat of his heart pounding in his chest and feeling another hot surge of adrenaline rush through his body like a tsunami, Gabriel leapt to his feet.
But he did not go farther than a step and half. He stopped and turned his head sharply. The fevered, mad cry of another man barreling out of the shadows made Gabriel nearly jump out of his skin. It was another soldier. Gabriel watched him with baffled amazement. The charging American had startled the rifleman who stumbled back to his feet while trying to turn around at the same time. Gabriel had managed a glimpse of the gun in the soldier’s hand. He had a shot and the time to take it had arrived.
The American’s rifle jammed. Where there should have been another deafening pop under a blinding, white-hot muzzle flare aimed in the direction of the tobacco-scented warrior, there was a much more disheartening noise. A ringing, hollow click and retching of small gears that was as unexpected as it was disconcerting.
The enemy’s gun worked with little effort. The older rifle was off his shoulder and loosely in his trembling grip in an instant. His own shot rang loudly, the muzzle flare as brilliant as the American’s gun would have been. The bullet that leapt like a rocket from the recesses of the dark, scathed barrel did its job as precisely as any other might.
Gabriel knew his countryman would be hit even before he was. The whole attempt seemed like suicide the moment it had started. When the newer, more advanced weapon made its fatal failure, Gabriel started on the step he had stopped. He stayed behind but to the side of his fellow paratrooper, fearing the bullet’s path would find him after exiting the back of his peer a few steps ahead. The soldier slumped to his knees, revealing the breathless corporal racing out of the darkness.
The rifleman saw Gabriel too late. The teenaged soldier pounced at the bearded man, knocking the arm with the rifle in it aside just as his trigger finger squeezed firmly. The shot was a powerful, heart-stopping clap of noise. It muted the hiss of the hot bullet traveling into the snow-dusted brush and frozen darkness. The eye-opening noise did nothing to cover the deafening gasp of the enemy who sank under the weight crashing down on top of him. Gabriel watched his eyes, studying without word or thought in that incredible moment how wide and fearful they became as the dirty blade silently dug into the rifleman’s torso.
By the third, heaving breath the enemy was dead. His blood was hot on Gabriel’s trembling hand. The dust hadn’t settled around the new corpse before Gabriel was on his feet again, backing away from the life he had just taken.
“Good work, Corporal...” said a tired, hoarse voice near his feet.
Gabriel turned around swiftly to look at the fellow American laying in the dirt. He thought he could make out stripes on the man’s shoulder, but he wasn’t sure how many there were. Gabriel guessed he was a sergeant. He didn’t know his name or what company he was with. Right at that moment, it didn’t matter. Gabriel peered at the sergeant’s rifle then over at the old stranger who had owned the deadly knife. “You took that shot?”
“That’s right. And you...you’re welcome, Corporal.”
“Thank you, Sergeant. But then why-”
A bullet slapped against the sand a few feet from the lifeless paratrooper. Another round whistled hauntingly as it zipped past Gabriel.
“Another time, Corporal! The enemy’s comin’! We’ve got to move!”
Gabriel began to panic. A moment ago, his movements and decisions seemed so clear and easy to act on. Now, suddenly, Gabriel felt lost. His thoughts were jumbled up, his mind distracted by the wounded sergeant, his lack of any real weaponry, and the sharp, knuckle-digging ache that would not show him mercy emanating from the side of his chest. From the darkness surrounding them, bullets moving too fast to see crisscrossed the small arena of dirt and blood.
“Can you walk,” Gabriel asked the bleeding officer.
The sergeant tried to sit up but quickly gave up. “Ha, ha...no!”
Shouting voices echoed over the fading gun shots. The enemy soldiers were drawing closer. He could hear the brush crunching as their hurried feet crashed through it.
Gabriel nodded his head. “Okay. Okay,” he said, trying to think. He was scanning the scene, trying to see into the dark. Never more than this would Gabriel have been more than thankful for just a little bit of sunlight. He blinked, trying to focus his eyes. In a passing glance, he spotted his own rifle, abandoned with his rucksack a short walk away.
His heaving chest made him wince as he looked back down at the sergeant. “Okay,” Gabriel said again, fighting back the pain that made him want to wheeze. “i’m going to have to carry you, sir.”
“What? No.”
Gabriel nodded his head. “Yes, sir. I can’t leave you here.”
“They’ll kill us both.”
“Then we’ll die as soldiers together, sir.” There was an unmistakable honesty in Gabriel’s trembling voice. “That’s better than dying out here alone.”
The sergeant stared up at the young paratrooper. Another shot cracked in the dark distance quickly being closed. Finally, the sergeant nodded his head to Gabriel who hurried to grab his near-forgotten gear. The enemy was within sight, the shadows of the early hour bending around them then retreating away completely as their guns came alive.
The fiery rattle of deadly bullets sprayed through the air and through the brush. Gabriel narrowly avoided his life coming to an end. With his rifle and rucksack slung over one shoulder, the frightened corporal returned to his wounded officer. With gritted teeth, he hoisted the sergeant he didn’t know onto the other shoulder.
“Let’s go, corporal!”
Practically dragging the wounded man, Gabriel led them away from the blood-stained landing site. Machine guns ratcheted a barrage of bullets toward them that whistled and hissed as they sailed through the air. Thin fountains of dirt sprang up at their feet where shots fell short. Twigs snapped loudly under their hasty, stumbling gait as they ducked the searing shells passing all too closely.
Gabriel felt a shot near his leg. It singed the thin hairs on his skin as it tore through the already gashed fabric. He took a deep, crippling breath. Tears welled up in his dirt-clotted eyes. The pain only pushed Gabriel harder. He tried to run even faster, carrying himself and the sergeant as swiftly as he could into the predawn darkness.
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