Fog (19 page)

‘What the fuck, Runner?’

‘I have to clean my rifle.’ He stands, walks a few metres away to sit behind a tree, and begins to work.
 

Puzzled, I watch him for a few moments, then stick my earbud in and say, ‘Have fun. I’ll see what our buddies down at the camp are up to. Maybe they need a hug. Or something.’

He doesn’t reply, only takes his earbud from his pocket and stuffs it into his ear.

I shut up and get to work. Our rucks go into hiding under a pile of leaves, my rifle and I hide underneath my ghillie. That ghillie stinks. I’ve walked, slept, and eaten in it. I’ve lived in that thing since we arrived here. Its inner netting is stiff with sweat and dirt. I’ll have to wash it soon, else I’ll retch.

After a thirty minute hike, I pick a tree roughly three hundred metres north of the camp and prepare for a long day ahead.

Laying my cheek on my rifle’s stock, I scan the perimeter. The scope shows me that the camp is beginning to settle down. Bodies are being dragged into the forest; a man with a gun watches a group of boys and girls dig a hole.

The sun crawls across the sky and slowly begins to dip down again. Shadows stretch. The girl’s body is still stuck to the puddle of her own blood in the centre of the camp. Erik still hasn’t shown. My eyes burn, my mouth is dry, and I need to relieve myself. I edge backwards until my feet touch the trunk, press my back against it, inch down my pants and pee down the bark.
 

My head aches. I’m dehydrated and I shouldn’t have let this happen. Enough sleep and water is what keeps a well-adjusted killing machine fully functional. A headache and flickering eyesight from dehydration and lack of sleep invite lethal errors. My accuracy goes from close to one hundred percent down to sixty. At this distance, four of ten bullets will miss their targets. I decide against climbing down to find water; I’ll postpone that until night falls. But I can catch up on sleep. After all, Runner’s just slept off his shooting spree stress. I can hear him stir now. I whisper to him, tell him where I am and that I’ll take a short nap. He says he’ll find us some food. He still sounds like he needs time alone. I wonder if it will always be like this. We kill, then we avoid each other.

Nestling in a crook formed by two thick branches and the tree’s trunk, I strap my rifle to my torso and lean my head against the bark. Sunlight peeks through the gaps in my ghillie. In the semi-darkness, I watch the foliage above me and the flickering of light until I doze off.

———

A noise awakens me. I twitch. My heart races but I force my movements to be calm and quiet.
Move the rifle in front of you, look through the scope, Micka. Breathe.
My gaze sweeps over the camp and the forest between my enemies and myself. The scope shows me two guards leaning against a tree two hundred and fifty metres away from me. They’re precisely where they’ve been on the previous days. It seems they believe us dead. Runner’s plan worked out well.
 

But then… What woke me?

‘Micka, can you hear me?’

Shit, Runner almost gave me a heart attack. I wipe my face and tap my earbud once.

‘Any movements besides the expected clean-up?’ he asks.

I tap twice.

‘Are you okay?’

I tap once.

‘Good. Retreat. I’ve moved our rucks two kilometres east of where you left them, I’ll give you instructions on how to find my location once you’re on the move. I’m preparing a late lunch. Goat cooked in a pit. Your favourite.’

Saliva floods my mouth and I almost forget to tap my earbud to let him know I’m coming.

Without disturbing a single cricket, I make my way down the tree, find water to refill my canteen, and hike the long way back to find Runner sitting cross-legged under tarp and netting. A leaf-covered hole in the ground burps faint wisps of smoke. The cooking goat meat makes my empty stomach rumble in anticipation.

We debrief after the meal. I tell him about the group of five who made for the site of the impact, about the pit the kids had to dig and the bodies they had to dump. He tells me he’s satisfied with the number of men we took down today and the smoothness of the mission. Two days’ rest, lots of sleep, good food, and a short dash to our buried ammo boxes. Then, we’ll return to terrorise what’s left of the Bullshit Army. He says there’s a chance some of the kids will escape if the men are all dead.
 

Twelve children kept as meat for the bunks and the battlefield. Why wouldn’t they
all
run the moment they were free? I don’t understand it. Runner says it has something to do with adaptation and fear. But my mind refuses to swallow this crap. They should have the guts to run. Fuck the fucking BSA.

The two days are over in a rush. I fold my clothes and pack them at the bottom of my ruck, the hammock follows, blanket, mosquito net, cookware, tarp, water filters and canteens, provisions, tools, lines, hooks, tape, a hacksaw, squeeze light, emergency fire starting kit, hunting knife, pliers, a compass should the SatPad fail, and more. MedKits are packed on the sides, ammo in the top pockets. I pack everything tightly and shake the ruck to make sure its innards don’t rattle. We need to be fast, quiet, and flexible.

I’m still worried about pulling the trigger. I know I can do it, will do it. But what if my rifle jams? What if it isn’t zeroed-in correctly and I don’t get to adjust it with tons of bullets zipping all around me and my calculations are off and… Fuck, what if my fingers tremble so hard I can’t even hold my rifle still?

The night is moonless. A few birds croak. My earbud is silent. My stomach is pressed against a thick branch about fifteen metres above ground. Dirt covers my face and hands, the remainder of my body is cloaked by my ghillie and the thick tree cover. The ruck is strapped to the trunk behind me.

It strikes me how natural this routine feels. My old life is far away and utterly strange; a tiny world in a different universe. The sorrows I had seem ridiculous and insignificant. Why did I ever waste a single thought on bad school grades? Who gives a fuck if I had friends or not?
 

The wind picks up and I lift my gaze from my scope. The greenery before me has a nicely shaved hole of approximately thirty centimetres width — large enough to allow a mild breeze to move the leaves without disturbing my view too much.

Only a gush of wind. The weather seems stable. The clouds are thick.

My night-eye shows me the camp. My IR laser measures seven hundred and sixty-two metres from my scope to the tent at the very centre of the camp. The vegetation is thinner in front of me than it is behind me. One foxhole is forty metres to my left, the other roughly two hundred and fifty metres to my right.

What Runner once said about owning lives echoes in my ears. Right now, I own the lives of eight guards. They are scattered in pairs at the perimeters of the camp, their backs leaning against tree trunks, submachine guns slung over their shoulders. No lights anywhere — not in the tents, not a single fire lit to cook, not one stink candle to fight off mosquitoes.
 

My neck tingles, the small hairs at its back stand erect. I stare through the scope, willing relevant information to show itself to me. Details of the men’s faces are blurred by distance and poor light. It’s blindingly dark. No moon, no stars, not even a firefly. The night-eye shows a flickering mush of green and black — the perfect night for an attack, and the perfect night for an ambush.

‘Runner. They are different tonight. Quieter. Do you think this could be a trap?’ I whisper.

‘Yes. Ours,’ he replies calmly. ‘Tell me what you see.’

I do, and almost jump when one of the guards shifts his weight from one leg to the other.

My heartbeat crackles in my fingertips and toes. I don’t know if I can even hold my rifle still. My vision through the night-eye is wobbly. I readjust my fist under the gun’s stock.
 

‘Breathe, Micka,’ sounds softly from my earbud. ‘Breathe — in and out, slowly. You will take lives tonight. Remember how it felt: the rage, when you wanted to stick me with that knife, when you killed the dogs, when you saw the man cut the girl’s throat. Use it, Micka. Use the rage. But don’t let it control you. You are the weapon. Push aside what’s not relevant. Close your eyes.’

I do as he says. My breath grows calmer; my mind shows me the images Ben and Yi-Ting took of the kids down in the camp, and it shows me Ezra. Happy, beautiful Ezra. I can’t even imagine her with empty eyes and a pack of C4 strapped to her stomach.
 

‘The fog has risen,’ he whispers. ‘Open fire when you are ready.’

‘Are you ready?’ I croak.

‘Always.’

I aim at a pair of guards straight ahead of me. They are so close to each other, one slightly behind the other, I might be able to take them out with a single shot. I hear nothing but my heart hammering against my ribcage. I see nothing but what my finder shows me. Time slows to a crawl. The pressure increases. A round lodges itself from the chamber and flies through the barrel. Two men fall. I didn’t hear the muzzle report. What’s wrong? Did Runner shoot them for me? Am I deaf?

Twigs are crackling, men are shouting and running. I can clearly hear them, so my ears seem to work just fine. I check my rifle and find that it did fire. I fired it. The chamber is empty and warm. I stick a finger in my ear and find the earbud. I’ll worry about the missing muzzle report another time. I aim and fire. The taste of bile begins to register.

A man two hundred meters away is in my crosshairs. My conscience is wiped clean off my chest. I engage the target. I’m trembling. It takes three bullets to finish him off.

I will my breath to slow: deep, calm — in, hold, out. Repeat.

Five rounds fired, three men down, the first row of bullets in my arm strap gone.

Second row.

Engage target.

I’m sharp and precise. There’s no better description for this. I’m in my tree. I’m a sniper. I spread terror.

‘Cease fire,’ Runner says. ‘Retreat.’

Finally, I understand his plan in its entirety. The men have no idea where death comes from so suddenly and effectively, or when it will return. Soon, they’ll learn that we come with the fog. They’ll fear the fog even if we’re not in it.

They are firing now. Bullets spray from their automatic guns, piercing the white void, chipping bark off the trees. We leave the noise behind. The fog cloaks us.

———

I dream of blood. It’s on my hands and seeps from my chest. My rifle plops out bullets the consistency of blueberries. Men laugh, lick the purple juice off their faces, and pin me to the ground. I wake up with a hiss. Runner’s hand is on my arm a moment later.
 

‘You are safe,’ he says.
 

I’m struck by the fact that he never says things like, “hey, it’s
only
this and
only
that. Don’t feel the way you feel, because it’s silly.” I don’t even know how to properly comfort people. I’d never seen it done before I met him.

I wonder how he copes with shooting people. Does he ever see their faces? Does he think
target engaged, target fell,
instead of
this man died at my hands?
Would he ever think,
I killed a man?
Or,
I killed my father?

Does it even matter?

The world doesn’t seem to give a shit. Down in the camp, bodies are dragged to the square, ransacked, and thrown in a pit.

‘Are you okay?’ he asks.

‘Um. Yeah. Thanks,’ I answer. ‘Didn’t you sleep at all?’ We are safely tucked away, not even the birds seem to notice us.

‘I slept, don’t worry. Are you hungry?’

‘Thirsty.’ I reach for my canteen but he’s faster, picks it up and hands it to me. ‘Are you worried about me?’

‘A little. How are you feeling?’ he asks.

‘Erm…’ Do I have to feel something specific? ‘I’m glad I’m not bathed in blood and my bullets aren’t blueberries.’

He snorts. ‘Is that what you dreamed?’

‘Yeah. Ridiculous, isn’t it?’

‘I have the same dream, or…similar. The barrel of my rifle is like rubber, it gets all floppy when I try to aim. Then I’m shot and wake up. Shooting practice usually helps me with the insecurity.’

We’ve both been talking to the netting and the foliage above us. Now, he rustles in his hammock and sticks his head over the rim of my hammock. ‘You were the first to shoot and a damn good shot that was! Two guys dead with one bullet. I’d expected much more…inaccuracy.’

I don’t say a peep. Vivid memories of spraying blood and holes punched into chests make my heart race.
 

‘You killed four men, I killed seven. If the fog is as thick tomorrow as it was today, we can take down the remaining fifteen men. Then, we’ll find Erik.’

‘Why did we retreat? We could have killed them all tonight.’

‘You didn’t notice they hauled the rocket launcher out and pointed it in your direction?’

‘Uhm…’ Shit. All I saw was in the restricted, circular view of my finder. ‘Did they kill one of the kids?’

He nods, touches my arm, and says, ‘I didn’t expect you to perform so well, Micka. I thought I’d have to pull you out much earlier. This was your first night — you focussed on what was most important — as I taught you. I’ve got your back. You’ll learn to broaden your vision, to keep your senses sharp for the things that happen around you, not only the things your finder shows you. And next time, change your location after five shots.’