The Sentinel's Fear
Picture a scene: four men standing in a field of partially cut corn, the hot summer sun beating down on them, each man soaked with the sweat shed from hard work, their calloused hands holding the implements of their trade proudly.
Sounded good on the surface. Never mind that the field had been crudely reaped not by scythes, but by bullets tearing savagely through the stalks. Shattered bits of unripened kernel and cob covered the soil below like pale yellow gravel. Here and there lay bloody corpses, their weight crushing uncut stalks.
There was a time when I'd have asked myself, "Keith, what the hell are you doing out here? And why haven't you lost your lunch?" Thankfully, that sort of thinking had gone the way of clean water about a year ago.
I knelt down next to a particularly brutalized cadaver. He'd been cut down by some manner of hacking implement-maybe an actual sickle-and then shot several times to get the point across. A single row over, his wife lay face-down in the dirt, her own fate far worse.
"Gopher," I growled, and a thin, weaselly man came up alongside. "Check out the farmhouse. Some of them may still be poking around. Be quick."
"Yes, sir."
Standing and shaking my head, I slung my rifle over my right shoulder. Some days the gun felt heavier than it really was, and today was one of those days. Turning my face away from the glaring sun, I silently cursed the heat and motioned for the other two to come closer.
"What's up, boss?" Molloy asked, firearm held easily in his huge hands. Molloy's nickname was "Shoulders." He was as tall as the undamaged corn stalks and dressed in combat fatigues that would have been considered second-hand were they not third, fourth, and fifth-hand as well. Small bits of metal, scrap plastic, and rubber were sewn into the fabric as a protective measure, though none of it would stand up to a barrage of gunfire. Still, you made do with what you could get your hands on; this far from Enforcer territory, we didn't have a quartermaster to supply us with new armor if things went sour.
"Gopher's gone to check out the farmhouse. Soon as he comes ba-"
My sentence was cut off by the sound of a single gunshot. It came from the house. All three of us immediately took off through the remains of the corn and emerged on the far side of the field, dropping into positions of cover behind the smoking debris that littered the farm's grounds. My rifle came up against my shoulder and my sight focused down the long barrel, to the exclusion of all else. Casey crouched, over to my right, down behind an upended wheelbarrow with his gun pointed at the boarded-over windows.
Shuffling noises came from inside the home, combined with the crackling of small, scattered fires that we hadn't stamped out yet. The front door opened and Gopher emerged. He twirled his pistol back into its holster and gave a thumbs-up. I heard a sigh of relief as Casey remembered to start breathing again. That was a habit I hadn't been able to break out of him, and at times I could have sworn he was turning blue by the end of any given engagement. The kid wasn't bad at what he did, but he still had the combat jitters.
"What was that about?" I asked, moving towards Gopher and leaning to the side in an attempt to look past him.
The thin man shrugged. "Eh, it wasn't a big deal. One of them wanted to stay behind and loot a little more, is all." Gopher gave an exaggerated bow and stepped aside, ushering me into the house with all the misplaced grace of a posh butler.
Sand and random shards of glass crunched underfoot, some of it spattered with blood. The interior had been thoroughly ransacked, all of the cabinets turned out and the small bed flipped over, sheets and mattress stained with broad crimson splotches. About ten feet to my left was another corpse, dressed in scavenged armor and with a rusty hatchet near his dead, gradually-relaxing hand. A spreading pool of blood seeped slowly into the thirsty wood planks around him.
I eyeballed the body, noting the charred edges of the hole punched through the center of the chest. "Close-range heart shot?"
Gopher shrugged. "Point blank. Came at me with the hatchet. Since I didn't feel like getting my skull split open, and he saw fit to give me a nice, big target, I went for it."
I sighed, but I didn't say anything else.
It wasn't uncommon for raiders to strike outlying settlements, but the past week had been anything but typical. Six farms in six days. A pack of truly vicious bastards were scraping their way across the land, striking at night and picking their targets clean before the sun even came up. They had guns, and armor, and cunning. Enforcer patrols had been hard-pressed to pin down their movements.
At least until yesterday. My team and I captured one of the stragglers, after we found him clutching his stomach and curled up under the ledge of an empty coyote den. He was extremely ill, and his so-called comrades had left him to die. He proved more than willing to tell four armed Enforcers where his former friends had gone, and where they had set up base camp for the time being. Then he died, vomiting blood as the plague he'd contracted finished consuming his organs.
A sigh escaped my lips at the memory. I couldn't help thinking it wasn't a painful enough way for the raider to go, and immediately regretted feeling that way.
"What now, sir?" Casey asked quietly.
"We do our jobs, soldier. We'll leave in an hour and wipe the floor with these sons of bitches."
It was almost too easy.
Twelve men dead, strewn about in their camp. Their sentry died first, pulled into the scrub and his throat cut by Gopher's wicked knife. From there, it went methodically: one shot, one kill for most of the lot. We had moved with effortless efficiency, as we had been trained to do, with no words exchanged or even required. A hand signal here, a brief nod there - and the raiders died as easily as their helpless victims.
There was one still alive, however. The bullet had traveled through his shoulder, crushing bone and severing tendons. That arm would likely be unusable even if the wound didn't become septic; what little medical training I had could tell me that. He sat propped up against one of the crates of supplies taken from the locals, clutching his shoulder in an effort to stem the sanguine flow.
I squatted down in front of the raider and gave him an appraising look. He would live, no doubt, provided he got the proper medical treatment. It'd be easier just to leave him here or put him down, but I instantly squashed that thought.
"Make sure his wound is taken care of. He's coming back with us to Zanesville."
Both Molloy and the raider were stricken with the same surprised look. Molloy cleared his throat. "Sir?"
I ignored him and stared the raider in the eye. "What's your name, kid?" Indeed, the description was accurate. The raider couldn't have been more than seventeen. Caught in the middle of a tiny meal, he hadn't even been able to get to his feet before a round from Molloy's rifle knocked him down for the duration of the battle. His eyes were wet from tears of pain and his pants were wet from lack of courage.
"I ain't tellin' you," the boy said in a squeaky voice of panicked defiance. "Enforcer trash!"
Gopher walked up, cleaning his knife on a torn scrap of cloth from one of the raiders' vests. "C'mon, boss. We don't have time for this."
I stood up. "Molloy, do what I asked. I'm not going to leave him out here to die." Molloy hesitated. I went on: "That's what they'd do. And we aren't them." I turned and stepped away, moving through the debris of the ruined farm, silent.
A whimper of pain cut the still air as Molloy began tending to the kid, followed by approaching footsteps to my right. "Sir?" came Casey's voice. "Something on your mind?"
"The same thing that should be on yours," I replied, turning my head to look over at him.
"I'm not sure I follow, sir."
My hand stretched out in a vague gesture at the surrounding wilderness. "Sometimes it feels like we're alone out here. Doesn't it? The Enforcers, I mean. Most people think we're no better than these murdering thugs."
Casey frowned. "Are you...saying it's not worth it, sir?"
I shook my head. "No, that's not what I'm saying at all. I'm saying that's the reason we have to try harder. We've made mistakes, Case. No one who knows anything about history can deny that. But we have to rise above it. You understand? We have to try to heal the wounds we've inflicted."
He frowned, considering, and his eyes darted over to the wounded raider. "Is that Sentinel-talk, sir? 'Cause I don't think we're gonna be done with the inflicting anytime soon."
I couldn't help but grin. "My affiliation shouldn't have anything to do with this. But yes, it's Sentinel talk. The kid deserves a chance to redeem himself. He's just afraid, and fear makes people do stupid things."
Casey cocked an eyebrow at me. "Like forget to breathe, sir?"
"That's not what I meant."
"I know," the young Enforcer continued. "But we're all afraid, sir. You just hide it better than the rest of us. Except maybe Gopher, but he's strange."
Gopher said, "I'm standing right here, y'know. Right in plain sight. See this guy, standing here? That's me."
"There's a difference," I went on, cutting off further commentary. "A hard line between our fear and theirs." I prodded one of the raiders' corpses with the toe of my boot. "My fear? My fear is that I'll not have the chance to make enough of an impact before something takes me down. Do you know why I joined up?"
Casey shook his head, waited for me to go on.
"I don't have any preconceived notions about Enforcer superiority. But sometimes folks don't have the strength to defend themselves. That's why we're here. That's what we do. We can't let ourselves lose sight of that. We just can't."
A long silence fell. I couldn't tell if what I'd said had made any impact on Casey at all. Finally I looked away. "Go check on Molloy and the captive. We'll strike out for Zanesville as soon as the prisoner's able to travel." Casey headed back towards the others, leaving me to watch the sun's final descent below the distant horizon.
Picture the scene: five shapes moving by moonlight, across the dark and deadly badlands. Three of those shapes are my men, my brothers-in-arms. Maybe we don't see eye-to-eye on everything.
Maybe not all of them want to think about things like mercy, or forgiveness.
But they're my brothers, live or die.
Their boots were dusty, their expressions grim, but their swagger sent a message. Yes, we're afraid. But we won't be ruled by it. We'll keep marching.
And on we marched, waiting - no, striving - for the dawn.
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