“Boog’s a fourth generation Marine. Men in his family have served in every war since the Civil War. He got called up under Desert Storm, served in Kuwait and the first wave that rolled over Baghdad. He took shrapnel in his leg defending his tank crew from enemy fire. A real American hero in the truest sense of the term. He gets back here, and while still recovering from his wounds, he learns that the state has decided to seize his land through eminent domain. He’d inherited a tenement house in New York City and was planning to renovate it when he got called up. While he was still overseas getting shot at, the city comes along and condemns the property on him, swoops down and gobbles up the land, and leaves him holding the bag on the loan he’d taken out to improve the property. He came home and found they’d already razed the building. Nothing left but a pile of bricks and a big ole hole in the ground. They paid him thirty cents on the dollar for what they’d assessed him in taxes. He lost everything so they could give his property away to some big shot developer who’d paid them off in campaign contributions.
“He can’t even go to the Supreme Court for it. Not after they betrayed the people with that decision of theirs, what was it? Kelo vs. New London. Gave the government the right to take your land and give it to someone else in the name of economic development. Now that’s just Boog. That’s just one example. I could give you hundreds. But that’s who we’re fighting for, ‘cause they’ve shafted so many people—so many stories just like that—and it’s nothing more than a big shell game with them. They pretend they’re protecting your rights and defending what’s good, but when push comes to shove, its all about money and power with them. Nothing but thieves and crooks.”
“See, that’s the thing,” added Martin. “It’s the system that’s corrupt, and that’s what’s got to be taken down. Wipe the slate clean and start over with just the United States Constitution and We the People. Jefferson thought we should do this every twenty years. Well, it’s been two hundred, and maybe that’s why things are ten times as worse.”
“And the government ten times bigger,” Jerry snorted.
Grant folded his hands. “And if that means we have to shake things up a bit to get it moving, so be it.”
“What signify a few lives lost?” I quoted. “The tree of liberty must be refreshed.”
“Now you’re talking.”
“Even if that blood is yours? Martin’s? Or Boog’s? Patriots and tyrants get killed in war.”
“War is hell.”
“Yeah, but it’s a hell you’re going to unleash on everyone else.”
“Better a little hell up front than a lot of hell later.”
I snorted. “You sound like William Booth.”
They exchanged glances. “Who?”
“Founder of the Salvation Army. He once said that, instead of sending his recruits to bible college for five years, he’d rather send them to hell for five minutes. That would do more than anything else to prepare them for ministry.”
“Well, preach it, Cherry. That’ll work for me.”
We fell to silence after that, and took to finishing our beers. Grant announced lights out and tossed a few more logs on the fire before we packed it in.
I rolled out my sleeping back and crawled inside, already warm from being near the fire. Shadows continued to flicker in the rafters and on the walls. The moaning wind, lonesome and bereft, closed our eyes and covered us beneath a snowy blanket, as if mourning our lost innocence.
Fifteen
I woke late the next morning. Grant and Martin were already up. They’d made coffee and were sitting at the breakfast table, talking in low tones. I shuffled past them and poured a cup, then took a seat at the table.
Stifling a yawn, I said, “How do you do it?”
“What’s that?”
“Go without sleep. You guys are always the last to bed and the first up.”
“You can sleep when you’re dead.”
“Combat makes you a light sleeper, Petey. Small price to pay to stay alive.”
“Right,” I murmured, tossing back a large swallow of caffeine.
“Somebody gonna wake up sleeping beauty?” Grant queried. Martin snorted.
“Better not,” I replied.
“Jerry’s not a morning person,” Martin explained.
“No he is not,” I agreed. “Comes from living with Mom and Dad too long.”
Grant grinned wickedly and picked up a pillow from the couch. “Hey! Jerry! Get up!” He threw the pillow at him.
Jerry groaned and threw the pillow off.
“Make breakfast, girl!”
Jerry gave a muffled, “Shut up!”
Grant stood up. Martin and I shook our heads knowingly. This would not end well. He walked over and tore the blanket off Jerry, dumping him onto the floor. Jerry almost seemed to bounce off the floor before he was on his feet, launching into Grant with a full body tackle. Just as quickly, Grant rolled backwards, kicking his legs high and tossing Jerry onto the far side. The table and chairs shook when he landed. Grant flipped over and got in his face.
“Morning,” he said sweetly.
Jerry groaned and swore.
“Now, don’t be like that,” Grant chided. “We’ve got fresh coffee for ya, and it’ll make all the headache go away.”
Jerry blew out a long breath and rose to his feet. Grimacing, he rubbed his back and walked to the sink. I poured a cup and set it on the counter beside him as he splashed water on his face.
“Thanks,” he mumbled, and joined us at the table.
“All right, Cherries, listen up: we’re gonna eat breakfast and clean up by 0900 hours. At 0901, we will be out on the deck, guns in hand, sighting in on our targets. Martin will fire up the ski lift ahead of time. We’ve got a lot of training to get done, and we’re already losing daylight. Forecast calls for more storms this afternoon. We’re gonna go as long as we can. We got less than an hour, so let’s get moving.”
Jerry and I exchanged glances. I was certain we were both thinking the same thing, but telling Grant to stick it in his ear probably wasn’t going to make our stay anymore pleasant. Still, Jerry hunched over the table and sipped his coffee, in no hurry to get started. Grant stared at him, evidently at a loss.
“Maybe you should just let the man finish his first cup of coffee,” I suggested. “It’s not like any of us are looking forward to his cooking.”
“This isn’t a vacation,” Grant insisted.
“Maybe not. But it ain’t boot camp, either.”
“Marty?”
Martin shook his head, leaning back in his chair. “Jerry only does what Jerry wants to do, Grant. You can’t force him. You can either let him have his way or kill him, but you won’t make him.”
“Yeah, I don’t wanna cook no more.”
“Ah, hell.”
“Cats and dogs, Grant,” I said.
“There’s a word for this,” he muttered darkly.
“It’s called rebellion. Ain’t that what you’re trying to start?”
He sat down at the table, fuming. “How in the hell are we supposed to pull off an operation this complex if you two can’t even get up on time, let alone follow orders?”
“You’re the logistics, guy,” I snapped. “You figure it out.”
He glared at me. “Logistics require that people do what they’re supposed to do when they’re supposed to do it.”
Jerry set his cup down. “Look, you want to stick me on a building while one of you takes potshots at the President, I got no problem with that. But I ain’t gonna have someone tossing me outta bed, calling me his girlfriend, and demanding breakfast.”
“Yeah, where’s your values?” I said with a grin. “Assassination? No problem. But wake a man up early? That’s just wrong.”
Martin slammed his hand on the table. “The man’s got a point. What’s this country coming to when a man can’t finish his coffee before he has to go practice killing someone?”
Grant swore, but cracked a smile. “It’s like work
ing with the Three Stooges.”
“Just wait’ll we start with the guns.”
“All right, all right. Could we please just try to get started by nine o’clock?”
“Sure,” said Jerry. “How do you want your eggs, just in case one turns out that way?”
***
The rest of the morning went more smoothly. Grant had softened his militaristic tone, having gotten Jerry’s not-so-subtle point. Jerry did a little better making breakfast than dinner the night before, but he still managed to break all the yolks and scorch the eggs before scraping them onto our plates. By the time we were dressed and ready with our guns, it was a little after nine.
Outside, the sun blazed through the overcast sky. The crisp air turned our breath into miniature clouds trailing away into nothingness. We trudged the M107s out through the two feet of snow that had fallen the previous night, following the rough path Martin had made a half hour earlier. When we got to the flat surface Grant called the shooting deck, we had to clear the snow first before setting the guns down on the hard-packed, icy surface. Martin showed up a few minutes later, thrusting his way toward us through the drifts.
“You’re late,” Grant chided, pouring him a cup of coffee from the thermos.
“Lines were frozen. Ice was so thick it didn’t want to roll over the pulley. Had to break it loose with a stick.”
“Figures. You set up the mannequins?”
“See for yourself.”
Grant pulled out his field glasses, staring across the snowy valley at the targets moving on the far ridge. He grunted and put down his thermos, retrieving a satchel he’d brought from the cabin.
“All right, Cherries. Let’s set up and start shooting.”
Martin and I took prone positions. I sighted in on my spot like Grant taught me the day before and waited for Grant to start saying, “Now.”
Instead, I heard a pop and a fizz, and a roiling cloud of bluish smoke filled my scope.
“What the hell?”
“Now,” said Grant, peering through the binoculars.
Over to my left, I heard Jerry spotting for Martin. “Now, I think.”
I glanced over the slope, seeing a pair of canisters emitting the dark haze. Smoke bombs.
“Now,” Grant called again.
I squeezed off a round, missing the target completely.
“Relax, Cherry. Time it with your breathing.”
“I can’t see anything.”
“Stretch out with your feelings, Luke,” mimicked Jerry. “Let the force flow through you.”
“Just breathe and squeeze,” Grant muttered. “Now.”
I searched the haze for my spot, finally finding the tree again. At that moment, a shadow passed in front of it. I squeezed off a round, blowing a mannequin to pieces.
“Got one!”
“Doesn’t count. That could’ve been the Chief Justice or the Speaker of the House or any of a dozen people at the podium. Maybe even a pastor. You only squeeze when I tell you to. Got it?”
I craned my neck and resettled, trying not to think about what he just said. “Got it.”
My next set of shots went much better, but Martin was still pulling to the left. Before long there was only one more target left wheeling along the cable. “Okay,” Grant called out. “Last target. Winner take all. Losers walk.”
“Not fair,” I protested. “Martin gets first shot.”
Grant snorted. “From what I’ve seen he needs it.”
A loud crack from the left, and Jerry said, “Missed.”
I grinned as the target swept toward my spot. Taking a long breath, I released it slowly. As soon as Grant said, “Now,” I squeezed the trigger three times.
There was silence for a moment then Jerry muttered a curse.
I peered through my scope, tracing the line of the lift, expecting to see the remnants of the mannequin dangling from the cable. “Where is it?”
Grant tapped my shoulder. “You hit it.”
“Cool. Which round?”
He chuckled softly. “Which round.”
I looked from him to Jerry and Martin, who were staring back at me with wonder. “All of them, Petey,” said Martin. “All three rounds hit. You practically vaporized it.”
I flushed, feeling something akin to pride and horror. It was one thing to be good at something. It was quite something else to be good at this, something so utterly destructive. A quote fluttered through my mind, from the Bhagavad Gita, said by J. Robert Oppenheimer when he witnessed the first test of the atom bomb in 1945. “Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds.”
I sat back on my knees, feeling colder inside than the winter ice encasing the ground.
***
My feelings of horror and pride had subsided when we set up again later that afternoon. We’d taken a break for lunch while Martin and Jerry reset the shooting gallery. Despite my success, Grant kept up the pressure, explaining that he wanted consistency more than anything else.
He tested us with more smoke bombs, flash bombs, and sometimes both together. He’d toss the flash bombs just before a mannequin would fly into view, trying to throw off my aim with the explosion.
Still, despite his distractions, I was destroying targets seven out of every eight rounds by the end of the day. Martin was close, at five out of eight, but still pulling to the left. I was sure it had something to do with his war injury, but didn’t feel like I ought to mention it. We’d burned through close to half our ammunition by then, and I began wondering what else Grant had up his sleeve for the rest of the week. If we kept training at this rate, we’d be out of ammo by tomorrow evening.
We wandered back into the cabin shortly after sundown for another round of Jerry’s attempt at cooking. Martin set him up with a pot of pork and beans and hot dogs, but it still seemed like an exercise in futility. Jerry burned the beans and overcooked the dogs, such that we found ourselves eating soggy, split wieners that tasted like rubber.
“Well, thank God for beer,” I said, washing down dinner.
Jerry managed to look hurt. “I tried.”
“Hey,” I tapped his shoulder, “it was much better than last night.”
He rolled his eyes and muttered darkly. I picked up my plate and dropped it in the sink, then went to stoke the fire. Behind me, I heard Grant say to Martin, “We need to talk.” I turned from the fireplace, but they were already putting their coats on and heading outside.
“Wonder what that’s all about,” I said to Jerry. He shrugged and said nothing. Rising from the fireplace, poker in hand, I stole over to the door, pressing my ear against it, trying to hear through the wood.
“Better hope they don’t come back in,” Jerry warned. “They’ll smack up you right upside the head when they open door.”
“Shh!”
Through the wood, I could hear their voices, but not the words. Whatever they were arguing about, Grant appeared to be winning. All I could make out was, “Do what we hafta do.” Then Martin seemed to relent.
I dashed away from the door, quickly picking up another log and tossing it on the flame in a hail of sparks as they came back inside.
“Good news, Cherries. We’re bugging out early.”
Sixteen
“Early?” I said.
“Yep. We’re gonna finish another round of targets tomorrow morning. Then we’ll head back down the mountain.”
I glanced at Martin, but his face was stony. The last time I’d seen him with that expression was when I’d first asked him about the IED that took out his Humvee in Tikrit. It meant he was in no mood to talk, period. I wondered what Grant had said to him.
The conversation that evening was flat and dull, like a sodden landscape of melting snow. Gone were the pleasant barbs we’d exchanged that morning, or the cryptic jokes Martin and Grant had shared the night before. Jerry pouted on the couch, nursing his wounded pride, as if we had failed to fully appreciate the genius of his culinary incompetence. Martin glowered in the easy chair.
Grant seemed satisfied but grim, as if some important decision had finally been settled. And as I was the only one of them experiencing anything resembling a good mood, I couldn’t escape the feeling that somehow it was all my fault.
I sat at the kitchen table and stared out the window, seeing nothing but the pallid glow of the full moon veiled by clouds. There was no wind outside, just a damp chill brooding over the snow-packed summit, as though even the weather had lost all passion. Its fury of the night before expended, it abandoned us to our fate.
Martin turned in early, followed a short moment later by Jerry and then Grant. I stayed at the window for an hour longer, lost in thought, and only once tossing a log onto the fire in a vain attempt to ward off the chill. In the spectral reflection of the window, I stared at my mirrored self, translucent and dark, framed by the fire.
What had I done? What sort of man was I becoming? I was good with the M107. Shooting it felt good. Powerful. I had a natural talent for it, the way some people have a talent for baseball or music.
Except that nobody died from catching a fly ball or composing an opera. Why would God give anyone a talent so contrary to life? Dad always loved to quote Psalm 127 when it came to Martin and me, but until now, I’d never really thought about what it meant. ‘Like arrows in the hands of a warrior are sons born in one’s youth.’ Not arrows in the hands of a hunter, but in the hands of one who intends to kill other men—maybe protecting the homeland, maybe in conquest. But whether in defense or offense the effect was the same.
This was what I was training to do, and evidently, I was rather good at it. I wondered now whether or not I shouldn’t have followed Martin into the military. Maybe I was supposed to be there for him when they were attacked, and lacking my presence, he was injured instead. Like the old poem: for want of a nail the shoe, the horse, the rider, the battle, the war—the kingdom was lost, and all for want of a nail. The butterfly effect in reverse.
Was I born for such a time as that, and had I missed my moment?
On the other hand, I might just as easily been killed in battle, and maybe my continued existence was itself a mistake—a cosmic joke on all my petty ambitions.
Or, and this thought I found more disturbing than all the others, perhaps I was right where I was supposed to be, and my skill was given to me for no other purpose than to destroy an evil in this blessed land before it blossomed into hell.