It was close to 3am, and the heightened sensitivity following Kelly’s HALO jump and night march was finally beginning to wane. In the idleness of the long drive towards town, in the cosiness of the back seat of the BMW, she felt a little tired. Just the adrenaline wearing off, she knew. No reason to let her guard down.
Kelly tapped her fingers against the holster on her belt and stared out the window, although the only thing she could see was road and glints of metal in the headlights, abandoned cars, ruined buildings.
“Slow down, just here,” said Miller. His gaze scanned from left to right.
Kelly leaned forward and said, “Anyone else feel like—”
A blinding flash cut her off, a terrible mind-numbing noise and a force that shook the BMW and shot silver rivers across the windscreen. Dunstan swerved away from the sudden cloud of dust and debris and heavy chunks of road, only to run into a large patch of shrubbery. The car stopped.
“Is everyone okay?” shouted Miller.
“Still in one piece, sir,” said Kelly.
The crackle of a distant assault rifle drew their attention out the left windows. Bullets zeered into the ground and kicked little spires of dust into the beam of the headlights. Kelly pinpointed the muzzle flash, and then another. She drew her sidearm. Her heart was pounding.
“Get to cover—go!” Miller kicked open his door and crawled towards one of the old huts, some kind of site office for the construction zone. Dunstan quickly followed.
The office was in the shape of a c-container, with plenty of windows and a single door. The walls dented with each bullet collision, and the occasional light-streaked hole punched through. Kelly peered through the window. The enemy had the advantage of range and higher ground. She exhaled shakily, and her hands steadied. First priority was to get out of this box.
“How many?” said Miller, as he yanked open one of the windows.
“At least two,” Kelly replied.
Another burst of fire flashed in the darkness, further along the ridge.
“Three,” Kelly corrected.
“Hold your fire. We’ll draw them in.”
It was an odd thing to do, waiting quietly while the enemy bared down upon them, feeling their cage vibrate with every short burst of machinegun fire, surviving on chance. Kelly knew that their assailants had no clear view of her or Miller or Dunstan. No doubt all the enemy could see was the headlights of the BMW and the rough shape of the office painted by moonlight. The enemy were guessing, or trying to keep Kelly pinned. Kelly checked her watch. She had already been crouched on the dirty floor for about ten minutes. The tang of ricocheting bullets rang in her ears and she breathed a heavy sigh.
Then Miller whistled to catch Kelly’s attention. He tossed her a flashbang grenade.
“Wait until they are close,” he said quietly.
Kelly nodded.
The bullets stopped firing, and as quickly as this all started it was quiet again. A dry gust of wind floated through the windows and cooled the perspiration on Kelly’s brow. Kelly listened. Footsteps crunching on gravel. A magazine slipped from a rifle and clattered against the ground. Miller gave another look out the window.
“Now.”
Kelly yanked the pin and lobbed the grenade overhead. She took cover. The flash beamed through the window like a flash of lightning, the bang was deafening even from afar.
“Go.” Miller called.
Kelly was on her feet. She grabbed Dunstan by the shoulder and hurried him out of the office. Dunstan stumbled through the dark like a moth helplessly seeking the beam of the headlights. Kelly turned and the muzzle flash of her pursuers gave her a target. In full sprint she was making enough noise for the enemy to guess where they were. She returned fire but didn’t stop moving, in the hopes that she could force the enemy to take cover, and buy herself a little time.
A bullet sparked off the roof of the BMW. Dunstan dived into the driver’s seat and slammed the door. Kelly rolled over the hood of the car and climbed into the passenger seat, but as she did so she heard that dreaded thud of bullet’s striking flesh. She turned back to see Captain Miller jolt upright, his upper body suddenly seeming too heavy for his legs to carry, and they buckled under the weight. The sidearm slipped from his fingers. He toppled face first into the dirt.
“Captain!” Kelly screamed.
She tried to find any sign of movement, any incentive to get out of that car and go back for him, but his body was still, lifeless.
“Go,” she ordered Dunstan.
“Are you sure?”
“Now, Riley!”
Dunstan put the BMW into reverse, the tires scraped over the hard sand, and then they found the road and took off. Kelly wondered if she too had been shot. The pain she felt was spine-jarring but vague, and it sucked the breath from her lungs. Captain Miller. Gone.
Kelly tried to think that it shouldn’t have happened, but somehow she couldn’t convince herself that it was a dream, try as she might. An attack was unlikely, but also to be expected. They all knew that. And now Captain Miller was dead. The slow minutes dragged on like the silence and the endless stretch of road. The sky faded to a gruesome apricot pink.
Kelly looked at Dunstan; his wrists were shaking as he clutched the steering wheel.
“Pull over here,” she said, quietly.
Kelly hopped out of the car, collected a chocolate bar from her pack and joined Dunstan, who now sat on the bonnet.
“Here.” She offered him the chocolate. He ate it slowly.
If Kelly wasn’t already tired before, she was beyond exhausted now. She rubbed her shoulders and closed her eyes for just a moment, then began to massage her lower back with her knuckles.
“What do we do now?” Dunstan asked. His voice was clear, but a single tear had fallen down his cheek.
Kelly put her hands in her pockets and looked straight ahead, where the road faded over the horizon. “We finish the mission.” She pushed off from the bonnet. “Take as much time as you need.”
She moved to the driver’s seat and waited quietly for Dunstan. Was something wrong with her? She wondered. Where were the tears? The shaking? The panic? She felt like she should scream but she couldn’t. She had witnessed death, more than once already. She’d been trained to be a friend of death. Until now she had believed it was a lie.
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