Chapter 11

“Fuck!” the man screamed.

Noah went for the pistol and struggled with the man to control it.

The two men that held me were distracted by it. Distracted just for a moment, but it was enough of a moment.

They weakened their grip on my arms. The pistol grip of an assault rifle strung to one of their chests came within my reach. I wrested my wrist free and grabbed the rifle’s pistol grip. My thumb automatically found the safety and clicked it to the ‘fire’ position. I squeezed the trigger several times, unleashing several 7.62-millimeter rounds point-blank into the other man’s chest with lightning flashes. He collapsed atop me. His last breath was a long blood-saturated gurgle. The acrid smell of gun powder filled my nose.

I then pointed the gun upwards into the remaining man’s jaw and watched his eyes widen in horror before I pulled the trigger. His blood splattered across my face.

The rifle was still attached with a harness now laying lifeless atop me, so I couldn’t aim it at Regan. But I thought at once of the shotgun lying on the ground. Regan had the same thought. We both lunged for it at the same time and wrestled for it. But he was much stronger than me. He easily yanked the shotgun from my hand and kicked me back to the floor. He stood over me, breathing hard. He pressed the barrels of the shotgun harshly into my breast, right over my heart. Then that smile again. And a wag of his finger.

“Faye, Faye, Faye,” he said through his clenched, sadistic smile.

“Did you think you could pull a fast one over me?”

His voice turned into a rabid snarl, his eyes into firestorm.

“Did you forget who the FUCK I am?”

He drove the shotgun harder into my chest. The metal tips of the barrels cut into my skin. He cocked the hammer on the shotgun. An unnecessary act as he could have just pulled the trigger. But he wanted to drive a point home. He was always one for flair.

“Of course, you did. Just like you forgot Eli. Just like you forgot the very thing that wins wars. You forgot fear.”

He chuckled, then continued, “To forget is a betrayal. As such, I cannot let you see the end of this war. So long, Faye.”

“Hey, asshole! Did you forget about me?”

Regan and I turned to the source of the voice. It was Noah. Pistol snug in his hands aimed directly at Regan. At his feet was the man that he had struggled with earlier, motionless.

Regan growled. He pulled the shotgun away from my chest and swung the barrels towards Noah. An ill-conceived idea. Noah was quicker. He shot before the shotgun could come around. The pistol kicked up. He recovered and shot again. Regan buckled and stumbled backward as the shots found their marks. The first on his shoulder, the second right below the center of his collarbone.

Regan fell to his knees. His mouth gaped. He craned his neck to watch in shock as blood spread on his shirt and finally rolled his eyes upward into the back of his head.

When he was sure the deed was done, and Regan was dead, Noah let the pistol fall from his hands, came running to me, collapsed beside me, and embraced me tightly. I held him to me. Kissed him thankfully on the cheek, then looked him over to see if he was alright. There was blood on him, but it wasn’t his blood.

We cut Nephele down. I removed the handkerchief from her mouth. Without saying a word, she wrapped her arms around us.

“Are either of you hurt?”

Noah was unresponsive. He was in shock.

I answered in a shaking voice, “No. Not hurt.”

She had on her leather flight jacket. She took it off and put it around my shoulders

“Neph. My family ranch in the countryside. Take him there. He knows where it is.”

She nodded and responded, “you’re coming too.”

“Your life is in danger, Faye.”

“I’m staying. Please, just take him.”

“Give me one good reason why I should let you stay.”

I could only think of one.

Nephele’s face twisted in confusion.

She grabbed my wrist and pulled me. But I wouldn’t budge. She didn’t know what this bar meant to me. I wasn’t ready to see it go.

“Shit,” she muttered. “Fine. I’ll deal with you when I get back. I’ll take Noah. Call the MPs, Faye. Tell them everything. They’ll believe you.”

She left, dragging Noah by the hand with her. Noah looked back at me through the door with teary eyes. I could see in those eyes the look of someone coming to the realization that he had killed. My car rumbled to life. Taillights flashed on and painted the garage in a dim red glow. Tires screeched. The car took off and disappeared, leaving me in silent darkness along with four dead men that were once Black Roses.

I called the military police, as Nephele suggested. They came promptly, and their immediate reaction to seeing my bloodied, shaved head (I didn’t have time to wash the blood) was compassion. They behaved with discipline and poise, considering the high rate of speed with which their occupation of this city unraveled. They called an ambulance. They treated me in the back of it. They gave me tiny stitches above my right ear where I was cut by the clipper. They asked me questions from a form that was already prepped. Other women had been punished the same way by the Black Roses for ‘unscrupulous’ relations with the occupiers. When they were done with the interview, and the medics cleaned my wounds, they asked me if I needed to see a counselor or a chaplain. I refused it. Instead, I told them what happened that I didn’t have time to explain. I told them everything. I showed them the bodies. It didn’t shock them. They didn’t set up a crime scene. They didn’t arrest me. I suppose there wouldn’t be time for any of that on the eve of their impending evacuation. They took the bodies. They took the guns. They never questioned my story or even charged me with a crime. They only asked that I be available for any further questioning, which was more a judicial formality than an actual request. This would be the last time I would see them. They knew it, and I knew it.

I stayed up the rest of the night. There was no way I was ever going to sleep after all that had happened. For a while, I sat quietly at the bar counter. But I couldn’t stand the silence, so I went to the beach out front and sat there, where at least I had the crashing waves to drown the nervous noises in my head.

Nephele came as the sun rose. She found me and sat next to me.

“Sorry, it took so long. Took a while for us to figure out how to turn the gas on in the house,” she said.

“We had to ask the neighbors. He’s safe now. He’s comfortable.”

She wrapped an arm around me. Her embrace warmed me more than she could ever know.

“I’m sorry,” I said. “I’m sorry for what Regan did to you. I’m sorry for what I did to you. I’m sorry for everything.”

I nuzzled in closer to her. Close, so that I could feel her heartbeat. We sat like that and watched the sunrise. It was cold, and she shivered, so I draped her leather jacket around us. It wasn’t enough to stave off the cold completely, but it was something. I didn’t mind the cold all that much anyways. Something was revitalizing about it.

“I’m sorry, too,” Nephele said.

“About Eli. I know he meant a lot to you. I know you loved him, and –“

She took a deep breath and continued,

“I know that you think I took him from you. And you’re probably right. I might have been the one.”

Her eyes were filled with tears. She blinked them away and wiped them with a hand.

At first, I could not tell if she cried because of any remorse for her actions, or because everything that has happened to her recently was crashing onto her like a tidal wave. But I soon saw clearly that it was more the latter, but that also, it wasn’t just the recent tragedies that affected her. There were many deaths in her life, and, whether she was to blame or not, she bore each one like a cardinal sin for which penance, or remorse, no matter how deeply felt, would ever absolve.

“It’s not your fault,” I muttered.

My voice faltered as I said those words. Faltered because as I was saying them, I realized that these were not some empty words to try to make her feel better, but words I knew in my heart to be true. Words that came naturally. Words that were not lies. They were a proclamation to me as well as to her that she was not the Widowmaker. That, like me, she was only a bird in a storm, and she was tired of flying.

She did not look like she believed me. So, I added,

“But if it were, you’re forgiven.”

She shot me a weak smile, then took out a cigarette from her pack and lit it.

“I had no idea you smoked,” I said.

“I don’t. Noah gave me the pack.”

She offered one to me. I took it.

“I didn’t know Noah smoked,” I said.

She smiled. I put the cigarette between my lips and craned my neck for the light.

“Guess that’s something you’ll have to chat with him about,” she replied.

We watched the sun climb out of the water, turning the pink sky golden. The water shimmered with its light.

“Doesn’t look too good,” she said.

“What? My new hairstyle?”

“It looks good for some people.”

“I guess you’re right. Not for me. We’re leaving today. I have to take the squadron back to Donavia.”

“You’re not going to fight?”

“No. Apparently, we’re too valuable to fight. We’re heading back to defend Donavian air space instead.”

“I see. How long do you think this war will last?”

Nephele shrugged. “Fuck if I know.”

“I heard there’s supposed to be a peace talk once the Allies take Estea back.”

Nephele gave me a funny look.

“Yeah. Why wouldn’t I?”

“Do you know how to do anything besides fight?”

“I know how to play the piano.”

“But you’ll miss the war.”

“Maybe. But I’ll miss you, for sure.”

“I hope you don’t. I’ve been fucking terrible to you.”

“I’ll still miss you.”

She took a long drag on her cigarette, then looked me in the eyes, showing off their wonderful hazel colors in this morning light. Her hand with the cigarette in it curled around the back of my head and pulled my face towards hers. With our lips a breath apart, she whispered,

“I just can’t get over kissing you.”

Then we kissed again. We kissed like it was the last time. More than likely, it was.

A van soon came by, and the driver shouted for her to come with him. The duty officer needed her urgently. She said only a curt goodbye to me, perhaps hoping it would not be the last goodbye. I went back to the bar and turned on the news. The invasion was already over. Images of it flashed on the news.

Footage of hundreds of cruise missiles flying off ships on the distant horizon, drawing white-hot streaks as they left, shrieking into the black sky like claws. Footage of them hitting their targets. The cruise missiles targeted the coast’s anti-aircraft and surface radar sites and control centers. The attack drew minimal casualties — they sent out warning messages an hour before the attack to give the radar and SAM operators time to evacuate.

Then the fighter bombers from the aircraft carriers came in. Sortie after sortie to soften the beachhead. Glowing tracers filled the sky impossibly. Brilliant, explosive fireballs on the ground flashed with lightning quickness, indicating when bunker busters met their targets.

After the bunker busters, the sun’s light shone over the horizon, revealing a beach filled with smoking debris. The hovercrafts and the amphibious vehicles came next, firing their heavy cannons and grenades at the beach defenses, lobbing white smokescreens before crawling up onto the sand. Tracer rounds responded from the machine gun nests that survived the barrage. Their response was in vain. They should have known it was in vain, yet they fought anyway. There were always some who did.

The Allied marines came out of the vehicles. They marched up the beachhead. The Donavian soldiers that manned the machine guns retreated through the salt marshes on the other side of the sand bar and into the forest. There was a small but important port city near the invasion point. The Donavian Information Minister swore it would be protected at all costs, and the Allies would be crushed. Either that was a lie, or the Donavian generals revolted. The troops retreated en masse on the superhighway that connected that side of the island, the south side, to the north. Like a long dark green python, the convoy of armored personnel carriers, supply trucks, and tanks stretched into the distance. Two hundred thousand troops that had been staged to defend the southern coast in full retreat, capitulating against a vastly superior force. They were escaping to Alexandria, where they hoped to be able to catch a troop transport across the strait back home.

But the Allies weren’t going to let that happen.

A squadron of attack jets, called ‘tank killers’ by the reporter, split off, one section to attack the tail end of the convoy, and the other raced along the length of the convoy to attack the front. They dropped cluster bombs, destroying large vehicles to block the highway, grinding the convoy to a halt, and trapping the convoy on the highway. Confusion and fear among the troops in the middle, who didn’t know what was happening.