WhiteShadow's Short Story

Period 2

Russell Beitzel

Mrs. Belden

Honors English 1

15 October 2014

Ambush

It was a bright, cold day in one of northern forests of Russia. The forest was teeming with wildlife. Birds chirped to each other, squirrels barked, and small woodland creatures ran through the bushes. The sun made the snow on the ground gleam like diamonds. There was not a cloud in the sky. One could say it was a perfect day. The five soldiers walked through the snow slowly, eyes peeled. The commander of the squad, Tony, was in the lead followed by Alexander the Great (known to the men as A.T.G.). Tony was a tall, rigid looking man and, if you looked into his eyes, you would know he has seen a lot of death. A.T.G. was also tall but had wide shoulders and looked like he could carry a tank with his weak hand. After A.T.G. came Nye, the tech wizard and communications specialist. Nye looked like a typical nerd whose mom wanted him out of the house so he decided to join the army. Tony, A.T.G, and Nye were walking single file but the last two soldiers, Mark and Chris, were side by side at the back of the group. Mark and Chris were standard issue soldiers with basic boot camp training and no combat experience. They continued on, slowly, but surely.

        “Command just radioed in and said the munitions base is about a mile straight ahead,” reported Nye.

        “Thanks Nye.” Tony replied. “Eyes peeled men, we are in enemy territory.”

The group trudged on through the snow which was inconvenient because it made them cold, wet, and very angry at command for sending them out on this mission.

        “I can’t believe just four months ago I was posted at base in California. I guarded throughout the week and surfed on the weekends. Life was perfect until the Russians just had to seem tough and invade the U.S.” Mark muttered to Chris. Chris was fiddling with his gun and replied,

“I know man. This does suck. I hate these new guns the army came out with. They don’t fit in my hand right. They shoot slower and they are less accurate. What a gun!” Chris replied sarcastically.

Tony stopped them just before a clearing in the forest. He signaled them to spread out along the tree line. The clearing was big and in the center was a large, cement building. It was one story tall, covered in snow, and very dreary looking. It looked like no one had been there in a while. Tony thought to himself, “I wonder where the guards are. Maybe this place is abandoned and it is just a storage place. Even so, there should still be guards.” He signaled to Nye to radio in to command. Nye was muttering something about how glad he was that the U.S. started using radio signals that are not hackable anymore. Tony signaled for Mark and Chris to start scouting around the base.

        “Nye, go follow them and take the C6I. Make sure they don’t kill themselves with it,” Tony said quietly.

C6I are the new and improved version of C4. C6I can be exploded in two ways. One way is to pull a trigger which sets off an electrical charge. The second is to shoot it or have something impact it hard enough to set it off. The second is safer because you can do it at longer distances.

“I don’t need all of it, take half,” Nye replied, giving half of the explosives to the commander.

Tony watched them walk into the clearing. They were cautious, looking around to make sure there were no enemies anywhere. Suddenly there was a lot of shouting in Russian and the air was immediately filled with the all too familiar metallic sound of the new Russian K 50’s.

The bullets were rain in a storm, leaving nothing untouched of their destruction. Chris pulled up the gun and put his finger on the trigger, or so he thought. He realized too late that he was putting his finger where the trigger on his old gun was, not his new one. Tony watched Chris lurch violently to the ground as blood sprayed everywhere. As Chris fell, Mark and Nye jumped for cover. A.T.G. reached for his huge chain gun but Tony stopped him.

        “They may not have noticed us,” he whispered violently.

A.T.G grunted and put it away. Tony looked back to the ambush scene and just caught Mark getting lit up with about 20 bullets before crumpling to the ground in a pool of white and crimson. Nye looked to the commander with horrified eyes that foretold his fate. One of the Russian bullets hit the C6I on Nye’s back, and Tony looked away as Nye was blown to pieces. The bullet rain stopped for a second, there was a Russian command, and the trees around Tony were instantly torn apart by a new volley of destruction. He ran as fast as he could, and with a split second decision, decided to circle back to the munitions base. Knowing that A.T.G was following him, he didn’t need to look back. The sound of the guns was fading as the Russians started running after them. Tree limbs whipped his face and bushes cut his legs as he ran for his life. He turned around just long enough to signal A.T.G. to run to the tree line and hide for a second to form a plan.

“Cover me while I run back to the munitions base and put the C6I on it,” Tony said. His heart was racing. Of all the dangerous military assignments he had done, this was the worst. A.T.G. grunted as he hefted his gun up. Tony ran into the clearing, while A.T.G. followed him and returned fire with his own rain of destruction. He didn’t look back, knowing it would be his death. While running, he took the C6I out of his pack and readied it in his hand. He was almost at the munitions base and he thought about how in a stressful situation like this, you tend to notice a lot of small details. He saw a tree behind the munitions base as he was running and it looked like it was crying for him, knowing he was going to die.

He reached the base, turning to see if A.T.G. was still alive. Indeed he was, mowing down rows of Russian soldiers. He was a tank. Bullets were hitting him and he didn’t seem to care. He knew he had to defend commander, so he did. Hearing the shouts of the Russians getting closer, Tony turned to the wall of the base, planting C6I as fast as he could. Finally, the deed was done. With the explosives in place, he looked one last time at A.T.G, seeing him fall to one knee. It was like watching the fall of a god, slow and glorious. It hurt him knowing he could do nothing to save him. Finally, the bullets overwhelmed A.T.G, and he fell to the ground. Tony saw his chest for a split second, and had to look away. He barely had a chest after that. His insides were not really inside anymore. What was left of him was riddled with bullet holes. Tony turned to run, but there was a gun in his face. He looked up to see a very angry looking Russian man.

“You were a fool to come here American. Now, I will end your life, but not before you tell me how you found this place,” He said in a thick Russian accent.

“Not until my job is done,” Tony said with a smile as he pulled out the trigger for the C6I. The Russian soldier's eyes widened as realization hit. The man had a job to do, and he was going to do it.