Child, Lee – The Enemy

their guns.

I got to my feet. Stood up straight. Wiped dust out of my eyes.

Stepped over to the iron door. Saw the bright crater my gun had

made. I knew Marshall had to be either standing in the south

window looking for me running or standing in the west window

looking for me dead behind the wreckage. I knew he was tall

and I knew he was right-handed. I fixed an abstract target in my

mind. Moved my left hand and put it on the door knob. Waited.

The next shells were fired so close that I heard boom whump

boom whump with no pause in between. I pulled the door and

stepped inside. Marshall was right there in front of me. He

was facing away, looking south, framed by the brightness of

the window. I aimed at his right shoulder blade and pulled the

trigger and a shell took the roof off the hut. The room was

instantly full of dust and I was hit by falling beams and

corrugated sheets and stung by fragments of flying concrete. I

went down on my knees. Then I collapsed on my front. I was

pinned. I couldn’t see Marshall. I heaved myself back up on my

knees and flailed my arms to fight off the debris. The dust was

sucking upward in a ragged spiral and I could see bright blue

sky above me. I could hear tank tracks all around me. Then I heard another boom whump and the front corner of the hut blew

away. It was there, and then it wasn’t. It was solid, and then it

was a spray of grey dust coming towards me at the speed of

sound. A gale of dusty air whipped after it and knocked me off

my feet again.

386

I struggled back up and crawled forward. Just butted my way

through fallen beams and lumps of broken concrete. I threw

twisted sheets of roofing iron aside. I was like a plough. Like a

bulldozer, grinding forward, piling debris to the left and right of

me. There was too much dust to see anything except the

sunlight. It was right there in front of me. Brightness ahead,

darkness behind. I kept on going.

I found the Mag-10. Its barrel was crushed. I threw it aside

and ploughed on. Found Marshall on the floor. He wasn’t

moving. I pulled stuff off him and grabbed his collar and hauled

him up into a sitting position. Dragged him forward until I came

to the front wall. I put my back against it and slid upright until I

felt the window aperture. I was choking and spitting dust. It was

in my eyes. I dragged him upward and hauled him over the

window sill and dumped him out. Then I fell out after him. Got

up on my hands and knees and grabbed his collar again and

dragged him away. Outside the hut the dust was clearing.

I could see tanks, maybe three hundred yards to the left

and right of us. Lots of tanks. Hot metal in the harsh sunlight.

They had outflanked us. They were holding in a perfect circle,

engines idling, guns flat, aiming over open sights. I heard boom

whump again and saw bright muzzle flash from one of them and

saw it pitch backward from the recoil. I saw its shell pass right

over us. I saw it in the air. Heard it break the sound barrier with

a crack like a neck snapping. Heard it smash into the remains

of the hut. Felt more dust and concrete shower down on my

back. I went down on my face and lay still, trapped in no man’s

land.

Then another tank fired. I saw it jerk backward from the

recoil. Seventy tons, smashed back so hard its front end came

right up in the air. Its shell screamed overhead. I started

moving again. I dragged Marshall behind me and crawled

through the dirt like I was swimming. I had no idea what he

had said on the radio. No idea what his orders had been. He

had to have told them he was moving out. Maybe he had told

them to disregard the Humvees. Maybe that explained their say

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