I could hear the bombs dropping in the distance.
No one was ready for this war even though it seemed everyone wanted it. The day the war was announced people filled the streets hooting and hollering, all saying that they would win and it would be over by Christmas. Young boys to old men all enlisted for the cause leaving their mothers and daughters home alone to tend to the farms and shops and deal with the horror of not knowing what had happened to loved ones long gone.
The war wasn’t just on the front. While the boys died the girls toiled. Communities became smaller and soon even girls were needed at the front. Then the front slowly disappeared. The war continued on, the fighting never ended but who fought who and for what seemed nothing but distant memories to most.
With the deaths and the losses came the orphans and The Lost. North of my village where was miles upon miles of woods, the Forgotten forest. When the soldiers came what was left of the village hid in the woods. Soon others would join us, and after a while it seems the war moved on and forgot about us. But without food or water we struggled. Some left, some stayed. Others, us, we decided to fight.
In a world torn apart by war fighting simply seemed to be the easiest thing to do. We could have scrounged around the broken yards and rotting fields for foods like others, but our homes, our farmland, our crops were no good. So, we stole from the soldiers coming through the woods. Simple things at first, some rations here, a bit of Drast* there, but in the end, we knew we needed more than just food and drink. The woods might be vast but we couldn’t run and hide forever. So, we started stealing guns and ammo. We stole bombs and grenades, even a AT gun, though with only three rounds it’s not something we used to often. We called ourselves the Lost and started our own war. A war I fight, that we all fight, for survival.
Yet today we were going to do something even I couldn’t believe. We were going to step out of the shadows and go beyond surviving. Tonight, we were going to steal a tank.
“Ari, are you ready to go” A boy behind me asked. His name was Tomas. He was fairly new to the lost, like many of us his parents died in the bombings. He wasn’t a good soldier, but he tried.
“Yes, I’ll be there in a bit.”
Operation Metal we nicknamed it, even though it wasn’t truly any sort of organized operation. Four of us where going to go down into a nearby encampment, sneak past the guards and steal a tank, simple as that. Though we knew it wasn’t going to be any sort of simple, and getting away with the tank is where things are going to go wrong.
I grabbed my gun, it was a SMR. A bolt action rifle, it had good range and was shorter than most standard issue rifles meaning it was easier for me to handle. It was a decent gun and it became like a friend to me.
Climbing down the tree from my post. I caught up with the other three. Tomas was going, he carried ammo and some grenades. He was our support because he couldn’t hit shit with his gun. Along with him and me another girl was going, I didn’t know her name but I’ve seen her around the camp before. She generally was on morning shifts. Finally, there was Georg, he was the head of this operation, he was a smart kid, smarter than most, but he definitely lacked any sort of leadership skills.
It was a sneak in drive out kind of deal. The camp was out posted at the edge of the woods with three tanks heavily guarded sat in the rear near the road. One tank though, our targeted tank had only one guard. A young woman with red hair. It seemed strange that this tank would be so far away from the other tanks and so close to the woods. It certainly didn’t look like the other tanks but it had tracks and a gun and that’s what mattered most right now.
So evidently our rag tag team decided to go with the low hanging fruit and steal the easiest to steal tank. Tomas and Nameless girl where going to provide over watch, staying higher up the hill we scoped the outpost on. While me and Georg went in. It was a full moon but the clouds hid any light that would help us see, or the guards see us, so we had to stay low and move slow, careful to step on a twig or crunch some leaves underfoot.
Georg put out a hand and we stopped. A man had come from a nearby tent his wool coat riddled with holes and his hair dirty and disheveled. He wasn’t wearing any pants, just polka-dotted red underwear in the cold night. He came within 10 meters of us, gave a grunt, and started pissing. It seemed like ages that we waited there in the dirt and underbrush listening to his awkward stream of unwanted liquids. Holding our breath in fear of being heard. But soon the moment passed and the man let out a yawn and slumbered back into his tent.
We waited a moment longer before moving again, the tank wasn’t far off now, and my heart was starting to race. The girl seemed to have left, or at least we no longer saw her around. So, we assumed it was safe.
My heart gave a jump as a wood owl howled from somewhere deep in the woods, the nearby fires of the encampment glowed orange and game a warm cackle, and the mumbled voices soldiers talking and laughing sounded in the distance.
But it seemed all those sounds feel dead silent the moment I laid my finger upon the cold heartless steel of the tank before us. And in my chest my heart dropped.
A flash and a crack from the hill where Tomas and the girl lay posted only confirmed the fear I began to feel. Men started yelling and grabbing their guns, shooting at the hill, some running by us, yet we lay hidden in the shadow of the metal beast beside us.
I had not noticed that Georg had climbed to the top of the tank and was getting in at first, but when I heard the latch shut I was brought back down to face the reality of the mission. I clambered onto the back of the tank as it started to rumble a sharp and repetitive growling starting and ending, starting and ending. Something was wrong inside the tank.
Three men and the girl that stood guard at the tank started heading our way, my eyes meeting with the anger burning within the eyes of the red-haired girl and for a moment I seized up. I could not move. The tank groaned and growled again then stopped. I hit the body of the tank hoping to warn Georg inside of the men approaching, but a bullet ricocheted nearby. And another thwapped into the dirt beside the tank.
With as much strength as I could muster I smacked the side of the tank before jumping off and darting for the trees behind us. As I ran I looked back and saw Georg struggling to get out from the tank when a bullet ripped through his shirt and his body slumped over the side. Closing my eyes, I ran. The mission had failed and anger and fear welled up inside me until my foot caught on something on the ground and I fell face first into the dirt. I had seen our comrades die before. I had seen my family and friends slaughtered but I had never feared anyone as much as I feared that red haired girl in that moment.
Branches rustled behind me and twigs snapped under the heavy booted of soldiers. I turned to face them my gun at the ready. I saw the glimmer of a helmet and I took the shot, a metallic ring sounded and I could hear a body falling into the ground. Several shots cracked back at me, tearing up the trees around me as I cowered behind a rotting log, I shot once, twice. The shooting stopped and I wondered if I had hit them.
I worked the bolt reloading the next round but my gun jammed. While I pried out the jammed bullet casing I hear a click behind me.
“Put down the gun.” Ordered a female voice.
I had no choice.
I lay down my gun before me and turned, looking into the eyes of a red-haired girl and the barrel of a revolver.
*Drast is an alcoholic beverage that is fairly easy to make. It is made from water and a plant that grows in abundance in the Forgotten Forest. The plant looks similar to a potato but grows above ground in moist swampy regions.
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