Jonathan Maberry - SNAFU - An Anthology of Military Horror

Paulson pulled fresh cartridges from a pouch and pushed them into his rifle. “They’re waiting for us to crack, which you’re doing.”

Webster’s tongue stopped flapping, but his cheeks started twitching.

“They can’t get to us without crossing open ground,” Paulson reminded him. “If there were enough to take us in a stand-up fight, they would have charged already. Understand?”

Webster nodded, controlling his nerves with a shaky breath.

“I want you up top,” Paulson said. “ Gary Owen , right?”

A rueful smirk crossed Webster’s features at the mention of the cavalry’s anthem. “We are the boys who take delight, in smashing limerick lamps at night, and through the streets like sportsters fight, tearing all before us,” Webster recited a verse. He rose to his feet and headed for the summit in a crouch. “Just don’t leave without me…”

Grant admired Paulson’s tact even as he resented Paulson for usurping his command. Now was not the time to seek retribution, however. To everything there was a season, and Grant could practice tact, as well. “Why haven’t the Indians shot at us? You think they don’t have guns?”

“They all have guns,” Paulson said. His jaw muscles tightened and released. “We take their hunting grounds, and the Indian Bureau gives them guns so they can better hunt the land they got left. Then we take that land, too, and they kill us with the guns we gave them.”

“You sound like a sympathizer.”

Paulson shook his head. “The Indians get cheated on what they’re promised, and traders and political hacks make profits. Accepting the fact they fight back isn’t sympathy. It’s recognizing human nature.”

“Some say Indians aren’t human.”

“Hell,” Paulson scoffed. “A man’s a man.”

Above, Webster continued to sing Gary Owen to himself.

“Instead of spa, we’ll drink brown ale, and pay the reckoning on the nail, no man for debt shall go to jail—”

The song broke off into a scream.

“Webster!” Paulson scrambled for the rock formation’s summit.

Grant didn’t want to expose himself, but if the Indians were up top, he was as good as dead. Fighting offered the best chance to survive whether he liked it or not. He followed Paulson. Webster’s screams, meanwhile, took on an odd dwindling quality. Grant started up the cleft, pebbles from Paulson’s assent bouncing off his hat. He kept his finger off his rifle’s trigger so he didn’t accidentally shoot himself. That wouldn’t improve his odds any. Grant reached the summit at Paulson’s heels.

The top of the rock formation stood deserted.

Webster may as well have disappeared into thin air.

“Where the hell is he?” Incredulous, Grant rushed to the edge of the rock formation and peeked over the side. He had the sudden impression of an Indian lurking below with an arrow notched and pointed straight up, ready to perforate his skull from chin to crown.

“Anything?” Paulson asked.

“Nothing,” Grant replied. The imagined Indian was gone, a mirage born of anxiety. Only bits of Jack lay below, now black with flies. Grant turned to Paulson. “How could they have gotten up these walls? They’re sheer. And how’d they get Webster down so fast?”

Paulson’s face creased in thought, drawing his mouth into a grimace. “I don’t know, but it’ll be dark soon. We stay up here, back-to-back.”

The sun set; the stain of night spread across the sky, and a quarter moon rose to hold sway over all. The prairie took on an eldritch cast. It might have been a sea and the rock formation an island. Stars glittered indifferently overhead. Despite the heat of the day, the night took on a surprising chill that pushed comfort just beyond reach. The men knew cold. On some winter campaigns, they’d awake frozen to the ground. That didn’t make this night any more bearable, however. Cold always had teeth.

Grant and Paulson sat cross-legged, wrapped in Grant’s blanket. They held their rifles across their knees and their pistols in their hands. Grant wondered if the Indians would start lobbing arrows at them, but such a thing did not occur. They saw nothing moving in the dim moonlight, and the only sound was the wind.

Grant thought about Jack’s remains. Had Breckenridge and Webster been reduced to the same? One minute men, the next minute parts…

Grant grew thirstier and regretted finishing his canteen earlier that day. Remembering the sensation of gulping it empty increased his craving. One wasn’t supposed to gulp water, of course. A cavalry health pamphlet recommended swishing and spitting only. Apparently, one could die from drinking too much on the trail. Grant didn’t believe it, however. He had seen men follow that advice, taking along only a little water to stave off temptation, and ending up opening veins in their own arms to wet parched lips. Grant wasn’t to that point yet, but the desire to go down to the horses and grab a canteen was maddening. Such a thing would be foolhardy, yet he couldn’t stop thinking about that itch in the back of his throat. He tried to concentrate on something else, but the only other thing that filled his thoughts was finding Jack.

“If the afterlife’s real,” Grant asked, trying to keep his tone light. “You think Jack went into it cut up?”

“People have perfect bodies in heaven,” Paulson said. “But even if people did go to heaven maimed, that’s still better than hell.”

Granted shrugged. “I don’t believe in heaven or hell. I believe this is all there is, so you better get while you can.”

“There’s a Bible verse for that outlook. ‘What does it profit a man if he gains the world and loses his soul?’”

Grant waved a dismissive hand.

“You can be wrong a long time, and God will give you chances to wise up,” Paulson said. “It’s not smart to let those chances run out.”

“Neither is believing in things that aren’t real—”

“Quiet!” Paulson cut Grant off. “You hear that?”

Before Grant could respond, Paulson crawled to the edge of the rock formation. Suddenly sweating, Grant followed with his heart thudding in his ears. If he believed in anything, he might have prayed to keep hearing it thud. He crept up beside Paulson and looked out into the murk. Now, stealthy sound reached his ears as a shape moved through the taller grass thirty yards away. Neither Grant nor Paulson could make out details, but the shape appeared to be of human height.

Paulson counted to three, and flames flashed from their Spencers. The shape collapsed as gun blasts dwindled to echoes.

“We got him!” Grant exclaimed.

An ungodly cry split the night, and the noise raised the hair on the back of Grant’s neck. He recognized the sound but couldn’t immediately place it. Surely, it was too inhuman to come from a man, and then Grant realized what the cry was and why it was familiar. Back at Fort Fetterman, two soldiers decided to have a horse race the month before. They took off outside the camp in a burst of hoof beats. A short distance later, one of the horses stepped in a gopher hole and broke its leg…

“It’s Jack’s horse!” Paulson beat Grant to the realization. The animal must have continued to plod along after the rest of them took off for the rock formation. It took all day to cover the distance, perhaps stopping to graze, but now it had finally caught up to them.

The horse continued to scream.

“Damn it!” Grant cursed. He put his rifle back to his shoulder and could just make out the patch of thrashing grass in the moonlight. He emptied the rest of his rounds into the area, and the horse fell silent.

Both men dozed off sometime after the incident with Jack’s mount.