Jeff Brackett - Half Past Midnight

Cheers erupted again, and I joined them unabashedly. Pumping my fist in the air, I whooped and yelled. As I turned about to share the glory of the moment with those around me, I froze. Staggering toward me, tears streaming down her face, Debra came to my arms.

“The second explosion…”

The last several minutes flew through my head as I tried to make sense of what she had said. Larry and Han on the bridge, paintball guns, playing dead, Larry’s attack with the tank cannon, Amber rushing to help…

…the second explosion…

I gasped. “Amber?”

Her sobbing was the only answer.

The Battle of the Bridge was the beginning of a three-month war that forced us to take to the forest, leaving even the tentative sanctuary of the fertilizer factory behind. Larry had shown us all too well just how fragile its protection was. By day, he held the town and much of the surrounding forest. Using Humvees and the remaining two tanks, his men constantly patrolled the perimeter and kept us in hiding. After dark though, we were able to sneak in and do our damage under night’s black cloak.

Night raids became the mainstay of our survival. Though Larry technically held the town, it was patently impossible for his men to guard every alley and side street in Rejas from the people who knew them best. We would sneak in at night using game trails and drainage ditches to scavenge the many stashes of supplies people had hidden in their homes before the USR amp;D takeover.

While we were in town, it just wouldn’t have been polite to leave without dropping off some type of thank you gift for the boys in uniform. Usually it was something simple; a nail-tipped arrow in the tire of a Humvee was a favorite or, when we were able to get close enough, rice in the fuel tanks. Some of the boys got more creative, though.

Mark Roesch got a group together and built a ten-foot slingshot out of surgical tubing. It took seven people to use it properly with two people bracing either end, two pulling back the pouch, and one loader. The giant slingshot could launch a Molotov cocktail into a group of vehicles or buildings from nearly half a mile away.

Not to be outdone, Fred Williams and Mike Tanner, who had built custom irrigation systems before the turn of the century, designed the craziest-looking contraption I had ever seen. About four feet long, it consisted of three pieces of PVC pipe strapped together like a triple-barrel shotgun. On the front, a six-inch metal scale, mounted vertically, served as a gun sight. The back end consisted of an intricate maze of valves, air nozzles, and pressure gauges connected by a hose to what appeared to be an old scuba tank.

When they first brought it out to demonstrate, I was sharing a meal with my family-garden snails boiled in lard, wild onions, and a few other local herbs. The food wasn’t appealing at first, but was actually pretty tasty when you got past the thought of what you were eating. Williams and Tanner approached the camp, heading for the mayor’s lean-to. A crowd of curious onlookers followed, as if they just couldn’t wait to see what the crazy contraption strapped to Williams’ back was.

Megan and Zachary raced to join the crowd, leaving Debra and me to catch up. We shouldered our way through the crowd in time to hear Jim put voice to what the rest of us were thinking. “What the hell is that thing?”

“Air cannon.” Williams was a man of few words and, rather than verbal elaboration, he simply pointed his chin at a tree across the creek, some hundred yards downstream. “Watch.”

He and Tanner conferred for a few seconds while the crowd milled about and speculated on what was about to happen. Debra and I took advantage of everyone’s restlessness to shoulder our way over to Jim’s side.

Tanner, much more outgoing than his partner, warned, “Better stand back. We’ve only tested this thing two or three times, and it might just blow.” This caused some quick shuffling as folks took him at his word and gave the two men more room.

Tanner pulled three round glass jars filled with water from a satchel and dropped one in each barrel. “Normally, we’ll be using Molotov cocktails or open cups of shrapnel instead of water. Right now, though, I don’t think we need to set the forest on fire.”

Jim appeared to be as much in the dark as the rest of us, but must have felt the need to make some kind of semi-intelligent response. “Um, yeah.”

Tanner stepped behind Williams and tapped him once on the head. Williams had already sighted his target and pushed the button mounted by his right hand.

Whoomp !

We all watched as the first jar tumbled through the air to land about twenty feet in front of the indicated target. It shattered on impact and sprayed water in about a ten-foot radius.

Tanner grinned. “Just remember, if that had been a cocktail, everywhere you saw water splash would be burning right now.” Then he closed one valve, opened another, sighted over Williams’ shoulder, tugged down on the back end of the air cannon, and tapped him on the head once more.

Whoomp!

Again, a scintillating jar tumbled through the air; this time, it landed within three feet of the target, saturating it with water.

Another valve adjusted, another tap, another whoomp , and another jar broke within feet of the one before it. The tree was soaking wet from the length of a football field away.

A cheer went up from the crowd, and they began to surge forward before Tanner raised his hand to stop them. “Wait a second! We have one more thing this bucket of bolts can do. Stay back for a minute more.” That started a round of muttering.

He reached back into the battered duffel and pulled out three handkerchief-wrapped bundles. Dropping one into each of the barrels, he pointed to a small group of trees just across the creek.

Tap. Whoomp !

Tap. Whoomp !

Tap. Whoomp !

Three handkerchiefs fluttered to the ground amidst mutters from the crowd. From where I stood, I couldn’t see that there had been any effect on the trees. Williams, evidently confident of success, had already set the air cannon on the ground and begun walking over to where we stood. Tanner just turned and smiled. “Anyone like to go check them?”

Several people waded across the creek to inspect the trees; the mutters quickly turned to excited exclamations. “They’re peppered!” someone yelled. “They’re full of nails and glass!”

Tanner just stood there as the people around him began clapping him on the back. Meanwhile, Williams came over to speak quietly with Jim and me.

“Got enough material to make three more. I need six men that have enough snap to know how to read pressure gauges and route high-pressure air systems. Gotta be willing to work hard and take orders, too.”

Jim waited for him to continue, but Williams just stood there looking at us. “Anything else?” Jim asked.

“Nope.”

Jim turned to the trees that had been filled with shrapnel. “What’s the range of those things?”

“Accurate for cocktails at about a hunnerd and twenty yards. Shrapnel at about a third that.”

The mayor nodded. “Take anyone you need. Tell ‘em it comes from me.”