SNAFU: Hunters

One sprang into a tree above Zakharov, but before it could pounce on him he peppered it with a burst from his PPSh-41. Several branches broke as the ghoul fell heavily to the ground.

The soldiers recovered quickly from their initial surprise and urged their steeds forward. They managed to ride clear of the ambush and then swung around to open a relentless fire from horseback. The pack was quickly eliminated.

Zakharov jumped down and rushed over to his fallen men along with the team’s medic.

Two were already dead. The third, the one missing an arm and the top of his skull, was incredibly, horribly, still alive and conscious. With the usual stoicism of Russian soldiers he did not cry out. But he was beyond aid and there was nothing the medic could do except administer morphine to ease his last moments, cradling him in his arms until he mercifully expired.

Zakharov had a green flare fired to signal that all the ghouls seen had been destroyed. Then he grimly collected the identification booklets of his slain men for safekeeping. The bodies were stripped of weapons and equipment and loose stones were piled over each to erect a crude cairn. The iron-hard permafrost made grave digging a herculean task they had no time for. They paused for a somber moment of silence, then mounted up and rode on, taking the extra horses with them.

Because of the classified nature of these operations the government did not award a campaign medal for participation. Zakharov would not even be allowed to write consolation letters to the families. He could recommend deserving men for posthumous decorations, but the citations would themselves be classified. Relatives would never be told the circumstances of their loved ones’ deaths, only that each had died “fighting gallantly in defense of his beloved Motherland.”

They returned to the original trail. Night descended, the gloom faintly illuminated by the cold gleam of the stars. The temperature dropped still further, down to fifty degrees below zero. The trail was clear enough for the team to continue following it by starlight for several hours before finally stopping to camp.

A sentry was posted and trip wires for flares were strung around the camp perimeter. Everyone would take his turn standing watch while the rest slept. Zakharov determined their location again using a sextant sighting of Polaris.

First priority, as always for mounted troops, was the horses, which were picketed, groomed, checked for injuries, and allowed to graze. Finally a tent was erected and the team sat inside to eat, huddled around the oasis of warmth provided by a little iron field stove.

Zakharov saw to it that his men were taken care of first before wolfing down his own meal of black rye bread, buckwheat porridge, and hard sausage washed down with hot tea. He made a point of refusing officer’s rations and eating the same food as enlisted men. An allotment of vodka was also authorized under regulations, but he strictly forbade it. Back at base the men could drink and carouse as they pleased, but on a mission he needed everyone sober and sharp.

Afterwards they cleaned weapons, oiled them with cold-weather lubricants to keep the mechanisms from freezing, and reloaded magazines. They talked and joked and enjoyed the luxury of a smoke, rolling strong, coarse tobacco in newsprint to make crude cigarettes.

The glint of metal betrayed a little Christian cross one private wore around his neck and kept hidden under his jacket. Zakharov, as usual, pretended not to notice.

He had seen too many good men die needlessly – and far too young – to entertain any belief in God. But like his soldiers he was the son of a peasant and understood their ways – their rough humor, their towering profanity, their taboos and superstitions – and he indulged them whenever possible. He also ignored their occasional grumblings about the regime. Zakharov was a pragmatic Communist. So long as his men fought that was all that mattered.

* * *

Zakharov snapped awake amid the frantic neighing and stomping of the horses. Even as he and the others in the tent fumbled for weapons the harsh, white glow of a trip flare suddenly lit up the camp and two bursts of automatic fire shattered the stillness.

Zakharov darted outside. Kaminsky was on sentry duty, smoke curling from his machine gun’s muzzle.

“Over there,” he said, nodding in the direction. “Two of them. Got both when the flare blinded them.”

The team scrambled to defensive positions around the camp as the flare fizzled out and darkness returned. They waited in tense silence as their night vision recovered. The dark woods seemed fraught with menace, a gibbous moon glowering above. But nothing happened, and at length the horses settled down and became quiet again.

“I don’t think there are any more of them,” said Okhchen.

The team relaxed. Zakharov went over to Kravchenko, who was squatting beside one of the ghoul ash piles, deep in thought.