SNAFU: Survival of the Fittest

He turned his attention to the girl. She had a spare clip in her back pocket, a wad of used chewing gum covered in lint, and a handful of pennies. Luke exchanged his pistol for his brush knife, and cut her shirt into strips. The tearing cloth was like a scream in the silence, and it brought him back to himself. He wrapped a long strip around the knife, and ran the Zippo back and forth over it. The cloth hissed and huffed, but eventually let the flame climb on. That was when Luke noticed the folded piece of notebook paper jutting out of the girl’s bra. He plucked it out and unfolded it.

It was a garbled mess. There were confessions to gods whose names Luke didn’t know, pleas for mercy, and cryptic nursery rhymes that reminded him of the stupid, endless tricks teachers had written on the board to help him remember facts and formulas. He read it twice, lips moving in silent repetition in the wan, wavering light.

Her name was Susan Griffith, and she was a sophomore. She’d been at a protest against the war, and someone had hit her on the head. After that was a series of white rooms, where people gave her pills and patted her arm reassuringly. She was flying, but she didn’t know how she got on the plane. She wasn’t alone, either.

She was taken to a cell to wait in silence and darkness. Then her food had come; a tray of sweet, salty mash with a bitter taste she couldn’t identify. The first three times she refused to eat, but the fourth time she gave in. It was the best meal she’d ever eaten, and she’d fallen into a stupor. She dreamed of men in white coats telling her everything would be all right. Saying her family loved her, and she was away at camp. She woke to whispers in the vents, and the cold, rhythmic echo of gunshots. The devil’s choir didn’t make sense at first, but in time she learned to love their words. To love their words and to hate the light.

They gave her Toto, a sleek, black thing that barked when she squeezed him, and stayed warm in her hands. She cleaned him, loved him, and when they’d grown inseparable the doors opened and she could go. She still thought about home sometimes, and about her boyfriend Paul. She thought about how she was going to fuck him after the protest, but never got a chance. She always found new friends though, and Toto would bark in the dark and put out their lights. The lights that hurt her eyes so much. Across the bottom of the page, written in tiny, smudged letters were the words All roads lead to Midian.

Luke was about to start over at the beginning again when he heard the moaning. It was flat and dull, like a busted church organ that only remembered one note. A high-pitched humming joined it. Teeth chattered in the mist like hungry castanets, with no rhyme or reason. A tongue clucked monotonously, like the owner was calling for a dog whose name he couldn’t remember. Shadows shambled out of the mist, drawn like blow flies to the dying fire in Luke’s left hand.

The first bullet spanged off the knife, twisting the metal out of true. The second tore through the meat of Luke’s little finger, snapping the bone and leaving the digit dangling by a thread. The third and fourth shots hit the knife just above the cross guard, sending it flying out of Luke’s hand. There were others, more than he could count, but they followed the burning brand as it tumbled into the dry grass. Luke leaped away, clutching his left hand to his chest and crouching near the dead girl who’d once been called Susan.

The spooks kept shooting, but the fire wasn’t made of flesh. It grabbed hold of the dry grass, and grew brighter. They kept shooting, but the hot lead passed straight through. The spooks reloaded, moving with a jerky, mechanical quality that was still faster than human hands should have moved. By the time they emptied their second magazines the fire had become a blaze, rearing like a dragon. It ate one of the shooters, who kept humming long after his clip went dry. The others fell back, chattering and clicking like a swarm with a dead queen. Light poured into the darkness like an ink stain, puddling around the borders of the mist. Luke turned, and that was when he saw the bridge.

It was an old bobbing Betty. She was held together with rusty chains, and the slick, moldy boards didn’t look overly reliable. The half-deflated pontoons sagged like an old woman’s dugs in the slow-running current. The span shot straight into the mist though, and Luke knew if the old sow was busted she’d have been pointing down river. He sucked in a breath and forced his feet to move.