Together they waited, each finding fortitude in the stoicism displayed by the rest, each determined not to be the link in their little chain that broke. Despite the struggles within themselves to maintain the appearance of calm, or perhaps because of them, a sense of foreboding, an ominous dread, an almost overwhelming feeling of impending doom seemed to compel a collective state of inaction.
Joe found himself in possession of a new appreciation for the phrase ‘a deer in the headlights’ that had eluded his previous understanding. He tried even harder, though with dwindling confidence in ultimate success, to calm his fraying nerves and to set some sort of example for Jen and Jake. An example of what, exactly, he wouldn’t have been able to say.
They could run, but those approaching were likely to be faster. They could hide, but evidence of their presence was clear, strewn haphazardly about them and unable to be masked before the distance would be closed. Even if the debris belying their existence could be hidden the smoke rising from the remains of their fire hung above them in the still morning air as clearly as a battle flag marking their position. They each watched, unmoving, transfixed as their options narrowed with each footfall of the newcomers.
They could ready themselves for a fight. Between them they possessed a snub-nosed thirty-eight special revolver with a dozen rounds plus the five in the cylinder. Joe carried it in a holster clipped to his belt, easily accessible by his right hand. It was small enough that it was usually concealed by just a T-shirt.
Jen carried a bolt action twenty-two rifle with a well worn sling over her shoulder. There was a full box of a hundred short rimfire rounds plus thirty-two more in another ammo box. There was also a full box of fifty high velocity long rifle rounds and six long rifle hollow-points held for the most dire of circumstances.
Finally, they had an antique but reliable double barrel sixteen gauge shotgun. Joe sawed off its side by side barrels just above the wooden forearm when they began their trek to make the gun easier to wield, reduce its weight and increase its close-in effectiveness. He rigged a homemade sling for it that allowed it to hang across his chest resting at his right side with just enough slack to be fired from the hip, though clumsily, if absolutely necessary. There were seventeen shells loaded with squirrel shot and five more loaded with double ought buckshot.
Joe also carried a knockoff brand Swiss army knife, the scissor tool broken long ago and several of its other implements frozen in place by rust and lack of use. The longest knife blade, the saw and the can opener were still fully functional, however. Despite the burden he carried its weight gave him comfort.
On his left hip, clipped to his belt opposite the thirty-eight special on the right, was a perfectly balanced and well honed hatchet. Joe’s great great grandfather carried it out of the trenches and across no man’s land in World War I where it’s original handle was shattered by a bullet otherwise destined to, as family lore held, cut short the family lineage at Belleau Woods. His great grandfather carried it into the Ardennes Forrest in December of 1944 just days before he and the rest of the US forces there were caught flatfooted and unprepared by Germany’s last offensive of WWII. His grandfather wore the hatchet on his hip as a US Marine for the entire seventy-seven days under siege at Khe Sanh seven miles from the Laotian border with what was then South Vietnam.
Joe’s father was wearing the hatchet in the Mountains of Afghanistan when an IED took his left leg. Somehow the hatchet made it back with him, however, and thus to Joe. When Joe turned eighteen and told his dad he was thinking about enlisting he was reminded that all of the hatchet carriers before his dad had been drafted. “I was the only one to go looking for a fight, and it’s left me leaning left ever since,” his dad quipped.
“You’re man enough to make this decision for yourself according to Uncle Sam,” his dad continued more seriously. “But consider the fact that you could very well end up walking the same ground in the same war that cost me my leg.” After a long pause he said, “Before I enlisted my daddy told me what I told you about it being my decision. He also had another piece of advice I often wish I’d heeded.”
“He told me that it was every man’s duty to defend his Country if called, but war was nothing to seek out. He said if I went, no matter how diligent my search for glory, I wouldn’t find it. I wish I’d recognized the wisdom in his words. Maybe you will,” Joe’s dad concluded.
No more was said about it. Joe opted for State U over boot camp, and carried the guilt he knew would accompany that decision. The hatchet did not pass to him as a young soldier as it had to his forbearers. It was willed to him with no elaboration when his father died of lung cancer a year before the dyings had begun in earnest. He wore it now with an amalgamation of guilt, reverence and utility. He was certain he felt its weight more than any of his predecessors.
Jen carried a boy scout knife Joe had been given as a reward for achieving the rank of Webelo as a cub scout back when things like that happened. She accepted it with a solemnity uncommon to her disposition when he’d given it to her, inherently recognizing the unspoken responsibility that came with the gift. The scissors still worked on it.
Jake carried a scabbarded buck knife with an imitation bone handle. It was bought for Joe by his grandfather when he’d been Jake’s age in the gift shop of a cruise ship returning from Alaska over the protestations of his grandmother. She’d argued that Joe was too young for a knife, dull as a letter opener or not. A wolf’s head was stamped into the ivory plastic hilt with much more efficiency than even the most skilled inuit elder could’ve managed.
Joe also carried a whetstone passed down from fathers to sons through more generations than anyone could remember. He kept it wrapped in oilcloth and tucked into the middle of his bedroll so as to protect it from breaking as best he could. With it he honed the blades whenever time allowed. The rhythmic gnashing produced as he worked the knives across its worn surface had come to be something of a lullaby, its gentle grinding the last sounds his children heard before falling asleep more often than not.
Joe had grown up with guns and knives, hunting and fishing with family and friends since before he could remember. His children were familiar with firearms and blades as well. They were tools to be respected and handled with caution, but tools nonetheless. None of them, Joe included, had ever fired in anger or at another person nor held a blade with malicious intent.
Arming his children to face whatever was coming wasn’t an option with any realistic possibility of a positive outcome he quickly concluded. He calmly summoned his kids to him. Draping an arm around each, Joe told them that everything would be okay as he watched fate close the distance separating them from whatever was to come.
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