Seven Bullets by John Ling

Author:John Ling [Ling, John]
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Publisher: Kia Kaha Press
Published: 2012-01-17T04:30:00+00:00

***

The moon was a silvery crescent as Abdi moved across the field, the night alive with screeching insects and a whistling breeze. The flashlight on his AK-47 swept across the tall grass, reflecting off the small animals scampering through the shrubbery.

The humidity felt oppressive.

Under the beret he wore, his face was weary, his dark skin glistening with sweat. His uniform was two sizes too big, doing a lousy job of disguising his youth. In the West, he would have been too young to drink.

Pushing on, Abdi entered a clearing with a small tree ahead, its branches skeletal and its leaves few, marking the end of his patrol route. It was time for a break. Bending under the tree, he switched off his flashlight, sinking down on a protruding root.

He struck a match, lit a cigarette, and sucked long and deep. Savoring it, he exhaled, watching the vapor curl before being carried away by the wind. Plowing his boots in the soil, he tried to relax, tried to calm his nerves.

But he couldn’t relax.

Going without sleep for three days now, the insomnia ate at him, like termites burrowing through his skull. It was like being trapped in a permanent state of fatigue, a permanent state of depression.

Butchered bodies stretching out as far as the eye could see. The coppery stench of blood and burning flesh. The wailing of children being pulled from the arms of their parents and finished off with machetes and axes.

It wasn’t always like this.

He remembered better times.

What little education he had had been given to him by missionaries in a school in his village. It only had one classroom, where the smell of chalk peppered the air, and colorful alphabets and numbers lined the dirt-specked walls. He could still hear his classmates giggling, their hands leaping up each time their pale-skinned teachers asked a question.

His teachers had taught him not only to read and write and count, but also to respect what they called the sanctity of life. They insisted—oh, how they had insisted—that tribal warfare was wrong. In other lands, people resolved their disputes through dialogue and understanding.

He had found it difficult to wrap his mind around such a concept.

What about defending the pride of one’s clan?

What about punishing the enemies who spat on one’s honor?

His teachers had chosen an unusual way of demonstrating their point. Along with the other children, they had given him a rabbit to look after, a white one with black spots and a sniffling nose. It was to be his pet, something he found odd. He had never known animals to be anything other than a source of food or a source of labor.

In time, his views changed.

He noticed how the rabbit would amble towards him with a twinkle in its eye whenever he fed it. It even played a mischievous game—chewing on his finger before darting away, long ears swaying, daring him to give chase.

Oh, how it made him laugh.

Looking after it no longer felt like a chore. It became a delight.

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