Braco (24 page)

“You are wrong,” Juso said, pointing at the shape in the shadows. “You take the words out of context. The Mujahidin mercenaries have corrupted you. They have corrupted our faith and twisted the words to suit their ends. This is not who we are.”

“The fact remains that he had no problem leading us to our deaths,” the other man said. “Revenge is mine, sayeth the Lord. Sound familiar, Emin? Well, now it's mine. I say kill the bastard.”

“We have no proof. Killing him would be unjust and we all know what the Qur'an says about that.”

“Doesn't matter,” Tarak said. “It's a tie. We leave him.”

Murat motioned to Atif.

“We haven't heard from the boy.”

Atif stared at him.

“No,” Tarak said. “He's only fourteen.”

“He's old enough to be out here. He gets a vote. What do you say, boy?”

Atif's thoughts swam through mud. The years of starvation and shelling. The taste of cordite. The dead soldier in the hospital. Dani's smile from behind the car. His father's last wave as he walked into the fog.

“Boy?”

Atif blinked and glared at Emin.

“He killed my friends. He probably killed my father.”

A pair of hands gripped Atif's shoulders.

“You don't know what this man did,” Tarak said. “He could be a recruit, drafted out of school. He follows orders like I do, like Juso does. He didn't kill your friends or your father.”

“You don't know that.”

“Neither do you.
Braco
, please. If you do this, you'll regret it. It will haunt you until the day you die.”

“I'm already haunted,” Atif replied. “Because of him. Because of all of them.”

“Let it go,” Tarak whispered. “Let it go.”

“I can't….”

A single gunshot exploded behind them. Tarak dropped to the ground, dragging Atif with him.

When they looked up, Emin was on the ground. Murat stood behind the body. He cocked his rifle and the spent casing flew away.

“What did you do that for?” Tarak's voice was rough with anger.

“Enough negotiating. I don't need a moral dictator to tell me about self-preservation. Let's….”

Murat's words became a gurgle. The farmer looked down at his chest as machine gun rounds sliced through him. When he collapsed, a red mist floated among the shadows.

The others scattered like deer. Tarak grabbed Atif and flipped him over the log.

“Stay down,” he shouted, slinging his pack over his shoulder.

Atif hauled his own pack on as more rounds bit into the air above them. Branches snapped and fell. Trees splintered. Red tracers lit the sky. Someone cried out.

“Crawl,
Braco
, crawl.”

Atif hesitated. He glanced under the rotted log. Emin's white shirt shone in the moonlight.

Tarak grabbed Atif's shoulder strap. He pulled him away from the log and deeper into the forest.

THURSDAY:
NIKO BASARIC

I CAN'T BREATHE!

A dozen soldiers and their equipment jammed the back of the carrier. Niko sat with his hands covering his ears, sucking in superheated air, unable to move in the suffocating space. The carrier shifted right, then left, and powered down.

About time.

The ramp dropped. Niko followed the section outside, hauling in a lung full of cool night air. Another carrier pulled up next to a truck. Three mortar teams dropped from the back of the truck and went to search for an area in which to set up their weapons.

Niko found Petar; they crossed the road together, taking up station against a guard rail.

“Isn't this where we were when they came out of the woods?”

“I don't know,” Niko replied, looking back. A second truck, carrying an anti-aircraft gun, pulled into the field behind them. Engines shut down. Lights faded.

Silence.

Niko could hear every voice, footstep, and snapping twig around him. Petar was looking over the guardrail at the forest.

“I think I can hear voices in there.”

Niko waved him quiet. He had no idea if their presence would attract or scare off the men in the woods. Many of them would be armed and they wouldn't think twice about shooting their way across.

“What if they come up to us?” Petar asked.

“We'll tell them to surrender. Then the trucks will come pick them up.”

“What if they start shooting?”

“Then keep your head down and let the mortars take care of them.”

The moonlight highlighted every motion of Petar's head as it responded to the slightest sound in the woods.

“Basaric! Kadija!”

Niko and Petar stood up. Drach was coming towards them with Ivan, Anton, and Pavle in tow. The group stopped at the end of the guard rail and Drach pointed into the ditch.

“We can hear them in the woods,” he said.

Petar turned to Niko, a smug smile plastered across his face. Anton pulled a cigarette from his pocket and stuck it in his mouth. Ivan snagged the cigarette and threw it away.

“Do you want your head shot off?”

“Listen to me,” Drach said. “The lieutenant wants a patrol to flush them out on to the road. Ivan will lead.” Drach pointed at Niko and Petar. “Let's see if he can teach you how to be real soldiers. You can prove you have a backbone after all.”

“Yes, Sergeant,” Niko replied.

“Move it.” Drach turned away and melted into the darkness.

Ivan cocked his rifle and the others followed suit.

“Whatever you do,” Ivan said, grimacing at Niko and Petar, “try not to shoot each other in the back.”

For an instant, Niko wished Drach was going with them.

Ivan stepped off the pavement and slid into the ditch. Loose gravel followed him down. Niko cringed at the noise, dropping to a knee next to the guardrail. Pavle and Anton slid down next, pursued by an avalanche of rocks and dust. Niko motioned to Petar to go next. The recruit smiled like a schoolboy on a field trip and dropped into the ditch.

Niko followed, unable to descend without kicking the gravel loose. But once they were in the woods, the group moved like panthers. Every step was dropped with care, every branch carefully returned to its original position. Petar performed better than Niko expected.

Then again, Petar's heart is probably ready to burst through his chest.
Niko pressed his hand to his own chest, surprised to feel a jackhammer at work.

The patrol moved away from the road. Voices drifted through the trees to their left. Shadows flickered in the waning moonlight. Ivan turned around and pointed south, opening his hand three times.

Fifteen men? Where?

Ivan signaled to them to spread out and move south in an extended line. Niko backed up a few steps and turned left. He kept his eye on Petar to make sure the recruit didn't advance ahead of him or the others.

As they slithered through the brush, voices emerged. They carried easily in the heavy pre-dawn air. Niko waved to Petar twice to slow down, but Anton was even farther ahead. Niko couldn't see Ivan or Pavle at all.

A twig snapped on Niko's right and the voices ceased. He looked at Petar, who shrugged. When he looked back, an orange glow was floating among the trees, moving towards him.

A cigarette?

He waved Petar down and waited until the cigarette hovered within a few steps of him. Then he stood up and raised his rifle.

“Stop where you are. You're surrounded.”

The cigarette fell to the ground.

“We want to sur….”

Automatic fire cut off the man's words. Niko dropped to the ground, unsure of who was shooting. He switched off his safety and pulled the trigger, spitting out thirty rounds in seconds. Men screamed and thrashed in the bushes.

No one fired back.

“Cease fire, you idiots,” Ivan shouted from behind. “Who fired first?”

They looked at one another and then all eyes shifted to Petar.

“I did,” the recruit said, standing to face Ivan. “It was an accident. I got such a fright when he spoke, I pulled the trigger.”

“You were walking behind me with your safety off?”

Petar swallowed and nodded. Ivan switched his rifle from his right to his left hand and then drove his fist across Petar's chin. The recruit staggered back and collapsed. When Niko moved to help him, Ivan stuck his rifle in the way.

“Forget him. Check the Turks. See if they're alive.”

Niko stepped over Petar and then over two bodies. Dozens of rounds had sliced their chests open. In a small clearing a few metres away, four more bodies lay in a pile.

He checked the woods but found no one. When he returned to the others, they were crouched next to the bodies, rummaging through pockets.

“They're all dead,” Niko said.

“Go get the recruit,” Ivan replied, stuffing a pack of cigarettes into his pocket. “Take him back up to the road and keep him there.”

Happily, Niko thought. He stepped over the bodies and then stopped. Another body lay off the trail. It wore a unique and familiar red and white track suit. Niko knelt next to the body and turned it over, brushing dirt and leaves away from the face.

“Goddamn it,” Niko muttered to himself.

Zahir.

He had attended Zahir's wedding years ago; the mechanic had a wife and three young children. Niko swallowed hard.

Did I kill you, my friend?

He checked Zahir's pockets, surprised to find a wallet.

“I'll make sure they know where you are,” he said to the unseeing face. “I promise.”

THURSDAY:
TARAK SMAJLOVIC

TARAK SLID DOWN
the side of a ravine and stepped into a small, slow moving river. He stared at the wall of trees before him; he didn't have the energy to scale another hill. Above him, the Milky Way painted the sky a dull white. He listened, but heard nothing.

“Are we lost?” Atif asked, submerging his bottle into the river.

Tarak looked at the boy. They were the first words he had uttered since the attack.“Not really,” Tarak replied. “I have a good idea what area we're in, but I'm not sure how close we are to the road or to what part of the road.”

Atif drank some water and dunked the bottle into the river again.

“I'm thinking we won't make it across tonight,” Tarak said.

Atif looked up at him.

“The rest of the men are undoubtedly across by now and the Chetniks are on the road. I don't think we should attempt to cross until we know how many there are and exactly where they are. And I have no idea if they've laid mines or traps. We'll lay low for the day and try again after dark.”

They crossed the river and Tarak surveyed the other side. He could see little beyond the thick brush.

“We'll be safe here until it gets light. We should try to get some sleep.”

Atif settled down next to a tree. Tarak pulled off his pack and sat next to him.

“Are you cold?”

“No.”

“Your clothes are still wet.” Tarak hauled out his ranger blanket and untied the compact roll. “Put this around you. It's a lot warmer than it looks.”

Atif took the blanket without a word.

“Hungry?”

“No.”

Tarak heaved a sigh, unsure of what to say. He didn't know if Atif was upset because of his friends, his father, or the man they had just killed. Or a combination of the three.

“It's not your fault,” Tarak said.

“Are you sure he was a Chetnik?”

“Right now,
Braco
, I'm not sure of a lot of things, but that guy just didn't seem right.”

“They killed him because of me.”

“You didn't pull the trigger. Murat was going to kill him one way or another.”

“Maybe that was a good thing.”

“Murdering someone who has no chance of defending themselves is not a good thing. I don't care how angry you are at them.”

“I'm not angry.”

“But you hate them, don't you? Because of your friends? Your father?”

“Yes.”

“You want to kill them for all that, don't you?”

“Yes.”

“Then if you're not angry, I don't know what to call you.”

“Why does it matter? Why can't I be angry at them?”

Tarak leaned against the tree, his mind flashing back: burnedout houses, smoke mingling with screams from the bridge, women wailing. A little boy shrieking.

“Because it does no good,” Tarak said. “All this anger and hate will burn you up inside. It'll change you into someone you don't want to be.”

“How do you know that's not what I want?”

“Do you want to know why I stayed with the Chetniks for so long?”

“What?”

“I told you I was one of the last to desert. I stayed because I wanted to fight the Croats until there wasn't a single breathing bastard left alive.” Tarak turned away for a moment. “We went into a Chetnik village in Croatia early in the war. The Croats had already expelled everyone, but some didn't make it out. We found the remains of one family in a basement. Sixteen people including four children. The Croats had barred them in there and lit the house on fire. They burned them alive.”

Atif was staring at him.

“So for as long as they would let me fight, I killed Croats. Men, women. Even children. I was convinced if we didn't kill them, they'd come back and murder our families like they did with the Nazis.” He hesitated, swallowing hard. “Until Vukovar. But even that didn't stop me because the Chetniks became my enemy.”

Fadil's scream echoed in his mind.

“That's what hate gets you,
Braco
. It took me that long to wake up to what my anger was doing. It consumes you. Every day, you think about it. Every night, you dream about it. I killed innocent people who had never done anything to me and I will have to live with that the rest of my life. And I will answer for it later.”

“So, when you get to Tuzla and your mother finds a way to get you to France or Canada or wherever, you go. You go as far from here as you can. Forget about being a soldier. Forget about all this. You go away and leave it behind. And when this war is over and you grow up, get married and have children, then you come back. You show your family where you grew up. Show them who you are. And you do it with some pride because you survived this insanity as a whole person.”

Atif opened his mouth to speak, but Tarak raised his hand.

“Don't say anything. Just think about it for a while. Right now, we need to sleep.”

“Okay,” Atif whispered. He wrapped the blanket over his head and lay down, turning his back to Tarak.

Better this way, Tarak thought, leaning back against the tree.

He closed his eyes and willed the images from his mind. He didn't need that. Not now. He needed sleep. He had to think clearly if he was going to get them both across the road.

Focus on that.

In his mind, tanks and artillery lined the road like the Great Wall.

But do they have enough troops to cover the whole thing?

That had been the problem with the Serb army from the start of the war. They never had enough troops to do what they wanted. There would be gaps in the road. The army would concentrate on the areas where they expected the men to cross the road, primarily between Konjevic Polje and Nova Kasaba.

We'll go west. We'll skirt south of Nova Kasaba and check the road. Somewhere on that stretch of road there will be a break in the coverage. In the darkness, we only need a few clear metres to get across.

Tarak glanced at the boy.

We'll get across, Braco. We'll get across.