Bowie Brown: Bleeding Kansas, Chapter 2, Kevin’s Story

Created and Written By Brandon K Montoya

“I hate the cold. I really hate the cold.” I said to myself as I exhaled, annoyed at the puff of frost in front of me. “I can’t hate it as much as I want to.” My boots crunched loudly in the morning air as my troop marched through Western Kansas. We were chasing down a group of violent slaves believed to be in the area. Captain Dietz gave us an order to kill every male we encountered. I hated it even more that I had to come out here in the snow to chase down those worthless furballs. I felt we would have an easy time tracking them down and killing them.

The snow fell gently as we walked. We didn’t have any gloves, so the cold bit right into our skin. My wedding ring attracted the biting cold and numbed my finger terribly. “I miss Betty.” I had last seen her on the way to Singapore last year for the WRAC. It had been almost a year since the BOAC crashed into the seawall. I was bitterly jealous of Barry, who was getting married later this month. I adjusted the ring on my finger as we walked, my rifle swinging on the shoulder cord. I wasn’t ready to move on. Not at all.

We were marching along the Big Blue River in an area I had not been to since I was a kid. I used to play cowboys and Indians with one of my cousins out there, and I still remembered the layout of the land. Lots of good memories here. That was another part I hated, I’d have to shed blood out here of all places.

“Hey Kevin,” Barry called out to me. “Is that the big house you told me about?” he pointed at the Swensen’s farm on the river banks, which was a nice place. But they were a couple of Quakers that kept to themselves and had no children.
“No, my cousin’s sorghum farm is up ahead. Should just be around the curves.” I pointed to the end of the natural dirt berm that was about to end, opening up to the trails the locals used to get to the river to fish.

The trails dipped down below the height of the row between tall rows of weeds and brush that stayed thick during the winter months. The snow had been falling for hours erasing any trail or evidence of those we were pursuing.

“How’d you like to live in a house like that though? That’s the kind of place Jessica and I have been talking about.” He smiled as he pointed towards it, his natural curiosity bringing himself and other members of first squad closer. “Don’t you think it would be great?”

I wished he had greater awareness that I lost my wife. But there wasn’t much I could expect from a fellow dogface.

“Yeah but imagine the mosquitos in the summer though if you’re right on the river.” Robby said. Robby was a smaller guy from Brooklyn. Nice but awkward.

“Robby,” Barry said, “If you have a house like that you just ignore the mosquitos! Some things are just worth it!”

Suddenly Captain Dietz’s M38 War Pony jeep whizzed by Barry and Robby. Robby was caught off guard and had to jump out of the way. As the jeep cleared the berm it came to a stop and the captain stood up in the back seat and began scanning the terrain with a pair of binoculars. He stood there for several minutes, examining the houses and hills quietly. From his vantage point he could see the basin beyond the river and the two hills that flanked it on either side in a horseshoe shape. The highway cut through town leading up through the wooded area. Dietz nearly fell off his temporary perch when “Big ears” our radio guy stumbled out of the jeep with the full weight of his radio backpack dragging him to the ground. He was always a try hard. “We’re not going to need the radio” I thought.

The snow let up as the second squad stepped beyond the berm, weak sunlight breaking through. The men started to joke loudly, their voices echoing in the snowfall. As moments became minutes the men grew bored and began to throw snowballs at each other. I went to speak and was hit in the face with one. I quickly wiped my face and was about to yell at the private who pelted me when I heard a sound I had listened to all too many times in Korea. From the southern hill the sound of a M1 Garand cracking the air open at a distance. I ducked and as I turned my head towards Captain Dietz for orders. But I had looked just just in time to see him fall from the jeep, blood spurting from an opening in his neck. A perfect kill shot.
“Sniper! Sniper!” Robby called out as he ducked unsure of which way to go.

“Take Cover!” Barry began to run for the trails below us as both squads followed.

I followed the two as quickly as I could, but I stumbled. When I looked up, I saw Barry return to earth in a horrific puff of smoke. A blur from the explosion hit me like a train and I suddenly slammed into the dirt. The blur was what was left of Robby.

“No, no, no—I can’t die!” Robby was crying in my lap. The explosion blew off the entire lower half of his body including his pelvis. “I can’t die… I’ve never kissed a girl! I wanted… to ask… the girl out at the bode… ga…” I was stunned as he suddenly ran silent, his body rapidly becoming as cold as the snow around us. Another soldier somewhere behind me tripped, and another explosion ripped the earth out from under us all. The mix of hot ash and cold snow spraying me was terrifying. The ringing in my ears was worse than terrible, I couldn’t hear anything as I stumbled and tried to regain my footing, dizzy and trembling… I lost the fight and the darkness of unconsciousness took me.

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My first thoughts were that my neck hurt. A slow, aching annoying hurt that would set in over hours. The kind of body pain I would get from trying to sleep in the seat of a War Pony.

“Kevin. Kevin. Kevin.”

My eyes snapped open and as I jerked away a shooting pain went through my neck and my knees hit the front dash of the jeep. Sergeant Blanc, the squad medic was looking at me. It was chilly and I was laying under a blanket. “Wha…” I was dazed.

“You took some shrapnel but I took it out. I need to finish wrapping that wound though.” He stepped away from me and began washing his hands in a small bowl of water.

The shade of a tall dilapidated barn loomed over me in the cool morning. “Where am I?” I shivered as I looked around.

“We pulled in nearby after the sniper took out Dietz and Big Ears. It’s been quiet since. Maybe twenty minutes.”

“Big ears is dead too? Damn it.”

“Yup,” he said with his Midwest accent. “It happened pretty quickly too. We lost about 6 men to mines. You were lucky.”

“Are we safe over here?”

“Yes, the sniper is on the Western side. We’re safe over here on the Eas…”

There was another crack that echoed across the horseshoe basin, this time from the other hill. It was different, and I could hear the “click clack” of a Springfield reloading echo as Sgt. Blanc weaved and stumbled on his feet, a red spot on his chest rapidly expanding. I wasted no time and rolled off the jeep as the next bullet tore through the seat I was in. Both our bodies hit the ground at the same time, I however, was still alive.

Another sound caught my attention, but it wasn’t a sniper shot. I glanced up from my position on the ground and saw the light of a red flare shoot into the sky. “Oh no,” I thought. “The savages are coordinated, they’re coordinated!” But they were more than just coordinated, they were heavily armed.

There was a boom. An artillery boom. But no whistle. “Get down! Get down!” Someone yelled! A moment later an ear shattering cacophony of sounds as the a mortar round hit the building next to us. I distinctly heard someone shrieking. And then another boom, followed by one more, and even one more after that! No whistles. “Take cover!” more shouting. More explosions.

They were crack shots with rifles and mortars. “We’re in a kill box,” I shouted at the top of my lungs “we need to move now!” There was a silence. A long silence followed by more booms, but they were retorting off of both hills. “Move! Move! Move!” I could see shadows rising the rest of the squad when they began to stand up. I was no officer but I tried to rally them. “Fall ba…”

A deafening explosion ripped behind us towards the bodies and the mine field. The pressure wave from the blast sent most of us backwards a few feet. The heat and light was so intense I could hardly see. Two fuel tanks far behind us out in the field suddenly exploded, the fire ripping across the dried brush even in the freeze.

Suddenly I was showered with brick and wood as a mortar directly hit the building next to me, I no longer had a choice, “Let’s get moving,” I shouted while muttering to myself that I had better earn a promotion after this. I kept my head low and kept running. Suddenly I saw Tony and Allen head towards the opening of a cellar “Don’t it’s rigged!” But my words were too late. A fireball engulfed both men, the first flew back at least two hundred feet from the blast. Instinctively I knew he could not have survived. Tony was far less lucky, barely at the edge of the opening, he was completely doused in flammable liquid, his screams muffled by the raging fire completely obscuring his body. He made is about 30 feet before nearly collapsing into me as I ran past.

There was a thicket of brush and old oak trees I started to aim for, but another mortar round took that out of the equation. We kept running as bullets whizzed by us. None of us recognized the trap we had blundered into. Every time we tried to stop and analyze our situation, another mortar round hit close to us.

A shot grazed my shoulder and sent me into the ditch face first, the rocks nearly breaking my nose as I fell. A mortar round also hit nearby, the explosion knocking the wind out of me. Somewhere in there I must have dropped my rifle. Between the fall and the explosion, I really got turned around. Panic was setting in. Something was bothering me about this. We kept running down the street weaving out of the ditches as exploding houses rained bricks and burning wood down on us all. I could hear someone shouting for help but I was unable to stop. As we neared the end of the street suddenly it hit me. This is where Johnny and I used to ambush the other boys. “No! This way!” I called out as loud as I could but I only saw Sam come my way. “We’re going up the back! I know this way!”

“Roger” he squawked out with a very irregular voice. I could see his shirt was bloody. He’d been hit by shrapnel and was struggling a bit. We rushed up through brush and thickets I was all too used to. After a minute of running there was the payout. Sam and I came up behind men in ghillie suits firing down on the rest of the squad. I only had my knife. I drew it quickly and rushed in for the kill, but the slave heard me coming and whipped the rifle towards me. I kicked it with my left leg and practically fell into my enemy. My left arm came in with my blade but he blocked it with his forearm, I brought my whole strength down and we started grunting at each other. I swore I was going to cut that freak’s neck wide open.

He reached for my left hand with his free one, but I caught it. I struggled to break through his block but he kept moving faster that I could anticipate. It wasn’t that I was completely missing, I’d cut his face several times particularly close to the neck. My face was flecked with it’s dirty blood, with each strike I was getting close. No time for words. This was it. One of us was going to die and that was it. I was absolutely going to make certain it was this filth.

A burst of flame erupted from my gut. At least that’s what it felt like. I glanced down to see a very, very large blade sticking out of my abdomen. I could feel my ribs separate and break as the knife twisted. “Say hi to Betty for me,” a voice whispered in my ear.

“Who…” I gasped. I knew that voice. I knew that voice!

Another sharp pain and the knife ripped backwards out of my body. My knees buckled and I kissed the ground once again.

“Owen, you okay?” the familiar voice said.

“Yeah, John, he got me a few times though.”

“Wait, Johnny?” I thought through the pain. I managed to roll onto my side, Sam’s shattered face wasn’t very far from me. He was motionless. My vision began to blur. I felt so cold. “I hate the cold. I really hate the cold.” I said to myself as I exhaled for the last time, annoyed at the puff of frost in front of me. “I can’t hate it as much as I want to.”

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