Sniper Distance
"Hhh... hhh..."
I gasped for breath, clutching at a heart that felt ready to burst.
Beads of sweat ran down from my forehead and kept slipping into my eyes, and I wiped them away with the back of my hand over and over again.
Terror bore down on me so completely that I wanted to put a bullet through my own head, but my body had gone rigid with fear, unable even to manage something as simple as drawing my pistol and pulling the trigger.
"Hss... haah..."
My head felt feverish, like it was on fire.
The chin strap tightening around my throat made breathing even harder.
Snap-
"Fuck..."
I cursed, yanked the chin strap loose, and took off my helmet. The air that had felt stifling a moment ago was suddenly cool against my skin.
"Phew..."
I wiped my sweat-soaked face with my sleeve and slowly looked around.
A cramped room in an ordinary house.
The strange patterns that had decorated the walls had been shattered and ruined by bullet holes, and the carpet laid across the floor was stained red with my comrades’ blood.
"...Rose."
I turned my head with difficulty and looked to the right, where Rose was asleep with her head resting on my shoulder.
Her face, smeared with dust, was covered in tiny cuts, and dark circles ringed her soft eyes.
A precious comrade who had fought beside me ever since the first day we were trained.
The one who had saved my life when the Humvee our squad was riding in came under attack.
The one who had comforted me when I panicked at the shocking sight of Laimi dying in my arms.
Even in a nightmare where countless soldiers died every single day, she was always the one encouraging the survivors, always shining.
And yet.
Here, in this instant.
In this hell where every last comrade had died all at once.
She was exhausted.
"Mm..."
"...?!“
Rose stirred with a rustle, letting out a strained groan as if her position was uncomfortable.
No.
Don’t get up.
Please don’t get up.
Thud-
"Ghk..."
"Sorry..."
I hurriedly caught her head and lowered it back onto my shoulder, then lifted my shaking gaze toward the window above us.
I held my breath and waited for a long time, but thankfully no bullets came flying in.
The sun was sinking into a red sunset.
With the light shining from our side toward the other buildings, the snipers’ line of sight must have been compromised.
Maybe this was our chance.
While traveling through the city in our Humvee with the new squad members, we’d wandered into a busy commercial district by accident. The street was dead, littered only with corpses, and an ominous feeling hung over the place, so we decided to go around instead of forcing our way through.
And just as we were turning the vehicle around.
An RPG came out of nowhere and struck the lead vehicle.
The fifth vehicle, bringing up the rear, immediately tried to back up to assess the situation, but the formation went to pieces when the driver was killed by a bullet that punched through the windshield.
The Humvee’s armor was never thick to begin with.
If rifle rounds came in from the side, they punched straight through the doors, and even shots from the front could smash through the windshield and threaten the lives inside.
In the end, we had no choice but to get out and use the vehicles as cover.
At least that way, we could avoid being trapped in the cramped interior and turned into Swiss cheese.
That was also when our squad suffered its first casualty.
Emma, the machine-gun gunner with her head exposed from the upper turret, provided cover by spraying the area that looked to be where the RPG had been fired from.
After the rest of the squad had dismounted, she began climbing out of the vehicle herself, and in the process her upper body was exposed beyond the armor plate.
If, instead of pulling herself out of the turret and jumping down immediately, she had climbed back into the vehicle, opened the door, and dismounted that way, could she have survived?
I couldn’t say with certainty that she would have escaped without a single injury, but at the very least she wouldn’t have died with a sniper round shredding her side and spraying ribs and flesh in every direction.
I can still see her lying there on the ground, pitiful and broken.
Worst of all, she had fallen with her face turned toward me.
Worst of all, she died without even closing her eyes.
That pair of eyes that had met mine still haunted me.
Vacant pupils, slowly losing all life.
Eyes gone slack.
Tears gathered at the corners.
After that, the nightmare turned into a horrible psychological war against the snipers.
We couldn’t recklessly leave the Humvee or move to a nearby building.
After we watched another squad that had been moving with us rush into an alley at their squad leader’s command and get wiped out in an instant, all we could do was hide desperately behind the vehicle.
There were snipers everywhere in this district.
There had to be at least ten of them stationed in the commercial area.
The exact number of enemy snipers eliminated by our designated marksmen was ten.
Those women had been taking out enemies until just yesterday evening, only to be mercilessly killed by other snipers.
You fucking bitches.
If you were going to kill them, you could’ve at least done it cleanly.
Under cover of darkness, our designated marksmen had gone into the street to locate the snipers’ positions.
The enemy snipers shot them in the legs so they couldn’t move, then shot their arms so they couldn’t fire back, and left them bleeding out on the roadside.
The squad members who had gone with them to provide protection all suffered the same fate.
Sometimes one would drop with a bullet in the torso, but most of the time it was the legs.
It was obvious they were planning to kill anyone who came running to rescue the wounded.
In the end, we had no choice but to ignore the injured soldiers crying out for help.
The reality of having to turn away from the moans and desperate pleas of the wounded was unbearable.
I had been so overwhelmed by the insane situation unfolding around me that I could do nothing at all, sitting on the ground with my hands clamped over my ears.
Rose had stayed by my side through all of it, trying her best to calm me.
And so, with our eyes open all night, dawn finally broke.
The snipers were still hunting us, and the psychological strain on our side had already gone far past the limit.
Then, at noon, during that exhausting standoff, our squad leader was shot.
At first, I thought she had carelessly exposed her head through the rubble and been killed that way.
And that thought was immediately disproved when Karin’s jaw was blown apart by a bullet.
She had been completely behind cover, and more importantly, that sharp, distinctive sound of a suppressed shot had come from behind us.
It didn’t take long to realize the snipers had gotten behind us.
Now we were mice trapped in a jar, and if we stayed where we were, we’d die like dogs.
After that, everything descended into chaos.
We weren’t special forces trained for this sort of thing.
We were a motley international legion of fools who’d enlisted for heroism, or maybe curiosity, or pride.
Because so many of Solomon’s regular troops had died in the early stages of the war, we had simply been issued the overflowing stockpiles of equipment.
Our actual combat ability was far worse than that of the regular army.
On top of that was the psychological pressure of knowing we could die at any second.
The squad members went berserk, bolting in every direction, and were turned into pincushions by the snipers lying in wait.
Of course, many of them had prior military service.
While they were still taking cover behind the Humvee, they were relatively calm and composed.
But once it was confirmed that the snipers had their backs, they rushed out into the street just like the soldiers who’d never seen combat—and were slaughtered without mercy.
The snipers had us surrounded on all sides.
I suspected they’d been keeping us pinned down and waiting, just to make sure no additional enemy forces were following behind us.
After an entire day with no meaningful movement, they must have wanted to make sure they had us trapped from behind before wiping us out.
Why hadn’t we called for support over the radio?
Because the radio was dead.
Even when we tried to use it, all we got was a hiss of static.
The enemy had to be jamming the signal.
Changing frequencies didn’t help either, and in the end there was nothing we could do except crouch there in place.
Either way, we were surrounded, and the only way to survive was to run.
So I took Rose and the last remaining squad member, Casey, and we sprinted for the nearest alley.
By some miracle from heaven, the snipers’ bullets aimed at other soldiers instead of us.
After desperately choosing any old building and smashing our way inside, we found an ordinary house.
Once we’d quickly checked the interior and decided it was safe, no more gunfire could be heard from outside.
Since we had no way of knowing whether any of the other allies were still alive, we hid deep inside the building.
We were sure the snipers hadn’t seen us.
For a long while, the enemy showed no reaction at all.
So we were trapped in this house for hours more.
Our canteen water ran out, and we had to endure the searing thirst with nothing to wash it away; then, just as we were all withering from dryness, Casey discovered a passage leading to the neighboring building.
Thinking there might be water on the other side, we started through the corridor.
And, of course, before long blood sprayed from Casey’s throat.
The gunshot only rang out a moment after she went down.
We immediately dropped low and took cover, but Rose reacted a little too slowly.
A bullet ricocheted off her helmet, and she went down cold.
Probably a concussion, I guessed.
The damn walls of this building were so thin that bullets punched huge holes straight through them.
Shots kept coming in toward where Rose and I were, and I shoved my arm under her armpit and crawled backward on my own back to escape that hell.
But Rose still hadn’t come to, and in the end I had no choice but to drag her into this tiny room and hole up.
Enough time had passed that moving again seemed like the right call.
If we kept wasting time, we’d only be giving the advantage to the enemy.
"Rose, get up."
"Ugh..."
"Rose, let’s move. Staying here is dangerous."
"Ggh... bleh..."
I shook her shoulder, trying to wake her, but she just kept gagging weakly, looking sick to her stomach.
So it really was a concussion.
I let out a helpless sigh, set down my pack, and turned my back toward her.
"Rose, then get on my back. I’ll carry you..."
Bang-!
"...huh?"
The door flew open.
I hadn’t even heard anyone approaching.
The door I’d thought was locked had been smashed apart and kicked wide open.
There I was, sitting there like an idiot.
Rose, still out of it.
And the barrel of a gun pointed at the two of us.
"Aaaahhhhh!!!!"
My body reacted before I could even think.
I lunged forward on instinct and slammed into the enemy’s stomach.
Crash-!
"Kgh...!"
"Ttlqkf!"
The force of the collision as we hit the floor brought a groan out of me, but I had to get up.
The enemy was still right in front of me.
I clenched my teeth and raised my upper body despite the stabbing pain in my arms and torso.
But the enemy was faster than me.
Grab-
"Kuhhk..."
Her rough hand closed around my throat.
I thrashed, unable to breathe, but there wasn’t a hint of hesitation in her eyes as she looked down at my face.
"Kheh... khk... guuuh..."
My eyes rolled back.
The world went dark, and my whole body twisted violently on its own.
No.
If I lost consciousness.
I don’t want to die.
I don’t want to die.
"Noooooooo!!!!"
In an instant, the world went red.
My hand lashed out toward the enemy in front of me.
I smashed the front of her throat with my hand and drove my knee straight into her abdomen.
As the enemy sucked in a breath and flinched, I hooked my leg around her torso and shoved away the arm supporting her weight, toppling her over.
I hurled my body upright, climbed over her abdomen, and smashed my fist into her face.
Pow-
Pow-
"Aaaaaaaaah!!!!!!"
You killed Rose.
Because of you.
You choked me.
So Rose got up to save me.
You shoved Rose down the stairs.
You. You killed Rose.
"You killed herrrrrr!!!!!"
I screamed in her face.
"Hah... hah..."
My heart was pounding out of control, and cold sweat poured down my body.
While I struggled to steady my ragged breathing, the enemy in front of me simply stared at me in silence.
White hair.
Red eyes.
A face smeared with nosebleed.
Lips split open, blood running from the corner of her mouth.
A flushed red face.
Unsteady, heated breaths spilling out irregularly.
"...Huh?"
There was no way.
That was supposed to be the enemy.
That bastard who had shoved Rose down the stairs.
Why.
"...Iris?"
"Hah... haaah... L-Leader..."
I looked around.
An old basement room in the dark.
On a bed.
Iris, pinned beneath me.
"Ah..."
So that was it.
I was broken.
Completely broken.
My body swayed unsteadily.
I felt like I might pass out right there.
If this had been a dream.
If only this had been a dream.
"Ugh..."
I lifted an arm to clutch my throbbing head.
But Iris grabbed my wrist and stopped me.
"Hnngh... Leader..."
"...?"
Her face looked desperate, as if she wanted something and couldn’t bear it any longer.
Iris spoke in a trembling voice.
"Please... hit me some more..."