Finally a guard signaled it was time for the noon break. Heads were counted. I grabbed a nearby water jug and drank deeply. That might be the last drink I took for hours if I was going to escape and make a run through the forest. I then sat down and sipped more water slowly, holding the jug with one hand. I cautiously scanned around me and noted that no guards were directly watching me. They were simply moving about, rotating positions in the field. With the other hand, I inserted the makeshift key into the lock on the shackles on my right ankle, and turned it. The Afghans had done well. Their key moved smoothly and released the grip around my ankle. I then did the same for the left. I didn’t remove the shackles, but instead just let them hang loosely around my ankles. If the escape was going to happen soon, I could be out of them in a second or two. If something interrupted the escape, then I could just as quickly relock them.
With my fingers, I scooped out dirt between my feet and buried the key a few inches deep. I covered the disturbed dirt with a triangular light-colored rock. I looked around to get an approximate fix on this spot. I was certain I could find this rock and the key under it again if necessary. I watched the Afghan closely, waiting for his move. He was a bit down slope from me. After a couple of minutes, he returned my gaze, holding it for several seconds. Then he starting yelling, stood up, and gestured wildly with his arms. He punched the guy next to him, and jumped on top of him. A tangle of arms and legs followed, then all hell broke loose. All the other Afghans gathered around the fight and started howling encouragement to the combatants, and other fights broke out nearby.
The guards rushed toward the scene. Their attention was focused entirely on the fight. No one was left up slope of me. I hesitated for a second because there was one guard still to my left. He then took several steps down slope, a spot where he would not be able to see me even out of his peripheral vision. I slipped out of the shackles, rolling over onto my hands and knees. I tossed the shackles aside, away from where the key was buried.
I stayed low using the scant cover of the poppy plants and scrambled up the slope, aiming toward an outcropping of rocks that ran downward into the valley. The sound of the fight below faded in volume as I climbed upward and broke free from the poppies and camouflage netting. I looked back and saw that the netting itself was shielding me from direct view of the guards below. So I got to my feet and ran uphill. In several more strides I would be completely out of sight of those below.
The slope was steep, and the ground was rocky. The rocks shifted with each footfall, and I feared I might sprain an ankle. Game over. I was just a couple of steps from the cover of the outcrop when the rock under my right foot slid sideways, and I came down hard on my forearms and knees. The pain shot through my upper arms into my shoulders and through my lower legs, causing my feet to tingle with the shock. But after a moment, I gathered my feet under me and crawled to the line of the rock outcropping and ducked down behind it. I took a few seconds to view my situation and catch my breath.
I could hear distantly that the fight was still going on below. I could not count on that distraction continuing for much longer. So in spite of the pain and tingling in my legs, I continued the upward climb. Within seconds I found the fence. I looked both ways down the space between the two fence lines and saw no guards inside.
The guards would soon enough realize this Caucasian face was missing from the valley. I had to go over the fence now. I jammed my fingers into the chain links, scrambled to dig my toes into the fence, and pulled myself up toward the razor wire at the top. The fence rattled loudly, sounding like an alarm. The guards were sure to hear it if they were anywhere near. I pushed harder to reach the top.
Up close, the razor wire was intimidating. The spacing between coils was narrow. I could sense the pain that would be inflicted by the sharp edges before I even made contact with it. With this spur of the moment decision to climb the fence, I had no plan of how to get through it without being slashed to a bloody pulp. The coiled wire overhung the fence by at least a foot and towered over me. It was unclimbable. I would have to go through the coils. But that was impossible too.
Then I saw a slim chance. Since the fence was embedded in the forest, the branch of an evergreen tree leaned over the barrier. It was a long thin branch, but might be strong enough and flexible enough to hold my weight. I moved laterally down the fence a couple of yards, grabbed the branch with one hand, braced by feet flat against the chain links, and then grabbed the branch with my other hand. It immediately sagged downward until my upper body was below my feet, which were still planted firmly against the fence. But the branch held. I pulled furiously, hand over hand, to get my head up. At the same time, I walked my feet up the fence.
I repeated this process of pulling with my arms to get my head above my feet, and then walked up the vertical surface of the fence. I did this until the toes of my boots were touching the bottom of the razor wire, then pulled with my arms until my head was above the top of the wire. I gingerly placed a foot on top of the fence, between two coils of the wire. As I pulled myself completely vertical, my other foot reached the top between adjacent coils. I was now standing on top of the fence. I kept my balance with my fingertips pressed against the tree whose branch had been so helpful in getting me up here.
Then I heard the heavy footfalls of someone coming my way. “Shit,” I said under my breath. I had been spotted. There was no time to plan my next moves. I had to get off this fence and over the second one in the next few seconds, or I was going back to that hell hole in the valley. A failure.
I bent my knees and sprang off the fence toward the ground below. I felt the razor wire cut into my left pant leg and through my skin. It knocked me off balance so that I landed hard on my right leg and fell onto my back. It felt like my right leg had been shoved upward through my hip. I rolled onto my left side and came to a stop in a low spot in the ground up against the outer fence. There was no time to scale that barrier. How could I hide here in this narrow space?
There were downed branches and evergreen needles all around me. I quickly scooped them on top of me in the low spot and lay perfectly still. The pounding of someone running came closer and closer. If he had seen me on top of the fence, I would be easy to locate. If he hadn’t seen me, he was going to step right on me. I tensed my muscles, preparing to grab a leg to tackle the guard if I was discovered. I also grasped a sharpened stick in my right hand. It was one I had fashioned and stashed in the fields. I had retrieved it this morning, tucking it inside my shirt, in the event it would come in useful.
The guard’s run slowed, but he didn’t seem to know where I was. Otherwise, he would already be all over me. Then he was walking. He was searching for me. He must have seen me climb up the slope or scale the fence. So he knew approximately where I should be. I lay on my stomach, my face turned in the direction he was walking, with my palms pressed against the dirt in a push-up position. I was right there in front of him, but he couldn’t see me through the branches I’d used as cover. A boot landed inches from my face, and then the other came down just beyond me.
I straightened my arms to bring my chest off the ground, quietly pulled my knees up under me, and sprang upward. I grabbed him above the ankles and pushed him down face first onto the ground. He twisted around to face me and already was bringing his weapon into a firing position. At this close range, he could easily shoot me in the top of the head. I squeezed his legs with my left arm. I extended my right hand and drove my sharpened stake into his side.
He screamed in pain, grabbing for his side with his left hand. But he continued to bring his rifle around into a firing position with his right. I twisted the stake and drove it further into his flesh. He screamed in agony. His blood flowed down his shirt and over my hand. The stake became slippery, and I was losing my grip. So I let go of it. I grabbed his shirt with my right hand and dragged my body up on top of him. I used my weight to pin the rifle to his
body and press him to the ground. I then used my knee to drive the stake deeper into him. He tried to yell, but the only thing that came out was a gurgle as blood gushed out of his mouth. In seconds, he lay motionless.
He was the first person I had ever killed. Yet I felt no guilt. I felt nothing at all except relief for having survived. Now I had his weapon, which I would not hesitate to use.
I wanted to just rest there. I was exhausted from my struggle to get to this spot and the fight with this guard. But it would not be long before another guard came along. So I slung the dead man’s weapon over a shoulder, and clawed my way up the outer fence. The metallic rattling of the chain links announced my location again. When I had nearly reached the top, there was another overhanging branch that I was able to grasp. I rested for a moment, holding on to that twig like a lifeline.
The sound of boots hammering on the ground signaled more guards coming my way. They were coming from the same direction as the one I had just killed. And there were shouted orders, as if the running guards were being directed where to look.
I had to trust in that thin branch. I grabbed it with both hands and pulled upward like I was climbing a rope. It drooped downward, bouncing me off the fence. But it held. As I climbed, my forearms were raked by the bottom edges of the razor wire, and as I climbed further my shins were sliced. The cuts were stinging from the dirt and salty sweat on my skin seeping into the open wounds.
I didn’t bother with standing on top of the fence. I climbed up that branch until I was hugging the trunk of the tree above the razor wire. Shimmying to the opposite side of the tree put me outside the fence. I slid down the trunk, but my foot caught on the stub of a branch, propelling me away from the tree and down the steep slope. I landed hard on my right shoulder and bounced up against the base of a tree.
I lay still, not by choice, but out of necessity. I lay there to take stock of my battered body. My right shoulder and back absorbed most of the impact from the fall. They were sore. My forearms and shins were sliced and bleeding, leaving streaks of blood on my grubby clothing. My face was scraped from sliding down the tree trunk.
I lay still also because guards, first one and then another a couple of seconds later, came from my left and stopped near the spot where I went over the fence. They bent over the body of their comrade.
“He killed Rodgers!” the second one to arrive spat out in rage.
“Did you see him?” the first one yelled.
“You mean you didn’t?” the second one howled in amazement. “Did he go over the fence? Or is he still inside?”
“I don’t know,” was the other’s response. “Fuck!”
They both leaned up against the outer fence and silently looked down the hill in my direction. I held my breath and lay perfectly still. They made no indication that they’d spotted me. The forest floor was dimly light, and I was so filthy that even my pale-skinned face wasn’t visible to them.
“I don’t see him, and I can’t hear anything down there. He must still be inside.”
They both continued in the direction they had been going, probably hoping to run me down between the parallel fences. They barked status reports into their walkie-talkies.
I looked around for the weapon I had confiscated. But it was nowhere in sight. I pushed the ground debris around for a few seconds looking for it. Nothing. Then I looked up. It was clinging to a branch of the tree that had helped me climb over the fence. I rushed up to the tree to retrieve it, but the guards were returning, yelling to each other that I must have gone over the fence near the body. So I ran and tumbled down hill. Tree branches ripped at my clothing and skin. I heard the guards still yelling from up on top of the hill. When I got to the barbed wire fence at the bottom of the slope, I hurtled it without breaking stride. I was now another one of Jake Monroe’s running men.