LITMIR.BIZ

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him in his sleep or he could take him with him. He couldn’t leave him behind. Leaving him to fend for himself would require a cruelty he didn’t have. He could shoot people at point-blank range, but he wouldn’t leave anyone to suffer. He might very well get the boy killed in the process, but at least he wasn’t leaving him behind.

      Torres took out a piece of meat from his pocket and fed it to Girl. Her time had come. He gave her a quick pat on her head. She was a good dog.

      He shot a backward glance at the guards. They were sitting on the ground smoking cigarettes. Their machine guns were slung behind their backs, out of the way. Torres patted his pockets, making sure he had everything. There was no point in trying if he didn’t have everything.

      He needed to be fast. Speed was the only thing that separated him from freedom, that and hundreds of miles of jungle and several dozen landmines.

      “Here,” he said to Ignacio. “Help me pick this up.” He pointed to a blue drum filled with chlorine. The gas burned when it hit the lungs. He was careful to turn his head to the side so as not to breathe it in directly.

      The boy nodded. Together they bent to pick up the container. Torres waited until Ignacio’s fingers were below the drum and then he dropped it, crushing his fingers.

      The boy screamed. Now was his moment. As he hoped, Ignacio’s cries were enough to distract the guards.

      He pounced.

      In an instant he was behind the first soldier. He took the man’s knife and slit his throat. He tried to scream but there was just a strangled gargle. Before the other soldier could react Torres was behind him. With one slash of the blade, his artery was cut. Blood spurted from his neck in pulses. Every beat of his heart brought him closer to death, and Torres closer to freedom.

      Torres wiped the knife on his trousers and then slid it into his waist band. He may need it later. He searched through the soldiers’ pockets, taking everything he could find. There was no telling what he would need.

      Ignacio continued to scream. Torres had to shut him up or the other guards would come.

      “Stop,” Torres commanded.

      The boy’s eyes were wide. His jaw shook.

      He thought Torres was going to kill him too. Torres lifted his hands, palm out. “I’m not going to hurt you. Stop screaming or the guards will come and they’ll kill us both.”

      The boy nodded his head. His mouth remained open like his body was not sure what to do next. His hands were still trapped under the drum.

      “I’m going to move this off you. It will probably hurt more as your blood flow returns. Don’t scream. If you scream, you’re dead. Do you understand?” Torres did not specify who would be killing him if he screamed but they both knew it would be Torres. The boy would be dead before the soldiers even registered his cry.

      The boy nodded.

      Torres lifted the drum off him. Ignacio whimpered but he didn’t scream.

      “Good. We’re getting out of here. Stay behind me. There are landmines everywhere around the coca fields. Don’t make a move unless I tell you. Do you understand?” he asked again. And again the boy nodded.

      For once Ignacio was quiet, no screaming or crying or incessant chatter. If Torres had known all it would take was seeing two men murdered to shut him up, he may have been tempted to do it long before now.

      Torres reached into his pocket and produced a long piece of string and a bolt. He made sure the bolt was firmly attached before he turned to Ignacio. “Follow me. Come on, Girl.” He motioned to the dog whose ears went up when she heard her name.

      Torres ran towards the coca fields. There was no need to need to tread lightly until they reached the far side. He only looked behind him once to make sure Ignacio was following him. If he did something stupid that would get them caught, Torres would pull out the knife and slit his throat.

      They ran until his lungs burned, Girl beside them. Torres pulled out another piece of meat and gave it to her. “Sit.” Torres surveyed the land that lay ahead of him. The most treacherous part would be the hundred feet that surrounded the coca field. After that, they would hit jungle again, and the IEDs would be less of a fear.

      Torres took the bolt and threw it, holding the end of the string so he would not lose it. Once it hit the ground, he slowly dragged it back to trip any wires attached to the landmines. Once he had pulled the bolt back they were ready to move. “Go,” he said to Girl.

      The dog ran ahead, stopping in the exact spot the bolt had fallen.

      “Good girl.”

      Torres turned to Ignacio. “Stay behind me.”

      “OK.”

      The first step was the hardest, when Torres’ stride took him from the safety of the coca fields to the uncharted periphery, but after that he was committed. There was no question: they were going.

      When they reached Girl, Torres through the bolt again, repeating the process. It was painstaking; they only gained another ten feet with each treacherous cycle.

      “They’re going to come for us,” Ignacio whimpered.

      Torres shook his head. “We have an hour. They won’t look for the guards until they don’t show up for the handover.” He had planned it. This escape had been months, no, years in the making. First was training Girl, and then he had to find the bolt and string. He would have preferred metal wire, but that was in short supply in the jungle. The hardest part of the plan was getting the guards to trust him enough that their guns were not always trained on him, that part had taken years.

      They were right to be wary of him.

      “But,” Ignacio began again.

      “Shut up,” Torres snapped.

      He pulled the string back slowly. Again the ground was clear. But just in case, he had Girl. “Go,” he said.

      “I can hear them,” Ignacio whimpered.

      Torres shook his head. “You don’t. That’s just your mind fucking with you. Stay focused. They’re not looking for us yet.”

      Ignacio began to cry. It was a quiet pathetic sound like he was trying to swallow the sobs. Torres put his hand on the knife. The blade was already sticky with drying blood.

      “Keep walking,” Torres commanded.

      “I can’t.”

      “We’re almost back to jungle. It will be safe there.” He was lying of course. There could be landmines anywhere. But he would tell Ignacio anything to shut him up.

      “I hear them!”

      Torres’ head snapped round. “You don’t.” He spoke as calmly as he could. He didn’t want to kill Ignacio; he was just a kid. But he would. “Keep walking. Follow my footsteps. Put your feet exactly where I put mine.”

      Ignacio’s lip trembled.

      “No. No. Focus. We are getting out of here. We are going home. We have people waiting that love us; that want us back. We need to get back for them. Your grandmother. Tell me what your grandmother is going to make for dessert.”

      “I can’t.” His face crumbled.

      “Yes you can. We have twenty feet left. Stay strong. Is your grandmother going to make flan? Or maybe a tres leches cake.” What Hispanic grandmother didn’t have a recipe for those desserts?

      “I can’t.” Ignacio began to shake. “I can’t.”

      Before Torres could stop him, Ignacio began running for the jungle.

      “Fuck.” Torres should have killed him. He was going to die anyway and at least Torres would have made it painless.

      Ignacio was almost back to the jungle when an IED exploded.

      “Fuck!”

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