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Writer's pictureRob Johnson

“The Bush” – FWG Flash Fiction for 7/13/2024

This week’s prompt struck me as so very bleak.

The prompt is:



 

 

THE BUSH

 

My squad took the worst of it. We were hunkered down behind a wall with a shell-blown hole made during some battle long enough in the past so that vines were growing over the opening, although not enough to provide much cover. From the sounds of the battle in the valley below, we expected the Robbies to come over the hill any second. When things got quiet, I thought about sending Jake out to gather some intelligence. But my “squad” was down to just three of us, and we’d lost comms to HQ hours ago. As far as we knew, we were it—humanity’s last stand against the machines. Sacrificing Jake so Jonesy and I could get off a couple extra rounds just didn’t make tactical sense. Besides, he had shown me a picture of the girl he married before shipping out, and I just couldn’t send her a body bag for a wedding present.


So, we waited. All afternoon, we waited. We stared at the lone, scraggly bush at the top of the hill through our shell-blown window. Every time the wind shook it, we thought they were coming. When the sun finally dipped below the ridge across the valley, I signaled to the squad to set safeties and drink some water, eat a protein ration, and pop a stim-tab. If the Robbies came at night with their infrared eyes, we might as well go out on a full stomach.


But the night passed and grew silent. At first light, Jonesy and I crept out to that bush and looked into the valley strewn with the bodies and the wrecks of our battalion. There wasn’t a Robbie in sight.


I sent Jake home to his wife. Jonesy shook his head, so we went looking for a working comms.

  

THE END

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