Amidst the falling dust (The Green and Pleasant Land) Read Online Free PDF Page A

lifting the gun and blowing the mother away in a style not unlike that of James Bond. It will remain a vision, I turn and run, Fiona will lay there unavenged, until she rises, perhaps to take her own retribution.
    This was some sort of utility block, I run past big old industrial sized washers and driers, piles of dress uniforms are neatly folded and covered in insects. A gasmasked villain has followed me, I hear his muffled shouts start to fade as I duck and dive and weave through the building.
    I exit a rear door to find myself on the field of battle. In the middle of the parade ground sits the Lynx. Its crew have abandoned her and appear to be sheltering behind some concrete bollards off to my left. They exchange frenetic bursts of gunfire with the masked men who seem to be swarming out of the buildings to my right like ants. Just as I am about to retreat back inside and find somewhere to hide someone rears up and slams me into the wall.
    I see the sun glinting on the knife as it heads for my throat, I close my eyes and piss myself in the same instant. Where is death? I sneak open an eye. Then another. The blade is millimetres from my throat. I look into the eyes of a berserker, a product of war, a machine for killing. I look into the crazed eyes of Lieutenant Emmanuel Tasker.
    “Redmayne” he growls at me with a note of disbelief, “God damned Redmayne”. I am shoved aside and follow him as he heads into the utility building from which I just emerged. The warrior is already moving away from me down a corridor, I am a distraction, nothing more. I think about following him, hiding within his shadow, but I sense his shadow is heading for a dangerous place. I let him go and within a few moments I am alone again.
    The solitude does not last long. The battle outside still rages and is about to enter the building. I start to run again and as I pass through the main corridor I see my old friend the gasmasked killer who murdered Fiona. In his right hand he holds a large hunting knife and I note that he has started to strip the body of my former comrade. Upon seeing me he curses. I do not fire, I run away and he gives chase once more. You must think me a coward, you don't know what this is like, we live in different worlds.
    This time he manages to keep up with me as I race through the building. When it seems that he is only a few seconds behind I take a gamble and almost fall as I race down the darkened stairway into the basement below the barracks.

    Deep down in the dark the din was dimmed to a dull and distant roar. The battle was a far off thing, the guns ring out with a hollow hate that cannot reach me here. Drip, drip, drip. The damp and dank dungeon below the barracks is a foul smelling and inhospitable place. My gas mask clad adversary followed me down here. His footsteps boomed with great confidence down the stairwell, but caution has staid his tread as it did mine. This is not somewhere that one runs lightly, and that goes for the hunter and the prey.
    If I meet a cadaver down here I am finished. If the bandit finds me I am finished, to them both I will be another hunk of meat just like Fiona. If I never get out of here then I am finished also. After a time it becomes obvious that the basement level goes down to several sub basements which run under the entirety of the barracks. Within a few minutes I am lost, within a few more I begin to wonder whether or not lost is an adequate term to describe the hopelessness of my predicament. It is a despair which is compounded by the whispers from my pursuer.
    I assume from their clarity that he has removed his gas mask. He calls out to me every now and then, perhaps trying to elicit a reaction that will not come. He whispers to me of all the things he will do to my body with his blade. He tells me that I can't get out. He tells me that he is coming for me.
    If his intention is to frighten me there is no need, I will not get much more scared than this I hope.
    “You may as