‘They’re Serbian spies,’ someone replied, prompting laughter.
What happened next was beyond surreal.
Jeton’s head suddenly exploded! Blood and brains spurted in all directions. A bullet entered one side of his head and came out the other taking his brains with it. The only sound was a sharp, loud slap. The life went out of his limbs and he dropped to the ground in a crumpled heap. His head was shattered.
Some of the officers dropped to the ground while others remained frozen where they stood. Everyone was trying to process what had just happened.
The first managed response was from Pandi’s uncle who snatched his pistol from its holster and aimed it at the father as he shuffled away from him, fully expecting to find a smoking gun in the man’s hands. But both hands were empty. He switched to the mother, shuffling his feet as he’d practiced many times on the range, knees bent, bottom out in a sitting position, arms reaching in front of him, both hands clenching the pistol. The woman was standing with her mouth agape in utter horror, staring at the dead officer who’s skull she’d seen explode. Her hands were empty and shaking.
The silence was broken by the girl’s high-pitched scream, blood and pieces of brain splattered across her face. Heads snapped around, searching in all directions, all wondering where the shot had come from. Hands reached for guns, bodies crouched, torsos twisted on heels, fingers on triggers.
It seemed longer than sixteen seconds before the next bullet arrived. It struck the other officer who’d been holding the girl, entering the back of his head just above the neck and exiting through his nose. He dropped like a discarded puppet.
‘It came from there,’ the commander shouted, pointing towards the wooded hillside to the west. ‘There!’
Everyone scrambled for cover except the mother who was catatonic, her eyes glued to Jeton’s shattered head. An officer grabbed the girl and dragged her to the cabin. The father stumbled back into his car before realising his wife was just standing there. He yelled at her to get in. She didn’t respond. He pulled himself across the passenger seat, reached out the door, grabbed the bottom of her coat and pulled her inside.
The other officers all found a tree to hide behind.
‘Pandi!’ Pandi’s uncle shouted. ‘Get down!’
Pandi realised he hadn’t moved and scrambled as quickly as he could to a tree where he hugged the base of it.
‘Anybody see a shooter?’ the commander shouted.
No-one had a clue. The ground to the west of the clearing went sharply downhill from the edge of the clearing for eighty metres to a narrow gully before turning steeply back uphill for another thousand. The first few hundred metres were bracken and shrubbery turning into uncultivated woodland the rest of the way to the top.
‘They must be in the woods,’ someone shouted.
The commander peeked around his tree as much as he dared to get a look. ‘Did anyone see anything?’ he shouted. ‘Anything at all?’
Silence followed.
‘Does everyone have their rifles?’ he shouted.
‘I don’t,’ an officer called out, his pistol in hand.
‘Me neither,’ shouted another.
Pandi realised he didn’t have his weapon. ‘Mine’s in the cabin,’ he shouted. ‘It’s with my body armour.’
‘It’s no good to you there, is it?’ the commander yelled.
‘So’s mine,’ another shouted.
‘Go get it,’ one of the officers called out.
‘I’ll get shot, you idiot,’ came the reply.
The commander considered the situation and came to a conclusion. ‘It was a long shot from that wood. The targets were standing still. No-one can hit a moving target from there.’
‘He’s right,’ one of the others said. ‘They won’t be able to shoot you if you run.’
The officer without his rifle, Eni, absorbed their comments. He wanted his weapon, not badly enough to get shot, but he felt he needed to show he wasn’t afraid.
‘Go on, Eni,’ a colleague shouted encouragingly.
‘You can do it, Eni,’ another called out.
‘Fuck you all!’ Eni shouted. But he wanted to do it anyway. He blew out his cheeks in an effort to get himself ready. He could see the sense in the argument that no-one would be able to shoot him from so far away if he ran. ‘I’m going for my rifle,’ he announced.
Everyone looked at him. He was nervous but confident.
‘I need to get mine too,’ another announced. ‘It’s in the truck.’
‘Go at the same time,’ the commander called out. ‘You’ll confuse the shooters.’
‘If they’re still there, which I doubt,’ Pandi’s uncle offered.
‘I agree,’ the commander said. ‘They will have run by now.’
The assumptions only increased the general confidence of the runners. Both tensed in preparation.
‘Ready?’ Eni called out. ‘Go!’
The two men propelled themselves forward. The one heading for the truck had taken hardly a second step before a bullet struck the side of his body, in the ribcage below his armpit, tearing through him and dragging tissue and blood out the other side. His legs buckled, he collapsed to the ground and after several spasms he lay still, his eyes open.
Eni had seen his colleague go down and put the brakes on. Panic set in. He couldn’t decide whether to go on or turn back.
‘Keep going!’ the commander shouted.
Eni half turned, changed his mind and took off towards the cabin. It was unlikely that either selection would’ve saved him. The distant crack announced the arrival of the bullet that slapped through Eni’s neck severing the vertebrae and he hit the ground.
Everyone was stunned. They pressed themselves tighter into their trees. One started to pray. Another began to cry.
The commander pressed his forehead against his tree, afraid
