Abby's eyes darted as a middle carriage was set ablaze.
"Make ready to the right," a man's voice yelled from the middle of the carriage. "Protect the carriages!"
Abby shifted her horse to the right as Luna got behind the carriage, protecting herself from an unknown threat.
"What the hell?" Marcus yelled as he sat up with his grenade launcher. Marcus leapt from the back of the caravan, landing on the sand. "You guys okay? Where's the gunfire coming from?"
Abby jumped off her horse with Luna in tow.
Marcus ran behind the caravan looking underneath, laying in the tall grass with the two women.
Quickly, Abby took off the sniper rifle from her back as she lay prone in the grass setting her scope and looking through the barrel across the rolling hills to the west.
"What the hell is going on?" Marcus bellowed. "Do you see anything?" Opening his chamber, he put on one grenade ready to go. "We're not even an hour out and we're already being attacked? Was the intel we received faulty?"
"Keep the carriages moving," they heard a voice say as a carriage moved away, continuing down the dirt road.
Boom! Ping! Whoosh!
The three comrades backed up into the low grass and down the back of a small ditch sheathing themselves from oncoming fire.
Luna looks on the scope of a rifle. "I just saw a head go from over the hills to the west. It's about a 250-yard shot from here." Adjusting the scope on the top of her gun, she put her head back into the scope. Taking her right finger, she licked it and put it in the air. "The wind is calm," Luna whispers with a sensitive determination in her voice. "Could you shoot a grenade about 300 yards out there?"
Marcus tossed out his toothpick onto the grass and took another one out of his pocket. "I got you covered! Abby, come to cover me!" Marcus glanced over to Luna. She was loading up a clip to her rifle and pulling the charging handle back.
Abby put down her binoculars, peering down screams echoing through the field. Her eyes frantically bounced around trying to find any opening for Marcus and Luna to take their shots. Abby stood up as she pointed her rifle straight downrange towards the first hill. Boom! Boom! Boom!
Three shots rang out as Abby saw a head peak up right from the hills. She felt a bullet hit near her feet as she jumped back into the grass. When it landed hard on the grass, she put her binoculars to look downrange.
"I got you," Luna whispered as she pulled the trigger on her sniper rifle. BOOM! The grass beside them fluffed up from the recoil.
Abby's mouth gaped open as a bullet whizzed forward, hitting the opposing enemy and mouth blood splattering everywhere. "That's a confirmed hit Luna!"
Luna clenched her fist, tears gleaming down from her face. "My first kill and it was to protect my friends. Marcus, let him have it!"
"With pleasure!" Marcus kneeled and looks at his grenade launcher at a 45° angle. His finger touched not only one but two triggers, sending two grenades flying into the sky.
Kaboom!
A cacophony of body parts splattered in the sky as Abby saw the flames and bone scatter across the hills. "Great shot Marcus," she yelled over to him.
Marcus put his dome up as he looks at Luna perched on her knees. "I wonder where everybody else is. She would push forward!"
"There's no cover," Luna bellows. "We don't know how many of them are out there have weapons. Let's shift over to the middle where the burning carriage is."
Abby ran up beside them, loading another bullet into her rifle. Hopefully these single shot rifles don't mess up. "I heard what you guys are talking about. Should we try to find Monica?"
"I think we're all in agreement here that we should go that way," Marcus states as he put his grenade launcher on his back, pulling out his pistol. "I'll lead the way."
The two women nodded as Marcus proceeded to go deeper into the grass away from the dirt road.
Marcus looked down to see one of their own troops with a wound to his neck. "He's one of ours." Taking two fingers, he placed them on the chest of the man pointing towards the sky. "Let's keep moving."
The three camouflage laden comrades moved slowly through the grass, keeping their heads low as bullets continue to whiz overhead.
Marcus touched his afro, looking back at the two women. "That was a little bit too close for comfort." Taking his right hand he brushed his afro on the top to see if any was missing. Pulling his toothpick out, he chewed it vigorously.
"Psst," a female voice says, grabbing Marcus's ankle.
"Oh shit! You almost got shot!" Marcus's eyes traced the outline of Rosemary who was hunkered low into the grass. "Sorry about that," she says as she stood up on one knee. "I almost died because I was right in front of the carriage. They shot a rocket or something at us…"
Abby looks down at Rosemary's leg which was bleeding with the cloth wrapped around it. "Are you okay!?"
Rosemary grabbed her ankle, twitching her lips a little bit. "It's nothing but a little bit of glass and I was able to pull it out. Hurts like a Charlie horse though."
"I ought to take a look at it," Luna insisted, leaning down in front of Rosemary and putting her hand on her right shoulder.