Weekly Expressions 3.2 [] Joe: He Sees You

 

The winds were harsh last night when we were flying. Snow flew all around us in the air until we couldn’t see squat. It was like a living snow globe of hell. Something crashed into our rotor, sending us to the ground fast. Our leader, MacMaheney, cursed us out, telling us to hang on for dear life. As we went down, I could see our morale fleeting away. Then nothing. It wasn’t like that originally. I remember it was only five of us lads traveling that night. There was me, Will, my mates Thom and Dan, our pilot Sam, and the leader of our regiment, MacMaheney. We were only able to travel in such small numbers, ‘cause MacMaheney had minimal connections to the Brits, and they weren’t allowing large bunches of ejits other than us to go.

Ya see, MacMaheney had gotten into his head that word of mercenaries coming to storm his side of Scotland, and it’d happening on the morrow. Only meeting with him a few days before, I already knew he wasn’t about to have any of that bollocks. Gruddus MacMaheney was a few things, but a sitter during wartime wasn’t one of ‘em. So, this man hand-picked four of us crabbit ejits to go with him, asking the Brits to give him funds to make it work. Reluctantly, they said yes, but they gave him an old ‘copter to work with. While it didn’t seem fit for travel, our numpty leader didn’t bat an eye. He kept on yapping, and thus, we left to find these “mercenaries”. Everything seemed fine up until the point of hitting the ground. Hard.

I opened one eye to see what was going on around me. MacMaheney was nowhere to be seen, but I could clearly observe the remains of everyone else. Sam’s jaw was dislodged clean off his minging face, peppermints on his forehead. The only recognizable features being the earmuffs he wore the night before. I turned to my right to see that Thom had a massive piece of candy coming out of his side. It was like his body became part of the wreckage, a furniture item in an unintentional feng shui. I slowly picked myself up, trudging towards what I thought looked to be Dan. Blood dripping from his hairline down, I used what strength I had to shake him awake. He couldn’t be too far gone.

“Git up, lad! For God’s sake! Don’t die on me now, ya dobber!”, I yelled as I shook ‘im. He started to open his eyes a wee bit. “There ya are! Don’t ya feel good to be alive?” Staring blankly back at me for a solid minute, he soon said, “I don’t what yer on about. Where are we?” A chill reached us then, causing us both to shiver. I gave him a knowing look that we needed to go. “I haven’t a clue”, I said. “But I think we shouldn’t be here. C’mon, up with ye.” Extending a hand to him, I helped him to his feet. He winced in pain for a moment, so I took an arm around him to help. We hobbled out of the mess, finally walking into the wooded area we found ourselves subject to.                                                                                         

As we were about to turn the corner, we saw it. MacMaheney, lying on the ground in a pool of his own blood. What came as even more of a surprise, was a candy cane was lodged into his right eye. His pistol was in his left hand, a piece of red cloth in his right. We knew something wasn’t right, though we didn’t take time to check further. Instead, unsheathing our weapons, we looked around us. I heard a distinct sound emitting from the trees then. It was some sort of…happy, familiar sound. A flash of red, and then I felt Dan’s stomach gurgle a bit. Turning to my mate, I understood what had happened. Dan was split in half. His body slumped to the ground, and I stood over my dead friend. Panic came over me.

And just like that, a gust of wind went by me, a plate of pudding smacking right into face. I quickly wiped it off, realizing I was also taking pieces of my face off as well. I cried out like I’d never cried before, the worst pain I’d ever felt as steam rose from the melted flesh of my face. I felt the urge of tears, but I couldn’t manage ‘em. Then a thing came out of the trees. A fat bugger with a great beard, big, bulky arms and legs, and a tremendous belly on the front side of ‘im. Still in agony, I reached out with my hands. The ejit took my left hand, crushing it in its grasp. The feeling of helplessness taking over my entirety of thought, I screamed. Releasing my hand, the thing grabbed my head with its bear paws for hands. It looked down at me and said, “Father Christmas does not appreciate strangers trespassing. Save that for Thanksgiving next time ye plan any adventures again.” And before I could say anything more, I fell asleep.