The Last Thank You

Thin sunlight seeps through the leaves of the trees. The clouds are hanging low and threaten rain. The burning wreck of my plane lays a hundred metres away and acts like a beacon to me.

My lungs and my leg burn with pain. The punch out wasn’t easy. The blow of the ejector seat hits with more G’s than a hard left bank. I jarred my knee landing and winded myself thumping into one these trees. I rest against one, I’m puffed. I’m in no danger. There’s no war here. Not now.  We fixed that. But we don’t want a return to the nineties when full scale civil war was killing everyone and no one knew who was on whose side and we flew circles in the sky and did nothing. That was before my time. Now I just keep watch. Well I did. Something went wrong. Electronics just cut right out as I passed over this very valley and the plane stalled and nearly dropped from the sky.

Trees are big here. Bigger than the surrounding woods. Branches interlock and leaves block nearly all the sunlight. The ground is soft and twice now I’ve seen white lights, like orbs shifting through the trees in front of me. Marsh light, Willow-The-Wisp perhaps? Or concussion.

Got to stay with the wreck. They’ll search this area. Then I just wait for a short helicopter ride, a hot shower and chow.

Feel really tired now. Drop in altitude was sudden, must be messing with me. Lights in amongst the trees again. All around me now, dozens of them it’s like they’re dancing through the branches. Kind of pretty. I shake my head, dizzy. I close my eyes for a second, rub the sleep from them with my palms, blink a few times and there’s a woman standing next to me. She has kind eyes that are icy blue, creased with laugh lines, and a woollen shawl draped over her shoulders and head with dark hair falling over her forehead. She doesn’t say anything, beckons to me, holds her hand out to me, her fingers are cold. She leads me away from the wreckage. I protest and try to turn back but she smiles at me and puts her fingers against my mouth and stills my argument. We walk surrounded by winking lights.

A light rain starts to fall. I’m not getting wet and the trees are smaller, less of them too.  The big trees that have surrounded me all day are gone. I hear voices drift on the wind and I crouch, the silent woman stands tall. Soldiers come from the tree line and surround us, but they don’t see us. They look through us, past us, over us. Women and kids emerge, all are crying, they’re being herded into a muddy pit, nearby idles a truck full of seedlings.

I can’t move, hardly breathe. They shoot them all. Mothers holding babies, kids screaming as their parents are cut down and then they’re shot too. Bayonets come out. I scream out, no one hears. I close my eyes.

I’m in the wood, the tall trees all around. Bright green grass under my feet. The woman is gone, the lights grow amongst the trees.  The wind rushes through the wood, bending the boughs of the tallest trees. I stare at the ground and then drop to my knees and scrabble in the dirt. I dig until my gloves are torn and my fingers are bleeding. The wind is roaring now, the sound a deafening crescendo. The orbs dance at the periphery of my vision. I find a piece of my plane and using it as a pick to keep digging. I hit a rock, but it’s not a rock. I dig around it, under it, lift it. A skull. Hole in the back of the head. The wind stops, the trees go still, I stand with the skull held reverently in my hand.

I think of the blue eyed woman and the skull in my bleeding fingers. The wind shifts, sighs through the wood. The orbs surround me, pulsing with soft light and then they vanish amongst the trees. I feel a soft caress on my check, a kiss? A farewell? Helicopter blades thump in the distance.

It was a thank you.