Bulldog: Too Many Monsters - Chapter 4
Bulldog 1: Too Many Monsters
Chapter 4: Two Goodbyes
“Hopefully it doesn’t come to that.”
Just as we reached the county line, almost dead on the line, we witnessed another catastrophe. This time an oversized truck, eighteen-wheeler variety, had come off the adjoining through road and ploughed straight through two cars that waited in the layby beside a grassy embankment. Pieces of human seemed to be littered across the lane, glass and metal twisted into the bodies. I begged Mum not to look, but she was already in tears and pleading with me to stop.
“I can’t stop, Mum; we need to keep going. I am so sorry.”
“Frank, please!” she asked again.
I drove a handful of metres past the accident unfolding behind us, Mum still begging me to turn around and help the survivors of the accident. Through the same ill-fated cruelty, a thunderous crash shattered our disagreement. Another truck had fallen off the overpass and smashed into the family car side on, flipping us inside and sending the shell tumbling down the embankment. It landed with a metallic boom on its roof upon the peaceful green.
“Fuck” I breathed out with a trickle of bitten lip blood.
My first thought going to my brother in the back seat.
“Sammy, talk to me, mate,” I shouted over my shoulder.
His groan was indicative enough to tell me he was alive and coming round. I checked over and grabbed the backpack that sat in Mum’s footwell, pulled it across, still juggling with the added challenge of being completely upside down, disorientated and likely carrying a concussion. Bullets fired outside off in the distance; it could have been in my head, but somehow I doubted life was going to give us a break like that.
“We got to get out,” I informed Sammy in the backseat.
“My seatbelt is stuck,” Sammy replied calmly.
Definitely in shock, I thought to myself. I rummaged through the bag and found that knife from the kitchen. Sammy cut away at his belt with the knife and eventually fell awkwardly to the floor-cum-roof, letting out a pathetic whimper as he did. I did the same, cutting away at my belt and kicking open my door, glass sprinkled onto the floor and my head as I crawled to safety.
“Is Mum?” Sammy asked before I cut him off.
“Yes, she’s gone.”
“Should we get her out?” he asked, sniffling as the tears came back to his eyes.
“Yeah, just give me a second to get my head together.”
Sammy went over to Mums door and gently creaked it open. It took some force, but he got through the struggle alone. I took in the surroundings; the mine shell was obliterated, as was the majority of our family car. Looking at the wreckage, I had absolutely no idea how either of us had made it out alive. It was honestly a miracle that only our dear sweet mum was taken in the impact.
“Help me get her out,” Sammy asked as he started sawing away at her seatbelt.
“Gently,” I said, holding her in place as he did.
We placed Mum by the side of the road. It was a nice bushy spot covered away from the potential passing traffic. I wish it weren’t so littered with debris from our near-death explosive experience. Her body was cooling already, she was always suffering with poor circulation, but this was noticeably different. Sammy was barely holding it together, but I saw his determination to get her to rest before he fully collapsed into another outburst of emotion. We stood for a moment nursing our wounds, checking ourselves over for any bleeding and silently saying our goodbyes to both our parents.
“Let’s get the bags” I instructed my younger brother.
“All of them?” he asked innocently.
“As many as we can carry.”
“Okay, well two of them are heavy with tins.”
“Good, we will probably need the food. Just grab what you can,” I asked again.
He obliged and made his way to the back of the car, upside down and twisted into a deformed mess of metal. He gingerly grabbed all three packs and placed them at his side. Then it happened. Pop Pop Pop sounded out from a hidden location. Gunfire.
I hit the ground as bullets ricocheted off the car’s shell. Sammy dropped to the ground, and I saw the look on his face. I will never forget it. Sammy was shot three times in the back, the last shot piercing his chest and destroying his heart. He died lying face down in the mud, covered in his blood and the blood of our mother. The murderers stormed across the nearby verge and took me under arrest. They threw our packs to the side of the road and left my brother’s body for the animals.
That was the last time I saw him; that was the day my mother and father died, that was the last time I ever saw Liz. I stood alone against the invading monstrosity that burned my family tree to the ground, bound, blindfolded, and gagged in the back of a military vehicle. I hadn’t any idea where I was being taken, hunched over in the corner of this military vehicle that roared through the war-zone streets. Occasionally one of my captures would shout in a language I did not recognise and throw a punch, kick, or slap my way. Tortured until we arrived at our location and the truck growled into a vibrating sleep.
