Post by Motown on Mar 16, 2004 16:20:34 GMT -5
I write this as a model to the other budding tale writers, in the hope that you turn you mess of incoherence and babbling, into a crafted piece of literature. The events, which transpired last summer during a Geist Kompanie practice, are mostly true (it is MY tale of valor afterall) The names have been left out, though I feel it better captures the enviroment by making it almost totally anonymous, however, those that were there (and those I wasted 
) should probably be able to attest to the gist of the story.
The Sun barely able to peek itself through the thick canopy of Michigan forest gave us a slight reprieve from the humid temperatures. By four in the afternoon, the heavy panting of five men ranging from slightly out of shape to horribly out of shape was starting to drown out the cacophony of insects atop this mountain. Slowly, we lumbered into a line, more envious of a squiggle, and set out to flush in addition to summarily wiping from existence the two snipers hidden beneath this leafy, foliage cluttered mountain top. Already the canvas straps of my suspenders were chafing my neck and shoulders, yet for fear of disenchantment of the others, I refused to adjust them. The sweat having already seeped into and diluting my reserves of patience, made listening to the gargantuan person seemingly barking orders meld into my daydream. Collectively, our common sense filled in the vital information we didn’t hear, and we alternated our muzzle direction to enhance our field of view as well as fire. Slipping back into the cool recess of inattentiveness, I was jerked awake by the seven foot tall, SR16 clad man hulking into pace ahead of me, as I quickly focused upon the daunting task at hand. With a quick glance over my shoulder to the camouflaged garbed shadow behind me, and a tug at my cartridge belt, I involuntarily followed the train.
The echoes of our footsteps and labored breathing the only audible sound besides the ubiquitous clank of my steel helmet, kept me alert to our prey or perhaps, predators. The 35 yard walk was transformed into a trek by the terrain deviation of this damned mountain top, only accentuating the depletion of my energy and my fall into the crevice of lazy Saturday dreaming. Contemplating why an airsoft team in Michigan would adopt a German name seemed akin to one solving the inquisition of time travel at this moment. While discerning over the practicality of the flux capacitor and use in contemporary time travel scheming, the train hit faulty rail. Within seconds the three men, my own personal shield had fled from being my protection to concentrating on their own survival, though my thoughts upon their selfishness disappeared behind my own desire for self preservation. At last we had met our first contact.
The scrambling of men clamoring for their own pseudo-survival atop this dense foliage was the only sight I could make out, until our finely tuned train lay strewn on the ground like a house of cards in a tornado. The sweat and lip of a steel helmet sliding over my eyes, made it nearly impossible to acquire any insight to where the fire was emanating from, or at least where the other team members were. Slowly I crept up, using the gun stock as a crutch to rest my now non-aching body in the throes of adrenaline. Visualizing every scene from every war movie I’ve had the pleasure to watch, I made a leap frog approach from tree to tree, until finally, there was nothing requiring a long sprint. As I lay down upon the roots and surveyed brilliant work, I noticed that two of my colleagues were to join the ranks that many other forlorn airsofters have, in death. I squirmed around my position to see if by any lucky chance, a fellow teammate was skulking around, but it was futile amidst this thick flora. Feeling isolated (I was), alone (I was), and targeted (I was), rational thought was breaking through the cluttered grapevine of my mind, to give me ANY answer to get out alive. Falling back upon my celluloid education, I slowly took off my steel pot, and held it into the open to draw fire ever so elegantly. It worked, perhaps a little too well, as now the plastic spheres of treachery were bouncing off the tree bark and ground, as if Stevie Wonder were tracing an outline of my location. The elegance was by now ripped away, to be replaced by the panic which could only be possessed by future sniper victim.
I was pressed tightly to the ground, almost too where I could’ve given myself a dirt moustache when I hear a faint rustling of branches to my right. Slowly, whilst bb’s whizzing past my face by mere inches, I had to make a decision. The bb’s, though by now, getting increasingly closer, only met the annoyance of a swarm of flies to me. Bravely (or cowardly) I propped the muzzle over the small berm at the base of this tree, to which I was starting to become more attached to then its own bark. Since the bb’s were flying at me from my front, I determined he must’ve been parallel to me, if not in the exact line I was, so it was the area in which I let loose a more determine and longer rip from the barrel, and heard a muffled “hit” emanate from small leafed patch not more than 25 yards down the hill from my location, a slight victory to raise my morale. At almost the exact moment, I heard a faint rustling the bush to my right. Once again, the cobwebs of panic were washed away in a bleach power wash, and I was immediately trying to discern whether he was friend or foe. The panic of being shot is only secondary to the panic and embarrassment of taking the life of a fellow teammate, making me judge the totality of circumstances and work out a semi-cohesive solution. I deduced that since he really didn’t look like somebody on our team, and the fact that everybody else was probably already dead, I slowly slipped the selector switch from safe to auto, which I oddly had done in the midst of this combat. Knowing I had to be right and understanding that the time had come where I had neither enough ammunition nor enough patience to stay here, I risked myself and knelt in more exposed position. Carefully, I propped the sleek plastic weapon to my shoulder, and peered through the sights, my eyes already squinting from the sweat, and let loose a three second staccato burst. My prey ducked and attempted to dive away from the path he was walking, only to be met with another burst, the final rounds of ammunition I had. He silently and subtly raised his hands and turned around.
I loudly yelled, trying to discern if that was “it”, for if it wasn’t, then the man which I just killed was a teammate, and there was still another sniper still secreted in the underbrush, and no ammunition. I happily heard that “that was everybody” and let out a barely audible, yet well earned sigh. I stumbled upon my feet, brushed myself off, and made my way back to the staging area, to regale everyone with my tale of triumph.
) should probably be able to attest to the gist of the story.The Sun barely able to peek itself through the thick canopy of Michigan forest gave us a slight reprieve from the humid temperatures. By four in the afternoon, the heavy panting of five men ranging from slightly out of shape to horribly out of shape was starting to drown out the cacophony of insects atop this mountain. Slowly, we lumbered into a line, more envious of a squiggle, and set out to flush in addition to summarily wiping from existence the two snipers hidden beneath this leafy, foliage cluttered mountain top. Already the canvas straps of my suspenders were chafing my neck and shoulders, yet for fear of disenchantment of the others, I refused to adjust them. The sweat having already seeped into and diluting my reserves of patience, made listening to the gargantuan person seemingly barking orders meld into my daydream. Collectively, our common sense filled in the vital information we didn’t hear, and we alternated our muzzle direction to enhance our field of view as well as fire. Slipping back into the cool recess of inattentiveness, I was jerked awake by the seven foot tall, SR16 clad man hulking into pace ahead of me, as I quickly focused upon the daunting task at hand. With a quick glance over my shoulder to the camouflaged garbed shadow behind me, and a tug at my cartridge belt, I involuntarily followed the train.
The echoes of our footsteps and labored breathing the only audible sound besides the ubiquitous clank of my steel helmet, kept me alert to our prey or perhaps, predators. The 35 yard walk was transformed into a trek by the terrain deviation of this damned mountain top, only accentuating the depletion of my energy and my fall into the crevice of lazy Saturday dreaming. Contemplating why an airsoft team in Michigan would adopt a German name seemed akin to one solving the inquisition of time travel at this moment. While discerning over the practicality of the flux capacitor and use in contemporary time travel scheming, the train hit faulty rail. Within seconds the three men, my own personal shield had fled from being my protection to concentrating on their own survival, though my thoughts upon their selfishness disappeared behind my own desire for self preservation. At last we had met our first contact.
The scrambling of men clamoring for their own pseudo-survival atop this dense foliage was the only sight I could make out, until our finely tuned train lay strewn on the ground like a house of cards in a tornado. The sweat and lip of a steel helmet sliding over my eyes, made it nearly impossible to acquire any insight to where the fire was emanating from, or at least where the other team members were. Slowly I crept up, using the gun stock as a crutch to rest my now non-aching body in the throes of adrenaline. Visualizing every scene from every war movie I’ve had the pleasure to watch, I made a leap frog approach from tree to tree, until finally, there was nothing requiring a long sprint. As I lay down upon the roots and surveyed brilliant work, I noticed that two of my colleagues were to join the ranks that many other forlorn airsofters have, in death. I squirmed around my position to see if by any lucky chance, a fellow teammate was skulking around, but it was futile amidst this thick flora. Feeling isolated (I was), alone (I was), and targeted (I was), rational thought was breaking through the cluttered grapevine of my mind, to give me ANY answer to get out alive. Falling back upon my celluloid education, I slowly took off my steel pot, and held it into the open to draw fire ever so elegantly. It worked, perhaps a little too well, as now the plastic spheres of treachery were bouncing off the tree bark and ground, as if Stevie Wonder were tracing an outline of my location. The elegance was by now ripped away, to be replaced by the panic which could only be possessed by future sniper victim.
I was pressed tightly to the ground, almost too where I could’ve given myself a dirt moustache when I hear a faint rustling of branches to my right. Slowly, whilst bb’s whizzing past my face by mere inches, I had to make a decision. The bb’s, though by now, getting increasingly closer, only met the annoyance of a swarm of flies to me. Bravely (or cowardly) I propped the muzzle over the small berm at the base of this tree, to which I was starting to become more attached to then its own bark. Since the bb’s were flying at me from my front, I determined he must’ve been parallel to me, if not in the exact line I was, so it was the area in which I let loose a more determine and longer rip from the barrel, and heard a muffled “hit” emanate from small leafed patch not more than 25 yards down the hill from my location, a slight victory to raise my morale. At almost the exact moment, I heard a faint rustling the bush to my right. Once again, the cobwebs of panic were washed away in a bleach power wash, and I was immediately trying to discern whether he was friend or foe. The panic of being shot is only secondary to the panic and embarrassment of taking the life of a fellow teammate, making me judge the totality of circumstances and work out a semi-cohesive solution. I deduced that since he really didn’t look like somebody on our team, and the fact that everybody else was probably already dead, I slowly slipped the selector switch from safe to auto, which I oddly had done in the midst of this combat. Knowing I had to be right and understanding that the time had come where I had neither enough ammunition nor enough patience to stay here, I risked myself and knelt in more exposed position. Carefully, I propped the sleek plastic weapon to my shoulder, and peered through the sights, my eyes already squinting from the sweat, and let loose a three second staccato burst. My prey ducked and attempted to dive away from the path he was walking, only to be met with another burst, the final rounds of ammunition I had. He silently and subtly raised his hands and turned around.
I loudly yelled, trying to discern if that was “it”, for if it wasn’t, then the man which I just killed was a teammate, and there was still another sniper still secreted in the underbrush, and no ammunition. I happily heard that “that was everybody” and let out a barely audible, yet well earned sigh. I stumbled upon my feet, brushed myself off, and made my way back to the staging area, to regale everyone with my tale of triumph.
