Four

They swam slowly and quietly under the pier and waited for the 'guard' to move on. As soon as he had cleared their section of beach, they quickly dropped their swim gear hiding it beneath the pier and scooped sand onto it. They quickly made their way off the beach and through the brush.

Staying low, they tried to be as quiet as the thick brush would permit. Sticks crunched, their equipment rattled, and the brush gave way to several open patches which would have, likely, exposed them if it hadn't been for the velvet cover of night. Paint-rifles ready, the team ducked behind a thick oak surrounded by waist-high bushes. Amber slowly raised the barrel taking a deep breath and sliding her index onto the trigger.

"Wait!" Nick yelled in a whisper, and swatted the barrel down, "POONTH!" the ball of red mush spread itself across the tree roots beside her left foot.

"What are you thinking?!" she whisper-yelled at him as a sort-of argument broke out between guards. The men argued indistinctly over a pack of cigarettes and yelled in a language neither of the kids understood.

"I know you just got here, but I have spent the better part of two years at this camp. I have never seen these 'guards'" he cautioned, "I have a feeling… just, wait."

A scream stopped the guards' quarrel and shattered the silence of the night. A young, mostly naked girl, "maybe 16" amber thought, was dragged to the side of a poorly lit shed. Both guards changed from arguing to a sudden burst of sporting laughter. Choking for breath she clawed at the men's faces and pleaded in another language, neither of them could make out, before being slapped to the dirt. Her hands were still bound in front of her, and her words hung still in the air.

The woman didn't even try to stand; she just laid face-down in the cold soil of mid-autumn night, bound behind a broken shed under the boot of sadists. A soldier knelt to her, and gently wiped the bloody dirt from her lips as he pulled her eyes to his.

"Ka, salosa valask." The man muttered to her.

"Something's wrong, nick." Amber stated, and the guards continued their assault.

"Ubit' yeye bystro, Karchkov." The first guard said.

"Dia, dia" number two replied.

Another kick spread crimson on the shed wall, begging had become duller, slower as their captive faded in and out of darkness. One man picked her back up and held her with his hand around her throat laughing at the steady flow of tears from her eyes, and blood from a sharp, fresh gash over her eyebrow.

The woman's black hair hung in matted clumps, soaked and dried together by mud and the blood from previous beatings. She shivered visibly in the cold October air, her skin a ghostly white. The first man, thoroughly enjoying himself, pulled her body towards him and threw the woman back, slamming her against the shed sending her sliding back to the ground.

Number Two seemed irritated, "Sdelay eto. Teper, Karchkov."

Shimmering mocha eyes stared upwards from the dirt while her blue-cold fingers dug into the leaves beneath her body, and steam rolled up from her breath. The team's eyes slammed shut, and their heads turned by themselves as a loud 'BANG, BANG' broke the night, and echoed through the coastline.

"This can't be a training mission. That girl just fucking died, nick!" she clenched her teeth and let tears roll down her cheeks. She rolled from a squat and thudded to the ground behind the tree.

"Our damn paint guns aren't going to do a fucking thing." He said, adrenaline clearly surging through him. "We need an upgrade. Fast."

Amber cleared her head and wiped her eyes dry with the back of her hand. "Squad command, this is training team Foxtrot Delta, copy?" nothing came back but a dull static. Again, she tried to reach answers, direction. And again, with more volume and panic this time. Still, nothing came back.

"How?" she asked herself silently, "how could they NOT know this was going on? They had to, didn't they? THAT was their job. Someone should have scouted the layout, mapping out the terrain. And what of the fake guards?"

"Okay" Nick started, "we need a better plan."

"No kidding." amber replied and thought for a moment. "Maybe we should go back the way we came?"

Shaking his head, he reasoned, "can't, the boat is gone. We can't swim back."

"What if we take out these two and try their radios?" she asked.

He looked at her disbelieving, "and how would we do that? Our guns aren't worth a damn, and they're twice our size."

She slammed her head on the tree she was leaning against, "well help me think of something!" she whisper-yelled at him.

"Can you like, throw a fireball?" He asked.

She shot him a look, "fuck you. I hate that, and it doesn't work like that anyway. I can't 'throw a fireball' like in the movies." She said making irritated wavy signs with her hands.

"Well, be useful, amber!" he shouted, and then muttered "I'm stuck with a pyro that can't use fire."

 She searched her targets, "Fine. Close your eyes nick."

"What? Why?" he asked completely thrown off.

"Just do it!" she scolded him, "and don't open them until I say to."

As soon as his lids closed, she peeked around the trunk and waited for the soldiers to be sufficiently hidden from the others. She took a breath, exhaled, took another, and her nostrils steamed. Up, she lifted her hands. Then down. Up again with more energy, then down. Up a third time, with real speed, down, and up a fourth time with real anger, the ferocity tore through the air. Her eyes roared with color, reds that faded into oranges, swirling into blues and greens. She focused her mind on the young victim, the abuse the two men had inflicted. The guards, silent in their fire, shared separate mixtures of color. And down the fire fell as she lowered her arms.