A Certain Level of Risk

A young Marine faces an unexpected nightmare

"Joey, I'm scared."

"What—?"

"Someone is following us, Joey."

Joey looked in the rear-view mirror and saw an old sedan about a quarter mile back. It was maybe a little odd; this stretch of road was so infrequently traveled—Joey had chosen it specifically for its privacy—that there were potholes virtually everywhere. Joey felt his risk meter slide into the yellow. The officers had gone over "Risk Awareness" before letting them get of the ship in Italy. It was a meter: green, yellow, orange, and red. Green was "no risk;" red meant "imminent danger." They had all laughed about the unofficial fifth level—that led to a change of trousers.

Joey glanced in his mirror again; the little hairs on his neck prickled. The car followed a little too perfectly. The only reason for a car to be down on this road (except for a little private rendezvous) was if they lived in one of the local tumbledown shacks that passed for houses. Or...maybe they were being followed.

Before Joey's started to actually worry, the old dark sedan turned left down one of the no-roads into the swampy areas. Joey relaxed.

Suddenly, at the last intersection of one rutted road before Route 12, the sedan reappeared, speeding in from the left, and cut Joey off. As Joey's brakes locked, a man came boiling out the driver's door of the car. He was at the side of Joey's car before the young man could react. The stranger banged on the window. When Joey stared at the man, suddenly puzzled and rolled the window down.

"Gunnery Sergeant Deely? What are you doing? You had me sca--"

Lena's voice from his right: "It's not what it looks like, Daddy!"

Daddy...? Daddy!

Private Joseph B Schmuckatelli's risk register moved from red to brown.

(Word Count 300)