The house was situated in rural America, in Wisconsin. It had been purchased by a Dutch family, of a father, mother, and older and younger son two years apart, and one daughter. They had moved from the Netherlands to America in 1968. The father was known as Hylke Boersma. His wife was Godelieve, the eldest son Christiaan , the daughter Josephine, and the younger son Sebastiaan.
Hylke had bought the house for less than it was worth. The owner had tried to dissuade Mr Boersma from buying the house, showing him properties in California, Texas, and even in Alaska. But Hylke had insisted on buying this house, in a very remote location in Wisconsin.
There were farming lands and mountains around the house, and an old fence. Inside the house was furniture, of European design, Hylke said to his wife. Christiaan got a job as a mechanic at the nearby US Army base, while Sebastiaan, two years his younger, worked on refurbishing the exterior of the house. Hylke regularly hunted, in the woods to the north of the house.
It was then after a little under three months of residence when Hylke noticed something out of place. He came home early from his hunt, with no kill. The caribou had scattered before he could take a shot. Disappointed, he headed back down the trail with the scoped rifle slung over his back. The air felt damp around him, clinging to his jacket.
He got in sight of his house and saw Sebastiaan working to fix the fence. Hylke merely nodded to his son before opening the front door. The fence did not extend around the whole house, but stopped at certain intervals. Hylke wondered at what could have happened to the fence to have it deteriorate this way.
He kissed his wife on both cheeks and opened the cupboard to put his hunting rifle away. He took the unused ammunition out first and placed it in a separate compartment. Godelieve spoke from the kitchen. "Christiaan clashed with his commanding officer again today. He is a little too harsh on our son perhaps." Hylke exhaled. "Or perhaps our son is headstrong." He said, walking over to the fire place in the first room.
Godelieve spoke again, her tone soft Dutch with a slight hint of American. "And Josephine is becoming bored. We need to send her to school. Maybe it is a good idea if Christiaan goes with her." Hylke sat down, frowning as he contemplated this. "Who will help to look after the house?" he said.
He shivered slightly, feeling the air cling to him. He looked around at the antiquated, faded sepia wallpaper. Everything suddenly seemed so hostile to him, so hostile he could hardly believe he had lived in the place for the past three months. The outlines of the furniture, sparsely decorating the room, seemed so sharp, cutting into his vision.
The place looked to his eyes as if it was decaying right before him. Then, the illusion faded. He wondered back to when the seller had tried to dissuade him and offer another property. Hylke did not know what had drawn him to this place, just something in the picture had drawn his gaze and held it. He then thought at why he had not asked the seller's reasons for dissuasion.
Godelieve walked into the main room they sat in. "I will. I will be fine." She said. Hylke stood up, feeling uncomfortable on the sofa. "Where is Josephine?" He asked, feeling the beginnings of a headache coming on.
Josephine came through the front door in a hurry. "Papa! Come quick, there are soldiers!" Hylke looked up and followed his daughter to the door. It was then he saw many men walking towards them. Some were supported by their comrades; they appeared to be wounded.
Hylke counted around 30 men, but he could not tell who they were. Sebastiaan walked over, and his keen eyesight picked up their uniform. "They are not American, papa." He noted. He put down his tools and watched. The leader of the men approached, and stopped. He looked at the family, trying to work out who was best to talk to. The leader was clad in brown and grey combat uniform and a beret. His eyes rested on Hylke.
The leader spoke. "I am Staff Sergeant Vladislav Bolotnikov. We were sent on a infiltration exercise...west of here." Hylke's mood soured when he realized he was talking to a Russian. Sebastiaan also tensed, but did not reach for the tools. Hylke's grey gaze had gone a small fraction colder, but the Russian soldier did not realize. "We will be quickly leaving to our extraction point, but we have been hounded by American soldiers for hours."
"Go on." Sebastiaan said, hiding his distaste under a mask of neutrality. Hylke did not speak, he looked to be thinking. Vladislav noted their voices lacked the tone of an American. "It would be kind of you to help us, or if not all of us, at least my wounded. I have 12 wounded men out of 31. We will be quickly on our way...within an will not fight on your residence, and if we are to be captured, we shall give ourselves over. It would not be good of me to ask you to shield us from the people who look after you." At this, Bolotnikov's second-in-command spoke into his ear.
Hylke spoke. "Why would we shield you? You are the enemies of America." Vladislav nodded.
"But we are not enemies to your people."
"That is not the point. You are in hostile territory, why do you expect help? Your commanding officers are not only foolish but quite stupid in not telling you this."
"This means you are American?"
Hylke did not answer.
Vladislav sighed, and spoke in Russian to his second-in-command. The other officer quickly moved back to his unit, who had gathered. Vladislav turned back to talk to the Dutchman.
"You're right. I should have known better. Anything in America is just owned and brainwashed by its tyrannical government. And the world calls us villains? The true villains are the ones who lead you. You must to be careful, comrade. You are part of a herd, being led by those who will eventually reveal themselves as the wolves and turn on you. Good luck with your day, friend." Vladislav said, and turned on his heel, walking towards his retreating men.
Once again, Hylke did not reply. "Husband." Godelieve said, reproaching him. "You should have helped those people Papa. They had wounds!" Josephine said. "Come, in the house, dear." Godelieve said, pulling her daughter away. Hylke gazed at the retreating Russian soldiers pitilessly. Sebastiaan spent a long time gazing at his father, but he said nothing and went back to work. He did not understand what was on his father's mind.
Hylke was inexplicably tired. He had woken up at 10:00 am that morning. Strange, abstract dreams had disturbed his sleep. It was a day after the Russians had come asking for help and been turned away. Hylke thought about the real reason why he had rejected them, only to find none. Godelieve made him breakfast, Sebastiaan set out to work on the fence, and Josephine tired her room.
Hylke thought about going out to hunt. His dogs were sat by the front door, two German shepherds. He sighed and opened his rifle cupboard. As he did, his dogs began barking ferociously. He frowned and said, "Quiet." in Dutch, a little startled. The dogs showed no signs of stopping. If anything, they got louder. Godelieve had come out of the kitchen.
The sound of barking died away and Hylke realized his dogs had escaped through the front door. He ran to the door to see nothing but thick white mists. Even the foot of the mountain close to the house was barely visible. Hylke frowned, still feeling the heat of the sun. The freezing aporia of the mists washed over his skin.
"Sebastiaan." Hylke said. His younger son came to him. "Yes?" He said. "Come inside." Hylke said. His eyes were on the direction the dogs had ran in.
Inside, he went for the phone. "What is it?" Godelieve said. "Christiaan needs to come home." Hylke said, calmly. He picked up the phone and dialled carefully. Godelieve looked quite alarmed at her husband's erratic behaviour. Christiaan stood over by his mother.
"I am Hylke Boersma, can I speak to my son please? It is of urgency." Hylke said. A minute later, Sebastiaan answered him and they had a conversation in quickfire Dutch. Finally, Hylke put the phone down and walked towards the cupboard, taking out the largest rifle. It was M14 with a scope. Not his usual bolt-action hunting rifle, which was the M1891/59.
He passed the bolt-action rifle to Sebastiaan and told his wife to take Josephine upstairs and start packing. She went to question him, but he shook his head. Godelieve did as she was bid, and Sebastiaan went across the living room. The fire was dying, waning out slowly. It wasn't long before Hylke glimpsed a limping figure.
He squinted through the scope of the M14 and saw it was a Russian Marine, but he did not pull the trigger. He would give them one last chance to move away, not wanting violence to erupt. He tried to think why they would come crawling back to him like dogs. Even when he raised his voice, it was still soft. "You out there. If you can hear me, please listen to me now. Do not come past these gates, I will have not any choice but to open fire. Your commanding office should have warned you."
Sebastiaan stood by him and they waited for an answer but received none. Hylke's brow furrowed; the soldier was still walking toward them. "Didn't you hear?" Sebastiaan asked, his voice breaking. He didn't understand all this. "If you come any closer, I will have no option but to open fire." Hylke said calmly, but his arms were shaking.
No answer. Sebastiaan looked from his father to the advancing figure of the soldier. And then the sudden gunshot made him jump.
A shell clattered to the floor and Hylke slowly lowered the weapon. He did not speak. His cold eyes rested on the figure that stood outside, motionless. "That is-" Hylke silenced his younger son. The figure continued walking forward, and Hylke raised the rifle and fired again, leaving three-second intervals between each shot. Finally, the magazine came to its end and Hylke lowered the rifle.
The body hit the floor, in a plume of dust. "That, is not of god." Sebastiaan said, backing away from the window. Hylke calmly reloaded, and went back to the window. More were emerging from the mist, accompanying smaller shapes.
Dogs.
"Barricade the front door and all the windows. Use the steel bars in the eating room" Hylke said, pulling the trigger. His next target was not going down either. Two more bodies fell, and Hylke realized he was out of ammunition. He put the rifle down and walked into the next room, pulling out a big steel box. Sebastiaan had paused. The M1891/59 was low. Hylke opened the box, throwing the chains to the floor.
"Here, take this." Hylke said, passing his son an M16. Sebastiaan slung the assault rifle into his arms. "Wait in this room." Hylke ordered curtly. He pulled out an Remington-870 shotgun with extra shells. "I will guard the first room. Lock the door behind me. Do not open it for anyone. Take the rest of this cache upstairs. Protect them, Sebastiaan." With than, Hylke disappeared into the first room.
He heard the door close behind him, a few seconds pass, and then the lock click into place. Already, he could hear a barricade being attacked. The place he had resided in for three months was so cold and hostile now. The legions of the dead, of the people he had turned away, were now coming back to tear him and his family from their residence.
What goes around comes around.
Hylke moved over to the window that was being attacked, and saw what he could only called a walking deadman. The corpse wore Soviet uniform, exactly the same to what had been issued to Vladislav's unit the other day. The skin was palid and decaying, like the wallpaper within the house. The uniform was ruined and the soldier had no visible weapon. The fingernails were black, and Hylke noted that three of the fingers on the right hand had been torn off by some kind of wolf.
The corpse was battering on the barricades lazily, gazing at Hylke with red eyes. Hylke felt the gaze on something behind him, not directly on him. He raised the R-870 and pulled the trigger, jolting with recoil. The zombie's face caved in itself and fell backwards, and out of nowhere another corpse replaced him. Hylke heard more barricades being smashed, M16 fire from the other room.
Something battered at the front door. Hylke whipped around and took cover by table. The door shook again. And then the window came through and a dog started attacking him, bloodshot eyes and torn fur. Hylke battered the dog away but it was onto him again, tearing into his arms. He swung the shotgun and knocked its legs out from under it and then brought the rifle down on its skull.
It fell still, but it was only a moment before it was back up again. Hylke stumbled back against the wall and raised the Remington. The recoil kicked his arms as the dog's head fragmented around the shell. The body slumped to the floor, and Hylke staggered over to the wall next to the door into the other room. Still the sounds of gunfire.