Flock Hunter

 Flock Hunter

1

Graham hated bear-crawls back when he was playing football. Almost as much as he hated burpees. Not these “influencer” burpees that have grown popular, but the real ones. The ones that had you bouncing from foot to foot as fast as you could until the coach blew his whistle, and you dropped to the ground pushed yourself back up and started again. Sometimes he would wait for a bit before blowing the whistle, and sometimes he would blow it the second you were back on your feet, or even halfway to your feet.  All the while, wearing full equipment.

Those burpees were exhausting.

Bear-crawls on the other hand were hell in their own right. From one endzone to the next, full equipment, and God help you if Coach thought he saw your knee hit the green. Coach demanded discipline and seemed to know when you were holding back. If anyone went slower than their previous time, they had to start over with the rest of the team doing burpees until you were done.

No one held back, and found that even in this singular activity, it was in the best interest of everyone to go full tilt.

Today, however, Graham was bear-crawling through the mud slowly. It struck him as ironic that the burning in his forearms and quads seemed to hit him much faster at this rate than when he used to go fast down the field.

Slow and steady was the pace today, however. Soybeans only gave so much cover, and even with a ghillie suit, if he moved too fast it would draw attention.

No, he had to move nice and slow and he had to get as close as possible while doing it.

He was a good shot, but there were too many variables to take a chance. He had to get close enough to those damned things to nail them without hitting any of the cars going by.

His first target sat a mere 10 yards away up the embankment right next to the highway, perched on its pole, taunting everyone driving by.

Its brother sat on its own pole about 60 yards further down the highway on the other side.

He slowly brought the rifle up, and aimed at the camera facing the west first, and without firing, he slowly lined up the next shot. He aimed at one and then the other, and repeated the motion slow and steady at first, and then faster. He tried to get it the bead lined up from one shot to the next as smoothly and as quickly as possible to avoid delay in getting out of there.

When he felt comfortable enough, he took aim at the West facing camera and listened to the hum of the traffic. When there was a relative lull, he squeezed the trigger.

There was a small burst of glass, plastic and wires at the crack of his rifle.
‘One bird down,’ he thought.

He swung the rifle to the closest camera.

Squeeze. Crack. Small burst of components.

“Ha!” He shouted out to the audience of passing cars and soy beans.

He pulled the rifle back in, sliding it back across his back as securely as possible under the ghillie and turned around. His bear crawl this time was a little more rapid, but still slow enough to not draw attention to him.

He heard the sirens just as he hit the tree line. Finally rising to his feet in the protective shadows of the trees, he pulled out a small pair of binoculars and looked out to the police cars now inspecting his handiwork.

They were all just looking at the ruined camera posts and looking out at the fields. He laughed again and moved further into the trees to where his dirt bike awaited.

Another successful hunt, and another two birds down, making six total this month. It was going to get harder the more he hunted, but like all true Hoosier men, he looked forward to the challenge.