The Watchful Barn Owl

“You couldn’t hit the side of a barn door, even if you were in one, Barney.”

Barney had a wistful smile upon remembering his brothers’ joke when he had told them he had joined the army. More so, the irony of that statement hadn’t escaped him now that he found himself in the hayloft of an old barn in a field overlooking a major crossroad.

Not for the first time today, he peered over the damaged half door of the opening to the hayloft and looked to the road leading east, scanning for any signs of movement. The platoon leader, a sergeant, had given him instructions and a codename with orders to keep contact with headquarters on a regular basis. He’d drawn the short straw amongst his platoon and was left behind by the retreating army to look out for enemy movement. He had been given one of the army's radios, some extra rations and extra rifle ammunition to go with his standard kit. There was a water pump in the corner of the barn near the entrance in case he needed water.

Barney had been assured that this was only for forty eight hours, a precaution in case the enemy broke through in the east before the relief army had dug themselves in while the army he was part of had resupplied before re-joining the front. The sergeant said that they would pick him up on the way back. With a last salute and a wave, he had seen off the sergeant and the rest of the platoon, joining the other forces heading west along the road. That had been at dawn yesterday.

Taking note of the time, Barney turned on the radio, dialling in the frequency of headquarters and gave his report, another “negative sign of the enemy”. After confirmation from the receiver, he redialled the radio to a random frequency before turning it off.

Standing up, Barney picked up his rifle that was leaning up against the wall next to the radio. He stepped over to the hayloft’s damaged half door and cautiously looked around. It was dismal day, a rainy day to yesterday’s cloudy day. Visibility was lower today but he could still see the roads well enough to the horizon.

Assured that there was nothing awry, he stepped away from the opening and backed into the shadows, raising his rifle to his shoulder with the barrel pointed towards the outside. He practiced sighting down the rifle at distant targets through the rain, quickly going through the motions of squeezing the trigger and re-sighting as rapidly as possible.

"Practice makes perfect" thought Barney. He knew he was the worst shot in his platoon. His brothers were right in their appraisal of his shooting skills. But he had somewhat made up for it by being the quickest in his platoon.

A flutter of wings broke his field of view as a drenched bird alighted onto the half-door.

“Back again. Guess it must be lunch time” mused Barney quietly.

The bird was a pigeon that Barney had discovered yesterday, shortly after the platoon had left at dawn, that was nesting in the roof above him. It had left soon after dawn only to come back when Barney had taken to eating his rations for lunch. It had stood in the same position and watched him eat. As a novelty, Barney broke up on the biscuits into crumbs nearby onto the hayloft.

Sure enough, it hopped down and partook of the offering, cooing softly as it did so. Barney suspected that the owners of the hayloft may have done the same in the past, judging by the bird’s action. After the bird had finished, it flew off again only to come back at sunset after Barney’s afternoon had been filled with reporting and boredom.

So for the second day, Barney had company for lunch. With a wry smile, he crumbled two biscuits for the pigeon so he could its company a little longer. He took to replying to the bird’s intermittent coos as if it were perfectly normal.

Barney finished his meal just the pigeon did. “See you later” he said as it flew off. He climbed over the edge of the hayloft and dangled his feet towards the ground floor so that it was only a quick drop. Make sure that no one could spot him, he cleaned his hands and refilled his water bottle at the water pump. When he finished, he took the ladder lying in the pile of hay and leaned it against the hayloft. Upon gaining the hayloft, he tipped the ladder back away, taking care of make sure it landed in the hay on the floor.

The rest of the afternoon proceeded in the same way as his morning, more reports of no enemies sighted, play targeting with his rifle and just sitting listening to the rain and trying not to get cold. As the daylight dimmed, the rain stopped and the pigeon came back and flew up to its nest, while Barney, sitting against the doorjamb of the hayloft’s opening, looked out in the encroaching dark towards the north and east horizon, the darkening sky soon allowing the tell-tale flashes of artillery and gunfire to be seen. Barney allowed himself to relax. The blackness and quietness of the surrounding area would easily give away any mass enemy movement.

Barney sat and spent the next few hours this way, trying to guess at the intensity of the fighting from the lights while feeding headquarters their required reports. He wondered as to how the rest of his platoon was going and was looking forward to seeing them tomorrow, feeling a trace of guilt at having had an uneventful vigil.

Feeling fatigue approaching, he informed headquarters this and prepared for rest of the evening. After carefully eating a meal in the darkness, he sat down into the pile of hay he had placed there for comfort, while keeping his right ear towards the outside with the radio’s earpiece placed into his left ear. This was how he had spent the previous night, catching sleep in an hour or so stretches before headquarters would loudly ask for a report.

"Better than no sleep" Barney thought to himself before closing his eyes.

The night past in snatches of sleep and wakefulness and it was soon near dawn. Barney awoke disorientated to the agitated cooing of the pigeon on the half door. Near panic set in when he realised the earpiece of the radio had fallen out. The pigeon kept cooing, prompting a near irate Barney to nearly rebuking the bird only to be beaten by the sound of a gunshot and something zipping past the bird. It promptly took off only to be chased by further gunshots as it flew out of Barney’s view as he laid himself flat as quickly and as silently as the hayloft allowed.

He crawled to the lip of the hayloft took get a look outside and saw a train of tanks and troops trailing all the way back towards the east. As he watched, he identified that the troops’ uniforms and the language they spoke were of the enemies. Indeed, he could hear them laughing and cajoling each other. At this, he quickly turned on the radio, hoping the hay would muffle his sounds. After a couple of nervous attempts, he dialled in the radio to headquarters as he quickly related what he saw to panicking receiver.

“Standby.....” was the last thing Barney heard as the radio noise turned to static before he felt a thump against the hayloft as the upper rungs of the ladder appeared. He dove for his gun and brought it around towards the ladder. The rifle shook in his hand and Barney did his best to fight it steady.

He felt the hayloft shake as whoever was climbing stepped up. A helmeted head popped into view with a surprised look on their face, a look that turned to an incomprehensible yell as they saw Barney sitting in the corner.

No less surprised, Barney pulled the trigger only to miss as he twitched the rifle left. The bullet glanced off the enemy’s helmet and hit the barn wall beyond. The enemy soldier fell off the ladder with a yell. Barney got up and scrambled after the soldier, holding to the wall of the barn to keep out of view to the outside.

The soldier was already up and running as Barney squeezed off another shot, hitting the floor just behind the soldier’s heel. Barney could hear the soldier’s alarmed yell and crawled towards the hayloft door. He saw the soldier join some other troops who were about to shoot their raised rifles at the barn but seemed to have been stopped by an authoritarian voice further back towards the road.

Barney weighed his options and liked none of them but it soon didn’t matter as he saw the turret of the lead tank slowly traverse around and pointed its cannon towards the barn. Barney knew he had mere moments. He felt like his remaining time was whistling away in the air around him.

The tank disappeared in an explosion, followed by another and another, as the whistling turned into a storm of artillery shells raining down that slowly worked its way along the road towards the east. Near blinded and deafened by the sudden barrage, Barney dropped to the corner of the hayloft, rifle bouncing away from his grip as he screwed his eyes shut while plugging his ears with his fingers as his surroundings turned to a cacophonic explosive hell of light and sound.

It was sometime before Barney woke up for the second time that day. As he opened his eyes, he saw the pigeon once more on the half door in what looked like a bright and sunny day. It wasn’t the bird’s cooing that woke him however. He couldn’t hear a thing. Instead he had felt the hayloft floor judder once more. He couldn’t see his rifle near him, so he just composed himself as best he could and faced the ladder, apprehension mounting at every shake of the ladder.

Apprehension turned to relief as the gnarled face of his sergeant came into view. Their mirrored relief followed into smiles. The sergeant said something at Barney he couldn’t hear before the sergeant looked down and said something to somebody below.

The next couple of days was filled with convalescing in a field hospital back at the front, while Barney’s hearing slowly returned. He had been given a citation for his actions, his lapse in reporting apparently unnoticed. The enemy had apparently managed to get a sizeable force around the relief forces while the army Barney was part of was pulled back. The enemy force had hung back to let the gap between forces grow as observed by their forward scouts, but their scouts hadn’t spotted a watcher in the old barn. Barney’s warning had given the incoming army’s artillery to form up and barrage the enemy at the crossroad. The surprise had been complete and what survivors remained were too shell shocked to put up a fight.

Once recovered, Barney was discharged from the field hospital. When Barney returned to the platoon, he remembered the sergeant’s smile but had to be filled in as to what he had said when now been adopted as Barney’s nickname.

Apparently the sergeant had said. “Well done, Barn Owl…… well done.”