Free Liberty or Tyranny by John Grit

followed, her face streaming.
    Mel picked up Nate’s rifle and walked through a sea of sadness. “Don’t back down on this,” he warned. “It wasn’t their fight, but they stayed and helped.”
    A bald man in his fifties, wearing dirty overalls, pulled his shoulders back and stepped forward. “I shot them. I’ll say that until the day I die, because it’s true. My bullets are in both of them.”
    Brian sat in the truck and stared blankly though the windshield. “They burned my best friend alive.”
    “I know,” Nate said, his voice uncharacteristically soft. He got in beside him. “It’s my fault. I shouldn’t have left you alone.”
    Deni, already on the driver side and about to get behind the wheel, nearly screamed, “No it’s not! We all know whose fault it is. Brian didn’t do anything wrong and neither did you.”
    Mel handed Nate’s rifle to him through the open passenger door. “They think they can kill kids? To hell with them. Brian, you didn’t do a damn thing I wouldn’t have done.” He started to walk away, then stopped. “I’ll stay here and take care of… everything. Tyrone and Atticus can help me make the arrangements.”
    “Thank you,” Nate said. “We’ll bury him in the morning.”
    Deni cranked the motor and drove away.

Chapter 5
    Brian insisted on starting the grave himself. The morning broke colder than the day before, and the first inch of soil was frozen hard. He tried pushing the shovel in but was forced to stand on the back of the blade to penetrate the frost. As he dug, people began to converge on the cemetery and gather around, their faces solemn. They were coming early, before the grave had been finished.
    A mule-drawn wagon came slowly down the street, driven by a worn-out-looking raggedly old man, so thin, his clothes hung loose and limp on his frame. The mule’s shod hooves clattered and the wheels rattled on the hard pavement.
    The sun seemed to catch in one place, just past the edge of the eastern horizon, fixed and still as the clear sky itself, out of sight and offering no promise for a brighter, warmer day. Brian dug for 30 minutes. The sun finally relented to the earth’s turning. Its upper edge inched reluctantly above the horizon. As he continued to dig, the sky brightened a little, but remained as cold as before, colder. Brian stopped to rest for a moment and looked to the east. There was no warmth to the dawn, just a red ball that hung there, suspended and immovable, it seemed. Its slanting rays reflected off a sheet of crystalline frost that sheathed everything not human or animal. There was no wind, just penetrating cold.
    The mule plodded along in its slow, steady gait, neither hurried nor hesitant, oblivious to the mood of humans.
    Donovan had seen to it soldiers were present in numbers designed to discourage attack and handle it if an attack came anyway. Nevertheless, everyone there was armed. Their faces revealed more than sadness. Most showed anger, defiance, and an expression that said, “If you want a fight, we’re ready to give you one.”
    Brian went back to work and dug faster, as if the gathering crowd was pushing him on or he wanted to finish before the mule arrived with its cargo in the back of the wagon.
    Nate finally spoke. “Take a rest. He was my friend, too.”
    Brian pushed the shovel in and lifted more of the dark earth, throwing it aside. “It should’ve been me. He could’ve gotten out of the way, but he pushed me and let the gas get on him instead.”
    Nate grabbed the handle. “Then I owe him my son’s life.” Brian relented and stepped back, his face wet again. Damn it, Nate thought. It seems I can’t protect him from anything. Should’ve left this miserable town sooner.
    He felt something tugging at his insides, telling him a job he had started wasn’t finished. Some group of crazy assholes had murdered a friend, burned a good boy alive, and tried to kill his son. Was he just going to let it go and act like he had