It was a mass exodus of good people following an idiot. Instead of anger, Kyle felt an overwhelming compassion, especially for the fathers.
There, but for the grace of God, go I.
178F
THE MONSTER HAD MOVED. Nikki was sure of it. That’s why she’d pressed the shoot button, and now her ears hurt so much, even worse than that earache last year. She wedged her hands against them, trying to shut out that buzzing sound.
The big gun was nothing like her brother’s video game. It was louder and scarier than thunder, and it didn’t shake like the game controller. It came to life, jumping, kicking her belly so hard that she couldn’t breathe. Real guns were nowhere near as fun as PlayStation.
She shined the flashlight toward the monster. His eyes and mouth were open, and there was a dark spot where his nose was supposed to be.
Now he’s dead ... But what if he turns into a zombie?
The door to the room suddenly flew open.
More monsters!
Nikki closed her eyes and squeezed the button again, hanging onto the bouncing gun, even though it felt like all the bullets were flying into her ears.
179F
BACK PRESSED INTO A doorway alcove, Ryan waited for the prolonged burst of gunfire to subside.
“Somebody just capped the two guards,” Bradley whispered.
“This floor’s gonna be crawling with enemy soldiers. We have to move. Now!”
They hustled through the hallway, unraveling the detonation wire. Illuminated by night-vision goggles, soot particles whirled like ghostly apparitions and stung Ryan’s eyes. Acrid smoke tickled his throat, and he resisted the urge to cough. He glanced at the dead men slumped across the threshold; then rifle leading the way, finger on the trigger, he nodded to Bradley and pivoted into the open doorway.
180F
EVERYTHING HAD CHANGED in less than a minute. Since then, Jessie had been lying on the ground with Billy, afraid to move. She’d made it as far as the driveway when a stabbing pain had stolen her breath and knocked her off her feet. A bullet had ripped through her right thigh and despite a tourniquet made from a shoelace, the wound continued to ooze blood.
Once the toddler’s incessant crying tired him out, a rogue wave of worry rose inside her.
Kyle should’ve been back from Tavares by now. Oh God, what if he’s been injured?
An image formed in her mind, unshakeable and terrifying. She could see him lying on some forest floor, bleeding and helpless, just like her. Tears spilled over her lashes, along her cheeks, and crested her upper lip, filling her mouth with the taste of salt.
Another sequence of gunshots assailed Sugar Lake, an onslaught, followed by an exchange of single shots. She was certain one of the muzzle flashes had come from the northern ridge, from Abby. Her eyes filled with joyful tears because her baby was alive; then as the deathly silence lengthened, despondent tears took over. What if that bullet hit her?
The ache generated by that question made Jessie forget about her wound.
Darkness fell, the temperature dropped, and she heard a scraping sound, moving closer.
“Will ... ?” she called out in a smothered whisper.
“Yeah.” His voice was faint, his breathing sounded labored.
When he’d closed within a yard, Jessie could see that he was walking on his knees, dragging the M1A behind him. The smell of blood enveloped her. “Oh God, Will. We have to stop that bleeding.”
She began untying her other shoelace, her eyes fixed on Will’s right arm, glistening in the moonlight.
Panting, he kissed his sleeping son’s forehead. “Take care ... of Billy.” The words escaped Will like a deflating balloon, then he collapsed.
Jessie tightened the tourniquet around his arm, promising herself he had merely lost consciousness. She looked upward at the star-speckled heavens and prayed for Will and George, for Bradley and Kyle, but mostly for her daughter.
Abby’s fine, Jessie told herself. She’s in her ghillie suit. She’s read every Sniper book. Bradley trained her. She knows what she’s doing ... Too bad I don’t.
She groped for the M1A, wishing she’d learned to be more proficient, regretting all the wasted opportunities. Then Jessie activated the nightscope and maneuvered the rifle toward the northern ridge. As she scanned the hilltop for Abby, a familiar question barged into her mind. What if she located the gunman? Could she actually pull the trigger?
She had asked herself that question during every overwatch shift. Tonight, the answer was coming back different. Hell yes! I can shoot that bastard!
181F
ANOTHER MONSTER APPEARED in the doorway. Nikki pressed the button again, bracing herself, but nothing happened. Where was the get-more-bullets button?
A big black gun was pointing at her.
Nikki screamed as loud as she could, and Bradley ran into the room. This time, he didn’t beat up the monster. He ripped the gun from her hands, hoisted her off the floor, and tucked her beneath his arm like a football.
“She fu-u-uh—fudging shot those guys!” the monster said. His voice wasn’t nearly as scary as she’d imagined it would be.
Bradley told him he was lucky she burned through the whole mag—what did that mean?
Nikki felt like Superman, flying through the doorway into the dark, smoky hallway. She extended her arms, enjoying the ride ... until the gunshots started again.
182F
RYAN SHOT FOUR GUARDS as they emerged from the stairwell, then he raced through the small office to catch up with Bradley. In eighteen years of military service, he had never felt so rattled. It was more than almost being shot by Nikki, more than almost shooting a five-year-old; it was downright inexplicable.
Ryan had burst through the doorway, zeroed on the rifle, and reacted as trained. He’d pulled the trigger, but his weapon failed to discharge. Somehow, the safety had ended up engaged when he knew damned well it wasn’t when he’d left that closet. It didn’t make sense.
He climbed through the broken window to exit the building, sucking in deep breaths of clean night air, then his eyes lifted skyward.
Did a higher power intervene? To prevent me from accidentally killing a child?
Bradley was making a crouched run for the fence, clutching Nikki and the spool of wire, leaving a metallic trail in his wake.
Ryan crept toward the fuel tankers. Under the glow of floodlights, he saw guards lining an empty walkway. Kyle had succeeded in stopping the influx of refugees, leaving only enemy combatants inside the building.
Ryan removed two claymore mines, firing devices, and blasting cap assemblies from Kyle’s backpack. He angled the first claymore toward the guards; the second, toward the white tent; and after rigging the mines, Ryan opened the fuel tank that fed the tanker’s engine and set it ablaze.
Frolicking flames leapt upward. Agitated voices bored through the drone of the generator. As guards dashed toward the truck to retrieve its fire extinguisher, Ryan detonated the mines, unleashing 700 steel balls at nearly 4,000 feet per second.
He bolted toward the fence, and poufs of sand began fizzing around him like tiny geysers. Ryan glimpsed the silhouette of a gunman perched atop the shipping container.
It was that guard—the one he never should have left alive.
183F
KYLE JOGGED BACK TO the Dodge dealership across from the hospital; and with each step, his blistered feet ached.
He watched the crowd approach a guard distributing MREs. As cheers and applause glided across the street, Kyle entwined his fingers and gripped the top of his helmet.
They’re all about to die. And I can’t stop it.
His faith in humanity transformed into a series of haunting questions. Why did people always follow the ranting idiot? What could he have said to make them understand? And why didn’t the damned building explode?
He checked the time. 8:03 p.m. His orders had been clear—head home at eight, with or without us.
Well, I haven’t followed any other or
ders, Kyle thought, yanking Ryan’s watch from his wrist.
He reset time to 7:53, and as he refastened the watch, he heard a popping noise that sounded like a grenade. A guard stationed near the roadway was scrambling toward the fence.
Shit! Kyle thought, he isn’t supposed to be there.
The man scaled the shipping container full of seized firearms then began shooting into the compound.
Kyle raised his rifle and aligned his sights on the silhouetted guard. Before he could fire, the man collapsed.
Civilians had stopped entering the facility, half pointing toward the dead guard, half toward the flames shooting from the western side of the hospital.
What the hell? A fire isn’t part of the plan.
A bright light flashed from the rear of the building. A resounding rumble shook the ground, then backlit smoke reared up, roiling like a pit of angry vipers.
Frightened refugees began running, and the guards who had been distributing food and water opened fire. Again, Kyle raised his rifle, but a few well-armed Americans had beaten him to it. He smiled, watching people disperse into the darkness. They had escaped with their lives.
I hope I can say the same for Bradley and Ryan, he thought, then he set off for the rendezvous point.
184F
AS CHASE KINDERMAN’S Raptor closed within range of the B-2 Bomber, two jets appeared on her radar, both on a heading to intercept the rogue plane.
They couldn’t have detected the stealth aircraft, she thought. Was it a routine Chinese patrol? A pair of Russian MiGs? Or did the traitorous Pilot radio his position and request an escort into foreign airspace?
Chase unleashed her 20mm cannon on the slow-moving bomber. A hundred rounds per second punched through the radar-absorbing skin, tunneled into the fuel tank, and turned the aircraft into a seventy-foot dagger of flames.
The approaching fighter jets closed within visual range.
Chinese J11s, she thought as a flurry of rounds pinged against her Raptor. Chase pulled into a steep climb, reporting that she was under fire.
Did the pilots mistakenly assume she had fired on them? Or were they angry over the destruction of their billion-dollar prize? Either way, it didn’t matter because permission to engage was denied. The U.S. could not afford a clash with China that might provoke an attack on Taiwan.
Although the J11s had stopped firing, their pursuit continued. Two more radar blips appeared ahead of her, another pair of J11s. Did they intend to drive her away from their coast? Or was this a hostile act?
Her thoughts jumped back to the Hainan Island incident of 2001. A Chinese fighter jet had caused a midair collision, forcing a Navy signals intelligence aircraft to make an emergency landing on Hainan Island. China had detained and interrogated the crew for eleven days and returned the disassembled aircraft months later.
Chase refused to let that happen to the Raptor.
Like most fighter jets, J11s could fly at high altitudes, but could not execute the tactical maneuvers that an F-22 could. Giving a fleeting thought to the Raptor’s failure-prone life-support systems, she pushed the jet above fifty thousand feet.
The J11s stubbornly shadowed her until four F-18 Super Hornets appeared on radar, then they abruptly broke for home.
A B-2 Bomber kill, she thought. I can’t wait to tell my dad.
185F
BRADLEY SHOT THE GUARD atop the shipping container, then lifted the fence and shooed Nikki beneath it. He handed off the detonator to Ryan and followed the Army Ranger out of the construction site. As the C-4 exploded, Nikki screamed and took off running.
Bradley chased her down, his wounded arm throbbing with each step, and lifted the squirming child onto his hip. “It’s okay—”
“Another monster!” she shrieked, pointing at Ryan.
“He’s no monster,” Bradley told her. “That’s my friend, Ryan. He’s one of the good guys.”
Nikki tentatively peeked over her shoulder. “No. You’re a good guy. He’s a monster,” she insisted. “And good guys need to kill the monsters!”
“Whoa,” Ryan said, indignation evident in his tone. “Why does he get to be the good guy?”
“Because I’m a Marine.”
“No-o-o!” Nikki admonished him. “It’s ‘cause you don’t look like a monster.”
Gleaning that she was referring to the uniform, Bradley said, “Nikki, the monsters were just dressing up like Soldiers. You know, pretending. The real Soldiers who wear those uniforms are good guys.”
She cast a wary eye toward Ryan then said, “Bradley, can you find my mommy and daddy?”
A rush of sadness plowed through him. “Were they inside the building with you?”
“Ut-uh. The monsters shoved them out a big door. That’s when I ran away.”
“Nikki ... I ...” He just couldn’t find the words.
“Did the monsters kill them? Like all those stinky people on the grass?” she asked, her little voice breaking along with Bradley’s heart. The EMP had forced her to experience death in a way no child ever should. Nikki plunged her face into his shoulder and began to bawl.
“I’m so sorry,” he said, patting the back of her head.
By the time they’d crossed Route 441 and doubled back to the Dodge dealership, she was inhaling with miniature gasps and exhaling muted sobs. Bradley gazed toward the hospital, now an inferno. Intense heat was rending windows, and ravenous flames jutted from the building like hellish tornadoes, spawning massive columns of sooty orange haze. Civilians were helping themselves to the pallets of food and water; a few had ventured back to the shipping container and were raiding the cache of weapons.
“I told you we should’ve taken out that guard,” Ryan muttered.
“I did.”
“Yeah? Well, it took you long enough.”
“Because you went off script, set the tanker on fire, and fu-u-uh—fuzzied up my night vision.”
“Nice save,” Ryan said with a chuckle. “So, are you reporting for duty? Or staying AWOL to try your hand at fatherhood?”
The barb reverberated through Bradley and settled like a slab of granite in his stomach. “Reporting.”
“Good, because the fifty-mile hike to Camp Sunshine is going to be much easier if we double up.”
“I can’t leave without my family,” Bradley told him. “I’ll need a couple days.”
“Is that Marine-speak for I’m staying AWOL?”
He sighed, knowing how it sounded. “Why don’t you come with me? Two days of R-and-R at Sugar Lake. We’ll load up with food, water, and ammunition then head out.”
“You want me to walk thirteen miles south, making it a sixty-three-mile trek back to Camp Sunshine?”
Bradley shrugged as they approached their rendezvous point, the man-made triangular lake.
“You got any alcohol down there at Sugar Lake?” Ryan asked.
“I don’t, but Kyle does—”
“Deal! And speaking of Kyle, shouldn’t he be gone by now?”
“Yee-yup.” Via night vision, Bradley saw Kyle fiddling with his watch. “Did he just reset the time?”
“Yeah ... Let’s teach him a lesson.”
“You sure you want to do that while he’s wearing your pants?”
“Point taken,” Ryan said. “There’s no way I’m going back to base dressed like this.”
As they closed within ten feet, Bradley said, “You were supposed to leave a half hour ago. That was an order.”
“Seven fifty-five,” Kyle said, displaying the watch as evidence. “Five minutes to spare.”
“You’re full of sh—sugar,” Ryan told him. “We just watched you turn it back.”
Kyle flashed a guilty smile, then nodding toward Nikki, he asked, “Who is that?”
Bradley’s pulse quickened, and his bandaged arm felt like it had spontaneously combusted. “I, uh ... I know I promised there wouldn’t be any additions to your family ... But ...”
186F
ABBY HAD BEEN FORCED to abandon
her hide. That damned twine was a post-EMP MapQuest leading directly to her.
Why didn’t I think of that before?
Alone in the darkness, she glanced at the moon, trying to determine how much time had elapsed. The full disk had risen around six p.m. and was now high overhead. Estimating fifteen degrees of arc per hour, Abby figured it had to be approaching midnight.
There had been no activity since her ill-advised AK-47 stunt, which led to three possibilities: the sniper was dead, had retreated, or was still out there.
Abby ruled out dead. The shot she’d taken couldn’t even qualify as a scientific wild-ass guess. Retreat was possible, but unlikely. A sniper wouldn’t just give up. For him, five hours hunting a target would be a mere blink of an eye.
Hearing a rustling noise, she held her breath. The sound was moving closer, emanating from behind, and Abby didn’t dare move. Above her thumping pulse, she heard a flutter directly overhead. Eyes projected upward, she saw nothing.
It must’ve been a bat, she decided, returning to its roost after feasting on insects near the lake.
Taking a slow breath, she thought, what would I do if I were the sniper? Her gaze swerved from her hide to the trip wire at the base of the hill. I’d establish the twine’s direction and sneak in from behind.
With deliberately slow movements, she retrieved the grenade from the pocket of her cargo pants. If she lobbed it at the middle of the trip wire, shrapnel would pelt anyone within a forty-five foot radius. Without the nightscope, it seemed her best—and only—defense.
Perilous thoughts seeped into her mind. Would Gramps have spotted the sniper if he hadn’t been distracted by their bet? Did she inadvertently get him killed? Get her mother killed? Will and maybe Billy?
Gramps would be so disappointed, she thought, not to mention my dad and Bradley.
Abby could feel herself crumbling, overwhelmed by grief and guilt, aggravated by her own incompetence. Hot tears began rolling over her cheeks, and she fought the impulse to vent a primal scream that her dad and Bradley could hear up in Tavares. That is, if they were alive. What if they were dead? What if she was completely alone?
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