Survival Rules Series (Book 1): Rules of Survival

by Hunt, Jack

  “Yeah, I’ll be right there.”

  He crouched at the lip of the store and used a pair of binoculars he’d grabbed off the counter on the way up. Even though Lou was convinced they were out of hot water, Tyler wasn’t. The smoke grenade he’d thrown had landed in the back of their pickup truck so even though it was dark, he could still see the smoke billowing in the distance as they swerved to the edge of the road near Bighorn Casino and one of them tossed it out. Had he got back in and driven off, Tyler might not have given it another thought, except that wasn’t what he did. The guy turned and looked towards the store. Another one jumped out the passenger side and they reached into the back of the truck and pulled out what appeared to be AR-15s with bump stocks, which would allow the semi-automatic rifle to fire bullets almost as fast as a fully automatic. They left their vehicle where it was and running at a crouch all four of them crossed the road and fanned out into the adjoining lot that was used for car sales.

  Tyler hurried over to the opening and yelled as he scaled down the ladder taking him back into the stairwell. “Lou. Uncle Lou! They’re not gone.”

  He almost bumped into him as he hurried into the store. Lou was already on it, carrying another M4. He handed it to Tyler without even asking him if he knew how to use it. It was a given. Tyler had been given lessons since he was old enough to hold a gun safely. It was the only thing his father taught him that he actually enjoyed. It let him release his frustration and pent-up anger. There were often days he would go out the back of their home in Montana and line up bottles just to unleash a few rounds. He’d become very adept at firing from a kneeling or standing position as well as moving. Left handed, right handed, with or without support. His father made damn sure they knew guns like the back of their hands.

  The soles of her feet ached more than her thighs. While hiking was a favorite pastime for tourists and residents of Vegas due to the immense number of trails in the area, she’d never had the time to waste. Waste. That was what her mother called it. Wasting time. What was the purpose of walking somewhere unless you have a reason? Why walk when you can drive or catch a plane, she would say. Her father wasn’t much different. Raised in a wealthy family, he knew nothing more than the silver spoon.

  Erika reached down and scratched the back of Bailey’s ear and pulled her in close. Even though she felt moderately safe walking the streets at night with her dog, the breakdown of power made her feel uneasy. With no lights on, and only the fires burning brightly throughout the city, the sense of impending doom felt ever present.

  She was halfway through the Art District when she saw a group of thugs coming out of the Gold and Silver Pawnshop dragging a man by the back of his collar. They were laughing and beating him with their fists while several others cleared out whatever they could from the store. Those not a part of it slipped by quickly, not wishing to get involved and not hanging around long enough to give the thugs a reason to turn their anger towards them. What caught her attention was that they weren’t what she would have classed as gang members, they looked like ordinary bystanders, the kind of people you might see waiting at a bus stop, or staying in her hotel. Erika crossed the street to avoid walking into them and tried to turn a blind eye but when Bailey started barking, one of them looked over.

  “Shh. Bailey. Quiet,” she said picking up the pace.

  “Hey. Hey wait up,” she heard one of them say. Out the corner of her eye she caught him jogging towards her. Before he could get close, Erika fished into her jacket and pulled out pepper spray. Trish always carried one in her purse, and she was mortified to learn that Erika didn’t. She’d never needed to. In all her times of traveling she’d been driven across the city. “Well you can use it when you take Bailey for a walk. You are planning on walking her yourself, yes?” Trish had said.

  “Of course,” she remembered saying.

  Spinning on the balls of her feet she didn’t hesitate for a second to threaten him with it. “Back off. I’ll spray.” Trish had told her numerous times that if she was ever attacked to spray and run, never give them the option to walk away. It was her first time being approached. In theory she hadn’t been attacked but there was the potential. Bailey tugged hard on the leash, baring her teeth and lunging at the guy.

  “Whoa!” he said backing up with his hands raised. “I thought you were someone else. My bad.” He backed up a little more but still wasn’t interested in walking away.

  By now his friends were looking over. Erika knew time was of the essence.

  She took a few steps back and then turned and hurried down the street. She went at least six blocks and found herself downtown before she dared looked back. They were gone. She stopped running and placed a hand up against a tattoo store to catch her breath. Bailey took a piss, and she looked around. Most if not all of the stores on the street had their shutters down. Besides the pawnshop, she hadn’t seen anyone else breaking into stores though she imagined it would only be a matter of time if the lights didn’t come up. Her thoughts returned to her parents as she trudged through the downtown weaving her way around stalled vehicles. On the way she passed by several people, folks who had common sense not to attack others. She felt like warning them about the group she’d passed but opted to say nothing and press on. A few tears welled in her eyes as she recalled her mother’s scream. Had someone broken in? It was possible. Their home in Midway was in a well-to-do neighborhood. Had someone taken advantage of the moment?

  As she came up to Stewart Avenue the Zappos building was on her left, and a huge open lot to her right. She crossed the street and turned her head at the sound of a bottle smashing, that was when she caught sight of the same group she’d seen looting the store. A shot of fear went through her as she became aware that they were following her.

  Erika swallowed hard and burst into a full-out sprint.

  No sooner had she started to run than she saw them take off after her.

  What did they want? She didn’t have anything of value on her. Across the street were a couple hurrying. She called out to them hoping they might listen but they were too gripped by fear to stop. They darted down another road and left her running towards a gas station on the corner of Las Vegas Boulevard and Mesquite Avenue. She had cut around the back hoping to find somewhere to lay low when she noticed they’d divided and two of them had circled around to cut her off.

  Her eyes darted back and forth as she tried to dash between the gas station and Money Gram. It was pointless. Bailey began tugging hard and trying to scare them off but it wasn’t working. “That dog bites me I will kill the damn thing,” one said.

  “I don’t have anything.”

  “Yeah you do, Lyons.”

  Then it dawned on her that they knew her. Her stomach sank.

  “Yeah, I thought I remembered you. I saw your billboard over on Clark Avenue. I don’t forget faces. Now come on, what have you got?”

  “I don’t have anything.”

  Bailey was now pulling to the point that Erika could barely hold her.

  While the group didn’t look like they were carrying any weapons, that didn’t mean shit. She saw what they did to the pawnshop owner. One of them came at her, a large guy, greasy hair, overweight and all hands. He didn’t get within spitting distance before Bailey pulled so hard that the leash slipped through her hand and she attacked the man, latching on to his wrist. He let out a wail as he stumbled back, falling over.

  That was when she saw one of them produce a tire iron.

  “Bailey,” she yelled as one of them struck the dog. Fortunately, she moved otherwise it would have nailed her head. It was the worst thing they could have done. Instead of cowering back, Bailey pounced on the tire iron-wielding lunatic and started snapping up her shit. As Erika tried to get Bailey off, someone grabbed her from behind and dragged her to the ground. She felt a hard whack against her head and then heard her dog let out a loud yelp. Erika blacked out at that point.

  How long she was out was unknown but when she came to, the peo
ple were gone and a familiar voice could be heard nearby speaking softly to Bailey. “There, there, it’s okay, girl.” As her eyes adjusted and the world snapped back into view, she saw Nate down on one knee, a gun in one hand and the other stroking Bailey.

  16

  Rounds snapped overhead, a torrent of gunfire that would have easily forced the Las Vegas SWAT team into action, except not that evening. “Tyler, one of them is going around the front. I’ll hold them off here,” Lou said. Tyler nodded and took off at a crouch. He spotted the guy darting from one vehicle to the next, using them as cover to close the gap between him and the store. The other three were nothing more than a distraction. There were only two ways up onto that roof. They had used the one through the store, and the other was around the west side of the building. There was a staircase that led up to a side door. If a person balanced on the metal railing they could easily haul themselves up. Tyler figured that was what this goon had in mind.

  For a brief moment, as Tyler tried to get a bead on him, he felt as if he was back in Whitefish, thirteen years of age with his father bellowing at him. He’d constructed an elaborate homemade shooting range out back of the home. It was on a level that even the FBI and CIA would have been impressed. There were buildings they had to clear, obstacles to shoot around, lateral moving targets and a few surprises that their father threw in each time to try and catch them off guard. Tyler had excelled in shooting stationary targets but it took him years before he could proficiently navigate that course without error. Throughout those early days he never heard his father once say well done, or good job, or you’re getting better. It was always the same shit — you missed that target which means you’re dead. How does that feel? Or what kind of shooting do you call that? Or you’re lacking focus. It was rare he heard any positive words. Even when he finally completed the course, his father simply snorted, got this half smile on his face and walked away. It had been his brother who had championed him, patted him on the back, told him he was getting better. Had it not been for him, he often wondered if he would have turned the gun on his father. It was crazy to think about that now but back then there were many times he felt as if he’d reached his breaking point.

  In his mind’s eye he could see the targets springing up into view from behind bushes, and moving along a rail his father had made. The anxiety back then was not about being killed but about getting it wrong. Missing the target. Firing too many rounds. Showing a lack of situational awareness. Being judged by his father. His palms would sweat and his pulse pound as he darted in and out of bushes, trying to hit targets while making sure that he didn’t trigger a trip wire and end up with a branch slapping his face or chest.

  Tyler squeezed off a three-round rapid burst, smashing the side windows of cars before a round struck the guy in the shoulder spinning him to the ground. His instinct or the memory of his father told him to climb down and finish the job. “You leave them alive, you die. You got it?” he recalled him saying after Tyler hit a target only to be shot with a rubber bullet. Yeah, his father didn’t do it by halves. Forget using paintballs. How could he forget the bruises all over his body? The pain of being shot with rubber bullets. That alone motivated him to get it right.

  At the lip of the roof he scanned for movement. He knew the guy wasn’t dead as he’d clipped his right shoulder but he also wasn’t lying down as his feet had disappeared out of view. Tyler looked back towards Lou who was taking care of business. “You okay, Lou?”

  He gave a thumbs-up before unleashing a burst of gunfire.

  Tyler hurried over to the side of the roof, swung his rifle behind his back and climbed over. He slid down and made his way to the front of the store. He cut the corner and pulled back before pivoting around and making a mad dash for the vehicles on the other side of the road. As soon as he was over, he dropped down and checked his ammo before looking to see where he’d gone. A quick peek showed no sign of him. Where are you?

  His mind flashed back to the past.

  After Tyler successfully completed his father’s shooting range multiple times over the years, Andy Ford looked more annoyed than pleased. In an attempt to ramp things up, and take difficulty to the next level, he’d invited buddies of his from a survival workshop and told Tyler he would be going up against six of them in a forested area, north of their home. It was a location he hadn’t ever been to but his father was all too familiar with it. Also, what he hadn’t told him was that he would be doing it at night, his attackers would be camouflaged, and he would be wearing a bright orange vest. Tyler would get five rubber bullets and he was to use nothing but the environment to evade and conquer. That was it.

  “But that’s unfair,” Tyler had said.

  “Life is unfair, kid. Get used to it. You think when this world goes to shit, people are going to ask themselves if they are giving you the advantage? No. You have to be ready any place, anytime, with whatever you have.”

  “But there are six of them.”

  “I guess you’ll have to adapt.”

  He spoke with him as if he was just a stranger who’d walked into his store to get survival advice. Corey of course had passed with flying colors, he was a natural, someone who took to any environment he was placed in. But Tyler. It was always an uphill climb. None of it came to him naturally. He made more mistakes than his father’s worst students. Dumped off in those woods later that evening, with no previous experience on what to do, he adapted by removing his orange vest, stuffing it in a bush and then climbing a tree and listening for movement. He took out three of them before they realized where he was. After that he dodged, hid in the dirt and leaves and even waded into a freezing cold river up to his neck in order to elude his pursuers. When he was out of ammo and down to the last man, he wielded his rifle like an ax and stayed low to the ground until he saw his window of opportunity. Now he would have liked to have said he passed that day but he didn’t. After knocking out the guy with his rifle, he met his father in the parking lot of the forest where he chewed him out for removing his vest.

  “Did I tell you to climb a tree or wade into the river?”

  “You said use the environment, I did.”

  “Did I tell you to remove the vest?”

  “You said adapt.”

  “Well you failed. Failure to follow the rules is failure in my book. Failure to—”

  Tyler cut him off. “I did what I had to out there and I’m the one still standing.”

  He knew there was a good chance he would get a beating for speaking out of line but at that point he didn’t care. Cold. Hungry. Tired, and miserable with spending hours and days doing everything his father said with little praise, eventually got the better of him. His father didn’t wait. He lashed out and slapped him across the face, knocking him to the ground.

  “Not standing now, are you?” his father said, leering over him. The smell of alcohol was thick on his breath. It wasn’t him talking but the whiskey. Tyler’s hands balled in the dirt, gripping wet leaves. All he wanted to do was knock his teeth out, make him understand what it felt like. His father saw his reaction and beckoned him to take a swing. “Go on. Do it. It will be the last thing you do.”

  He was baiting him.

  Corey had been waiting in the idling truck. He’d watched it all play out but did nothing. Tyler looked his way expecting him to intervene as he usually did but he didn’t that evening. He assumed his father had told Corey to stay put or his punishment would be even more severe.

  Instead of taking that swing, Tyler released the leaves and rose to his feet, brushing himself off and gritting his teeth. He scowled at his father before saying, “You know what, Dad — fuck you! And fuck your rules of survival.”

  His father attempted to strike him again but he ducked his open hand and bolted into the dark forest. Back then he was certain his father would chase him down and give him an ass whopping. But he didn’t. Instead he let him stay out there for close to forty-eight hours in the worst conditions of rain and cold. Miles and miles
from the nearest town, in a landscape that looked the same everywhere he turned. In those two days he learned more about surviving against nature than he had from his father, all of which led him to believe that his father had purposely set him up, knowing he would bolt. He’d played so many head games with him he didn’t know whether he was coming or going.

  When Tyler finally emerged from the forest and arrived home, his father didn’t lay into him, neither did he greet him with open arms. He just acted as if nothing had happened. It was business as usual. But it had happened, and those events and many more had stuck with Tyler, eaten away at who he was, and for better or worse shaped him into the man he was today.

  Movement off to his right snapped him back into the present.

  “Arggh,” he heard as the Asian guy catapulted himself off the top of a truck landing on top of him. Tyler’s rifle was knocked from his hands as they rolled across the sidewalk into the road. Bleeding badly from his wound, the guy had his hands wrapped around Tyler’s throat and was trying to choke him out. Tyler reached up and jammed his thumb into the man’s bullet wound, causing him to cry out in agony. He followed through by striking him in the eyes and digging in his finger so deep that he could feel the bone. They rolled again, and now Tyler was on top. Without hesitation he reached around, pulled his pistol and fired three into the guy’s stomach. His body went limp beneath him and Tyler stared down at the first person he’d killed. Shock quickly set in as he crawled off, rose to his feet and stared blankly. He staggered back trying to come to terms with what he’d done. It didn’t matter how many times his father had told him he’d have to kill someone one day to survive, it didn’t register in that moment.

  Fear gripped him. He was thinking the cops would show up any moment and toss him in the back of a cruiser. He looked down at his bloodied hand and felt his stomach lurch. With one hand on a car trunk he retched before wiping his lips with the back of his hand. Tyler hurried over and retrieved his rifle, then he ran to the far end of the store and took up a position to help Lou. Fortunately, two of them had already been taken out.