by Schow, Ryan
She brought the Uniden to her mouth, waited. Her heart was kicking in her chest, black spots building along the edges of her vision. More sweat rolled down her face, forcing her to give a quick wipe.
When the men approaching the lead vehicle were close enough, she keyed the Uniden and said, “Start the relay race.” The relay race kicked off everything. “The last in line confirms. The first shots start the war. Brace yourself, run like your freaking ass is on fire.”
Orbey turned to the boy with the bucket full of dynamite and said, “Swiftly, quietly, fly like the wind.” She said this as she readied her rifle and prepared to lead her team into battle.
The boy was no more than ten years old, but he ran the fastest and the farthest of all the kids in town who couldn’t shoot. He had the bucket of dynamite at his side and scampered through the deeper parts of the forest, stopping at his preselected points to give each of the kids their one stick of dynamite.
Each child that got a stick treated this like a relay race where grabbing the dynamite spurred them into action for the next leg. They quickly got in position, found their target, readied their lighters and waited for the next signal.
Each child was spaced out fifty yards apiece with adults in between. This was done on both sides of the highway with the TNT tossers staggered accordingly. On the other side of the interstate and the impossibly long line of SAA vehicles, Stephani handed her children their sticks of dynamite, told them to get into position.
She could barely breathe.
Each one of those kids and their parents were trusting her not to get their children killed, but some of them were going to die. That’s what Stephani told herself. That’s how she was even able to contemplate all this.
The reality of it nearly brought her to tears, but she was not one to fold under pressure, so she watched them like a hawk, ready to gather them up and get them out if the situation prematurely necessitated it.
She and the kids were farther down the line than her counterparts, Noah and Connor. They were the end of the line on the eastern edge of the interstate with a small team and the spotter. The spotter was about to become the grabber when they needed more guns.
The grabber’s job for Noah’s end of the line was tasked with running into the line of fire and grabbing the discarded weapons from the fallen enemy soldiers.
Lastly, Felicity was positioned in the trees with a rifle and plenty of rounds. She was slow on her cut leg anyway, but a self-described good shot.
With more enemy soldiers than rounds to defeat them, they were going to need every shooter and weapon they could get their hands on. That was the only way to make a dent in this beast.
After three tension-induced minutes of waiting, the little boy’s out of breath voice came over the line: “Confirmed.”
Two curious soldiers from farther back in the convoy were walking toward the lead vehicle. They looked inside the rig, didn’t see them.
In that moment, when all hell was about to break loose, everything in Skylar went completely still, and her courage flooded in.
The inquisitive men meandered around the Chicom vehicle graveyard, then stopped at the trench.
“The first gunshots are your signal to light your dynamite,” she quietly keyed into the Uniden. “Throw them at your targets and run to the hills.”
All the kids had armed leaders or parents beside them. They also had Unidens and hand signals for those who didn’t have the two-ways.
Skylar continued speaking, a sense of dread once again overwhelming her as the first man cleared the vehicles and found the trench. “You have your leaders, meet up and follow their lead. Until you see a parent, they are in charge.”
The SAA soldiers looked into the trench, realized the men at the bottom were their dead countrymen. Skylar lined up the shots, took them both. They dropped into the trench with their brethren.
“Sights on your marks,” she said into the Uniden.
Everyone had their marks, including her. She’d had her pistol ready to go the second the two men approached the ditch. Other SAA soldiers moved forward now, getting their guns out, not quite sure they heard the shots over the sounds of some of the still-running engines.
More and more of them were getting out of their trucks. She saw a man on a radio. What was he saying? Had he sounded the alarm? As for the new group closing in on her position, she saw them looking at the Chicom wreckage, appraising the reason for the slow down.
She spoke into the Uniden one last time, “Three, two, one. Fire.”
She pulled the trigger and her first mark fell. The air suddenly exploded with gunfire and whole swaths of SAA men dropped dead. She lined up the second and third shots, taking her targets down fast, each shot accurate. Still, it never left her mind that there were way too many men for the rounds they had on hand, even with the confiscated SAA weapons.
This is our last stand, she told herself. It would also be their death. For this was the bloodbath Skylar would soon have on her hands.
There’s nothing you can do about it now, she told herself.
Enemy soldiers continued to drop right, left and sideways. That’s when the dynamite went off—one stick after another, blowing up vehicles, ripping apart the bodies, punching holes in the road itself.
The kids all hit their targets.
As she took off down the line, Skylar saw glimpses of the kids sprinting up into the hills. Their timing was spot on, for retaliatory fire was officially underway.
Skylar dropped into a shooter’s stance, took out half a dozen targets, reloaded and shot two more. Using the break in the action, she scrambled forward in the mix of dead SAA soldiers and snatched up their guns.
She hopped into the lead vehicle, shut the door, grabbed the mags out of two guns, stuffed them into her jacket pockets, then took the third gun and her pistol. She scrambled out the other side of the truck, shot two men who were surprised to see her, then made for the western edge of the woods, a stitch of gunfire tearing up the earth behind her.
Keeping the vehicles between her and the Five Falls firing squad, she placed each shot, made sure not to fire into the eastern offensive line.
Or are they the defensive line now?
When she reached the line of TNT destroyed vehicles, she took a deep breath, shielded her eyes and ran into the smoke, shooting anyone still alive, stealing what she could of their guns and ammo without slowing. Eventually she was out of rounds, so she dumped the pistol, made sure she was loaded for bear on the SAA rifle.
When she reached the last demolished vehicle, when she saw the more than a mile long line of SAA military vehicles still left untouched, she slowed, drew a startled breath. Her heart all but stopped at the sight of them.
All this destruction wasn’t even making a dent in the procession. Ahead, she saw Stephani. They exchanged startled looks. Knowing what lay ahead after their best attack, she realized that she indeed, might have gotten the entire town killed.
Herself included.
That’s when the soldiers in the rear convoys began piling out of their vehicles and rushing them. Skylar glanced across the highway, saw Noah and Connor. They were shooting everyone approaching, Noah on his scoped sniper rifle, Connor on his. The spotter was doing his job, but he looked like he was tiring.
Noah sighted those approaching, took his shots and hit them, then switched off for the binos. He saw a man getting on the nearest gun turret, went back to the sniper rifle, scoped him in and shot him.
“Let’s go!” Connor said.
They got on their feet, advanced their position, watched Logan and Harper and their crew blow by them, take a position, drop down and start firing, too.
Noah, Connor, the spotter and most of their crew joined the rush to a new position. They left behind several dead shooters. Noah didn’t even know who they were, but the fact that they were Five Falls residents ate at him. Back to a prone position, sighting their targets, he put the losses out of his mind, knowing more would die before the hour
was over.
As the enemy fell, the spotter ran into the interstate, grabbed what weaponry and ammo he could, then bolted back. The SAA were catching on, so they started targeting him.
He began to zig-zag, stop and go, fake and feint.
For a little while, it was enough, but it was draining his energy. But then he took a bullet in the side, a glancing blow by the look of it. This took even more energy from him. He dumped the guns at Connor’s and Noah’s side, then ducked down and said, “I’m shot.”
“Are you dead?” Noah snapped.
“No.”
“Then get back in there and quit your whining.”
“I said I’m shot!” he barked.
Noah pulled back his jacket, showed the boy a blood stain where he’d been grazed as well, then said, “This is war, not a damn tea party!”
Noah, Connor, the spotter and those of their team who weren’t dead stayed on the move, killing what they could, the spotter working in an in-and-out confiscation that began to get worrisome when the SAA men began piling out of the untouched convoy behind them.
Behind Noah, Connor and their team, Logan and Harper and their team caught the men who got by Noah’s team. Wasting time and ammo on those in hiding, and getting pissed off, Harper turned to her team and said, “Clear my twelve and watch my six!”
Harper ran into a lane of gunfire, Logan by her side, and they played hide and kill better than the SAA men. She opened the doors; he shot the passengers. They both rolled under the undercarriages of the vehicles and shot those tucked behind the wheels. It was a good racket until Logan hopped onto one of the trucks and an SAA soldier shot at him through the window. The bullet missed, but a dozen shards of glass caught Logan in the face. The cuts were superficial. Not missing a beat, he shot back at them, not missing. He didn’t even bother to pick out the glass. The shards would hold the wounds shut until he could deal with them.
Without a word, they moved down the line, Harper nearly catching a round that ricocheted off the side of the truck in front of her. She looked at Logan who looked back at her and said, “Don’t stop. Don’t ever stop!”
One of the SAA men appeared, had them dead to rights, then took a bullet in the forehead and dropped dead. Harper looked over, saw Felicity lining up another shot.
Along the tree line, Connor felt the panic welling in him. Just when he felt there were too many men approaching and they needed reinforcements, Boone and Clay and their team leapfrogged them, dropped down, got back in the mix quick. The spotter, who’d become the runner, was falling behind, but then Orbey and what was left of her team ran by, dropping spare mags off with both Noah and Clay.
The spotter ran forward, slower now than ever. The dirt before him was now jumping with rounds, his path cut off. He stopped, flustered, frozen.
“Hurry up!” Noah barked.
But the spotter couldn’t go any faster, not with the growing red bloom on his side. Noah had his own rifle and was using it to take out the guys trying to lob grenades their way, or the guys manning some of the weapons turrets. The second some asshole got behind one of those turrets, in Noah’s mind, they were done for, dead before they knew it.
When all eyes were on the eastern defensive line, Skylar called out from the western defensive line. In the Uniden, she said, “You’re up, Otto.”
Otto had been taking out the easy marks with his pistol, trying not to get into the mix of things because he alone was phase three of the assault: the next wave of TNT.
With everyone’s attention on the shooters on the eastern defensive, Otto sprinted down the line on the western side and started tossing half sticks of TNT at the SAA’s backs.
He was just about out of dynamite when a bullet ripped through his shoulder. It staggered him, but he fired on the man who’d shot him, dropping down quick and aiming right. The dynamite behind him began to blow, the sweetest sound ever. He had to move! Pain flared in his shoulder, though, numbing it and temporarily halting him. He was done for, he knew this, but he wasn’t done. He started to run again, but a bullet blasted through his calf, slowing him down.
“Dammit!” he growled.
No matter.
Holstering his weapon, tightening his satchel of dynamite, he grabbed a stick of TNT in his mouth, lit the fuse, then tossed it at the next target. Limping forward, going too slow, the dynamite hit, the blast knocking him sideways. Ears ringing, half his body numb and bleeding, he realized he was on the ground. Picking himself up, making forward progress, he didn’t watch for enemies, he couldn’t do that. All he could do was zero in on the next target and force one foot in front of the other.
Another round hit him in the side, and one more in the thigh.
He slowed, nearly to a stop, looking down at his satchel. He had three more sticks in there, plus one for his mouth. Fifteen yards ahead he saw the first turret truck and a dead man slumped over the roof beside it.
Someone pulled his body out of the truck from below. That soldier then lifted his head up, but quickly ducked as a shot pinged off the top. He went for the weapon again, keeping his head low.
Limping as fast as possible, he saw Skylar up the line, sneaking in and out of the trees, shooting, ducking, sprinting forward and shooting some more. A grenade blew up in the forest behind her, but she was already ahead of the blast. Looking back, she saw him, paused, then pushed forward.
She was clearing a path for him. But he wasn’t going to make it.
He moved steadily toward the turret, the strength draining from his arms and legs, a wheezing deep in his lungs, sucking sounds coming from his side. He bit down on the stick of dynamite, his good arm trying to light the fuse, the satchel ready to go.
He got within fifteen feet, lit the fuse, threw it. Another round caught him in the throat. Gasping, gulping, he dropped to a knee, grabbed the satchel off his body and tossed it toward the stick of TNT.
He was aiming for the top of the truck, but it fell short by a lot, skidding under the front engine bay instead.
He tried to get up and run, but another shot cut a hot trail through his cheek, spinning him around. Falling back to an arm, another shot hit his chest and he fell over.
The dynamite then went off, deafening him.
He wasn’t sure if he was dead yet, until he was. He knew it for sure on that last, final gasp. After that, there was no pain, only peace. He hadn’t known peace a day in his life, so what he felt didn’t seem possible to him. If he would have had a mouth, he would have smiled.
Across the way, Noah and Connor were dug in behind the tree line, taking heavy fire. The spotter, who became the grabber, was now dead a dozen feet away, the left side of his body blown apart by a grenade. Connor had a piece of shrapnel in his side and Noah’s face was sliced open, a flap of skin hanging. He still had ammo left, so he told himself he couldn’t die until he was out of rounds.
“We have to move,” Connor said. “Too far away.”
“You can’t move,” Noah said.
“I can move just fine!” he grumbled. “Let’s go!”
They got up, moved down the tree line, taking fire, watching as the SAA troops moved up the line gathering in masses. Noah saw them and felt his soul tremble.
There was no way to survive this.
Behind him, he heard a low sounding thump and an oof. He looked behind him and Connor was staggering a bit, clearly hit.
“Let’s settle down here,” Noah said, concerned. “You shot?”
“Bee sting,” Connor said, a bit of blood gathering around his lips, a hole in his shirt just below his right floating rib.
The two of them dropped down, lined up their shots and took them.
Ahead, Orbey was firing and taking fire, nothing about her panicked. Connor felt himself smile, then he considered that bee sting.
He was going to miss her.
Connor lined up his shots, took them until one caught the side of his head. He felt rattled, his neck jarred, like he was mule-kicked. A drizzle of blood ran down the
front of his face. Was this it, he wondered. He lined up his next shot and thought, no, not yet.
Ahead of him, dirt was kicking up in their faces. Noah jumped, a spray of blood fanning out of his shoulder.
“Son of a gun,” he muttered. Aggravated by the pain, he screamed, “That’s not good enough you commie cocksuckers!”
The barrage of gunfire was now deafening. Ahead, Connor saw the dirt kicking up around Orbey, knew it was just a matter of time. But then he found the man shooting at her and put a bullet in his chest. She looked back at him and he waved for her to go.
She got up and ran into the woods, looking back at him, but he was already on his next target. There were so damn many to choose from! In the distance, a helicopter appeared.
Oh, no, he thought, the kids.
Orbey.
Ahead, Boone and Clay were still firing on the SAA, both of them running for SAA weapons, weaving in and out of the vehicles, taking down the men firing on Connor and Noah.
Clay looked at his brother, saw the beast of a man he always knew he’d become, felt reassured, even though they were both bleeding. He looked back, saw the chaos, found Felicity. She was running out into the field for a weapon, then hobbling back for cover.
Overhead, a chopper dusted them, but it did not fire on them. It was headed toward the hills. After the kids? He wasn’t sure. All he knew was he and Boone couldn’t get there in time.
Down the line, Harper and Logan were doing the same thing as Clay and Boone. But then a sudden burst of gunfire had them all ducking for cover.
On the western edge, Stephani sprinted through the forest, heading dead even with the cluster of men shooting at her friends. She lit the fuse, waited, then ran forward and tossed the stick under the Jeep, right into at least twenty men or more.
Because she’d waited on the fuse, the men had no time to react.
The explosion was so fierce and all encompassing, it literally power-burped up body parts and gore. She ran for the trees, the slop of soldiers raining down around her. Wasting no time, knowing she had to move so they didn’t get a bead on her, she sprinted forward, using the trees as cover, but then she saw half a dozen men doing the same thing as her, skidded to a stop, ducked down and took fire. She scrambled for her life, tapping the last of her reserves, but the men were coming fast.