Enduring Grit: an EMP survival story (The Off Grid Survivor Book 3)

by Connor Mccoy

  As his truck coasted across State Road 22, Kurt sat in the passenger’s side of the truck’s back seat, deep in thought. He hadn’t had time to relax like this in a long time. His thoughts had remained with his men and his hold on Davies. It was so strange suddenly to have nothing to do but sit and wait.

  He glimpsed at himself in the rear view mirror, his burns and scars reflecting back at him. Kurt couldn’t answer why any man would turn violent, but he could say why he did. Death and rebirth. Kurt Marsh, family man, suburbanite, died in a blaze of fire. This new man, Kurt the Phoenix, was reborn in his place.

  How does a peaceful man turn violent, Jimmy? He learns that’s how the world works. He makes killing the tools of his trade.

  The biggest irony was that the last time Kurt had laid eyes on Jimmy, Kurt’s friend of many years was lying on the street, bleeding from the head, with a handgun dangling from his fingers.

  So, Jimmy, what made you pick up a gun and shoot someone? His lifeless friend never answered.

  Fallon, driving again, kept his eyes ahead. With the second truck back in Kurt’s possession, the trailer no longer was needed to haul the other half of his men, so that group piled into the second truck. The men rode either inside the truck cabs or on the truck beds. Thanks to the truck beds’ more solid surface, those men would be able to aim and shoot better when the time came.

  Fallon had asked Kurt if he should push on the gas, but Kurt decided against it. Instead, the two trucks would coast down the road, with periodic applications of gas, to preserve their fuel supply. Even with the load they got from Hooper City, gas was a valuable commodity. Besides, it wasn’t as if his doctor could go anywhere quickly.

  So, it was a surprise when Fallon suddenly hit the brakes.

  “Why are we stopping?” Kurt asked.

  Fallon put the truck into park. “The first truck’s stopped. Something must be up.”

  Two of the men from the back of the truck climbed out and hurried forward. Kurt waited until a man returned from the first truck and reported in.

  “There’s a tree blocking the road,” he said.

  Kurt stepped out of the truck and took a look himself. There, lying a yard in front of his lead truck, was a thick oak tree. The trunk crossed the road from the right to the left, and it was so thick that driving over it was impossible, even for Kurt’s trucks.

  “Pretty damn convenient,” muttered Behr. He walked up to the tree and lightly punched it.

  “Hardly a coincidence.” Hunter walked up to the break point of the tree. He pointed to the tree bark. It was dark and black, with a faint burning smell wafting from it. “This was done in the last few hours.”

  Kurt examined the break carefully. “A small explosive. Detonated precisely to topple the tree onto the road.”

  “Bastards. This was to stop us.” Behr curled his fingers into a fist.

  Kurt straightened up to his full height. “A cheap and desperate trick. This was the obvious road to his ranch. We’ll just go around it. Our trucks can handle the wilderness. There’s no way he can stop us from reaching his ranch.”

  “Doesn’t this mean he knows we’re coming?” Behr asked.

  Kurt started walking toward his truck. “Of course it does. Why does that matter?”

  Nobody had the courage to ask Kurt why they should not be concerned.

  THE TRUCK JOSTLED SLIGHTLY. Kurt barely noticed. His thoughts were centered on the thick trees that surrounded them. For the past hour, the trucks had been climbing a patch of muddy hills. Finding this route presented its challenges. They had driven about thirty minutes, only to be stopped by a deep stream that Kurt refused to risk driving through. Instead, they followed the stream until they discovered a shallow spot. They drove across it and then found themselves on this hilly land.

  The land itself challenges me, Kurt thought with some amusement. He enjoyed the thought of the trees and the rivers around here putting up a fight. Back on the road, he even had entertained blowing a hole in that tree with one of his high yield explosives. Yet he quelled his lust for destruction. He would save his weapons for human targets.

  This is exciting me, he thought to himself. I’ve never been on a hunt like this. I actually may forgive Darber for putting me through this. Kurt felt the gun under his coat. That is, if the rewards we reap from this are good enough.

  Kurt raised his left arm. He wore an old wristwatch, still ticking. It was the only machine he possessed from his old life that hadn’t been ravaged when his home burned down or fried by the EMP. The time read two minutes to eleven in the morning. There still was plenty of daylight left. Hunter had suggested taking Conrad’s ranch at night, to catch them off-guard. But Kurt rejected the idea. This Conrad Drake sounded like someone who was so paranoid he never would not be on his guard. So, Kurt made it clear this would be an open battle. It couldn’t be otherwise.

  I wonder about you, Kurt thought. The fire of the sun transformed this world. Did the sun turn you into a man of war?

  The ground beneath the truck leveled off from an especially steep slope. The sudden leveling of the land raised Kurt’s trucks to eye level with State Road 22. A cattle fence stretched forth, running parallel with the road. Kurt reached for the manual window crank and turned it, lowering the glass so he could stick his head out and see better.

  He was quite surprised. The number of animals, plus the plentiful land could last for years. It was better than he had imagined, particularly more so than the ranch where Kurt and his men had discovered Blake and the other men. This place would be a great present for his men. And to possess such a ranch out here only could expand Kurt’s reach from Davies.

  The lead truck performed a sharp turn onto the state road. Kurt’s truck quickly followed. Now they had a straight shot to the homestead, which just now was coming into view.

  The house was too far away for Kurt and his forces to assault from the road. However, there was an old, small wooden shed that lay a short distance from the house, but close that if the shack suddenly exploded it would rattle the nerves of the people in the house.

  Kurt’s desire for excitement was reaching its apex. He wouldn’t wait any longer to ring the bell, signaling the fight had begun.

  He stood up in his seat and turned around so he was facing backward. Then he pointed to the shed. “Let’s shake things up!”

  Fallon got the message and slowed down. At the same time, one of the men unzipped a large blue duffle bag. Then he pulled out a rocket-propelled grenade. Kurt quickly ducked back inside and watched the spectacle to come. At this distance, they couldn’t miss.

  “Open fire!” Kurt shouted.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  KURT WATCHED the smoke rise from the remains of the shed. The rocket blast had done its job beautifully. The blast had reduced the small shed down to just a few flaming boards stuck in the ground. As the fire raged, small bits of wood fell and continued burning until they were nothing more than smoldering piles of ash.

  I wonder how that little bang shook them up, Kurt thought.

  It hadn’t seemed to cause any outward panic. Nobody had come out of the house, nobody had tried returning fire, nobody even had tried to flee. Odds are Conrad, Doctor Darber or anyone in the house would be cowering inside.

  Maybe not Conrad. Kurt scratched an irritating itch on the side of his burned cheek. If the rumors he heard about this guy were true, Conrad would attempt a counterattack as soon as they got close to the house, with the doctor probably hidden away somewhere deep inside the house, perhaps in a basement or a barricaded room.

  So, they wouldn’t attempt to surround the house and outshoot Conrad’s group in a firefight. Instead, they’d make an assault on the front door. And thanks to these trucks, Kurt’s men had their own cover, plus quick mobility if things got rough.

  In the lead truck, a few of the men in the bed raised metal plates. These were inspired from the shields of medieval times. Just as the knights of that era would hold up shields to guard against the
strike of a sword, these plates would provide some cover from gunshots. Conrad wouldn’t find it so easy to take out Kurt’s men the way he had taken out Derrick’s when they tried seizing his ranch.

  I’m going to see what you’re made of, Kurt thought with a smile. Then he stuck his head out the window. “Go! Head for the front of the house! Today, this ranch is ours!”

  The men in both truck beds laughed and cheered. “Light it up!” one of them cried in the lead truck.

  Kurt then sat back inside and spoke to Fallon. “Drive slowly.” He didn’t know what to expect, but he sure wouldn’t walk blindly into it to find out.

  Fallon obeyed, allowing the lead truck to gain distance. Soon, the first truck reached a gravel drive that stretched all the way to the homestead. The lead vehicle rolled more slowly, its wheels fighting to gain traction on the gravel surface. Still, it wasn’t much of an obstacle. The truck would reach the front of the home within a minute.

  Kurt watched as two of his men leveled machine guns at the front door. A quick assault would blow the front door open. Another man clutched a second RPG. This would be used in case Conrad put up a fight. If shots rang out from just behind that front door and the nearby windows, a sudden rocket up their ass would take them out nice and quickly. Doctor or no doctor, Kurt vowed to win this ranch for himself and his followers.

  At the halfway point to the house, something clicked loudly under the lead truck.

  Kurt didn’t have time to fully register the sound when a shrieking explosion blew the truck into the air.

  “Son of a bitch!” Fallon turned the wheel hard, spinning the truck a full one hundred and eighty degrees away from a rising fire. Kurt clung to the passenger side door handle for support. Once Fallon had spun the truck around, he hit the gas and ran the vehicle off the gravel driveway, back onto the road.

  “Stop! Stop!” Kurt shouted.

  Fallon jammed on the brakes. Kurt looked out the window, just in time to see his truck slam down hard onto the ground, a few yards from the gravel driveway. The truck, now fully aflame, bounced upward once and then hit the ground again, rolling a short way until it stopped near a swaying bushel of tall weeds off the side of the property.

  Kurt flung open the door and dashed onto the road. The rest of his men followed, but they stopped short of the gravel road. Their lead truck lay burning, with the bodies of the driver and a few men inside. As Kurt gazed around, he discovered the remains of the men who had been in the truck bed. They were strewn about, most of them not burned at all. The explosion had not killed them. Instead, they died from being flung out of the truck and striking the ground. One of them, ironically, landed flat on top of his metal shield.

  “What the hell was that?” Behr asked, “Was that a mine?”

  Kurt eyed the crater in the ground where the truck had exploded. “An IED,” he said.

  “A what?” Behr asked.

  “An improvised explosive device,” Kurt said, “Something crude, no doubt, but effective.” He softly ground his teeth together. “Put in an explosive, hitch it with a switch that’s triggered when pressure’s applied to it. The weight of a truck, or even a human being, usually will do.”

  “Who the hell makes things like that?” Behr threw up his hands.

  “Someone who will do anything to guard what’s his.” Kurt kicked a pebble onto the gravel road. “Well, Mister Drake, it seems I understand you now. I’ll never take you for a pushover again.”

  “That tree on the road.” Fallon backed up a step, further onto the road. “That was to lead us here. This was a trap!”

  “He’s probably got more of those things on the road.” Behr pointed to the land around the house. “Maybe he’s mined the whole land!”

  “No problem.” One of them grabbed a stick and tossed it onto the ground. “We’ll just throw something in front of us first.”

  “That won’t work,” Kurt said. “The IEDs are calibrated for heavier weights. A stick, or even something like a storage chest, won’t apply enough pressure to trigger the explosive. Unless you plan to throw another man in front of you, ‘testing’ for more IEDs is worthless.”

  The men looked at each other, as if wondering whether Kurt actually suggesting one of them should proceed forward to “scout” out another IED.

  “We won’t be stopped by this,” Hunter said. “What are your orders?”

  Kurt hurried back to the truck. “Forget the driveway. It’s probably mined all the way to the porch. I don’t expect he’s mined his land extensively. He couldn’t have had that much time to plan after he learned we were coming.”

  “Listen up!” Kurt then shouted. “Two men are going on this truck. Everyone else is to avoid the driveway and anything that looks like a path. You run your asses to that house. You don’t stop until you’re inside.”

  The men nodded, despite obvious looks of fear on some of their faces. But they all knew that defying Kurt was much worse.

  “Oh, and remember something. We’re not here to take prisoners, except for the doctor. They’re more trouble than they’re worth. You find someone, you know what to do.”

  Suddenly, the sky above cracked with a loud pop. Fallon suddenly lurched backward and fell to the ground. Blood dribbled from his forehead. He never had time to man the truck. His eyes were locked open.

  Kurt’s fist shook. “Take the house.” Then he raised his voice. “Take the house, now!”

  Hunter turned to the men, who looked at Fallon’s corpse with shock and fear. “You heard the words of the Phoenix! This ranch is ours, and those in it die today!”

  The nine men remaining obeyed. Now it was truly do-or-die for all of them.

  KURT’S MEN broke off into four groups of two, one headed to the front, two charging for the right side of the home, and the last pair aiming for the homestead’s back end.

  The first pair split up and stepped to opposite sides of the doorframe, each man between the door and a window. No gunshots erupted from either the door or the windows. There was just the front door, and on the porch in front of it lay a mat with “WELCOME” in big letters.

  The man to the left, Tyrone, curled his thumb toward the front door. No sense in waiting. It was time to act.

  Tyrone’s partner, Kelly, grabbed the front door handle. It was unlocked.

  “Shit,” Kelly said softly. He pushed the door all the way open.

  Again, Tyrone and Kelly flattened themselves against the outside wall. But no bullets greeted them. The pair glanced at the open doorway. Only a closed screen door was there to greet them.

  Tyrone had taken the door handle and pushed on it. The screen door opened easily.

  “This is crazy, T,” Kelly said, “This codger didn’t even lock his front door?”

  Tyrone crouched down while aiming his gun into the living room. “Yeah, well, he’s not fooling me for a damn minute. Get your ass down and get ready to spray bullets.”

  Kelly followed his partner’s lead. Keeping low, the pair crept inside the homestead’s living room. The place lay still. Nothing moved between or around the couches, tables, and lamps. The doors leading to the kitchen and hallway were closed.

  Before either of them could speak, at least four loud pops rattled the far wall of the living room. Kelly opened his mouth to shout something, but Tyrone slapped him back. Then he put a finger to his lips.

  Kelly leaned next to Tyrone’s ear and whispered, “They must have got Lee and Sam on the right side.”

  “I knew it. This is a trap,” Tyrone whispered. “Well, they’re not getting us.” He pointed to the door to the kitchen. “They’re hiding in there. Get your gun ready. We spray them first before they come out and bleed us.”

  Kelly nodded. “Yeah.”

  Tyrone crawled on the floor, with Kelly beside him, all the way to the kitchen door. The pair then drew their guns on the kitchen door and fired several shots.

  “Ha! Think you’re smart shit, aren’t ya?” Tyrone then charged through the kitchen door.
<
br />   There was no one there.

  Tyrone looked from side to side. All he and Kelly had done was rip a few holes in the wall and the cupboards above the counter and stove.

  “What the hell?” Tyrone yelled. “They got to be here!”

  He didn’t get the chance to ponder where the home’s denizens might be hiding, for two shots quickly ripped through his chest.

  “Tyrone!” Kelly shouted as he watched his friend slam hard onto the floor. Kelly then looked up and saw two small holes in the window glass.

  “They’re outside,” he whispered.

  CONRAD LOWERED HIS SCOPE. “Welcome to my home, assholes,” he said under his breath.

  So far, the plan was working just as he had hoped. A frontal attack, man to man, was out of the question. With Conrad, Liam, Camilla and Tom, that made four to go up against Kurt and his twenty men. Conrad knew they wouldn’t stand a chance, even if they added Carla and Ron Darber to the mix.

  Instead, Conrad decided to think like a hunter instead of a soldier. Hunters scout out the land and set traps for their prey. Conrad knew all the routes to his ranch, blocked off the most obvious one with a felled tree, and used it to buy him more time to rig his front yard with IEDs. In an instant, he had cut down his number of enemies by probably half.

  The next step was turning Kurt’s goal into a trap. They wanted the homestead? Sure. He’d even make it easy to get in. It was the perfect switch from Derrick’s siege, when Carla, Liam and Camilla were holed up inside against an outside attacking force. But now Kurt’s men were inside, and they didn’t have the advantage of knowing the house as well as Camilla did. Conrad laid out where the men were likely to go and planned it all out for his hunting party.

  Scratch that, hunting parties. Conrad had divided his force in two. Camilla was at his side, from this vantage point south of the house, out in the fields, while Liam, Sarah and Tom were closing in on the house from the home’s right side. They would be put in charge of taking out the men who entered through the right side of the home.