The posse caught up to him, but the horses had been pushed to a full gallop as soon as Moira radioed them the Huey was down and the animals were tiring. Ellen was forced to call a temporary halt to the pursuit. They stopped beside the burning wreckage to let their horses blow.
Blinking back her tears, Ellen got on the radio and interrupted Moira, who had been screaming Aaron’s name over and over.
“Moira, this is Ellen.”
“Ellen! Where’s Aaron? I can’t raise him. He’s...”
“Oh, Moira, I’m so sorry.” Ellen cleared her throat and searched for the right words. There was no easy way.
After a moment’s silence Moira’s tear-choked voice responded. “Find them, Ellen. Find them and kill them and...and salt the earth where they fall!” Moira lay her head down on her folded arms and sobbed. Now, that it was too late, she wished she’d told Aaron she was pregnant.
It was Terrell Johnson’s sharp eyes that spotted the glint of light that led him to the Star of David medallion. He gave it to Ellen, to return to Moira, who would pass it on to Aaron’s unborn son, who would wear it with pride.
The posse watched the Huey fade into the distance. Ellen told them to prepare for a long pursuit. No one disagreed. No one was giving up on this chase.
She issued orders to preserve the horses, half an hour mounted at a gallop, half an hour dismounted, running along side. She split the posse into two squads, one mounted while the other ran, put Dan in charge of the second squad, then mounted up and led her half of the posse off toward Como at a gallop. The Huey was out of sight, but they could still hear it, so they followed the sound into the darkness.
Twice before they reached Como they almost caught up to the Huey. Each time, it returned to the air before they got within shooting distance, but they were heartened by the fact it had to keep setting down.
The two squads rendezvoused in Como, where they all switched to fresh mounts from the remuda the Freeholds maintained there. Jim Cantrell joined the posse and shared the intel he’d brought from Breckenridge.
Ellen looked to the East where a paling sky promised a too-soon dawn. “Everybody gather ‘round!” Ellen said, waving the posse over to her. “I want to make sure everyone here understands that we have three main priorities.” She ticked them off with her fingers. “First, we want the children back alive. Second, Jim says Linda Garrett was alive and kicking when last he saw her so we need to find her. And third, we need to keep that helicopter from lifting off.”
She paused to let that sink in. Using one finger, she began to draw a map in the snow. “According to Jim they’ll probably set down in the north end of Breckenridge near the Mountain Thunder Lodge.” She drew an “X” near a squiggly line to mark the spot. “Jim says they have plenty of reinforcements, so I’m assuming they’ll dig in until they get that chopper fixed. Terrell says that should cost them at least one day.” Terrell Johnson was an army trained helicopter mechanic and pilot who had been one of Aaron’s best friends.
“Dan, take your squad over Georgia Pass. That’ll bring you out about here,” she said, indicating a “D” she had just drawn north of Breckenridge. “The rest of us will go over Boreas, cut over to Goose Pasture Tarn and come up from the South. With any luck, we’ll catch them between us.”
Heads were nodding all around the circle. “I want to remind everybody that we’ll be outnumbered so we’ll have to fight smarter and harder. If things go well we’ll be in position to attack by three this afternoon. Once you’re in place, I want you to settle down and get some rest. We’ll take out their guards and hit the town at five minutes after midnight. If they try to leave before then, use your best judgment. Any questions?” Several Freeholders shook their heads no.
“Dan, take Terrell and Garrett and scout Boreas for us. I wouldn’t want to blunder into any surprises. Then I want Garrett and Terrell to take a couple of RPG’s and find that chopper. When the shooting starts...” she turned to Terrell, “I’m assuming you know the best place to hit it.” He answered with a smile, his teeth gleaming against his black face.
“I get a chance I’ll cripple her without turning her into scrap metal,” he said. “She might come in handy later on.”
“So long as it doesn’t get off the ground,” Ellen agreed. “Our best chance is to take them totally by surprise. So be quiet and careful. The last time we chased members of the King’s Army we lost them. That may work in our favor. They might think we quit easily, that we’ve given up the chase.” She paused for effect then added, “They don’t know us very well, do they?”
Her posse grinned like wolves.
*
Linda Garrett had been in a running gunfight, playing hide and seek, for too many hours now. Her hands were trembling, her vision a bit blurry and her judgment was worse than her vision. She was out of ammo for her AR-15 and almost out for her Glock. If she could isolate one of her pursuers she could kill him and take his weapons, then lead them on another merry chase. But finding one man alone was proving impossible. They worked in six man teams and it was obvious they’d hunted people before. She’d watched as they surrounded a house, made simultaneous entry from front, rear and side if needed, then move to the next one.
If she could make it back to Downstairs at Eric’s she could wait them out and resupply. She was pretty sure they wouldn’t find the well hidden rear entrance and from street level the whole thing looked like an complete wreck. Too bad reaching Eric’s was out of the question.
The Huey had limped in yesterday morning, smoking badly, landing in the dirt lot near the lodge. Godzilla and his thugs got out carrying a couple of kids. She was too far away to identify the children but their presence was what kept her from escaping into the hills.
Instead, she used her intimate knowledge of the town to snipe at her searchers and evade them, doing everything in her power to slow them all down. She even put a few rounds into the repair party working like demons on the helicopter, because it’s condition, the missing Cobra gunships and the presence of the children, meant her people were coming. And if she knew Ellen Whitebear they wouldn’t be far behind.
She dropped down low and edged one eye out past the trunk of the large spruce she was hidden in. Several search teams were in her area so she figured she was surrounded. She never considered giving up. If half of what Sara Garcia told the Freeholders was true these were not people you surrendered to, these were people you fought to the death against.
“We know you’re in there. Come out now and you won’t be harmed.” The voice was so loud, startled her so bad, she almost squeezed off a shot. She risked another peek and saw an officer standing in the starlit street with a megaphone dangling from one hand. He was facing away from her, the rest of his squad encircling a half-burned duplex she’d been in less than half an hour before. Her tracks in the snow were leading them to her and she was fresh out of ideas.
When she’d joined the militia her brother, Garrett, had told her, “Don’t be a hero, just do your job.” She’d tried, but now it looked like death was just around the corner. Her parents had died, guns in hand, shielding her little sisters with their own bodies. She hoped when her time came she’d measure up.
The enemy stormed the house, found nothing and regrouped, but now there were only four of them. Where had the other two gone? The four immediately returned to the house they’d just searched, two to the front and two to the rear. A couple of minutes passed. The two waiting out front fidgeted, glancing around. Finally the officer with the megaphone called out a name, but since he didn’t use the loudspeaker she couldn’t hear him. He raised a whistle to his lips--she’d heard those annoying blasts calling others onto her trail for what seemed like an eternity now.
But before he whistled, he collapsed. The soldier next to him spun around and flopped to the ground, dead.
Garrett Haley and Terrell Johnson walked around the side of the house holding silenced AR’s and her eyes suddenly watered as she realized she’d get to live a little lon
ger.
*
Terrell Johnson nudged Garrett and pointed as Linda Haley stumbled toward them smiling brighter than a full moon. Garrett gathered her up in a big hug.
“Hey, Sis,” he said, choked up.
She pulled back, took a deep, shaky breath and said, “Took you long enough.”
Wiping tears from her eyes, she hugged Terrell and said, “Trying to get the kids back?”
“Actually, we were looking for you.” Terrell said. He slapped Garrett on the back. “Lughead here spotted all the activity over this way and figured you were involved.”
He led the Haleys back under cover and said, “Now we gotta stop that copter from taking off. Maybe you can show us where to set up--get a good, close shot?”
“Gimme some ammo and I’ll point the way,” she said, her fatigue gone. Nothing like finding out you’re not going to die in the next ten minutes to give a girl a lift.
Garrett handed her half a dozen clips and a screw on silencer for her AR.
She admired it as she attached it and said, “You’ve been busy.”
He shrugged and said, “The whole posse has them. We need to keep things quiet until the main attack.”
“We can hit the Huey from the Blue River wash if we can get out of this box they put me in,” Linda said.
“What box?” Garrett asked. “You think this is the first patrol we took out getting here?”
“In that case follow me,” she said and led off.
Thirty minutes later Terrell had the Huey in his sights.
*
“Fucking bitch!” John swore. He was in deep trouble. The Freeholders had taken out his forward observation posts and were hitting his troops from all sides, rolling them up faster than he could counter. Though it stuck in his craw like a chicken bone he had to run. Freaking disaster. How he’d explain this to his father...he’d cross that bridge later.
“Jamal, you and Sergeant Carter grab the kids. We’re making a break for it.”
“They’ll slow us down,” Jamal argued. Damned squirmy, biting brats.
“They may be the only thing that gets us out of here,” John yelled. His personal guard formed a cordon around him as Jamal and the Sergeant returned with the children.
As they neared the helicopter the tail rotor exploded and shrapnel cut down two of his guards and nicked his cheek.
“The horses,” he yelled, grabbing a belt fed M-60 and a can of 7.62 mm belts. He fired the weapon one-handed, like an over-sized pistol, handling the twenty four pound weight of the gun and the even heavier ammunition box like a toothpick.
He glimpsed a woman with long blonde hair, heard Jamal hiss, “Whitebear,” and swung his M-60 her direction as Jamal fired. She fell and he took advantage of the momentary confusion in the Freeholder’s line to break through. Five minutes later he and his people were on horseback fleeing into the night.
*
“Dammit, Jim, get off of me,” Ellen grunted. She’d had him, that giant, was squeezing the trigger when Jim tackled her. She’s actually felt the deadly breath of bullets cutting the air above her as she fell.
“Ellen? You okay?” Terrell Johnson knelt beside her and rolled Jim off.
“Ugh,” Jim groaned as they flopped him over. “Take it easy.”
Blood oozed from his left calf.
“You’re hit,” Terrell said and yelled, “Medic!”
“No shit,” Jim said, wincing.
Wayne Anderson ran over and threw himself down beside Jim. In less than a minute he’d cut Jim’s pant leg and peeled it back exposing the wound. “Through and through. Good.”
Wayne swabbed some honey on the wound to sterilize it, he’d been out of Betadine for years, pulled a tampon out of his med kit, snipped off two small pieces, wrapped some clean spider webs around them and applied them to the wound. A bit of gauze and tape and he was done.
“Stay off of it,” he said, fixing Jim with a look. “I mean it. It may not hurt much now but it’ll stiffen up and scream like a bitch in a couple of hours. So take it easy.”
“I’ve been shot before, Wayne.”
Wayne rolled his eyes. “And yet you’re still catching bullets. Not a quick learner.”
Terrell chuckled.
Gunshots still popped like firecrackers but the volume was dying down. In the distance someone yelled, “Medic,” and Wayne said, “Gotta run. Do as I say, Jim, or next time I’ll use my homemade blood clot on you instead of nice, clean spider webs.”
Jim shuddered. The homemade stuff worked but the cayenne pepper in it burned like hell.
Dan Osaka came running up and said, “Ellen, we’re about done mopping up here.”
“Great,” she said. “Let’s get after them.”
Jim Cantrell started to rise but Ellen laid her hands on his shoulders and held him down. “I need you to stay here and look after the wounded and prisoners,” she said. “And thank you for saving my butt.”
It took another two hours to round up stragglers and get reorganized but as Ellen and her posse thundered up the valley her mind drifted to Michael. He was long overdue. She was now certain he’d been hurt. She hoped he hadn’t run into this group while it was on its way to Breckenridge. That thought made her grit her teeth and her eyes grew hard. The same look could be found on every face in the posse, a look that said that no quarter would be offered nor mercy given to those they caught.
*
Leona Perry and Elizabeth Town, best friends at first sight, sat at Leona’s desk in the principal’s office at the Freeholds school and studied the crop rotation spreadsheet in front of them. Sunlight streamed in from a skylight, highlighting a few stray dust notes. Since most of the Freeholds leaders were off fighting the war the grunt work of figuring out what heirloom seeds to plant and how many children they could pull from school to help harvest the early spring crops in the greenhouse fell to them. Elizabeth was a lifelong gardener who taught intensive, vertical and companion planting techniques to more Freeholders than actually wanted to know them. She had originally gained membership in the Freeholds by bringing along an heirloom seed bank.
Leona, who, if she could organize a mass of unruly children into an orderly school, could organize anything was well-suited to this work. Still, the task was anything but easy.
“I think the Detroit Red Beets and Boule D’Or turnips are ready for harvest,” Elizabeth said. “The Purple Top White Globe needs another week and so does the de Ciccio Broccoli and Copenhagen Early Market cabbage. I think two more weeks for the Bloomsdale Long Standing spinach and the Lacinado kale.”
Leona nodded and checked the chart. “We’re getting short on a few lettuce varieties, Liz. Red Salad Bowl, Iceberg and Calmar especially. I think we should allow half of the next rotation to bolt.”
Elizabeth cocked her head. “With this new milder climate...hmmm. Those varieties are slow bolters but we’ll be looking at mid-May so I think they’ll cooperate. We should do likewise with the Cherry Belle radishes and the Sugar Ann snap peas. Oh and the alfalfa.”
“That’s right, I forgot. Between using them as sprouts and growing them all winter long in the greenhouse we go through a lot of those seeds,” Leona said. “Melinda McKinley said...” She stopped as it sank in that the girl, one of her favorite students, was dead.
She cleared her throat and pushed the grief aside. There was work to be done. “Melinda said there were weeds showing in the main garden. She thought we should loose the chickens in there after we fix the fence and let them scratch before first-planting.”
Elizabeth nodded, her eyes glistening with tears. Mariko had been one of her closest friends and that hurt badly enough, but the loss of Melinda, Randy Junior and the two little ones drove an arrow through her heart.
“Melinda always was sharp as a razor.” She paused for a second as the vision of Mariko’s scalped head flashed in her memories. “I hope Ellen boils those bastards alive,” she said and at Leona’s sharp glance added, “Well, I do!”
Cha
pter 17: Dog Days
North of Steamboat Springs, Colorado
Early March 13 A.I.
Pain stabbed Michael awake, his hands instinctively groping toward the source--a broken right leg. He jerked upright, cursing as he banged his head on the downed trees of the windfall, his shelter from both the storm and the dogs. His small fire was almost dead so he threw on some kindling, blowing on the embers until they caught and flared. His eyes went to his leg then darted away. The swelling was worse--much worse.
The sweat dripping from his brow didn’t come from heat--not on a snowy night in March at 9,000 feet--but from a fever that was taking hold of his mind and body, draining him when he needed strength, fogging his brain when he needed to remain alert.
A shiver ran down his spine, goose bumps trailing after it. Fresh blood blotted the rocks where he’d been dozing. His sudden movements had torn open a few dog bites. He dipped his bandanna into a puddle of water that formed when the heat of the fire melted some snow and dabbed his forehead and the wounds he could reach. Scabs cracked as he eased himself around and he wondered if the cuts he couldn’t reach were festering.
Stay warm. Stay hydrated. Those are the keys to winter survival. He pulled out his paratrooper water filter, inserted one end in the puddle and drank until it was all gone, the cold water clearing his brain slightly, enough for him to take stock of his situation. Not good.
He was badly wounded, broken in fact, feverish, suffering from shock, loss of blood and lack of food and adequate water. What fuel he could reach to feed his small fire was almost gone. He was practically weaponless, alone--a low growl rumbling in from the darkness beyond his fire reminded him that he was most definitely not alone. The nearest help was probably 200 miles away, if he was mobile. And he was beginning to think he wouldn’t make it out of this mess. But more deadly than that was a bone-deep exhaustion that made it hard to care.
The Dying Time (Book 2): After The Dying Time Page 17