by Dirk Patton
Rachel and I discussed and weighed each of the options, finally settling on pulling back and waiting. I was too concerned about taking the boat into the river in the darkness and neither of us was ready to abandon the big cruiser just yet. Neither were we eager to introduce ourselves to the strangers. Even if they were friendlies it was almost two o’clock in the morning and not the time of day to make a social call.
As we sat and discussed our options I noted that we were slowly drifting back towards the open lake, away from the river. Well, that answered that question. We were in a mild current that was resulting from the river emptying into the lake. We rode that current for another hour, far enough out into the lake that once again the lighted windows could only be seen with the binoculars. Dropping the anchor I sent Rachel below to rest while I settled into the padded captain’s chair on the flying bridge to keep watch for a few hours. Dog padded into the salon with Rachel, leaving me to my thoughts in the quiet night.
34
The eastern sky was just starting to lighten when I went below and shook Rachel awake. Her eyes flew open and she sat straight up in bed the second I touched her shoulder, relaxing when I spoke softly to her.
“It’s going to be dawn soon. Can you take watch and wake me in two hours?”
Rachel nodded, rubbed her eyes, scooted to the edge of the bed and stood up. Dog looked up at us without moving and grunted his displeasure at being disturbed before rolling over onto his other side and ignoring us.
“Anything moving?” Rachel asked, pulling her pants on and picking up her socks and boots off the floor.
“Quiet as a tomb,” I said, then grinned in embarrassment at my poor choice of analogies.
Rachel patted me on the chest as she squeezed past me and I fell into the bed, sheets still warm from her body. I twisted the pillows around to get comfortable, pushed Dog’s big paws out of my face and closed my eyes. Moments later Rachel was shaking my shoulder.
“It’s been two hours,” She said.
I opened my eyes and the first thing I saw was Dog’s ass aimed directly at my face. Slapping his tail down to cover the view I sat up, wincing from the pain in my chest. The good news was my chest only hurt when I moved now, not all the time. The bad news was it still hurt enough to slow me down if I needed to move quickly.
“Still quiet?” I asked, accepting the cup of coffee Rachel pressed into my hand.
“Very. Sun’s been up about an hour, but we’ve got a layer of fog on the lake that’s keeping us well hidden. Can’t see past the bow, but I’ve not heard anything so far.”
I stood up and sipped the coffee, wincing from the pain in my chest and the bitter coffee. Dog rolled over and laid his head on the pillow I’d just vacated, tail thumping the mattress like a bass drum. Rachel leaned in, smacked him on the ass until he finally jumped off the bed, and then straightened the covers. While Dog wandered forward to the small deck at the bow to take care of personal business I did the same in the small head, then finishing the coffee I made my way out of the salon and up to the flying bridge.
We floated in a world of white cotton. The fog was thick and all enveloping, nothing visible beyond the boat’s railing. Leaning out and looking over the side I could make out the steel grey water lapping against the hull, but the sound was muted in the thick fog. Every surface had beaded water on it and when Rachel climbed the ladder and joined me I noted her normally thick hair was plastered to her head in the damp.
We sat quiet, listening, but other than the gentle lap of the water all we heard were Dog’s nails on the fiberglass deck as he made his way back to the stern. “When did the fog roll in?” I asked in a quiet voice.
“About half an hour after you woke me. It was clear as a bell when I came up, then it felt like the temperature dropped ten degrees and within fifteen minutes it was like this. This is pretty normal in Georgia for this time of year. In another hour the sun will have burned it off.”
We sat in the fog, talking in low voices, discussing our plan. Neither of us was anxious to make contact with other survivors. We had the supplies we needed for a while, were well armed and still had a good stock of ammunition. There was nothing we could see being gained by taking the risk of approaching more people at this time. For all we knew they could turn out to be even more paranoid than us and start shooting as soon as they saw us.
With our decision made we ate a Spartan breakfast, sharing with Dog, and took the opportunity to individually jump into the lake with a bar of soap. Despite the chilly fog, the lake water was warm and refreshing. Rachel had bandaged my wounds with plastic wrap and medical tape before she’d let me get in the water, and it felt wonderful to get the last of the blood and grime washed from my body. The boat did have a small laundry set on board and Rachel had washed and dried a set of clothes for each of us. Before dressing I rummaged through one of the heads until I found a disposable razor, then sat on the stern rail while Rachel shaved the stubble off my head. I took care of my face, dressed in clean clothes and felt like a new man.
About 8:30 the fog started thinning slightly, then quickly burned off as the sun’s light warmed up. Back on the flying bridge I scanned with the binoculars and realized that the lights we’d seen the night before hadn’t been a building on the shore but a house boat tied up to the shore. The ski boat from yesterday was tied to the house boat’s rail and there was no sign of movement.
Swinging the glasses to the river I was immediately thankful that we had not tried to take the cruiser up the river in the dark. Sitting half submerged and blocking almost half of the river was a crashed helicopter that had been invisible in the dark. The nose of the chopper was stuck into the muddy right bank of the river, the body of the aircraft tilted sideways nearly 40 degrees and the tail extending out into the water. The rotor blades were snapped off and it was easy to trace their path of destruction into the trees that lined the river. I silently handed the binoculars to Rachel and she caught her breath when she saw the downed craft.
“Can we get around it?” She asked without lowering the glasses.
“The short answer is we’re going to get around it. Either in this or the speedboat.” I answered, looking over my shoulder, trying to identify the low sound I was hearing. Not able to see anything I reached out for the glasses, rudely taking them from Rachel without asking and using them to scan the open lake to our rear.
Two bass boats with monster outboard engines were coming towards us at what had to be full throttle. Four men were in each boat and the long, stick looking things in their hands were most certainly rifles. I spun around, started the engine and hit the switch for the anchor to raise. Again, it seemed to take forever but if I started moving forward before it was fully retracted I could end up driving over my own anchor line and getting it tangled in the boat’s propellers.
Rachel had the glasses back and was watching the fast approaching boats, my eyes glued to the anchor winch willing it to go faster. When the anchor finally broke the surface of the lake I slammed the throttle all the way forward and the big boat’s engine bellowed. The stern settled for a moment as the props displaced the water directly under it, then we started accelerating. Much too slow. This wasn’t a speed boat, it was a floating luxury home and not made for fast starts.
“Not going to make it,” Rachel shouted over the engine noise.
I looked back and realized she was right. The bass boats were moving at a high rate of speed and would intercept us well before we made the river. I wasn’t even sure the river was a good idea at this point. No room to maneuver. No room to turn and fight. They’d be able to stay on our ass and keep pumping bullets into the boat until they hit something that was either mechanically or biologically vital. Without another thought I spun the wheel and the cruiser slowly responded to the new course I set towards the middle of the lake.
We kept turning until the bow of the big cruiser was pointed almost directly at the approaching boats. I straightened the wheel and double checked to make sure the thr
ottle was wide open. The duct tape from the night before was still covering the gauges and I started ripping pieces off, surprised to see our indicated speed as just over 28 knots and slowly climbing. Rachel leaned into me and shouted above the engine noise and slipstream of wind,
“Should we do something to alert the people in the houseboat?”
I shook my head, eyes fixed on the approaching threat. We know nothing of the dynamic here. The people in the houseboat could be bad guys and these were the good guys coming to take care of a problem. I wasn’t sure which group, if either, could be trusted and I was more concerned about getting us out of the middle of whatever dispute was going on. The boat was easy to pilot with one hand on the wheel and I had my rifle up and resting on the bridge railing, right hand on the pistol grip and thumb on the safety in case it was needed.
The two boats were now close enough for me to make out more details. One was bright red, the other a color of blue that can only be described as electric blue. Other than that they were almost identical, both sporting huge Mercury outboard motors that had to be around 300 horse power each. No wonder they were so fast. The men riding in the red boat seemed to be fixated on me, the blue boat steering slightly to its right to bypass me and be on a direct course to the houseboat. The red boat made the decision for me when the man in the bow braced himself and pointed a rifle in my direction.
“Drive, and sound the horn!” I shouted to Rachel as I slipped out of the pilot’s seat and onto my knee, rifle up and aimed over the bridge rail.
Rachel hit the button for the horn and the blast pierced the morning, carrying for miles across the water. I still didn’t know the dynamics here, but if these were good guys approaching they had made a critical mistake by pointing a rifle at me. I hoped the horn would alert the people in the houseboat and they could keep the blue boat occupied.
Settling into the stock of the rifle I flipped the selector to burst mode and briefly wished for a heavier caliber machine gun such as a good old fashioned M-60. Oh well, you fight with what you have as I’d been told over and over.
Even at almost 30 knots the cabin cruiser provided an amazingly smooth and stable ride. The bass boat on the other hand was bouncing and jarring around, sensitive to every little ripple on the lake’s surface. This was to my advantage as far as a stable aiming platform, but hitting a moving target that is moving up and down and side to side at the same time is not child’s play. They hadn’t fired on us yet, but the threat was clear and I didn’t intend to wait to see if I was just misunderstanding some poor souls who only wanted to stop by for tea.
Taking a deep breath and slowly exhaling I tracked the boat, aiming for the man in the bow. As the last of the breath left my lungs I squeezed the trigger twice, sending six rounds down range. A moment later I was rewarded with an explosion of fiberglass from the bow of the boat, inches from the rifle that was aimed at us. The man in the bow jerked away from the impact of my bullets and raised up in perfect profile at the very front of the boat which was getting closer by the second. I quickly sent another three rounds on their way and was gratified to see him pitch over backwards in the boat. Whether hit once, twice or three times didn’t matter as he was now out of the fight.
The red boat reacted exactly as I expected. Instead of continuing closer and the remaining men opening up on us it turned quickly to its right, presenting me with a perfect profile. Ready for the opportunity I sighted on the big outboard motor, leading it in the scope by what I hoped was the right distance, and started sending three round bursts downrange. The third burst did the trick, the top of the housing shredding into dozens of pieces as thick, black smoke started pouring out of the motor. Propulsion gone, the boat quickly came off plane and settled in the water, momentum carrying it forward a short distance until it fell adrift.
I put six more rounds into the side of the boat, just to keep their heads down and motioned for Rachel to turn and follow the blue boat. A quick magazine change and I used the binoculars to check on the boat I’d disabled. Two of the men were battling a small fire in the motor while the third watched us through a pair of binoculars. He was a sitting duck and was at least smart enough to not point his rifle in my direction.
The cruiser came about and I shifted attention to the blue boat. The boat was sitting still in the water fifty yards from the houseboat and all four men were standing and firing their rifles into the side of the craft. They seemed unaware of what had transpired with their buddies. Amateurs.
I stood and leaned into Rachel, telling her to bring us up behind them and cut speed when we were about two hundred yards out, but be ready to throttle up and get us moving. We covered the distance quickly, and I resumed my one knee shooting stance at the bridge railing as we came at them. Rachel cut the engine to idle at the right spot and the big boat quickly settled in the water, momentum carrying us forward. At about 150 yards I opened fire, still in burst mode.
The man standing in the stern pitched forward, rifle flying out of his hands and splashing into the lake just before his body hit the water. The two men to the far left were so focused on firing at their target that they didn’t notice, but the man closest to him did. He lowered his rifle and stared at the body of his friend in the water and started to turn just as my next three rounds shredded his lower torso. He pitched forward across the pilot’s seat and lay still.
The other two men noticed now, turning and gawking at their two dead friends before spinning around in my direction. The man in the bow took the next three rounds to the chest and flipped backwards out of the boat into the water. The remaining man could have lived if he’d had the sense to put his rifle down, but he raised it and started to aim at the cabin cruiser. Three rounds sped downrange, two slamming into his chest and neck, the third punching through his skull leaving a faint pink mist in the air for a brief moment before it settled onto the water along with his body.
Another magazine change and I stood and glassed the red boat. They had extinguished the fire and were slowly motoring away from us, a small electric trolling motor their only source of propulsion. I had no idea if the battery powering the motor was capable of getting them to shore and I frankly didn’t give a shit. They picked the fight, now they had to live with the results.
“Jesus Christ,” Rachel said, still staring at the four dead men in and around the blue boat.
I just looked at her then turned the glasses back to the houseboat in time to see one of the curtains twitch open as a pair of binoculars looked back at me. Raising my hand in greeting I kept watching until the curtains were pulled aside and a man waved back. Handing the glasses to Rachel I told her where to look and after a moment she waved back to the face in the window.
35
The man in the houseboat window turned out to be one of four men who were holed up in the small craft. They were the crew from the crashed helicopter which was an Air Force Pave Hawk, the AF variant of the Army’s Black Hawk. They weren’t in the best of shape, the pilot the worst off with a severe concussion, broken leg and crushed pelvis. We had slowly motored in after the firefight and the cabin cruiser now lay at anchor a hundred feet from the shore the houseboat was tied to. We had crossed the open water in the speedboat, Rachel driving and me standing behind her with my rifle at the ready.
On board the houseboat we were greeted warmly, but with caution. These were Air Force guys, and they were in the Georgia National Guard. They’d been lucky enough to have never been deployed to the Middle East which answered a lot of my questions about their poor tactical decisions. They introduced themselves and Rachel kneeled down next to the injured pilot, a Captain who looked too young to be playing pilot, to see what she could do for him.
I stood on the small deck at the stern, rifle slung but hand still on the grip, and started talking with the other three. A very young looking kid wore First Lieutenant’s bars and was the only officer other than the pilot, the other two both enlisted and wearing Tech Sergeant’s and Senior Airman Chevrons. I looked them over
as they settled down, the Sergeant by far the old man of the group. He looked to be in his early 30s.
They were haggard and filthy, their flight suits smeared with mud, blood and other things I didn’t want to think about, faces unshaved and gaunt. The Airman had a dirty bandage wrapped around his head and the Lieutenant had a crude splint on his left wrist and bruising across his face, the kind of bruising that comes from getting punched in the nose or hitting your face on a control panel when your helicopter crashes. Each of them carried an Air Force issue side arm but they didn’t have any other weapons.
“I’m John,” I introduced myself. “That’s Rachel in there with your Captain. She’s had medical training and will do what she can for him.” I nodded towards the interior of the boat.
“Thank you, Sir. I’m Lieutenant David Anderson, Georgia Air National Guard. This is Tech Sergeant Blake and Senior Airman Mayo. We just want to say thank you for helping us out. I thought for sure those guys were going to kill us.” I acknowledged his thanks with a nod and looked over at Sergeant Blake when he lit up a cigarette.
“Think I could bum one of those, Sarge?” I asked, mouth already watering at the thought of a smoke. I’d been without since the morning the world fell apart and probably should have stayed quit, but all things considered I’d probably die of a thousand different things before a cigarette killed me. Blake smiled and handed me the pack and a battered Zippo.
Lighting the cigarette I inhaled deeply, blew the smoke out with a satisfied smile and handed the pack and lighter back. The head rush hit a moment later and I took another long, satisfying drag off the cigarette. Fuck the Surgeon General. He was probably dead anyway.
“Thank you. That’s a damn good smoke.” I said to Blake. “Now, I have some questions and I’m sure you do to, but first I want to make something clear. Nothing personal, but we’ve not exactly had the best of experiences with survivors, and it appears you haven’t either. That said, I don’t want there to be any misunderstandings between us. I see each of you with a side arm. That’s fine, but those pistols stay holstered until further notice. Am I clear on that?”