Escaping Home

by A. American

  “Bastard’s still out there!” Ted shouted.

  “Morgan, how can we get up to the end of the road without this sumbitch seeing us?” Sarge asked.

  “I know a way.”

  “Perfect.” He crawled over to the buggy and pulled a bag out, handing Danny a small handheld. “You and Thad stay here and give him something to see.” He looked over at me. “Give me your jacket.”

  I didn’t know what he was up to, but I did as he asked, tossing it over to him. Sarge zipped it up and started looking around. “I need something to stuff in this thing.”

  “There’s a roll of plastic in the trailer; I’ll go get it,” Danny said, taking off in a sprint.

  “Bring a broom too!” Sarge shouted.

  “What the hell are you doing?” Ted asked.

  “We’re going to make a dummy and put it in the seat of that buggy. Danny can lie on the floor and drive it; he’ll be behind the armor so he can’t be hit. He’s gonna drive it straight down the road here, and then we’ll be in position to see the next shot, hopefully.”

  “You’re gonna do what?” Thad asked incredulously.

  “Oh, Danny’s gonna love that.”

  When Danny got back Sarge and Ted spent a few minutes assembling the dummy. The jacket was stuffed with plastic, the broom handle running up it. Sarge used a green triangular bandage to make a scarf around the face and a Kevlar helmet for a head.

  “Give me your shades,” Sarge said to Ted, holding his hand out.

  “What? Why?”

  “We need some eyes on this thing! Now give ’em here!”

  Very reluctantly, he handed them over. Sarge pushed them on the head and the two of them set the decoy in the driver’s seat, taping the sleeves to the steering wheel with duct tape. Sarge gave Danny the rundown of what he wanted him to do.

  “Are you fucking nuts?” Danny asked, shaking his head.

  “You’ll be behind the armor, as long as you keep your head down you’ll be fine. We got to find this guy, or he’ll pick us off one by one.”

  “I think it’s a shitty idea.”

  “That’s fine, you can think that. Now get your ass in there,” Sarge said, pointing to the buggy.

  Danny climbed in, trying to squeeze himself onto the floor. Sarge told Thad to wait for him to call. He wanted him to go out behind the truck and move around some, not to stand still, but to move, then run off the road. He needed to keep the guy busy. Thad nodded and Sarge looked at me to lead the way.

  We passed Doc who was still sitting beside Reggie, Sarge looked at him. “You all right?”

  “Yeah.”

  “There was nothing you could do with a wound like that. Get it together; we need you.”

  “Go on, I’ll be all right.”

  “Doc, if we get a line on this SOB and start shooting, tell Danny to swing back around and pick you an’ Thad up. We may need you guys to maneuver on his position.”

  “Roger that,” Doc said as he started to stand, pausing to wipe the blood from his hands on Reggie’s pants.

  “Teddy, where’s that sixty-millimeter tube?” Sarge asked.

  “At the house, want it?”

  “Yeah, go get it. How many rounds did we get for it?”

  “Twenty, all high-explosive HE rounds.”

  “Bring five of ’em.”

  Ted ran off toward Reggie’s place while we waited. Sarge pulled the buggy’s SAW off its mount, draping belts of ammo over his shoulder. After a few minutes, Ted was back with a tube about three and a half feet long and had a plate on one end with a handle. He handed me the tube and slung a heavy-looking pack over his shoulder.

  “Is this a mortar?” I asked, looking at it.

  “Yep, if we find that bastard, Teddy’ll shove a round up his ass.” Sarge grinned. “Lead the way!”

  We took off through the backyards of houses in the neighborhood, scaling multiple fences. When we came to my yard, the girls were outside throwing a Frisbee that Meathead was eagerly trying to catch.

  “Get inside and stay there!” I shouted as I cleared the fence.

  Little Bit took off at a run for the house. “What’s going on?” Taylor asked.

  “There’s a sniper out here somewhere. Get in the house!”

  “Really? I didn’t hear anything.”

  We were running past her and Lee Ann, but they were just standing there, dumbstruck. “Move your asses, in the house now!” Sarge barked.

  That got them in gear. We used the hole in the fence to get into Howard’s yard, knowing the next property over would be the best one to use to take cover. That one had a screen of cedars planted along the road that would provide great concealment.

  We stopped at the side of the house, Sarge peering around the corner.

  “Where do you think he is?” Ted asked.

  “Can’t see shit from here. We need to get to them trees,” Sarge said, pointing at the cedars.

  He led the way as we moved in a crouch toward the tree line. Just short of them, we dropped onto our bellies and crawled under them.

  “We need to find a place to set this tube up,” Ted said.

  “Let’s see if we can find ’em first,” Sarge said, pulling his binos out of his pack.

  I pulled mine out of my vest and started to look around. “What the hell am I looking for?” I asked.

  “If he’s any good, it’ll be hard to spot his hide,” Ted said. He was looking through the ACOG on his rifle.

  “Let’s hope he isn’t any good,” Sarge said.

  The field across the road was bare except for the house. I honed in on all the usual places—windows, doors and the shed off to the side—but everything looked normal.

  “I don’t see shit,” I said.

  “Just keep looking. He’s out there somewhere,” Sarge said.

  Ted called out a couple of likely places and we all watched them, looking for any sign of movement. After a few minutes, something caught my eye.

  “Hey, look at the gable on the house. See that attic vent up there?” It was one those decorative louvered-style vents mounted on the end of the gable.

  “Yeah, I see it, got two slats missing from it,” Sarge said.

  “They weren’t missing the other day when Danny and I were looking out from the roadblock.”

  “You sure?”

  “Positive. There’s nothing else out there to look at; I practically memorized the house.”

  “Then that has to be his spot,” Sarge said, pulling out the little handheld radio. “Danny, start down the road.” He dropped the radio. “Everyone keep your eyes on that hole.”

  “He’s headed out,” Doc called back. Sarge didn’t respond.

  In the distance we could hear the buggy as it started down the road. I was watching the slot when Sarge said, “There, did you see it?” At almost the same instant, Doc called on the radio.

  “A round just bounced off the armor. Must have scared him; he almost went off the road.” Doc paused. “More incoming.”

  “I didn’t see shit; what’d you see?” I asked.

  Sarge picked up the radio. “Danny, drive it off the road and let it stop. Stay down.”

  “He’s in the ditch, you got him?” Doc asked.

  “Yeah, we got him, just sit tight.”

  Sarge back crawled out from under the trees. “Ted, what do you make the range?”

  “Hundred and seventy meters.”

  “Good, close to what I had. Come out here, let’s find a place to set this tube up. Morg, you keep an eye on that hole, but watch the whole house in case they try to run.”

  “Roger that.”

  Ted and Sarge moved off and I could hear them talking, trying to find a place where they could see the house but not be seen. After a few minutes Sarge came crawling back in. From behind me,
I heard a metallic sliding sound with a tapping thunk.

  “All right, in a minute were going to open up on that gable. Don’t try to shoot through that hole—I want you to shoot low and to the left of it. You gotta think about where his body is going to be able to shoot out of there—it has to be low and to the left. Got it?”

  I nodded. “Yeah, low and left.”

  Sarge picked up the radio. “Doc, soon as we open up, you and Thad get to Danny and head for that house. Shooter is in the attic behind that gable vent up there.”

  “Roger, waiting on you.”

  Sarge pulled the SAW up to his shoulder and looked over at me. “Low and left.”

  I nodded and pulled my rifle to my shoulder, lining my sites up at the gable. The sound when Sarge pulled the trigger on the SAW was deafening. It made me jump, but he never let up, and when I regained my composure, I started to fire. With all the racket the SAW was making, I never heard Ted’s shot, but I saw it as a shell landed just short of the house.

  “Add ten!” Sarge shouted, pausing the SAW, then immediately went back to work on the end of the house.

  I was shooting steadily at the gable, which was crumbling before my eyes. A moment later, the roof of the house erupted in an explosion. The blast was massive and I stopped shooting.

  “We got a runner!” Doc screamed into the radio. Looking down the road, I saw the buggy come off our street and take off to the right, the crackle of gunfire coming from it.

  “Get him, get his ass!” Sarge screamed into the radio. “Put another round into it, Teddy!” Sarge shouted, and resumed firing at what was rapidly becoming a pile of rubble.

  A few seconds later, there was another thunderous explosion in the house, as the wall facing us collapsed and started to burn. Sarge ceased firing and climbed out from under the trees.

  “Come on, let’s go check it out.”

  I got up and Ted stepped through the trees. Together we crossed the road, weapons at the ready, covering each other while we hopped the fence. We could still hear shooting coming from down the road. When we got to the house, the damage was impressive. What wasn’t blasted apart had shrapnel damage. It looked like a tornado had hit the place. A large chunk of the roof lay upside down in the yard with a two-by-four stuck through it.

  “Let’s see if we can find a body,” Sarge said.

  With the flames growing, we moved into the mangled end of the house, flipping over plywood and pieces of drywall.

  “Look here,” Ted said, picking up the rifle, its barrel bent and half of the scope missing, with a badly dented suppressor mounted on it.

  “There must be two of them, but we got one,” Sarge said, looking over. He was holding a bloody arm up by the hand. It still had part of the black BDU sleeve on it.

  “See if we can find any intel, Morg. Go look in the garage.”

  “You mean what’s left of it?”

  Sarge looked at me and tossed the arm. “Yeah, that’s what I mean, now go.”

  While the garage was heavily damaged, the drop-down attic access ladder was still down. Against one wall were a radio and pack with a couple of sleeping mats. Empty MRE packages littered the floor. It was obvious someone had been here for a couple of days at least. Smoke drifted into the garage, and through the sound of the flames I could hear something, like someone talking.

  The sound was coming from a handset laying on the ground. “Delta One-One, what’s your situation?” There was a pause. “Delta One-One, Delta One-One.”

  They’d either gotten a call out or they were part of larger operation. Snatching up the radio, I ran around the house.

  “Here,” I said as I tossed the bag to Sarge, “someone’s calling.”

  He passed it off to Ted to go through as he talked into his radio. “Good, check his pockets and bring back anything interesting.”

  “They get him?” I asked.

  “Yeah, they got him. Hoped they’d take him alive, but it didn’t work out that way.” He looked at the radio I found. “What’s going on there?”

  “Dunno, sounds like someone’s trying to call these guys.”

  Ted looked up, the handset to his ear. “We got problems. There’s got to be more of them.”

  Sarge knelt down beside him, and Ted handed over the handset. He listened for a moment before jumping up and looking around. “We gotta move, they’re going to try and hit us!”

  Danny came driving up with the guys. Doc hopped out before it even stopped. “He didn’t have anything important on him, just a map of the area.” He handed the map to Sarge.

  “Who got him?” I asked Thad and Danny as they got out.

  Thad shrugged. “All of us, I reckon.”

  “Yeah, he was pretty shot up,” Danny added, then looked at the house. “Anyone in there?”

  “Pieces, parts.”

  “Damn,” Thad said.

  “All we found was an arm; there’s probably more, but it was enough,” I said. Looking at Danny, I asked, “Was that guy in uniform?”

  “Yeah, big ole DHS patch on his sleeve.”

  “Why in the hell are they trying to kill us?”

  “Probably ’cause we left that pile of guys in the road,” Thad said.

  “We’re going to have to get the hell out of here now,” Danny said.

  “Hey!” Sarge shouted. “This ain’t over; we need to get back home. The shit’s about to hit the damn fan around here.”

  “Where are they coming from?” I asked.

  “Don’t know, but we need to be ready for them. If it were me, I’d come in the back door.”

  We made it down to the barricade just as Mike and Jeff came flying down 19.

  “What the hell’s going on?” Mike asked as he shut off the buggy.

  “Sniper got Reggie an’ more are coming. We need to get ready for them. Mike, take a SAW, and you, Thad, and Danny go back to Danny’s place. Doc, Ted, and me will position ourselves at the intersection with Reggie’s place. Morg, you and Jeff take the front door. Wherever they show up, we’ll act as a reaction force to counter them.”

  We piled into the buggy. Ted was already running to where he left the tube. As Danny raced toward the neighborhood Sarge asked, “Jeff, you got something other than that peasant rifle?”

  “No, just my Glocks.”

  “I’ve got an AK that I can give him. Take us to my place,” I said as we passed through the barricade.

  Danny took off down the road, dropping Sarge and Doc off at the intersection. Thad jumped out as well. “Go ahead, I’ll meet you at your place!” Danny nodded and took off in a cloud of dust.

  “Where you going, Thad?” Sarge called as Thad ran off.

  “To get my rifle; this scatter gun ain’t gonna cut it if they show up!”

  “Grab a radio too!” Sarge shouted as Thad ran off. “Go get as many rounds for that tube as you can carry,” Sarge told Doc, who nodded and trotted off toward Reggie’s house.

  Ted ran up, huffing and puffing. “Shit, this thing is heavy when you’re running with it.”

  “Let’s get some ranges real quick,” Sarge said as he stepped out into the road, binos in hand.

  Jeff and I ran to my house. Mel was on the porch with her H&K. “What’s going on?” she cried.

  “We think they’re about to hit us here. Where are the girls?”

  “In the house. What are we going to do?”

  I went to the safe and pulled the AK out, along with all the mags and ammo I had for it. Mel came into the bedroom. “What do we do?” I could see the fear in her eyes.

  “I don’t know, I don’t know, let me think,” I said as I headed for the living room. “Here, Jeff, I’ll be down there in a minute. Let me get everyone straightened out.”

  “No problem. Just hurry,” he said as he hit the door.

  The house wouldn’t pr
ovide them any cover, I knew that. Bullets would shred this place. I needed to think of somewhere for them to go. My head was spinning—Mel was talking, the older girls were asking questions, Little Bit was crying. It was too much.

  “Okay, guys, calm down and listen up. We don’t know what’s happening, we just think something is about to, and you guys need to be somewhere safe.”

  “Where are you going? You aren’t coming with us?” Lee Ann asked.

  “If they show up, I’ll have to help fight them.”

  “We can help too,” Taylor said.

  I looked at her and took her hand, “Kiddo, I know you want to help, but believe me, this isn’t anything you want a part of. The biggest help you can do is to stay safe with your sisters.”

  “Why can’t we stay here?” Mel asked.

  “Because they know where our house is and could show up here. I want you guys outside somewhere where you won’t be seen.”

  “What about that old oak tree by the back fence?” Lee Ann asked.

  I didn’t even think of that. During a storm a few years back, a huge old oak had split in half and fallen into two pieces. The way the pieces had fallen on the ground created a nook where Little Bit and her friends had made a clubhouse of sorts. The tree would provide both cover and concealment.

  “That’s perfect. Grab some water and your weapons, and get out there.”

  “Is it going to be safe, Daddy?” Little Bit asked.

  “Sure, no one will look in there. Just stay inside and hide, okay?”

  She nodded, wiping tears from her cheeks. Looking at her, I had a thought and went back to the safe.

  “Hey, Mel,” I said as she was filling water bottles from the Berkey. “Take these. If it comes to it, let Little Bit load it.” I handed her a box of .22 shells.

  “You’re going to give that to her?”

  “Yes, because it could come down to it.”

  Little Bit came out of her room with a Hello Kitty backpack. Seeing me, she asked, “Why do you have my Cricket?”

  I handed her the rifle. “’Cause you’re taking it with you, just in case.”

  Usually when the rifle came out of the safe she was excited and could hardly stand still, but this time she was quite reserved. Looking up at me with big, serious eyes, she asked, “Where’s the bullets?”