He felt Erin drop next to him. “Get the motors. Make them stop circling,” and then continued firing.
Emily lay down next to Erin.
“Over watch,” Stryker said to Erin. “I’m moving down to those rocks below us.”
“Got it,” she replied to Stryker’s back.
“I’m going with you,” Emily said.
He moved down the hill, shooting to maintain fire superiority, but was appalled at Emily. She moved toward the house without firing at all. He dragged her to the ground. “The best way to keep your parents alive is to use the damn weapon. Start killing them now or give up on seeing your parents.”
He leveled his weapon at the next boat that passed and again emptied a mag.
“Use the damn weapon,” he yelled as he moved to the cover of the rock formation.
She immediately began firing with little effect, but at least it was suppressing fire.
He heard the boom of the Barrett and saw smoke emerge from a boat motor, and it puttered to a stop. He saw six bodies in the water, slowly floating to the east as the current carried them away from the battle.
Stryker emptied another mag at the men in the back of the stalled vessel, dropped the expended one and inserted a fresh one. It was his last mag. He watched as the two surviving men jumped off the boat, swam to the two other boats, and pulled themselves over the sides.
“Shit,” he muttered and put the selector back on burst.
The Barrett boomed again, and that finally got the men’s attention. The two remaining boats again moved down the side of the house, but moved off farther to the west. Stryker watched as they disappeared behind the house, and then continued to move west, again into his line of vision.
He peered through the scope and saw they were headed directly west, toward another house that appeared to be around three klicks away. It also sat on a rise and was not in the flood water.
Emily stood next to Stryker and stared down at her weapon for a moment. “I’ve never fired anything like this. I didn’t do so well.”
“We’re alive,” Stryker pointed out. “Do you have any idea who those men are?”
“Yes, the Pierce boys. My dad testified against the oldest one in a murder trial right before the plague hit, and I’m guessing this is payback. He went to the pen, but I bet he got out and rounded up his brothers and uncles, and came over to get revenge.”
“They live in that house just to the west of your place?”
“Yes,” she replied. “I need to let my dad know I’m all right.”
“Go ahead,” Stryker replied.
“Dad!” she yelled between cupped hands.
“Emily?” A man yelled from the house.
“It’s me.”
“Who’s with you?”
“Some friends.”
“Can you get to us?”
“Sure, it’s not a very long swim.”
A man who looked to be in his sixties appeared on the porch of the house, peered up at them and yelled, “Get over here. Your mother is having a fit.” A scoped hunting rifle hung from his hand.
Stryker waved, and he waved back weakly.
“I have to go,” she said to Stryker.
“Understood.”
She handed the M-4 to him, waded into the water, and then yelled over her shoulder, “I still want that Humvee.”
“We’ll deliver it when the water goes down.”
“Thanks.” She turned around and looked at him for a moment. “For everything.” She turned again, and plodded toward the house.
CHAPER THIRTEEN
“I think we can leave now,” Stryker said two days later. “The road is covered with slime and probably slippery, but the water has gone down and we can just take it slow.”
“I’m ready,” Haley replied.
“Let’s leave in the morning,” Erin said. “We only have a few hours of daylight left.”
“Works for me,” Annie added. “We’re only two days or so from my place, if we have long days, and I don’t think we should drive in the dark if we don’t have to.”
Stryker stared west at a vast, cloudless sky. The sun baked-earth puffed vapor until the humidity surrounded them. He felt a trickle of sweat under his shirt.
“Are we still going to deliver the Humvee to Emily?” Erin looked concerned.
“I said we would.”
“Are they all running now?”
“Six are. We only need two. So, we can give her a third one and then start the drive.”
The following morning, Stryker fussed over the order of the vehicles and finally said, “Okay Erin, you and I need to split up. I need you with Annie, and Haley will drive the Humvee for Emily. I’ll drive the lead vehicle.”
They had all taken the last hot shower they would have for some time, and Stryker felt like he was on top of his game again, after what seemed to be a long recovery from Emily’s rescue.
She shrugged. “That’s fine.”
“I’ll be the lead. You need to maintain spacing discipline and stay fifty meters behind me. If you think you can trust her to drive, you should be the shooter. If not, and I have no way of knowing if she is even capable of driving, you’ll have to take the wheel.”
“So, Haley is by herself at the end of the stack?”
“It has to be that way,” Stryker said.
“I’ll talk to her.”
“Okay, let’s get our shit in a pile, and load the Humvees.”
“When do you want to leave?” Erin asked.
“Now. Let’s just load and go.”
The Humvees used both lanes of the highway, navigating around tree stumps and branches, and stopped in Emily’s front yard. They all dismounted and stood by the vehicles until Emily’s father appeared, weapon still in hand, and eyed them from the porch. The front of the house was riddled with bullet holes, and Stryker had to wonder how anyone could survive the sheer volume of fire.
“You Stryker?” he asked.
“I am.”
“Thanks for taking care of my girl.” He approached with a wary look, and examined all of them. “I like seeing empty hands.” He stopped in front of Stryker and stared up at him. “Nothing personal.”
“I feel the same way,” Stryker replied.
“Hi, guys.” Emily emerged from the house.
A chorus of hellos greeted her.
“Name’s Bob.” Emily’s father said.
“Pleased to meet you.” Stryker kept his hand at his side, close to the XD.
“Same here.”
“You figure those men will come back?” Stryker asked.
“Doubt it. I’m not sure who shot them, but both Frank and Lloyd are dead, and they’re the only ones in that group that who had any balls. I hauled all the bodies out back after the water went down and stacked them on the burn pile.” He looked away and sighed. “A hell of a thing. I never figured I’d have to kill anybody. But, the ringleader of that pile of trash was one of the dead. He was the guy I testified against.”
“You just defended yourself, and to be honest, I killed most of them.”
“Thanks, I guess.”
“We just stopped to drop off the vehicle for Emily and to say goodbye. We need to get on the road.”
A woman emerged from the house, dressed in jeans and a sweatshirt, and was even more diminutive then Emily. She walked up to Stryker and hugged him. She barely cleared his waist in terms of height and it was an awkward moment with Stryker having to stoop to receive the hug. “I’m big Emily,” she said.
Stryker looked down at her and fought down an urge to reply with a retort. “Pleased to meet you,” he responded instead.
“Thanks for taking care of my daughter.”
“Of course,” he murmured, looking away.
Emily came over and gave Stryker a hug and looked up at him. “Thanks again for everything,” she said
“Hell, the worst that could happen was you being stuck on that knoll for a few days.”
“If you say so.”
“We gotta get moving.” His voice was gruff. “The battery on the Humvee is charged and it’s running fine.” He started to turn, but Emily put a tiny hand on his wrist.
“It’s okay. You can stay and have a cup of coffee or something.”
“Thanks, but we need to get on the road.”
Stryker got into his vehicle and waited while the women all hugged Emily and said their goodbyes.
They drove down the driveway, with Annie and Stryker in the lead vehicle and Erin and Haley following, then pulled back onto the highway and drove for two hours without stopping.
When they got to the junction of the Interstate and were at the apex of the overpass, Stryker raised a fist and pulled onto the shoulder of the road. He got his binoculars and glassed the highway to the west, then walked back to Erin and Haley.
“You guys need a break?”
“Not really,” Erin replied from the passenger’s seat. “But, I guess a stretch couldn’t hurt.” They both dismounted the vehicle and followed Stryker back to the lead vehicle.
“How you guys doing?” Annie stepped out of the passenger’s seat.
“Pretty well.”
Stryker stopped at the trailer, ripped open a case of bottled water and handed bottles to each of the ladies. He again glassed the freeway to the west, grunted with satisfaction, and then placed the binoculars back into the Humvee.
“We can make Las Cruces in a few hours,” he said.
“You want to spend the night there?”
“Might as well.” They all finished their water, and again mounted the vehicles and entered the interstate heading west. A few hours later they ran into an area where the interstate had been under repair. The roadway was a series of rutted tracks and potholes, and the highway and the shoulders of the road were littered with abandoned graders and repaving equipment. They bounced along for close to ten kilometers before the road improved and they were again able to make good time.
The sun was sinking lower in the sky when they passed the White Sands Test Facility, and later the White Sand Missile Range. They drove by a highway sign that pointed to a large hospital to the north, and then by a large commercial mall. Before they entered the town, Stryker spied what looked to be a regional airport, noting the line of UH-72 Lakota helicopters tied down on one end of the tarmac.
“Must have been a National Guard unit here,” Stryker said to Annie.
“Why?”
“Those are military helicopters on the tarmac.”
She looked over her shoulder and shrugged.
Stryker spied a Best Western motel on the north side of the freeway, motioned toward it without turning around, and then saw Erin do a thumbs up in his mirror. He pulled off the freeway and came to a halt in front of the hotel. It was a long, ungainly one-story building painted a dull yellow color with several dusty, abandoned vehicles littering the parking lot.
“Wait here,” he said to Annie, grabbed his M-4 and entered the lobby as Erin and Haley pulled up and stopped.
“It’s clear,” he yelled from the entrance. “Grab food, water and weapons.”
“We’re staying here?” Haley asked.
“Might as well. We’re almost out of light. Bring in the camp stove and lantern too.”
“Okay.”
Stryker disappeared back into the building and cleared the back office and a small kitchen that sat to the side of what he guessed was a breakfast room that was filled with tables and chairs. He walked back into the lobby in time to see the women, laden down with cargo, entering the building.
“One more generic hotel lobby,” Haley said. “They all look the same to me.” She set her load on the front desk, and Erin and Annie followed suit.
“Let’s find some rooms, and then we can eat in the breakfast area.” Stryker found a master key hanging from a pegboard behind the desk, and walked down a hallway, where he opened the first two doors and looked in.
They were both made up and reasonably clean with the exception of a fine coating of dust that covered everything.
“Good enough,” he grunted and returned to the lobby. The women moved into the breakfast area and were preparing more freeze-dried food for dinner. They ate silently at first.
“Does anybody know anything about this town?” Haley asked.
“Nope,” Erin and Annie replied.
“All I know about it is it was the birthplace of Anwar al-Awlaki.”
“Name rings a bell,” Erin replied.
“He was the first American citizen to be killed by our drones.” Stryker chewed and swallowed his food.
“Was he the cleric that we killed in Yemen?” Haley asked.
“That’s him. We had a dossier the size of an encyclopedia on the guy. He was a real piece of work. He was born in this town while his dad was going to college here on a scholarship that we paid for. Then, years later, after the family moved back to Yemen, we paid for his college as well when he came back to study here. He never finished anything and just studied all sorts of different topics, at different colleges, without completing a degree. And, we just paid the bills.”
“What did the guy do that made us want to kill him?” Annie asked.
“That’s a long list, but the short version is that he probably knew about 9-11. He was the Imam for two of the hijackers, and his phone number was found in the apartments of two others. They never could prove it, but it’s pretty certain he knew it was coming.”
“That’s not enough to kill him,” Haley said.
“Well, it is in my book, but there’s more. He moved back to Yemen and made propaganda recordings to recruit people to commit acts of terror in the U.S. Because his English was perfect, he was successful several times before he was killed.”
“Talk about biting the hand that feeds you,” Annie said.
“He was also convicted of solicitation of prostitutes several times in California, later convicted of fraud and kidnapping, and he was the guy who convinced the Fort Hood shooter to kill all those servicemen.”
“I had no idea he was responsible for that. I thought that guy just went nuts,” Erin said.
“He was also behind placing those bombs on the cargo plane that landed in Chicago, the underwear bomber, and a host of other attacks. A real sweetheart of a guy. He kept getting away with things until he went too far. He also trained in Afghanistan while he was going to college here. Think that over. He was taking our money, using our university system for free, and training to fight us at the same time.”
“So, he was a traitor?” Erin asked.
“Yes, and he was pretty damn good at it. I only wish it was me who put that mad dog down.”
“Why do you suppose he did all that?” Annie asked.
“Money and power, just like all their leadership. Hell, half of them were drug addicts and alcoholics. This joker was convicted repeatedly for hiring prostitutes. Does that sound like a person who is highly religious?”
“No,” Erin replied.
“That is one of the most misunderstood parts of our war on terror. Everyone assumes it’s theological or based upon religion. Nothing could be further from the truth. The leadership of all those groups were losers who couldn’t make it doing anything else, so they found a way to make money that didn’t involve working, and to gain power without risking their lives. Did you ever hear of any of their leaders who actually died in battle?”
“No,” Haley replied.
“That’s because they didn’t fight. They hired poor ignorant kids from some Podunk village to do the dying for them.”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Stryker was sipping his second cup of coffee when the women started trickling into the breakfast room. Annie showed up first. Her hair was still sleep tousled and she looked cranky. She went over to the camp stove, poured a cup of coffee and sat down in the breakfast room, two tables away, with the look of a person who would rather be in hell than on earth.
Stryker sipped his coffee again and then looked away.
When Erin entered the room, Stryker beamed, poured her a cup of coffee, and kissed her forehead. “How’s my little chew toy doing this morning?” He handed her the cup.
“Grrrr,” she replied and joined the other women.
“I thought that was kind of funny,” he mumbled to himself and took another sip of coffee.
An hour later, they left. Stryker decided to have Erin ride with him as Annie had proven to be poor company the previous day, and. seemed a bit sullen and moody.
“I can’t believe you are letting Annie and Haley ride together,” Erin said with a note of reproach. “Annie can’t drive well or shoot well, so Haley has to drive and shoot if we hit some trouble.”
“Well, I’d rather lose them than you.”
“That’s my sister back there.”
“You sure about that?”
“Pretty sure.”
“She doesn’t seem much like you or your gramps.”
“She’s just a bit more sensitive.”
“Well, if we hit any bad guys, I will appeal to their sense of pity and explain that to them.”
“Sometimes you’re an asshole.”
Stryker held his tongue and thought his reply through. “Seriously, I think something is just off with Annie. I realize she went through hell, but I don’t think she wants to even try to hold up her end, and Haley just confuses me at times. I get that she is not a warrior like you, but she works hard to avoid conflict and I just find it hard to relate to her mindset.”
“She’s done fine when we needed her.”
“She does fine when we don’t need her. She does nothing when we do. I like her just fine, but she just doesn’t have it.”
“Maybe you need to look in a mirror and ask yourself if you are in any position to judge. You don’t come from the same world, and she does not have your experience.”
A brittle silence ensued. Stryker sighed once, and then pulled over. The Humvee driven by Haley followed suit, and Stryker said, “Go tell Annie to ride with me.”
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