"You really loved her, didn't you?" asked Derek.
Cooper cleared his throat and looked back at the screen, clenching his fists to distract himself from the pain. "Yes." There. I said it out loud. Now it's real.
The emotion between he and Brenda was no longer a secret. Saying that one word suddenly made it all real. A sense of peace washed over him as if Brenda herself had suddenly touched the back of his neck. Cooper resisted the urge to turn and look.
"Thank you."
Cooper arched an eyebrow. "For what?"
Derek sighed. "Brenda and I have had a pretty rough time since…for the past ten years."
Cooper nodded. "She told me about your family. I know it's not much, but for what it's worth, I'm sorry."
Derek waved off the sentiment again. "It was long time ago—I'm just upset than Brenda had to go through it alone. I wasn't there to help—I was too sick to help. But she's tough." Derek looked down again. "She was tough. She went through a lot to save as many people as she could. That was her way—always looking for a way to help someone. She never gave up on anybody."
Cooper thought back to their argument in the corridor outside the ICU where Mike had been in a coma. He thought back to how she wanted him to stay, how she never gave up on Mike. He smiled. "She was a wonderful person."
Derek nodded. "What I'm trying to say is that I think you were good for her. From what everyone tells me, after she met you she became a different person, maybe healed a little—I don't know. She laughed more, she smiled more. The nurses saw the change, they told me."
Cooper looked down. There was nothing he could say.
Derek continued. "Anyway, thanks. I appreciate you looking after my little sister, even though you are just a Squid."
Cooper snapped his head up. "Yeah well, somebody had to teach you Army brats how to have a good time." Cooper regretted the words instantly. Why the hell did I say that? "Shit—I mean…"
Derek laughed. "Hey, it's okay! She was my little sister, but she was a grown woman." Derek laughed again. "I got over the whole 'my sister is having sex' thing back when she was a teenager!" Derek laughed harder at Cooper's expression. "Ha! Got you. No, seriously," he said, still chuckling, "it's cool. I have a feeling if things had worked out differently, you and I might've been family."
Cooper felt relief and a sense calm he hadn't known since Brenda was alive. A weight departed his soul—he finally understood what closure meant.
"So how long they gotta keep you in there?" he asked with a nod toward Derek's quarantine cell.
Derek rolled his eyes. "Damn if I know..." He glanced over his shoulder at one of the nurses who was glancing up at Derek more frequently now. "They're probably gonna pull me away from here and say I need 'my rest' any minute," he said with air quotes. "I'm ready to get up and go for a run, but they say I'm not allowed out of bed for another week. Brenda's treatment worked, so I'm clear of the flu, but I got a lot of work before I'm useful again."
Cooper nodded. "You'll get there."
The nurse now stepped up to Derek's shoulder and whispered something in his ear. He frowned and nodded. "Looks like my times up. Hey, it was good to meet you, Lieutenant Braaten."
Cooper smiled. "Likewise, Captain Alston. I'll be in touch. But…" Cooper looked around, unsure of how to proceed.
Derek waved the nurse away and focused on the screen "What's up?"
Charlie rushed into the room and leaned down. "We got a signal from 13: 'Target identified'. Bennet's sending over the mission details." Charlie stepped back and met Cooper's eyes. "We're gonna get this fucker." He clapped him on the shoulder and left the room.
Cooper looked back at the screen. He felt the weight of responsibility settle onto his shoulders once more. "I can't give you any details, but I want you to know something in case I don't come back."
Derek's face grew somber. "You're going after him, aren't you? The one that started all this? I've heard the rumors."
"Reginald," Cooper said. He gave the barest of nods. "I will find him."
Derek stared at Cooper for a long moment. "The brother in me wants to tell you to put a bullet in his head. The Ranger in me wants to tell you to bring him back alive to face justice. This son of a bitch has killed hundreds of thousands of people by now. It'll be in the millions before it's all said and done."
Cooper nodded. "He'll pay for every one of them."
Derek swallowed. "Hooah." The nurse reappeared behind him. Derek flicked his eyes away from the screen, then focused back on Cooper. "I know you'll do the right thing."
The transmission ended. Cooper stood from the desk and stared at the black screen for a moment. He looked up at the wall—at the global map showing infection and death rates.
Reginald. The Council. They're the ones that started this sick, freak-show train ride. They're the ones that caused all this death and destruction around the world.
Cooper looked down at the handwritten note Charlie left on the table: Definitely Scotland—Skye. He glanced back to the map and looked at the relatively little island labeled off Scotland's western shores.
I know where you're hiding now, you son of a bitch. Cooper picked up Brenda's picture and smiled. He traced the outline of her face with his thumb and closed his eyes, burning the image into his memory.
I'm going into harm's way again, Brenda—I'm doing it for you this time. The man who…the man who's responsible is going to pay. I swear I'm not going to fail this time. I'm coming back with my shield or on it.
Cooper opened his eyes, picked up a pencil from the desk, and put the picture of Brenda on the map over the British Isles. He stabbed the pencil into the corner of the picture above Brenda's head with a vicious thrust, pinning it to the map. He grabbed Charlie's note and slipped it into his pocket as he got up, then very quietly and deliberately closed the door behind him. and stopped out of the room, black fury on his face.
With my shield or on it.
CHAPTER 33
Salmon Falls, Idaho.
FURY ERUPTED INSIDE DENNY'S chest. He'd been so close. Townsen just couldn't leave well enough alone. He had to make himself King.
Anse took over leadership of the group in the cabin. "Listen up!" he said in an urgent whisper. The room fell silent as all faces turned to him. "I built this cabin with my own hands out of the timber I cut from these mountains. The logs on these walls are 10 inches thick. It might not stop a .50, but we'll have decent protection if we stay inside." He pointed to the wall on the far side. "You got one window on two walls, make 'em count. Stay in the corners, don't present a target to those assholes out there," he said, jerking a thumb over his shoulder. "We stay near the walls, we stay below the windows, and we take good shots–"
"Better shots than Tommy with that eight-pointer last year," someone said to a few nervous chuckles.
"Those guys out there are just wannabes. The real hunters in Salmon Falls are right here in this room."
Denny felt his chest tighten. Anse was more right than he knew. He ran his hand along the smooth surface of the rough-hewn log next to him. "Anse, we should find a peaceful way out of this–"
"The time for talk is over, Denny."
"Yeah!" three or four men shouted at once.
"Hey," Mary Winselm said from the far window. "I see a torch!"
"That son of a bitch aims to kill us!"
"All he has to do is set this place on fire with one of their torches—we're inside a matchbox!" snapped Denny. "If you're serious about this, then you need to make sure every single person out there who might be prepared to light up this cabin is taken down. I'm not talking about shooting people in the knees, folks," Denny roared. "If you're going to do this—you aim for the chest! You've got to put them down before they set this building on fire or we will all be burned alive."
Anse looked at Denny and smiled. "That's the Denny I was hopin' would be here tonight."
Denny pulled the pistol from his belt. "You—"
"If you won't listen to me, lis
ten to your friend!" bellowed a voice from outside.
"Guys, they're serious! Gris, it's a 213! Stay low–" the bullhorn went silent with a squeal of feedback.
One of the men near a window pulled back the curtain just enough to peek around the corner. "Holy shit…they're beatin' the hell out of that deputy out there…"
Griswold looked at Denny. "I knew he didn't give us away. I knew it."
"He didn't," said Anse.
Denny turned to look at him. "Why did you betray us?" he asked. The fight had gone out of him. It was as if all the air in the room and been sucked out.
Anse smiled sadly. "Somebody had to do something," he whispered. "I didn't turn us in, I just tipped them off."
"Why the fuck did you do that?" more than a few men growled. A couple moved forward to surround Anse.
"I knew if we didn't do something against Townsen right now—at this moment—he'd become too strong for us to stop. And if that happened," Anse said, talking quickly with both hands in the air, "all of us were as good as dead anyway. I figured the best shot this town has is to start something right here, right now and finish it. Tonight. We do this rough, bloody, hard and fast, and we get it over with."
"You set us up…" said Denny, "to start a fight we hadn't even decided we needed yet…"
Anse rested his rifle on the floor defiantly. "I did what had to be done. Somebody had to touch this powder keg off before it got big enough to destroy the whole town when it blew."
"Jesus Christ," said Deputy Griswold. "We don't have time for this right now—Evans said this is a 213."
"What's a 213?" asked Denny.
"An inside joke. Sheriff Bridger had us go through tactical training last year. Counter-terrorism shit. A '213' is some Federal code they made up for when terrorists have taken hostages and they're prepared to kill everyone."
"They have our families?" a voice called out.
Deputy Griswold raised his hands before the murmuring could turn to shouting. "I didn't say that—I'm pretty certain Evans is talking about us as the hostages and that the terrorists," he jerked his head towards the window, "out there are willing to execute us."
"Hey! Hey…hey I got another guy with a torch out there…he's moving closer," muttered a man from the other side of the cabin.
Denny locked eyes with Anse.
"Come on guys! Give it up," said a new voice over the bullhorn. "Y'all may not like me, but I don't have anything personal against you. Just give up and come on out, we can talk this over like friends and neighbors. There ain't nothing in town worth dying for."
"Townsen." Anse said, his face hardening into a block of granite. He turned to the men stationed at the windows. "Anybody got a bead on 'im?"
The answers all came back negative. Townsen stayed in the treeline and it was too dark to see him.
"Anse, there's a few trucks out there, but it's so dark, I can't hardly see anything, just shadows moving behind trees."
"Got another torch on this side!" somebody warned from the south wall.
"Tell you what—I'll give you 30 seconds to come out that front door. If you don't, we'll burn you to the ground."
In the silence that followed Townsen's ultimatum, Denny heard maniacal laughter coming from the east. "That's Jeb," he said. "Jesus, Townsen brought his kid?"
Anse chambered a round in his rifle and slammed the bolt home. He walked over to the closest window and punched it out with the tip of his barrel. "Let's get this party started. You take one step near my cabin with them torches and it'll be the last one you ever take!"
"Anse! You ain't the one that makes the rules here! In case you forgot, you're surrounded!"
"Fuck you!" somebody shouted from another window.
"Hey, he's coming closer!" the lookout on the east wall warned.
"Take 'em down!" shouted Anse. He pulled the trigger and his rifle echoed like thunder inside the room. Two more shots fired out in quick succession from the other window. Denny pushed his way to Anse's window and spotted the sputtering torch as it died in the snow.
"God dammit, Anse!" shouted Townsen.
"It's on, boys!" someone shouted in the distance.
Denny dropped to the floor. "Get down!" The battle erupted in a deafening roar and crackle of gunfire that surrounded the little wooden structure. Two men near the east window screamed and fell over in a spray of blood. Bullets disintegrated both windows and curtains. Plates and dishes, utensils, kitchenware pots and pans hanging on the wall—all tumbled to the floor and shattered in a spray of wood. Men screamed and after a few seconds it stopped, the last echo of gunfire rolling through the hills.
"Now! Shoot back!" Anse shouted. The men closest to the windows stood and fired into the woods.
Denny barely heard the screams of the injured and dying over the gunfire. He gripped the pistol in his hand with white knuckles and tried to crawl as close as he could to a wall. The sound of rounds impacting the outside of the cabin reminded him of a heavy rainstorm. He touched one log and felt it vibrate. Anse was right—so far the small arms fire outside couldn't penetrate the thick logs.
As he stared at the trembling wood, a small hole appeared in the mud caulking between the two logs, not six inches from his hand. Behind him one of the men screamed and fell to the floor, clutching his calf.
Not as safe as I thought…
The men inside hunkered down against the walls and shouted when they were low on ammunition. Soon enough, a fire chain of sorts formed, and they passed spare bags of hunting rounds back and forth. Denny was amazed at how quickly the ragtag group of hunters coalesced into a unified fighting force. Those armed with semiautomatic AR-15s, moved into front positions and fired quick shots into the attackers while those with slower bolt-action rifles jumped up and fired at will.
Denny had an idea. Only a few had AR's—most of those in the cabin sported bolt actions. "You've got to set up in teams!" Denny shouted over the din. A few of the heads in the room turned toward him and nodded. "Shoot then duck—never stay still long enough to be a target," Denny said, moving quickly along the walls. "When one of you ducks, the other stands and shoots from a different angle."
He ran from group to group, urging them to organize. "Keep up a continuous fire—don't give them a chance to rest, but make sure you aim!
"Make every shot count!" added Anse.
Denny moved on to the other window and slapped the AR-toting hunter on the shoulder. She fired four quick shots then ducked. The man next to her stood under Denny's direction and put his hunting rifle through the window. He fired once, then spun out of the way to be replaced by a third man.
"Good! Keep it up!" Denny shouted. The defenders looked scared, but determined and more confident now that they were organized.
"Remember to aim!" Anse shouted.
Denny had to see what was going on outside. He felt trapped. The press of bodies against the walls kept him from being able to see through the ragged windows. The ever present threat of bullets coming through the chinking between the logs was real. Six men had already gone down squirming on the blood-slick floor. Those who could helped reload and hand rifles to the shooters.
"I'm running low," called out one of the men with an AR. "I didn't think I was going to need a lot of ammo!" he explained.
"Me too," replied Mary Winselm from under her window. "I don't know how much longer I can keep this up."
Denny looked in the far corner. Two bodies lay slumped over. He looked back to Mary. We're down to 16, including me.
He had to do something—he couldn't just stand around and wait to take a lucky hit. He glanced up at the rafters. It was an open ceiling—Anse used the beams across the ceiling to hold extra planks of wood and store fishing poles and supplies.
Denny tucked his pistol into his belt and ran to the washbasin, a steel tub attached to the wall near the front door. Dented from multiple bullet strikes, the big steel tub still looked serviceable. The mirror on the wall above it had fallen into the basin and shattere
d. Denny found a shard as large as his hand and tucked it inside his coat, then jumped up to the closest rafter and pulled himself up.
The men around him ignored him as they continued to pour fire out into the attackers. A woman's scream abruptly cut off as a body hit the floor where Denny had just been standing. He didn't focus on the surrounding chaos—he threw his legs up and around the rafter and pulled himself vertical.
Once above the rafters, he looked down at the grisly scene below. A pool of blood spread underneath Freddie Mell's head. The man who'd lost his family to Townsen now went to join them in the afterlife. A man next to Freddie picked up his discarded rifle and fired out the window.
Mary Winselm knelt by her husband, pressing red bandages to his chest. He clutched feebly at her face as she leaned over him.
Denny turned away from the scene below him and faced the roof. He didn't hear anything outside over the noise of the men firing below. He crawled up toward the peak of the roof and examined the wood there. A spot of mold stained the peak black, and the wood gave when Denny pushed his fingers into it.
He pushed his fist into the underside of the roof and the plywood sheathing gave way into wet chunks that fell to the floor beneath him. His fingers touched tar paper and after a few moments of pushing and prying, Denny created a rough hole in the roof. He pulled the bits of shingles down through the hole so as not to attract any attention from Townsen's group outside.
The gunfire continued unabated below. More men screamed in pain and death. Denny risked a glanced down—between his feet, he saw the body pile in the corner was now up to five.
Five men dead, a dozen wounded. I must hurry. He pulled out the mirror shard with his left hand and stuck it up through the hole up at the peak of the roof. He angled it down and spotted the reflected muzzle flash of men firing into the cabin.
He noticed a flashlight in the distance and watched a person moving through the woods tending the wounded. When the light panned over the ground to the east, Denny counted seven bodies in the snow—three writhing around. He turned the mirror to face north and saw more of the same. Every direction he turned the mirror, he spotted at least one body in the snow.
Firestorm: Book III of the Wildfire Saga Page 24