by Mark Goodwin
“Get in!” JC grabbed his long lost son’s hand and hoisted him into the truck.
Chris helped the other man into the truck. “This is my Air Force buddy, Clay.”
JC slapped the side of the truck again. “Go! Go! Go!”
Catfish sped away again while JC embraced his son, sitting in the back of the truck bed. Danny turned his head when he saw JC sobbing over the reunion with his first-born. That was the tender side of the man that he admired so much.
Alisa continued to reload magazines, and so did Jack, after a quick hug from his older brother.
Chris had to yell to be heard over the wind blowing past the speeding truck. “We hit the center of the Hummer’s window, which shattered it. So they can’t see out. They’ll either have to pull over to kick out the windshield or the driver with have to navigate the vehicle with his head stuck out the window.”
“That’s my boy!” JC held up one of the grenades. “Both of those options provide a nice opening for gift deliveries.”
As the truck peaked the next hill, Catfish knocked on the back window to get the attention of the passengers in the bed of the truck. Danny looked to see what he wanted. Catfish was pointing straight ahead. Down the hill, perhaps a mile and a half in front of them, Danny could see the Hummer following close behind the white van.
Chris lowered the legs of the bipod affixed to his rifle. It was a camouflaged tactical rifle with a fancy looking scope.
“What’s that?” Danny asked.
“.338 Lapua. It was beast to pack here all the way from San Antonio. But it helped get us here alive.” Chris popped up and set the bipod legs on top of the truck cab. Clay got behind Chris and sat with his back against Chris’ legs to keep him from falling backwards.
Danny turned to look at the Hummer that they were slowly gaining on. They had spotted the truck and someone was attempting to get in position to run the .50 cal.
Chris’s rifle rang out and the man in the Hummer slumped over the handle of the large gun. Danny waited to see if someone would come out to replace him. No one did. Either there was no one else in the Hummer to replace him or no one with the courage to face off against Chris.
Chris kept his rifle mounted on the roof of the cab. JC opened the back sliding window and instructed Catfish of the plan. It took a while, but Catfish finally caught up to the Hummer, most likely because of the visual impairment of the driver as the vehicle could have easily outran Catfish’s old truck. The van, however, looked as if it were topped out.
JC looked at Danny. “When you see me let go of the grenade, start counting off the time, one Mississippi, two Mississippi, got it?”
Danny nodded. “You don’t know how long the fuse is set for?”
“Probably five seconds, but every second counts.”
Catfish slowly edged up to the Hummer. The driver had indeed been driving with his head out the window, but was forced to bring his head back in as Alisa and Jack took shots at him. But the window was still down, providing JC the opportunity to toss the grenade into the cab. JC stood next to Chris and launched the grenade. It bounced off the shattered windshield and in the direction of the passenger’s seat.
Danny closed his eyes as Catfish hit the brakes. “One Mississippi, two Mississippi, three Mississippi, four Mississippi, five Mississippi, six . . .”
BOOM! The Hummer careened off the road and came to a sudden stop after running head long into a group of trees.
JC slapped the side of the truck and yelled to Catfish, “Keep going we have to catch the van!”
After Catfish slowed down to avoid the explosion in the Hummer, the van had now gained over half a mile on Danny’s group and was putting more distance between them every second. The van made a quick turn onto Dobbin’s Bridge Road. Catfish followed, then veered off into the neighborhood.
JC yelled, “What are you doing?”
Danny slid closer to the cab so he could hear Catfish’s reply.
Catfish yelled back. “They’ve got to get to 29 if they’re headin’ to Greenville. Monitor Drive will get us there faster!”
“Then you’ll be in front of them. That’s not what we want!”
“We’ll just wait for ‘em, then.” Catfish sped through the neighborhood and parked behind the burned out gas station on the corner of Monitor. “They’ll be comin’ round any second. Y’all best get in position.”
JC shook his head. “I guess Catfish is running this op. Come on.”
Danny and the others all found positions behind the bushes lining the gas station parking lot, lying in wait for the white van.
JC quickly asked Danny, “How many seconds on that last grenade?”
“Five and a half.”
JC took off running in the direction that the van would be coming. He swiftly cleared an empty lot and disappeared into a cluster of bushes, trees and tall grass.
Seconds later, Danny saw the van coming in their direction. Just before the van reached the brush where Danny had last seen JC, a grenade went off right in front of the van. The vehicle swerved into the parking lot of the auto repair shop on the other side of the street. It came to a stop as it smashed into several cars in the lot.
Chris and Clay led the assault on the van as they ran toward the vehicle with weapons leveled at the doors. Finally, the back doors swung open and three men ran toward the side of the building for cover, to evade Danny’s group, who were approaching from the front of the van.
Danny saw JC bolt from the bushes, across the street firing at the fleeing men.
Chris and Clay first cleared the driver’s side of the van. Clay double tapped the driver making sure he wouldn’t regain consciousness at an inopportune time for the team. Next, they made sure no one else was in the back of the van.
Danny waited for their signal, then assisted Chris and Clay as they pursued the fleeing goons. Jack and Alisa were close behind him. The men from the van took cover behind a red convertible at the corner of the building and began firing on Danny’s team.
Chris looked to his father for direction who made a couple of hand signals that Danny wasn’t familiar with. Chris called Danny over behind a silver PT Cruiser for cover. “You guys keep shooting at them. Keep them busy long enough for Clay and I to get around the back side.”
Danny looked at Jack and Alisa. “Okay, we can handle that.”
Chris and Clay stayed low to hide behind the other cars as they made their way around to the opposite side of the building. Danny, Alisa and Jack took turns firing volleys of shots toward the goons. JC also took several shots from another position to help keep the men distracted. This went on for roughly a minute, then Danny heard the shots coming from the back of the building.
“That’s our cue.” Danny led his team, shooting as they walked toward the red convertible. JC also converged on the location, helping to finish off the three men that Chris and Clay had attacked from behind.
JC let his rifle hang from the single-point sling. “Good work guys, let’s see if that van is still drivable and get out of here.”
Danny was confused. “Won’t that lead the others to us?”
“That Hummer had a radio antenna. Schlusser already knows who we are and where we’re at. It’s just a matter of time until he gets organized and comes after us. And when his boys get here, we’ll need every asset we can get. If they hit us with forty guys and couldn’t take us, you can bet there will be a heck of a lot more than that next time.” JC’s tone was grim.
Chris hugged his dad again. “It’s good to see you.”
“You, too.” Despite the dreadful prognosis of the immediate future, JC cracked a smile as he embraced Chris. “Let’s get this op wrapped up so we can get home. I’m dying to hear about your trip. I bet it was a doozy.”
Jack jumped in the van, the engine was still running. He put it in reverse and backed away from the row of parked cars which had stopped it.
Catfish put a hand in the air. “Might want to make sure you don’t have no gas leaking ‘
fore you take that thing out for a spin.” Catfish got down on his stomach and checked for leaks. “Looks alright.”
Jack proceeded to back the van out. The front fender scraped against the tire rim as the shredded rubber of the blown out tire flipped past the folded metal. The constant metal on metal sound was interrupted by the rhythmic “ffflump, ffflump, ffflump” of the separated tread.
Catfish pointed to the back. “You youngins scratch around in the back, see if you can’t find a spare tire. It might be up underneath the vehicle. I’ll see if I ain’t got somethin’ to rectify this fender.”
Danny and Alisa located the spare tire, but it was flat. Still, Danny knew something had to be done with it so he removed it from the van and rolled it up to the front where Catfish was beating the fender with a hammer. “That’s a pretty low-tech solution.”
Catfish looked at him for a second. Finally he said, “I reckon it was low-tech problem, then.” He continued bashing the fender with the hammer until it was well clear of the wheel well.
JC looked at the tire. “That thing ain’t going to do us much good.”
Alisa looked around at the cars in the lot. “If we can find a girl’s car . . .”
“A girl’s car?” Danny cocked his head to one side as he tried to figure out what was coming next.
“Girls hate to change tires, or, we’re just smarter as a sex, but either way, lots of girls carry Fix-A-Flat in their cars so we don’t have to stop and put the spare on. If we can find a girl’s car, we’ll probably find some Fix-A-Flat.”
Danny rolled his eyes. “Great idea, but I’m not sure your theory of us having a better chance of finding a can in a girl’s car is going to hold up.”
Danny took the tire tool from the van and began smashing out any windows that weren’t already broken, then checked the glove boxes and the trunks.
Alisa borrowed Catfish’s hammer and began a separate search, starting with a Volkswagen Beetle. “Oh Danny, guess what I found,” she called out in a sing-song voice.
JC took the can. “Let’s see if it works before you start gloating.” He shook the can as required by the instructions, then screwed the short hose on the valve stem of the deflated spare. In seconds the tire inflated.
Jack, Chris and Clay worked together to get the shredded tire off and the new tire on.
Danny peeked into the back of the van while the lug nuts were being tightened. “Looks like we’ve got some more ammo.”
JC looked over his shoulder. “Good, we’re gonna need it.”
Jack, Chris and Clay loaded into the van.
JC waved at Danny. “You guys ride back with the Fish. I’m gonna ride with my kid. It’s been a while. We’ll lead, you follow, so you’ll know if we have any trouble on the way back. We’ll stop at the wrecked Hummer. It’d be real nice if we can salvage that. If not, we at least need to get that .50 cal.”
Alisa slid into the front seat of Catfish’s truck to sit in the middle and Danny took the passenger’s side.
Catfish started the engine and followed the van. “I best not never catch none of you youngins referin’ to me as ‘the Fish’. If JC was any younger, I’d tan his hide.”
“I’ll tell him you said that,” Alisa said with a coy smirk.
They arrived at the Humvee minutes later. While the heavy steel front bumper was slightly dented from the impact, the tree had suffered the most damage. Inside the cab was a different story. The first ninety-five percent of the driver’s body came out in one piece. The other five percent of it was strewn about the inside of the cab like a gut pile in a tornado. The seats were shredded, the radio was in three pieces, the speedometer was missing most of the glass, and it was stuck on thirty-five.
JC looked at the bloody mess and curled his lip before jumping into the driver’s seat. He pushed the clutch, put it in neutral and turned the key. Despite the catastrophic damage caused to the interior of the cab by the grenade, the engine fired right up. “At least the government did something with all that tax money, that didn’t turn out to be a total waste. Looks like they bought a Hummer that can stand up to an EMP and a grenade.”
Chris looked the vehicle over. “And all for the low, low price of $220,000.”
“You want to ride with me, Chris?” JC asked as he put the Hummer in reverse.
Chris looked in at the mangled seat with bits of flesh and blood all over. “If you don’t mind, I’ll just ride back with Jack. I missed my little brother too.”
JC smirked. “Yeah, sure thing, kid.”
The van led the convoy, with JC driving the Hummer behind the van, and Catfish at the end.
As they pulled into the driveway, Danny was instantly reminded of the carnage they’d left behind. He exited the truck to the sound of wailing and crying. Tracey, Jason, Emma and Kalie were all on their knees in the grass, circled around Korey’s bloody body.
Pauline sat at the edge of the Bravo fox hole, with her dead husband’s head in her lap. Weeping with a loud sorrowful howl.
Danny dropped his head. As much as he wanted to go make them all feel better, he couldn’t. And before he did anything, he needed a glass of water. The stress of the battle and subsequent assault had taken everything he had. He needed some water, and he needed to sit down, if only for a few minutes. The sudden heaviness hit him like a ton of bricks as he walked up the stairs to the house. Alisa followed close behind.
Danny turned to see two-year old Annie bolting toward JC as he got out of the Humvee. She clung to his leg, crying. What an awful thing for a little child to see, what a horrific event for a little girl to live through. Even so, she was much better off than the Reese children. Their pain was only beginning.
Danny looked at the front window of Nana’s house. It was shot out and there were bullet holes all over the house. He opened the door to find Steven stretched out on the couch, towels under his leg, Nana cleaning the wound and Dana assisting her. “How is he?”
Dana forced a smile. “Oh you know, Nana got him drunk, on top of the loss of blood. He babbled on some nonsense for a few minutes, then passed out. He should be okay though.”
Danny was relieved that Steven was going to be okay. He wondered what a messed up world it was that this was the second time he’d seen Steven, in exactly the same position, the same condition, and the same bandages on the same leg. “I guess this is the new normal,” he muttered as he made his way to the kitchen. The walls of the living room were riddled with bullets, some of the pictures on the wall were busted. The old TV that hadn’t worked since the EMP was also ripped apart.
Danny got his water from the old metal pitcher and went to sit down in the dining room. Nana’s china cabinet had a few holes in it and some of the plates were busted and broken, but many others were still intact.
Alisa got a glass of water as well and sat down at the table next to Danny. “I’m so tired all of a sudden.”
“Post-adrenal-dump crash,” Danny said.
“Did you learn that in college?” she asked.
He fought back a laugh. “No, I made it up. But it kind of fits, right?”
“I’d slap you if I wasn’t having a post-adrenal crash.”
“Post-adrenal-dump crash.”
“Whatever. You made it up.” Alisa put her head down on the table.
Danny put his hand on the back of her neck. “I’m glad we made it. I love being married to you and I’m thankful for every day I have with you.”
She lifted her head to turn toward him and put her head back down on her hands. “Thanks. Me too.”
Melissa walked in from the porch. “Hey, Cami sent me up here to ask for some more towels.”
“There’s a tiny hall closet, it’s behind the bathroom door. How is Nick doing?” Danny asked.
“He lost a lot of blood, but Cami got the shrapnel out of his shoulder and arm. It was a 5.56 hollow point. It made a real mess. He’s resting, but I think he’ll be alright.”
“There’s a bottle of Jack Daniel’s on the kitchen coun
ter if Nick needs it.” Alisa sat up for a moment.
“Nick has morphine, so he’s going to be okay. But don’t tempt me with it.” Melissa snickered. Then, her face went solemn. “And poor Tracey, she’s got all those kids alone now. Not even morphine can take away the pain she’s going through. I don’t know what I would do if JC hadn’t made it.” A tear ran down Melissa’s face.
Danny bit his lip. “We’ll all make sure Tracey doesn’t have to raise her children alone.”
Melissa nodded and forced a smile. “Yeah, I’ll certainly do what I can. It could have just as easily been me in her shoes. Well, I better get those towels. See you guys later.”
The next day Danny asked God for the strength to complete the macabre tasks of the day. It would be his duty to select a grave site for Korey and Rocky. Of course he would need to find a serene location that could accommodate additional residents. It was highly unlikely that they would be the last members of the compound who would have to be buried. Danny knew that it was very possible that he could be selecting his own final resting place, or worse, Alisa’s grave. Nothing good could come of dwelling on such things, so he got busy doing what needed to be done. A quiet place down near the creek was the perfect spot. A grand oak offered shade and sanctuary. The plot could easily be expanded. Next, Danny got JC to assist him in operating Rocky’s tractor to dig out the two graves. Between the two of them, they soon had all of the buttons and levers figured out.
Chris and Clay were granted a twenty-four-hour period to rest and recuperate, before being expected to chip in with chores and security shifts, but they knew the hardship that had been brought on the compound by the two deaths and the injuries, so they insisted in helping out. The two of them, along with Jack, took care of gathering wood and burning the bodies of the assailants scattered about the entrance of the driveway.
Nana, Cami and Melissa tended to the wounded and took care of cleaning the bodies of Korey and Rocky for the funeral service to be held that sorrowful Saturday afternoon.
Alisa and Dana took care of preparing the food for the day and trying to clear out some of the debris from Nana’s house caused by the previous day’s battle. They picked through the dishes in the china cabinet, throwing out the broken pieces and seeing what was usable.