The Skaggs were pushing hard against our defenses. Heavy snows into the early spring had minimized the fighting, but, with a lull in the weather, the enemy was back in full force. Their ranks had risen dramatically since the initial conflict at the first Europa drop. Their every-man-for-himself motto had attracted all the disillusioned from the outlying communities around us, forcing Roslyn and Cle Elum to band together with Lakedale, Driftwood Acres, Pine Glen, and Easton, if only to match the Skaggs in numbers.
The never-ending war had few rewards. Everyone fought desperately over the Europa humanitarian drops, but they were infrequent and inadequate; both sides constantly ran low on food and supplies. I hadn’t eaten three squares a day in over four months. To top it off, we had yet to encounter a single Europa representative. All we’d ever seen of Europa were their planes and their crates of supplies.
Ben and I leapt over a dead Skagg. Normally we’d pause to see if we knew him—nine times out of ten we did—but tonight we had information that couldn’t wait. We continued our headlong charge toward the barricade at the end of the street.
A board swung back as we raced inside. There were more than thirty troops positioned behind the salvage wall made up of cars, old appliances, furniture, metal sheeting, and tires, among other things. They were men, women, teenagers—anybody capable of carrying a weapon was welcome in the 1st Cascade Militia.
“They’re coming!” I shouted.
A barrel fire set near the center of the fortification illuminated the determined faces staring back at me. Though cold and exhausted from holding the line for the past few days, we would not falter in the defense of our town and the people we loved.
Grandpa emerged from the rickety shed converted into his headquarters. Several days of dirt filled the lines around his eyes. He gave me a tired look. “Tell me.”
“They have the tank.”
He cursed and kicked a stack of tires. He’d made a mistake in not securing it that first night he’d taken us to the armory. Now one of the Skagg scouts had found it and, somehow, made it operational. At least they hadn’t found the armory itself.
“We couldn’t verify ammo,” I added. “But Skaggs is riding in the turret.”
Grandpa shook his head. I could tell he was beating himself up over his mistake, but he’d led us well over the past six months and nobody blamed him. “Well, let’s hope they didn’t find an ammo supply point somewhere and all we’re really dealin’ with is a seventy-ton battering ram. How many troops?”
“We count forty-seven,” Ben replied.
A shout came up from the ranks. “Skaggs incoming!” It was Jude, Ben’s brother. He was on sentry duty, wearing his nightvision goggles.
The Turner brothers had become a permanent fixture around our house, ever since a recon team found them trying to survive on an abandoned farm four miles outside of town. I’d hardly known the two of them in school—Ben was a sophomore on the football team and Jude was the senior class president—but now they were like brothers to me. Grandpa Donner said war could do that; it turned strangers into family.
I clambered up onto a sideways refrigerator and a broken chair to peer over the top of the barricade. Down the street I saw marching silhouettes flickering in the light of the distant truck fire. I lifted my weapon and peered through the nightscope. The vehicle fire washed out the scene, but with each step, the Skaggs’ numbers became clearer. I could hear the rumble of the tank.
“Forty!” Jude hollered. “Maybe fifty!”
Charlie Eagle climbed up beside me and peered over my shoulder. “Tank’s in the rear!”
“Hold ’em back!” Grandpa ordered.
Charlie tapped my shoulder. “You’re up.”
I steadied my weapon, chose my shot, and fired. One of the silhouettes fell.
Weapons fire broke out all along our line. The Skaggs, ducking for cover at the sides of the road, returned fire, but they couldn’t do much damage through the barricade. We picked them off one by one. They mostly fought with hunting rifles and handguns, no match for our M16s. If the battle had been soldier against soldier, we would have won the day.
But then the tank lined up.
I glanced back at my grandfather watching from the hood of a car. Our lives all depended on the hope that they didn’t have ammo in the big gun. The turret swiveled around toward us. I held my breath. It lined up on our position, then let loose with a heart-stopping BOOM!
The 120mm shell blew our fortification to bits.
Ben and I slammed to the ground. His elbow drove into my cheek. I tasted blood. We stared at each other, wide-eyed, slowly realizing we were both still alive. He shouted something—I saw his lips move—but I could only hear the ringing in my ears. And then my hearing came back with a high-pitched whine—slow and then sharp.
“Charlie!” Ben shouted.
Charlie Eagle lay facedown a few feet away from us, his arms at odd angles. We both scrambled to our feet and rushed over to him, but I could already tell there was nothing we could do. Ben turned him onto his back. Dead eyes stared up at us. One more stone piled onto my heart. One more name added to the list of people I’d lost to the Skaggs.
Grandpa bellowed behind us. “Fall back!”
Ben grabbed me by the sleeve of my coat and pulled me away. The Skaggs poured in.
We saw Tim helping Mike Jorgenson out from beneath a large piece of sheet metal. We paused to help them, then we all took off running. Bullets whizzed past my head and zinged off the asphalt behind me. Following my grandpa, we barreled into the Chevron tire store and dove into the dark shadows behind the racks. A volley of shots hit the building. A mirror hanging on the wall behind me shattered. We returned fire.
The tank plowed over the remains of our barricade and crushed the fire barrel. Then it paused, adjusted its heading, and started moving toward the tire store.
We were about to get hit again.
“Here!” Grandpa shouted from back of the store. He threw open the rear door, spilling in red moonlight. We piled out into a back alley, slipping away as another tank shell exploded the store.
Grandpa led us west, skirting through parking lots and winding our way through darkened backyards. He finally stopped just outside the old wastewater plant, allowing us to regroup and catch our breath.
“What’s the plan?” Tim asked.
“We’re falling back to the fortification at the roundabout,” Grandpa replied.
Jude balked at that idea. “But, sir, if we fall back, they take control of the Drop Zone.”
“I know that, son,” Grandpa replied. “But if we pull back now, we live to fight another day. Sera? You with us, girl?”
I blinked at him. My ears were still ringing and I was having a hard time getting the image of Charlie Eagle out of my mind. He and Vivica had been married for only three weeks. His loss would crush her.
“Sera?”
“I’m fine,” I replied.
Jude slapped his gloves against his thigh. “How the hell are we going to fight off a tank?”
Tim snorted. “Don’t s’pose anybody’s got a tank trap in their pocket.”
A look came over my grandfather’s face that I’d seen many times in the past few months. He had a plan. “Everybody follow me.”
I slung my rifle over my shoulder and we all took off into the night.
He stopped us at the top of Widowmaker Hill on the southern outskirts of Roslyn. The blind hill had a slight jog to the left where there’d been several head-on collisions over the years. “This is where we make our stand,” he said.
Out of breath and frustrated, Jude shook his head. “I don’t get it.”
“How does Widowmaker Hill stop a tank?” asked Ben.
“Ever heard of an abatis?”
We all looked at each other.
“That a Starbuck’s drink?” Tim joked.
Grandpa grunted. “Skaggs is gonna wish it was. I want every troop we’ve got, from the roundabout to the café, onsite within the hour. The r
est of you, I need six chain saws and thirty Molotov cocktails. Can you do that for me?”
“Yes, sir!” we all shouted.
“They lost a lot of soldiers in that fight, so they’re gonna want some time to regroup. That’s gonna be our window of opportunity. Now, everybody head out!”
The troops scattered into the darkness.
“Sera? I want you and Ben to scout south. Report any movement. Do not engage.”
Ben and I took off through the dark forest. I wove through the trees and ground cover in the direction of our last stand at the Walmart and, with no extra gear weighing him down this time, Ben kept up with me easily. The snowpack was shallow and we had our determination to keep us warm.
“Watch your three,” Ben whispered.
Noting the break in cover to our right, I moved more deliberately until I’d regained the trees.
“You think this abatis thing is gonna work?” he asked.
“We’re gonna find out.”
“Guess that wrecks our wild plans for the night.”
“What wild plans are those?”
“Bark tea at the café?”
I shook my head. If Grandpa knew how much time Ben spent flirting with me in the field, he would assign me a different spotter.
“Is that a yes?” Ben persisted.
I ignored him and kept moving.
He puffed his breath. “It is colder than a whore’s heart out here.”
“Next time wear the long johns.”
“They’re too constricting.”
Something caught his eye and he pulled up short. We both dropped down into the snow. He pointed to our one o’clock, then held up two fingers. I lifted my head and saw two Skaggs peeing against trees fifty yards ahead of us. Beyond them, what looked to be the entire Skaggs army made its way down Highway 903, with the tank leading. They’d regrouped faster than expected and they were moving ever closer to the city limits.
“Looks like double what they had at the barricade,” Ben whispered.
“They must have merged with another group.”
“Ronald,” we both said at once.
“They turned on us over a lousy bag of rice,” Ben muttered.
“The good citizens of Ronald deserve what they get.”
We watched the enemy in silence, trying to get a good feel for their numbers and capabilities. Every foot the tank rolled forward made me more uneasy. I started forward. “We have to stop that thing.”
Ben grabbed my leg. “G-Pa said not to engage.”
My grandfather was a smart man, but I was not going to just sit back and let seventy tons of metal roll over my town. “Then stay here.”
I crawled through the snowy underbrush on my belly until I’d maneuvered onto a rise overlooking the highway. I propped the muzzle of my M16 on a rock and evaluated the situation through my nightscope. The Skagg soldiers appeared to be no better off than our own: ragged, gaunt, battle-worn. The men and women, mostly in their twenties, looked as hungry as we felt.
We’d heard rumors that the Skaggs ate their dead. Like Grandpa always said, never underestimate a hungry man.
A female fighter near the middle of the group slipped on the icy road and fell to one knee. I zeroed in on her, recognizing Naomi Laswell. She’d cut her brown hair short and traded in her designer jeans for a pair of camos, but it was definitely the girl who used to call me carrottop.
A hand reached down to help Naomi to her feet. Somebody lit a cigarette, illuminating her rescuer’s face and I froze.
Large brown eyes, a long straight nose, a chiseled chin and a crooked smile—a smile that used to melt my heart.
Micah.
I gasped and jerked away from my scope, feeling like I’d just been struck in the chest. It couldn’t be.
I pulled in a shaky breath, blinked to clear my eyes, and then took another long look through my scope.
I watched him move casually alongside Naomi, trading a few words with the man walking on his other side. It was definitely Micah. Naomi said something and Micah laughed. He laughed with our enemy as they pushed forward to destroy us. He wasn’t tied up or under coercion. He marched with our enemy willingly.
I would have preferred to find him dead.
Tears sprang to my eyes, blurring my vision. What had he done? Had he walked away from me that night and joined the Skaggs? I’d spent all those months, missing him, crying over him and he’d been conspiring with our enemy the whole time—an enemy who invaded our homes, stole our food, and murdered our citizens.
David was right; people didn’t change.
Something shifted inside me. All my heartbreak fled, replaced by a rage so potent I could taste it in the back of my throat. I set Micah’s face in the crosshairs of my scope and nestled my cheek against the stock of my rifle. I eased my finger over the trigger, letting out a slow, steady breath.
“How’s it look?”
My muscles twitched in surprise. Ben had crawled up next to me.
I came to my senses, realizing what I’d been about to do.
“What?” Ben asked in response to my expression. “Did you really think I was gonna let you have all the fun?” He raised his own weapon to look through his scope.
I stopped him. “It’s just a bunch of useless Skaggs.” That wasn’t a lie. “We need to report this.”
We had a tense walk back through the dark to our new field position on Widowmaker Hill. My silence wasn’t lost on Ben. He probably thought he’d done something wrong; I wasn’t in the mood to correct him.
Fifteen minutes later, we heard the rumble of chainsaws echoing through the forest. We moved quickly to clear the woods. Then we saw trees being cut down along the reverse slope of Widowmaker. They were felled carefully, one at a time and at an angle, so that their trunks interlaced with their tips pointed toward the top of the incline. My grandfather was a genius. The trees would make an impenetrable wall that the tank could not see until it crested the top of the blind hill.
We found him instructing snipers positioned in the trees on the far side of the highway. “He’s gonna have vehicles following behind his tank,” he was telling them. “Aim for the drivers.”
He turned to us. Meeting his bloodshot eyes, I wondered how long it had been since he’d slept. “How many?”
Ben answered him. “At least eighty.”
He nodded. “They got reinforcements.” He looked at me, sensing something was wrong. “What else?”
I shook it off. “Just tired.”
“If this works,” he replied, “we’re all gonna sleep well tonight.” He pointed to the east side of the road. “I need you two on the other side of the road in those trees over there. You’re looking for bolters—soldiers going to ground in the woods. Nobody gets away. This ends today. Capture or kill. Got it?”
We heard the roar of the tank’s engines. They were coming. Micah was coming.
“Positions!” Grandpa yelled.
Ben and I headed back into the woods. “You gonna tell me what spooked ya out there?” he asked, checking his weapon.
“Nope.”
He snorted. “Figures.”
“Just do your job, Sergeant Turner.”
He found a thick copse of trees with adequate cover, overlooking the road. I moved thirty yards south and positioned myself behind an old shed. I tried to focus on my mission, but I couldn’t get Micah’s face out of my head. How could he have done this to us—to me? I raised my weapon, zeroed my nightscope on the road, and waited.
Will I be the one to kill him?
The thought popped into my head just as the tank appeared in my scope, roaring like a gray monster down the road toward Widowmaker Hill. Or will it be somebody else? Ben? One of the snipers lying in wait on the other side of the road?
Five SUVs followed the tank, along with eighty or so armed footsoldiers. Dirty snow churned beneath tread, wheel, and boot. The faces passed in a blur…until I saw him.
Everything came into sharp focus. He looked directly at me
, as if he knew I was there, sighting on him from fifty yards out. My mouth went dry as I waited, breathless, to hear the first shot that would signal our attack.
Then it came. One loud, lone shot sent the world into chaos. I flinched, but kept Micah in my sights. I watched him through my scope and pictured his warm brown eyes. The way he smiled. The feel of my hand in his and the way my heart tripped at his touch.
Do it!
But I couldn’t. I couldn’t bring myself to squeeze the trigger.
I lowered my weapon.
The sound of gunfire split the night; the soldiers around Micah ducked for cover along the road. He didn’t move. He just stood there like an idiot who wanted to die.
A heavy rain of bullets bombarded the Skaggs’ SUVs, sending two of the vehicles screeching and skidding into a collision with each other. One of them exploded in a spectacular orange ball of fire, knocking Micah to the ground. He ducked his head just as one of the doors shot past him.
He was going to get himself killed.
Without thinking, I ran toward him. I leapt over prone Skaggs—some dead, some firing into the tree line—without a thought for the bullets flying around me. The Skaggs, busy shooting wildly into the woods, paid no attention to me.
I reached Micah just as the second SUV exploded. As the blast knocked me off my feet, I dove on top of Micah.
He blinked into my eyes. “Seraphina? What are you doing?”
“Saving you!” I shouted back.
A bullet whizzed past my head.
“Who’s saving you?”
I took him by the sleeve of his jacket and pulled him to his feet. Ahead of us, the tank lumbered on toward Widowmaker Hill, despite heavy losses among the foot soldiers. Frank Skaggs obviously felt invincible hidden deep inside the belly of his armored vehicle. He was about to get a rude awakening.
The sound of shattering glass drew my attention to the three SUVs that made it through the initial onslaught. One of them suddenly erupted in a splash of red-hot flames, forcing me and Micah back several steps.
The Goliath Code (The Alpha Omega Trilogy) Page 13