The chopper’s landing could be felt inside the tavern, causing Bear’s children to whimper in fear. The Old Man coughed as Dublin placed a jacket around him and gently sat him down in a chair against a wall farthest from the entrance. I took a count of how many were now inside Freedom Tavern – there were forty four of us.
Several minutes passed with no sound from outside. A voice whispered from someone seated near Mac’s jukebox.
“What are they doing? What if they just blow us all up inside here?”
Mac shook his head slowly, his eyes never leaving the door.
“No, if they wanted to do that they already would have. No need to land. They are messing with us. Trying to build up your fear…don’t let them do it. Stay calm. They’ll be walking through that door soon now.”
True to Mac’s word - that is what happened. The door opened and four men dressed in all white winter clothing with a small baby blue New United Nations emblem on the right shoulder of each uniform, entered Freedom Tavern. Two of the men carried a weapon similar in appearance to an old musket rifle, though the butt of the weapon had a small charge box attached. I had seen those weapons used while watching footage of riots from years ago. They shot out an electrified net meant to disable several people at once – a modern version of a riot gun.
“Well hello again! And so many of you gathered here all in one place is going to make my job so much easier!”
August Hess had returned to Dominatus, his voice dripping menace as he addressed those of us inside Freedom Tavern.
“Ok then, let us get to it. For those who don’t know, I am Special Operations Officer Hess. I have been sent here on the direct orders of the New United Nations to clean up this little shit hole once and for all. Or to put it another way, I’m from the government, and I’m here to help. What that means ladies and gentlemen, is that you do what I tell you to do or…you die. There is no compromise here. None. This action is off the books people…meaning I have the ok to accomplish this mission by any means necessary. And what that means is that for me and my men…there are no rules. Whether any of you live or die does not concern me. I have more men stationed outside this building…and I have many more due to arrive soon. So don’t get any silly ideas about making some kind of stand…there’s no need for us to shed blood here. Ok?”
Mac did not respond, so the rest of us remained silent as well. The familiar wolf-grin of August Hess made a re-appearance as well as he motioned a hand toward the door.
“Oh…perhaps I should introduce you to the one who made this particular little moment possible for us today. Told us when and where so many of you would be found sitting here all in one place. Bring her in.”
The door opened and a woman was pushed inside as the door closed behind her. She stepped forward and her face was immediately familiar to me – to everyone. Stacy Carter, the woman who had voiced her anger at my arrival to Dominatus during the recent meeting at the operations center.
Stacy looked at the faces of those she had lived among for so many years before pointing a finger in my direction and turning to face August Hess.
“You said you would take him and leave the rest of us alone. Give us time to get out safely. That was the deal. So there he is, take him.”
Special Operations Officer Hess glanced at me, looked at Mac, and then returned his attention back to Stacy.
“I did agree to that, Ms. Carter, and I am a man true to my word. And thank you so much for letting us know of this gathering. As I said, you made my job so much easier.
So here’s the deal, everyone! I take Mr. Neeson with us today and we don’t return back here for another forty-eight hours after that. Let me be clear though, when we do return, it will be to wipe this place off the face of the earth. There will be nothing left of it…NOTHING. I’m offering you the chance to get out, to return to regular society and quit this Dominatus nonsense. Become a part of the New United Nations, or…choose to die here.”
Stacy Carter stepped forward, clearly sensing the angry glares of her former friends and neighbors who now considered her a traitor.
“I bought us time. I don’t want anyone to get hurt. Just…just let them have him, he’s not one of us. He brought trouble here, so I just…I’m just trying to give us time to get out so nobody gets hurt.”
August Hess placed his hand atop Stacy’s head and smiled, patting her as if she was his pet dog.
“That’s right, Ms. Carter, you’re just doing what is right, now aren’t you? You’re being a good girl. So now, Mr. Neeson…how about you step over here with us so the rest of these fine people don’t have to sacrifice themselves all for you. That just doesn’t seem right, now does it?”
From behind me I heard someone clearing their throat, and then saw the Old Man walking slowly without the aid of his granddaughter, toward August Hess.
“Welcome once again to Dominatus, Officer Hess, I only wish your arrival was with far less…ill intent. You must realize, of course, that Ms. Carter does not speak for the rest of us, certainly she does not speak for me or my personal guest, Mr. Neeson. As such, your efforts to remove Mr. Neeson…or any of us…will not find acceptance. I strongly suggest you remove yourself and your men from here as I am certain your superiors will not be pleased to have me…so dissatisfied with this operation.”
August Hess stared down at Alexander Meyer with simmering contempt, his mouth curled downward as the Old Man spoke to him.
“I have no interest in your stupid words old man – your threats are empty. Do you understand? So shut your mouth and go back to your seat. Either your ‘guest’ comes with me NOW, or all of you give up any additional time to get out of this place alive. And that includes you and your bitch granddaughter, Mr. Meyer.”
Stacy Carter spoke up angrily in defense of the Old Man.
“There’s no cause for that kind of talk, Officer Hess, or those kinds of threats. No cause at all.”
August Hess’s right hand shot out with incredible speed and force across the face of Stacy Carter, snapping her head back as her body crumpled to the floor.
“Let that be a lesson to the rest of you – I’m in no mood to listen to your —”
Officer Hess’s words were interrupted by the Old Man’s own hand slapping across his face with surprising force, drawing a small amount of blood from the officer’s upper lip.
“You are nothing more than a government bully, a killer of freedom, a tool of tyrants…a coward who hides behind a uniform and the system’s precious mandates. We here are not easily frightened, Officer Hess. You would do well to know that now, and consider, carefully…your next action. Mr. Neeson remains here with us. He is one of us.”
August Hess put his fingers to his mouth and removed them, looking down at his own blood before staring back with shock and rage into the eyes of Alexander Meyer. The Old Man returned that stare without fear, straightening his aged spine even further, a defiant smile deepening the lines of his face even as Officer Hess formed a fist.
Mac’s voice, like cold ice dropping into a glass of water, issued a warning.
“You touch him, you die. You die today. You die here. You die now.”
Officer Hess hesitated, a small twitch at the corner of his mouth revealing how very much he wanted to strike out at the Old Man. Instead, the moment passed and his wide grin returned.
“Ok then, so all of you are willing to give up yourselves for one person? Is that it?”
Hess noted the Tedlow children huddling with their mother.
“What about those kids…you want to condemn them too? For a single person? A stranger? You know I’ll kill those kids too. Give me Neeson, or everyone in here will pay the price for this stupidity, including those kids right there. I will rip their limbs off and shove it up your ass.”
Bear took two slow and deliberate steps toward Alexander Hess, the floor of Freedom Tavern groaning under his considerable weight as his low voice growled its own warning to the operations officer.
“Ma
ke another threat toward my kids. Go ahead…see what it gets you.”
The three other officers who had entered with August Hess shifted uncomfortably, likely out of their inexperience in dealing with people who simply did not cower and comply to their every demand. The New United Nations and all those who worked within its massive bureaucracy had grown accustomed to very little opposition to its near absolute authority.
“I am going to have another thirty officers here in minutes, and this place will be leveled. And every last one of you---“
The timing of the explosion, likely some two miles away, could not have been more ironic given August Hess’s just spoken promise. It was Mac’s turn to now smile.
“That would be your thirty men Officer Hess, getting their ass handed to them by one of our RPG’s. Yeah, we got those up here too. Looks like those men of yours might be just a little late in coming.”
Another explosion was heard, followed by yet another.
Officer Hess backed toward the door as the two officers carrying the electric riot guns pointed them at the citizens of Dominatus gathered inside Freedom Tavern. As soon as Hess found himself safely behind the two armed operations officers he locked eyes with Mac, both men glaring at one another from across the room. August Hess grinned as he hissed the order to his men.
“Fire.”
XVII.
The sound of Mac’s handgun was quickly followed by Bear’s move to protect his family and others from the electrical net of the riot gun, his massive arms stretched upward as his body spread itself as wide as possible. The net was fired, its electrified charge both felt and heard as it flew from the gun’s barrel. Both of Bear’s hands wrapped itself around the net and then drew it toward himself, his body already convulsing as it hit the ground, but not before he had managed to wrap yet more of the net around him, protecting others from being harmed by its charge.
The other operations officer who had been armed with a riot gun was already on the floor of Freedom Tavern, shot dead by Mac before he was able to pull the charge gun’s trigger. That left August Hess and one other operations officer inside the room. Hess had his back to the door, pushing the other officer in front of him as he began opening the door behind him.
“Keep them here…I’ll be back.”
Hess’s order was met with a confused look by the remaining operations officer whose hand rested on the butt of his charge gun as Hess slid outside, shutting the door of Freedom Tavern behind him, followed by the sound of a locking device being turned.
Dr. Miller knelt beside the now motionless body of Bear, as the large man’s wife frantically helped to remove the fully discharged net from around her husband while the two children repeatedly asked if their father was going to be ok.
“He’s suffered a significant electrical shock. His heart rate is unstable. Breathing is somewhat labored. His hands, there is some burning there. I need to move this man to the medical room, either at the operations center or the cave. I think the way his heart is reacting, he will be in need of defibrillation very soon. If he wasn’t such a large man, he’d probably be dead already. Mac, I need to move him now.”
Mac pointed his gun at the remaining operations officer.
“Ok buddy, looks like you’ve been locked up inside here with the rest of us. Now I’m guessing Hess is calling in an armed drone strike – that’s how you people do this kind of thing isn’t it? If you can’t intimidate people, you just blow them the hell up, right? How about you try that door and see if I’m right?”
The operations officer, who appeared to be no more than thirty years of age, reached back to push Freedom Tavern’s door open. It didn’t budge. Mac walked slowly toward him, his gun still pointed at the officer’s head.
“Here’s the deal now…we are gonna walk on out of here. You’re welcome to come with us. No sense you dying in here when they blow the place up – unless you’d rather follow orders and stay. Your call.”
The operation officer’s hand tightened on the grip of his still holstered charge gun while his other hand pointed at Mac.
“None of you are going anywhere, you are to remain here until---“
Mac’s weapon fired – and another operations officer’s body fell to the floor of Freedom Tavern.
“Like I said…his call.”
Mac leaned down to look at Bear as well.
“How’s he doing Doc?”
“Mac, if we don’t get him to one of my medical rooms he might very well die within the hour. He’s fighting like hell right now, but his body is at war with itself. His heart is not doing its job - he’s going into shock.”
Mac smiled, his hand clapping the doctor’s shoulder.
“Well then I guess we need to get to gettin’. Reese, in the room back there, the one you slept in, bring out that cot. We need to use it to haul him out of here. And it’s gonna take a few of you to do it, he’s a big boy. Now we are going out the back door and sneak into the trees behind here…go wide until we are out of site and then make for the operations center. Whoever isn’t here is likely there right now waiting for us. I’m pretty sure we have no more than an hour before the drones arrive, so we need to be at the cave by then or we are really gonna be in a world of hurt. Dublin, if you need help with your grandfather, you need to speak up. Don’t let his stubbornness prevent you from getting that help – we can carry him if we need to.”
Dublin nodded, but then asked a question.
“Mac, we’re locked in here…what back door are you talking about?”
Mac smiled again as he made his way to the hallway toward his office.
“Old dog…old tricks. Now everyone, we walk out of here single file, no need to rush. When we are outside, I want your guns out and ready. If Hess has put some of his men around the perimeter, we will need to shoot our way out of here – don’t hesitate. You see one of them, shoot. Don’t think – shoot.”
Dublin pointed to Stacy Carter who remained unconscious on the floor after being stuck by August Hess.
“What about her - Stacy?”
Mac paused for a second before looking to the Old Man for guidance. Alexander Meyer looked down with sadness at the woman who had betrayed them.
“Move her outside far enough from the building to provide some chance of safety, but we don’t take her with us. She is no longer welcome inside the cave. She made her choice.”
Mac returned to his office and began moving the bookcase behind his desk from one wall to the other, revealing a locked panel just large enough for a man to walk through. He withdrew a key and unlocked it, and with his gun ready, slowly opened it up to the outside. The storm was still ongoing, rain and wind hammering down around them as each stepped through the panel and lined up against the back wall of Freedom Tavern. The late afternoon daylight was greatly diminished from just an hour earlier, which would make walking off the trail more challenging though also providing much needed cover from more of Hess’s operation officers.
Without speaking, Mac motioned they were to make their way toward a tree line that was nearly forty yards away. Dr. Miller along with two other men and Bear’s wife Clancy and her children, were near the front – the two men pulling the cot that Bear had just been tightly secured to. I was only mildly surprised to see both the doctor and Clancy Tedlow holding their own handguns out in front of them, their eyes searching in the near-darkness for any sign of August Hess and his officers. Mac walked near the rear of the group, his own gaze looking back toward the building that had been his home for the last twenty years – years he had already indicated were among the happiest of his life. To my right walked Dublin and her grandfather. The Old Man was saying nothing, instead focusing all of his energy in moving his feet forward through the now wet and treacherous ground below them.
Just before we reached the trees, the sound of Hess’s helicopter being started reverberated around us…its turbine engine howling even over the din of the wind and rain. Mac yelled for everyone to keep going into the trees. The New Un
ited Nations helicopter rose above Freedom Tavern before turning and making its way with considerable speed back in the direction of the reservation – away from Dominatus.
Mac’s face looked grim as he watched the chopper’s swift departure.
“That confirms it, the drones are on their way, and the son-of-a-bitch Hess is gonna send a whole mess of them. We need to get to the operations center inside of fifteen minutes people – MOVE!”
Within minutes of our journey back to the operations center the Old Man’s breathing became increasingly labored as Dublin struggled to move the both of them forward. Before I could offer help, a smallish man who I did not recognize took the other side of Dublin’s grandfather to assist her in keeping pace with the rest, though each of us was now struggling to make our way up the side of the hill as the wind blew directly against the group while the last of the daylight gave way to darkness.
Military Fiction: THE MAC WALKER COLLECTION: A special ops military fiction collection... Page 83