The bodies of the fallen littered the barbed-wire area as the squatters dog-crawled across the barren strip to the gate in the darkness. A pair of riders jumped the wire, strafed the checkpoint, and leaned low on their horses, drawing fire so the others could get closer. The gambit worked as the guards fired wildly at the mounted gunmen, buying the crawling fighters precious seconds, allowing several to close the gap to the gate. One leapt up, a handgun clenched to his side, and ran straight at the nearest guard, whose attention was still on the riders and who didn’t see him in the dark. The attacker fired twice, his pistol barely more than a percussive pop amidst the rifle fire, and the guard screamed and fell backward, dropping his AR-15 outside the barrier wall as he tumbled out of sight.
An orb sailed through the air toward the remaining guards, and Lucas winced as a grenade detonated with a blinding flash on the far side of the gate. He waited for more shooting from the checkpoint, but none came, and one of the horsemen loosed a triumphant whoop as he goaded his mount forward, AK held aloft over his head like an Apache warrior from the movies. He was nearly at the barrier when Lucas squeezed off a single shot that caught him in the back of the neck and sent him pitching forward as his horse prepared to jump the wall. The animal leapt through the air, but the rider arced from the saddle and landed headfirst in the dirt, dead before he hit the ground. The horse cleared the top of the wall and vanished behind it, and Lucas was already in motion, riding toward the shore lest he draw any fire in the confusion.
The shooting tapered off as the attackers realized there were no targets for their guns, and another mounted fighter yelled instructions, urging the throng to rush the gate while there was nobody defending it. The crawling men sprang to their feet in twos and threes and made for the barrier, hollering war cries as they ran across the killing field. Lucas watched with a sinking heart as the first men reached the gate and heaved each other up and over the barricade, unchecked by any townspeople.
The gate groaned as it slid on a rail that the Astoria engineers had mounted across the access road, and then the attackers were pouring through the opening as the riders tore toward it now that the coast was clear. Lucas considered picking off a few of the men but knew that it would be futile to try to hit that many moving targets – he’d simply give away his location and draw fire from a hundred guns. Instead, he spurred Tango to the rear of the advancing force, galloping like one of the assailants until he passed through the gate and found himself on the familiar main boulevard that led to the hospital.
He continued down the street without slowing as shots rang out to his left – the boom of a shotgun answered by the bark of an assault rifle. Lucas hunched low on Tango to reduce the target he presented and stuck to the shadows, slowing as he directed the horse onto the sidewalk where he wouldn’t be a sitting duck out in the open. He spotted a mounted gunman ahead of him no more than fifty yards and reined Tango to a stop before flipping his M4 to three-round burst and stitching the man’s back, his silhouette glowing neon green in the night scope. The target’s arms flew into the air and he collapsed from his horse, and Lucas nodded in grim satisfaction – he might not be able to single-handedly stop the incursion, but he could do some serious damage with his rifle and a couple hundred judiciously placed rounds.
Lucas made for the hospital and stopped at an abandoned warehouse a few blocks away that he’d seen on his prior loops around the area. He slid from the saddle and lashed Tango to a beam inside where the horse would be safe. After transferring his extra magazines from the saddlebags to his vest, he beelined for the facility as more gunfire exploded from near the gate.
He made it to the hospital lobby in record time to find Sylvia and Rosemary staring at him like he was a demon, the nurse holding an antique pistol in her shaking hand.
“Sylvia, it’s Lucas. Put the gun down,” he hissed, and after a second she complied, her expression shocked.
“What’s happening?” Rosemary asked, a fearful quaver in her voice.
“Big group overwhelmed the guards. They breached the gate and are overrunning the town. Shut off the lights – they’ll draw them right to us,” he ordered, and Sylvia rushed to comply. “How’s Ruby doing?” Lucas demanded as he perused the lobby in the gloom.
“Steadily better. What are we going to do? Who’s attacking us? Portland? The tent people?”
“Looked to me like marauders and some of the squatters. The squatters were pretty riled up earlier today. Looks like they hatched a plan to work with the marauders and take the town.”
“That’s crazy. Everyone’s armed. They know that.”
“Maybe so, but so far they’re winning,” Lucas said, his tone grim. “How do I get up on the roof?”
“There’s a maintenance stairway at the end of that hall. What are you going to do?”
“Lock yourselves in the room with Ruby, and don’t allow anyone in. You have your gun?”
She nodded. “In Sylvia’s room.”
“Get it and go to Ruby. Keep the lights off. I’ll do what I can from the roof.”
“I…the doors don’t lock.”
“Wedge a chair against the handle. Shoot anyone who makes it through.”
Rosemary was about to speak just as the lights went out. They stood motionless in the dark as Sylvia felt her way back to them, her shoes crunching on debris in the hallway. Lucas repeated his instructions and escorted them to their room using the scope to guide him. After Rosemary retrieved her gun, he showed them to Ruby’s room and waited until they’d barred the door. He retraced his steps to the hall and swung open a heavy steel door as the sound of sporadic shooting drew closer. He took the steps three at a time, pushed through another door onto the roof, and jogged to the edge, where he had an eagle’s-eye view of the approach.
Lucas lay on his stomach and slid two magazines from inside his vest to lie within easy reach, and eyed the street through his scope. He saw three men with rifles trotting toward the hospital, no more than a block away, and switched to single-fire mode before adjusting his aim so the first man’s torso was centered in his crosshairs.
The carbine cracked, and a moment later the man tumbled forward like he’d tripped. The other two gunmen slowed and Lucas fired again and again. His second shot cut the legs from under the man beside the fallen one, but his third missed its target, and the gunman threw himself to the side, searching futilely for cover. Lucas loosed two more shots, and one found its mark. The man pitched backward and lay still, and Lucas watched the trio for signs of life before movement further along the same street drew his attention.
A horseman was riding hard toward the hospital. Lucas switched to three-round burst and estimated the rider’s speed, and then fired two salvos as the man neared. One of his bursts caught the man in the chest, knocking him from the saddle, and he fell to the pavement like a sack of rocks. The horse instantly slowed, unsure what to do without its rider, and Lucas put another trio of rounds into the man’s form, hoping at least one of his shots would hit where he didn’t have body armor.
Answering fire shredded the cement to his right as two more riders appeared, these moving slowly and keeping to the darkest areas. Lucas drew a bead on the first and waited until he was no more than a hundred yards away before emptying the rifle at him. Lucas rolled to the side as the second shooter fired volley after volley at the roof, and his fingers felt for another magazine and slammed it into place. When the shooting stopped, he looked over the lip again and saw that the horseman had dismounted in the few seconds it had taken Lucas to reload. Lucas spied him by a tree and put a single round through his skull, thanking his good fortune that his NV scope was decently charged.
More shooting echoed off the buildings as the battle was joined deeper in town, and Lucas cut down another dozen men over the next twenty minutes, none of them standing a chance against his elevated position and night vision gear. Eventually the firing slowed as the fighting moved from the gate area toward the waterfront, leaving Lucas to guess who was prevai
ling. Another group tried to rush him, five in all, and he took them out on full auto, dispensing with surgical precision lest one make it past him and get into the building. His rifle bucked like a living thing in his hands but he dropped them all and replaced the magazine with another full one, ears ringing from the shooting, listening for any indication of how the town was faring.
Smatterings of gunfire boomed from different areas, the shooting less concentrated than earlier. Either the attackers had overcome the resistance, or the town had mounted a counterattack and was fending off the intruders. He hoped it was the latter – from what he’d seen in the tent city, most of the squatters were just trying to live day-to-day and didn’t seem to mean the town any harm. With the notable exception of those he’d encountered the prior day, but that seemed to be driven by the revelations about the vaccine rather than any general ill will toward Astoria.
He was jarred from his musings by gunfire from his left, a volley that peppered the building just below and forced him from the edge, the shots too close for comfort. He crawled ten yards to the corner and peeked over the edge with his rifle, searching for the shooter. This one seemed to have more game than the others, and he didn’t show himself, which was bad news. Lucas remained motionless, moving the barrel of his rifle in increments, waiting for a tell from the street below. After several long beats he saw movement by a tree in the park across the street and swept the area until he had the gunman in his scope. He exhaled softly and caressed the trigger, the familiar kick of the stock against his shoulder immediately preceding the man flailing at his chest before his knees buckled and he dropped as if in slow motion, his rifle still gripped in one hand. Lucas fired again and ended it, and the target keeled over, neutralized.
He checked the time as the shooting faded in intensity. It would be dawn in a couple of hours, and the advantage conferred by the scope would vanish. If the town wasn’t able to regain control and repel the attackers, it would be a bloodbath at first light – even the pacifists among the squatters were likely to take the side of the assailants if it looked like they were prevailing, and he didn’t like Astoria’s odds against a force that size.
Fifteen minutes later, more motion drew his aim to the street, but he froze when he saw Hayden’s familiar face in his scope, two men accompanying him, both carrying their weapons like they knew how to use them.
Lucas waited until they were almost at the hospital and called down, “You boys drive ’em back?”
Hayden swung his rifle toward Lucas and then relaxed when he placed the voice. “What are you doing here?”
“Protecting my interests. Ruby’s still inside, with Sylvia and Rosemary. Figured it would be a shame if anything happened to them. There are about twenty scattered around who tried to get in. You can mop them up in the morning. They aren’t going anywhere.”
“Twenty?” Hayden repeated incredulously.
“I must have gotten lucky.” Lucas paused. “How are the rest going?”
“We drove them back. There are still a few isolated pockets, but they’re finished.”
“So I can come down now?”
Hayden shook his head in wonder. “Twenty?”
Lucas sighed and sat up. “Could be a few more. I stopped counting at twenty.”
Chapter 37
By first light, the fighting was over and guards were back in position at the gate. The town had lost sixteen in the attack, with over sixty enemy casualties. Some of the townspeople were wounded, and Sylvia, Rosemary, and Mary set up a triage area where a couple of the men with military experience did what they could with field dressings, but nobody was kidding themselves – a bullet wound, absent antibiotics, was too often a death sentence. The hospital stank of seared flesh from the primitive cauterization they used to seal and sterilize flesh wounds, and the air was filled with the groans of the wounded and the occasional cry from someone suffering from shock or delirium.
Lucas snatched a few hours of sleep in Ruby’s room before being awakened by Hubert and Hayden, who apologized for their rough treatment of Lucas and Joel the day before, and in light of Lucas’s contribution in defending the hospital, suggested they let bygones be bygones and start over. Lucas was too drained from his all-night watch to argue, and merely nodded before stumbling back into Ruby’s room and collapsing on a cot Sylvia had found for him that morning.
Lucas woke to Ruby standing shakily by his bedside, staring down at him, her color better than he’d seen it in a week.
“You going to make it?” she asked.
He sat up with a yawn. “Should ask you the same thing.”
“Feeling much improved, thanks. Fever seems to be abating. The antibiotics are working.” She managed a pained smile. “Thank you for that.”
“You can lie down now. I’m up.”
“I had to use the bathroom, if that’s okay.”
Lucas averted his gaze. “Sorry.”
“There was a lot of shooting last night.”
“Had a problem with the squatters. Bunch of them hooked up with some marauders and hit the town pretty hard.” Lucas explained about the battle and the vaccine going missing.
“I get a scratch and all hell breaks loose!” she said, lowering herself back into bed with a wince.
“You need to mend so we have your stabilizing influence,” he agreed, and stretched his arms overhead before gathering up his M4 and slinging it over his shoulder. “I need to check on Tango and get some more ammo. You going to be okay?”
“Sure thing. Go do what you need to do.”
As Lucas was walking into the lobby, a pair of townspeople carried a squatter in, his shirt crusted with blood and his face pale as a ghost. Rosemary hurried to tend to the wounded man, and Hayden appeared in the entryway as the stretcher bearers lowered him to the ground.
Hayden stood over the stretcher, staring down at the man impassively. “You’re lucky we don’t just put a bullet in you now.”
The man grimaced but didn’t say anything. Lucas approached him and waited by Rosemary’s side as she inspected the wound. “What happened?” he asked, his tone soft. “Why’d you do it?”
“We heard about the vaccine being rationed, and a bunch of us…the stories from Portland are bad. Lots of people dying. Some say it’s the new virus. A couple of guys hooked up with some marauders. People are desperate.”
“Probably the radiation. You know that,” Lucas countered.
“Easy for you to say in here, behind your wall, treating us like animals ’cause we’re outside. You try telling your kid he’s not going to get a shot that could save his life and see how it sits,” the man said, his words bitter through the pain.
Lucas threw a look at Hayden and remarked as he moved away, “There’s your outcome to keeping it only for the town. How many dead?”
“Don’t try to put this on me.”
“It’s on everyone who voted to keep it to yourselves. If the shoe fits…”
Hayden looked annoyed. “That isn’t fair.”
“Neither’s life.”
Lucas began walking toward the door and then stopped. “Don’t suppose anyone’s seen Joel around? Not one of the wounded…or a casualty?”
Hayden shook his head, as did Rosemary. “Negative,” the sheriff said, his tone curt.
“I lost him last night. Just wondering.”
Hayden didn’t respond with anything but a grunt, and Lucas took that to mean he had nothing to add. He made his way outside and down the block to where Tango was waiting patiently inside the warehouse. He watered the horse before walking him back to the stable, which had thankfully been spared any gunplay.
“Take extra good care of him,” Lucas instructed the stable hand, who nodded as he led the horse to a stall. “Just leave my saddle and saddlebags in with him. They’ll be fine.”
The street was a grim scene. A group of townspeople were loading up corpses into a cart drawn by a swayback nag, and Lucas pushed past them and walked to the main gate. It was now closed, and a
new contingent of guards was manning it with considerably more attention than their predecessors. Lucas approached the leader, who slid the barrier open a few feet for him and murmured a warning.
“Still kind of riled up. I’d stay close to the gate. Or better yet, don’t go out at all.”
“Got to get my stuff and find someone,” Lucas explained.
“Stay locked and loaded, then.”
“Had any more trouble?”
The guard shook his head, his eyes jittery. “No, but I don’t trust any of ’em. Especially after last night.”
“Bright side is it probably cleared out all the troublemakers.”
“Hope so.”
Lucas made his way through the strip of no-man’s land and past the trampled tents littering the perimeter outside the wire, their spines broken like discarded kites. Those that looked at him were quick to avert their gazes, as though fearing that he might open up on them in retribution for what their fellows had done. Lucas didn’t engage, instead continuing to where his tent, and Joel’s, were still intact. Joel’s horse was still tied up, apparently unmolested. Lucas made quick work of his gear and Joel’s, and when everything was stowed in the horse’s saddlebags, he led the beast away.
Bobby eyed him from inside his tent. “Your buddy get taken out last night?”
“Don’t know. Probably sleeping it off somewhere. If he comes back, tell him I took his horse to the stable, and I’ll be at the hospital.”
Bobby’s eyes widened. “They let you in?”
“I know all the wrong people.”
On the way back to the gate, Lucas spied Ray watching him from beneath the spread of a tall pine tree. Lucas made eye contact and slowed when Ray signaled for him to join him. Lucas led Joel’s horse to where the youth was waiting, and stopped when he saw the expression on his face.
The Day After Never - Insurrection (Book 5) Page 19