Autumn (Four Seasons Book 1)

by Robert Sullivan

  “Yes, I do,” Zach said fearlessly. “You just went into an unsecured vehicle. Anything could have happened in there, you jackass.”

  The man looked furious, but he it was because he knew that Zach was right. “Alright smartass, where is the gold?”

  “I don’t have any gold in here. You are welcome to check though,” Zach said, waving at the rest of his convoy. “I would recommend not repeating the same mistake though.”

  The man waved his men forward, driving Zach forward ahead of him as a shield in case any of the vehicles were occupied. Zach took his sweet time; he knew that it would only be a few minutes before David would be in position and ready to launch his attack. The man holding a gun on him impatiently poked him with the barrel to move him forward a bit faster and Zach obliged. He wanted to irritate his assailant, but he did not want to get himself shot.

  They reached the first truck and the man pushed him into the back first before entering himself. The truck was empty, which led the man to shout, “Where is the fucking gold?!”

  “I told you there is no gold,” Zach said patiently. He tensed his body though, ready to pounce on the man the moment an opportunity presented itself.

  The man noticed this and lifted his gun at Zach’s head, saying, “Do it. I dare you, motherfucker.”

  “Ethan, we’ve got a problem,” somebody from outside the truck.

  Zach suddenly realized that this was the Black Hand’s Manhattan borough leader, Ethan Rush. Ethan turned his head slightly without taking his eyes off of Zach and said, “What the fuck are you talking about?”

  Gunfire suddenly rang out in the direction of the Black Hand trucks, letting Zach know that David had moved in for the ambush. Ethan turned to leave the truck, which gave Zach his moment. He grabbed Ethan by both shoulders and ferociously threw him backwards, sending him flying across the floor of the truck.

  Ethan tried to get up, but Zach was on top of him in a rush, landing punch after vicious punch into his torso and head. Ethan barely had the wherewithal to try to deflect the blows, but Zach was laying into him with such ferocity that he was quickly overcome and gave up. Ethan lay moaning on the floor of the truck and Zach felt that it was safe to take the gun and help his platoon.

  Zach leapt out of the truck and rushed towards the gunfire. The Black Hand soldiers that had come forward to inspect his trucks had taken cover and were firing randomly back in the direction of David’s attack. Zach snuck up on them and began taking them out of the fight by stabbing them in the back of the knee and taking away their firearm. They would not be able to walk again without major surgery, but that would not be an issue considering they would spend the rest of their lives in jail anyway.

  Once he taken out the forward unit, he moved forward to the barricade, where the Black Hand had taken cover from David’s attack from the other side. Before he could get closer though, he suddenly took a blow to the back of the head. Blinking stars out of his eyes, he turned to see Ethan had recovered from his beating and was back to fight again.

  “How the fuck are you up again?” Zach demanded, drawing his knife again.

  “I’m stronger than you, motherfucker,” Ethan said, spitting blood.

  “Bullshit,” Zach said, moving closer to within stabbing distance.

  Ethan attacked with strong blows that Zach was barely able to deflect. One or two managed to land on his torso, sending pain throughout his body. He realized that Ethan must have taken an adrenaline shot and was using the high to try to finish him off.

  Zach bared his teeth; adrenaline shots wouldn’t do any good for stab wounds to critical areas of the body. He managed to slice his arm initially, but Ethan shrugged it off. Zach aimed for something more important on the next swing, only to have Ethan deflect it and graze his side.

  “What’s the matter you old fucker? Can’t you hit anything?” Ethan taunted him.

  Zach ignored him, taking the knife low and bringing it up towards the underside of Ethan’s ribcage. The knife punctured the skin, went upwards, and punctured Ethan’s heart, a fatal wound.

  Ethan staggered backwards, clutching the hole in his abdomen as his heart leaked blood at a critical rate. Having trouble drawing breath because of the damage to his lungs as well, all he could do was spit blood up before falling backwards, coughing. Zach walked forward, looking at Ethan as he passed away. He looked defiant to the end, which Zach noted as he shut his eyes. He admired courage, even in his enemies, and Ethan had clearly been no coward.

  Zach turned back to the fight ahead of him. The Black Hand fighters had been thinned out considerably and looked as if they were ready to break altogether. Zach moved forward, dispensing with the knife this time and opening fire on the remaining Black Hand soldiers. Stunned by the sudden fire from behind, the few soldiers left threw down their arms and raised their hands in surrender.

  “Hostiles neutralized!” Zach shouted, moving forwards to the barricade. “It’s safe to move forward!”

  David was the first to make it to the barricade, moving through it towards Zach. “Sir, are you alright?”

  Zach reached to the back of his head and found some blood had been drawn by Ethan’s blow. “I’ll be fine,” Zach said. “Ethan Rush is dead.”

  “Shit!” David said, stunned. “Let Greg know!”

  “First thing first, we need to finish securing the route,” Zach said. He went back to his truck and said to the radio, “Captain Stanford, we’ve neutralized Black Hand hostiles at the obstruction. We’re going to remove the barricade and you will be able to proceed when we are done.”

  “Copy that,” Captain Stanford replied. “Did you take any casualties?”

  “I’m not sure yet,” Zach said, looking behind at David. “The Black Hand has casualties though and fatalities. Their Manhattan borough leader is dead.”

  “The one that torched Central Park?” Captain Stanford asked.

  “Yeah I think that’s the one,” Zach said, looking back at Ethan’s body.

  “That’s a relief to hear,” Captain Stanford said. “We’re going to move ahead now and wait for you to clear the barricade.”

  “Okay. My men will get the barricade down, then move ahead to see if there is any other obstructions ahead. I doubt there will be though,” Zach explained.

  “I hope not,” Captain Stanford added.

  Zach moved away from the radio and turned to David. “Did we lose anyone?”

  David bit his lip. “Yeah we did. Those Black Hand fuckers were tough. I know we’ve lost a few people and have some injuries.”

  Zach sighed. “We need to move the barricade and gather up our dead and wounded. We don’t have time to mourn right now.”

  Chapter Sixteen

  The Penalty for Treason

  Greg was staring at the gathering crowd in Battery Park. Several more boats had departed towards Staten Island, but the main bulk of the force remained. They were being organized into platoons and companies, which let Greg know that it would not be long before they were moved out. Once they were organized and had their march orders, they would move out and take the island.

  “Greg, come in, this is Zach,” a voice said suddenly in his ear.

  “Zach, go ahead,” Greg said urgently. “How’d the transport go?”

  “We made it to the Federal Reserve. The gold’s being unloaded now and it’s all secure,” Zach explained.

  “Did you run into any trouble?” Greg asked.

  “The Black Hand set up along the route and tried to ambush us. We defeated them though, but we lost a few people,” Zach said. “Ethan Rush is dead though.”

  Greg was stunned. “Are you sure he’s dead?”

  “Yeah, I killed him myself,” Zach said dully.

  Greg could not believe it. Two borough leaders had been lost to the Black Hand tonight, one of which was the most wanted man in the city. The Black Hand had been severely damaged and Greg wondered if it was right to try to finish the job tonight.

  “Thank you, Zach. We�
�re still observing here, but we’ll let you know how it goes,” Greg said.

  Greg turned to the rest of the Conspiracy leaders with him and said, “Ethan Rush is dead.”

  They were all in a collective shock. “Rush is dead?” Ashley asked. “How?”

  “Zach said that he killed Rush,” Greg explained.

  Ashley looked amazed. Bob said, “He’s the one that attacked Central Park right? That’s a great win for us.”

  “We lost a few people too,” Greg replied.

  Bob grimaced. “That’s the kind of thing I was afraid of Greg. This is exactly why I wanted to…”

  Greg cut Bob off before he could get going. “We’ve been over this, Bob. The alternative here was to let the Black Hand attack the Army and possibly steal the gold back. You don’t see us trying to fight here do you?”

  Bob still looked angry, but did not say anything else. Greg turned back to the crowd of Black Hand, who were all suddenly moving forward to board the gathering ferries. “They’re moving. We should head back now and wait for our people to report back in.”

  The Black Hand finally had the locations of most of the traitors. They had been content to occupy the parks on Staten Island as opposed to occupying residences, which suited Jared well enough. They were at least out in the open which would make them easier to take out.

  There was no word on John’s location, but Jared was unconcerned about that; it was likely that they would take captives and would likely get that information from them. Jared walked away from the map and towards the companies of Black Hand fighters that had been hastily assembled.

  “Alright, listen up. I called you out here to teach a lesson to these traitors. The borough leader on that shit island over there has taken it upon himself to betray our cause for his own personal ends. We are going to teach him that no one, fucking NO ONE can betray the Black Hand and be allowed to live.”

  “Those Black Hand traitors you come across will be given the opportunity to come back into the fold. It is likely they are just following orders and are unaware of the treason. They will be allowed the chance to surrender and be repatriated. However, everyone from the neighborhood commander up are to be captured, interrogated, and executed. The borough leader, John, is to be brought to me personally so I can kill him myself.”

  “We’ll have separate landing groups, but we will all converge on CUNY’s campus. Your company leaders know the way. Now, get going! We need to take that island before the authorities realize what we are doing!”

  The horde of Black Hand soldiers converged on the boats. Jared turned to follow them until Julia stopped him, saying, “You are too important to risk on that island, sir.”

  “Fuck you, Julia. I’m going to be there when we take John,” Jared said, continuing on.

  Julia did not dare protest further. Jared stormed off to the closest ferry, joined the bridge crew, and said, “Let’s go.”

  The pilot obliged, opening the throttle and sailing towards the island. Jared looked at it approaching land mass through his binoculars, straining to see if there was any trouble ahead. There was no sign of any people on the piers across the way, but he remained wary nonetheless. It struck him as strange that the island was dark, but he did not worry about it. If there was a blackout on the island, then it would help his forces remain under cover until it was time to attack.

  The ferry drew level with the pier and several Black Hand fighters got out to tie the boat down so everyone else could disembark. Jared waited for them to do so and got off the boat first, pointing his gun ahead into the residential neighborhood. There was no sign of trouble up ahead, so Jared moved ahead slowly with the growing number of fighters that had disembarked. Their goal was to go to the nearest known location of the traitors.

  Jared led his company into the neighborhood, noting the silence as they penetrated further into the houses. They were uneasy, but kept going on towards Clove Lakes Park. Though he did not show it, Jared was uneasy about the quiet; he had not known John to let himself be caught unawares like this. He would have known that Jared would retaliate.

  Silver Lake Park, which was half a mile away from their destination, suddenly opened up in front of them. Jared decided that they would cut through the park when suddenly a hail of gunfire opened up on them. He ducked to the ground to reduce the likelihood of getting shot while others around him did the same, either because they were taking cover or they had been hit.

  It was a classic ambush. John had clearly known what he was doing and misled the scouts on the actual locations of the traitor Black Hand. Jared held under cover as bullets flew over his head. He cursed silently to himself and peered behind him to see what other people he had left to him. They were in no position to move while the gunfire continued, but at least he had some forces left in case they were able to move.

  Jared lifted his gun and fired in the direction of the attack. Their assailants were just wasting ammunition at this point firing over their heads, so if Jared fired on them, it would ensure they would keep wasting bullets. He could only hope for them to run out of ammo or for reinforcements to arrive to help tip the battle in their favor.

  The hail of bullets suddenly ceased, letting Jared poke his head up slightly. He wanted to see if the attackers were close enough to be able to shoot. There were shapes moving in the darkness ahead by the lake, but they were not coming from the direction that the gunfire had. Jared lifted up his head a little higher and recognized a neighborhood commander from Manhattan leading the group.

  “All clear!” Jared shouted behind him, getting up. The neighborhood commander strode forward, waving his fighters ahead as well to help Jared’s company.

  “It looks like we got here just in time. These bastards were not where they should have been,” the commander said.

  “No, they weren’t,” Jared said, looking behind at his dead and wounded. “John knew what he was doing.”

  “Are we still advancing, sir?” the commander asked.

  “Damn straight, but we are going to do it with better stealth. We need to split up into squads of a few people each and do a sweep through the area from here to the college. If someone come under fire, the adjacent squad can help,” Jared said.

  “Understood. Have you heard anything from the other units?” the commander inquired further.

  “No. But we have a significant advantage in numbers, so we should be fine,” Jared said, waving a few fighters towards him to form a squad.

  The Black Hand gathered there had heard Jared’s decision and were acting accordingly, spreading out in three directions to sweep as wide an area as possible. Jared’s squad led on point, moving through Silver Lake park towards Clove Lakes Park. Jared could see the latter park was densely forested and reasoned that there could be a good number of traitors embedded in the trees. He waved his squad forward into the trees, saying in a low voice, “Keep your guard up and don’t lower your fucking weapons.”

  The trees closed in around them and the eerie quiet had resumed following the firefight. Jared moved his squad through the dense trees slowly, looking for any sign of movement in the gloom of the woods. He was wondering whether those reinforcements had defeated the traitors that had ambushed them or just driven them back. He grimaced; if the latter was true, they would know it soon enough.

  Jared noticed slight movement up ahead in the trees and held his hand up to halt the squad’s movement. They got some trees in between them and the movement up ahead and waited to see if there were any further disturbance. Jared kept his gun trained on the shape, waiting to see if it would do anything.

  After a tense moment, Jared decided to edge closer. He whispered, “Stay here,” to his squad and moved ahead ever so slowly. The shape took focus and it became clear that it was a person. As he drew closer, it became clear that it was a single person and Jared bared his teeth, drawing to within feet of the person.

  Jared resisted the urge to shoot the person, but instead drew level and held his weapon to the woman’s h
ead. “One wrong move and you die,” Jared said.

  “I don’t want to die,” she said. “I want to stay loyal to the Black Hand.”

  “Smart answer,” Jared said. “Where’s John?”

  “The borough leader?” the woman said. “I don’t know. But I do know where the traitors are nearby.”

  Jared lowered his gun. “Who are you?”

  “I’m Christina Larsson,” the woman said.

  “Well, Christina,” Jared said. “Where are the nearest traitors?”

  Christina pointed to her left and said, “There’s a platoon with a neighborhood commander a hundred yards that way. She’s in charge of Westerleigh and Charleston Corners. Taking her out would clear the way to the center of the island.”

  “I need to capture her alive,” Jared said, waving his squad forward. “I need to know where John is.”

  “I’ll point her out to you so you don’t kill her,” Christina said.

  “Good,” Jared said as his squad arrived. He noticed an adjacent squad nearby and waved them towards himself; they would be outnumbered if Jared’s squad went for the traitors alone. The combined squads moved in the direction that Christina had pointed. Before long, they noticed the platoon as Christina had described, waiting on the edge of the tree line.

  Christina pointed ahead and whispered, “See the redhead on the far side of the group? That’s the commander.”

  Jared halted the squad again and lifted his rifle. The squad fanned out among the trees and waiting for Jared’s signal. He decided that his signal would just be to open fire on the squad. He let his first shot ring out, hitting someone who had been leaning against a tree facing away from them.

  As the person fell, howling in pain clutching his side, the platoon suddenly lurched into action, raising their arms so as to fire into the trees. Jared’s platoon, however, was already firing on them, driving them back from the trees and scattering the traitors in surprise. Once they began to retreat backwards, Jared moved towards them, continuing to fire to keep the traitors in retreat.