This Shattered Land - 02 (35 page)

“Gabe,
stop-stop-stop!” He shouted.  

I
braked as quickly as I could without slamming Tom and Sarah into the roll bars.
The MUV came to a halt as I reached for my rifle and swept my gaze across the
road ahead of me for signs of hostiles.

“What
is it?” Eric asked, turning around in his seat to look at Brian.

“Straight
ahead.” The boy pointed. “There’s a big van on its side across the road. Could
be a good place for an ambush.”

Eric
looked over at me and didn’t quite manage to suppress a smile. The kid was
developing the kind of healthy paranoia he would need in the days ahead if he
wanted to stay alive. A van across the road wasn’t necessarily an indicator of
an ambush. Plenty of cars crashed during and after the Outbreak, and with no
highway safety crews to clear them away, they stayed right where they wrecked. Prudence
was warranted, as always, but I honestly didn’t think that we were likely to
face armed attack as far away from any major population centers as we were.

I
should have known better.

The
biggest mistakes of my life have always been the result of overconfidence or complacency.
My friends learned that the hard way when those raiders led a swarm of undead
against us back in Morganton, and they sure as hell got nailed by it again
today. You’d think I would have learned by now.

I
ordered Brian to sit down in the back while I eased off the brake and
approached the wreck. It was an old white and yellow conversion van laying on
its side and covering most of both lanes. Judging by the rust on the exposed
sheet metal, and the plants sprouting through the asphalt directly beneath it,
it looked like it had been there for a while. To get around it, I would have to
drive through the overgrown brush on either side of the crumbling blacktop. That
worried me. Anything sharp that lay out of sight in the high grass might damage
the Honda’s tires. I slowed to a halt a short distance from the van and studied
the sides of the road.

Several
things grabbed my attention at once.

Tell-tale
streaks ran through the grass, standing out brighter than the growth around
them, indicating that someone had walked through there recently. Footprints
marred the ground where the asphalt met the brush; booted footprints with an
even gait, not the erratic barefoot kind left behind by the infected. Alarm
bells started ringing in my head. A brief memory of an empty, dusty road in
Fallujah flashed through my mind. A road that seemed not quite right, a road
with footprints where footprints shouldn’t be, all coming into view just as
IED’s blasted the Humvee in front of me into a flaming wreck and bullets
started pouring out of the sky like rain. My adrenaline spiked and my heart
began to race as realization dawned on me.

Brian
was right. It was a good spot for an ambush.

All
this occurred to me in the space of less than a second. Eric watched me and
read my expression. His eyes hardened into twin shards of ice, his jaw set into
a grim line, and the fighter within him once again emerged. He snatched up his
M-6 just as two gun-wielding figures popped over the far edge of the overturned
van. He didn’t hesitate. His rifle beat out a muffled staccato rhythm as he
sent bursts of sound-suppressed fire downrange. One of the figures ducked for
cover while the other fell back spurting blood from a hole in his throat. I
slammed the shifter into reverse and began to peel backwards. The trailer
jackknifed to the passenger side, forcing me to wrench the wheel into a J-turn
and expose Eric to enemy fire. The Glovers shouted and clung to the roll cage
for dear life as I fought to turn the MUV around.  Other gunmen came boiling
out of the forest on all sides of us and starting cracking off shots. There had
to have been at least eight of them. Eric switched his rifle to full-auto and
unleashed a stream of suppressing fire forcing them to keep their heads down
and preventing them from aiming their weapons. Bullets cut the air in our
general direction, but nothing hit us. Yet.

I
had almost gotten the Honda back in drive when Eric’s magazine ran dry. With no
time for a reload, he snatched his Kel-Tec from its holster and started
spraying lead at the side of the road farthest from us. Something popped on my
left, and I turned to see a man with an M-1 carbine shooting out the driver’s
side tires from twenty yards away. I snarled a curse and reached for the pistol
on my vest.

“Cease
fire! Cease fire now goddammit!” a voice bellowed over a bullhorn from behind
the van.

The
command distracted the gunmen, but it didn’t mean shit to me. I switched my
pistol to my left hand and sent two rounds at the man shooting our tires out.
He saw the gun coming in his direction and ran for cover in the trees with his
rifle clutched in one fist. A .45 round from my Sig smashed into the stock of
his weapon and burst it into splinters, just barely missing a kidney shot. He
yelped in pain as wood shrapnel peppered his lower back. I fired a couple more
rounds to give him something to think about before turning to where the other
gunmen had fallen back into the high grass. I couldn’t see them, but I could
see where they had disturbed the foliage in their retreat, and began cracking
off low potshots at the indentations they left in the brush.

“Reloading!”
Eric barked. I kept up the covering fire. He swapped out the mags in both of
his weapons in a quick series of practiced movements, less than five seconds on
the reload. Just as I fired the last round from my pistol, he brought his rifle
up and starting shooting again.

“Goddammit
Gabe, get us the fuck out of here!” He shouted.

I
turned the steering wheel and jammed the accelerator. The flat tires on my side
dragged the front end hard left as the wheels on the right gripped the road and
started pulling us forward. A rapid series of booms shattered the air as
several bullets slammed into the sheet metal around the Honda’s engine
compartment. I could tell by the sound of the shots that some bastard was
hitting us with a semi-auto .308. The powerful rounds wreaked havoc on the
MUV’s engine from such close range. We rolled only a few more feet before the
motor sputtered and died, leaving us sitting ducks in the middle of the road.

By
then, Sarah and Tom had recovered from the initial shock of the ambush and
added their rifles to the fray. Sarah swung her weapon toward the man who shot
our engine. He saw it coming and ducked back down behind cover. Sarah stitched
the bottom of the van with half a magazine hoping to penetrate the layers of
metal and hit the men behind them. The steel and aluminum used to build cars
was not designed to stand up to assault rifles, so her shots stood a good
chance of punching all the way through to the assholes on the other side. I
expected to hear shouts of pain from behind the van, but none came forth. The
SCAR 17 I kept in Honda’s cab came with me as I jumped out to take cover behind
the engine block. If these fuckers wanted to fire high-powered rifles at us,
then two could play that game.

“Tom,
watch my back!” I called over my shoulder. He nodded and kneeled down to point
his rifle at the open road behind me. Brian scrambled into the cab and planted
a knee in the seat I’d just vacated.

“Dad,
you cover left, I’ll take the right side.” He called. Tom gave a quick nod and
adjusted his aim while Brian brought his sub-machine gun to his shoulder. Eric
dropped his mag and reloaded, then jumped down to stand near Sarah. A terse
exchange passed between them before they separated a few feet and knelt down to
cover the remaining lanes of fire. For a brief instant, a fierce surge of pride
burned within me at the withering, organized response my team brought to bear
against our ambushers. They reacted exactly as I’d trained them to, but my
exultation was short lived. We were still in a world of shit, and if that guy
with the bullhorn hadn’t ordered a cease fire, some of us would be sporting
brand new bullet holes in our hides. If the gunmen rushed us, we would probably
die, but we would take a few of them with us. I was betting they knew that as
well as I did.

A
few tense seconds passed. My adrenaline pump was still working overtime,
sharpening my senses and lending strength to my limbs. The forest around us had
gone silent, spooked by all the gunfire. I wracked my brain trying to come up
with a way out of this one. If we didn’t get out of here soon, the undead were
going to show up and ruin everyone’s day.

The
guy with the bullhorn blared out.  “We want your equipment, not your lives. You’re
surrounded, and you have no chance of escape. Lay down your weapons, and you
will be allowed to leave unharmed.”

I
couldn’t help it, I laughed. “No can do, asshole. You, or any of these other
shitheads show your faces, and I’ll shoot a fucking hole in it.”  

“To
hell with this Ronnie.” Another voice called out. “The motherfuckers shot
Cato!”

“Ryan,
you shut the hell up and stand down!” Bullhorn guy called back. “I told Cato to
wait for the signal, and he didn’t listen. Now he’s dead. There’s a lesson in
there for you.”

“I
think you backwoods fucktards are missing the point.” Eric shouted. “We’re not
giving you our supplies, or our weapons. You’re gonna have to break cover if
you want our shit, and when you do, we’re going to rip you a hundred new
assholes.”

“Listen
buddy,” Bullhorn replied. “I don’t want to kill you, any of you, but we are
taking that trailer, and we are taking your weapons. I’m going to count to
five, and then my men are going to start shooting. You’re outnumbered, and we
have plenty of ammo. We’ll just keep shooting until you’re all down. Or you can
surrender.”

He
paused for a moment. “One.”

“Gabe,
got any ideas?” Eric asked.

Frustration
and anger threatened to cloud my judgment. I took a deep breath and looked
around. “We have to find cover.” I said. “We’re dead meat out here.”

Eric
nodded and stepped backward, lowering his voice. “Alright, on my signal,
everybody break for the tree line and take cover. I’ll hang back and lay down
covering fire.”

“No
Eric, we’re not leaving you here.” Sarah hissed.

Ronnie
the Bullhorn Guy interrupted us. “Two.”

“Dammit
Sarah, we don’t have time to discuss this. Just do what I say.”

She
opened her mouth to say something else but I interrupted her. “He’s right,
Sarah. We have to move. We have no chance out here.”

She
looked at me, then at Eric, her mouth a thin, bloodless line. “Fine.”

“Three.”
Came the bullhorn.

I
wasn’t any more pleased with the situation than Sarah, but right then we didn’t
exactly have a lot of options. I would rather it be me that stayed behind to
cover the other’s escape, but Eric’s thinking was sound; I have the most combat
experience. The Glover’s were going to need me if they were to have any chance
of getting out this mess alive. I just had to hope the skills I’d taught Eric
would be enough to keep him alive for the next ten seconds.

“Okay,
get ready.” Eric said, his voice nearly a whisper.

The
bullhorn squawked. “Four, last chance.”

“Now.”
Eric hissed.

Brian
scrambled out of the Honda and bolted for the woods, followed closely by his
father. Sarah raced to catch up with them. I kicked on the after-burners and
sprinted ahead of them as fast as my legs could carry me. My long stride
quickly outdistanced the other three. Eric’s M-6 roared in three round bursts
behind us as he put the crippled MUV between him and the enemy’s line of fire.
It wouldn’t provide much in the way of cover, but it was better than nothing. Shadow
figures shouted in surprise and shifted through the brush ahead of us as we
broke for the tree line. We only had a second or two until they started
shooting.

A
long time ago, I learned the hard way that being able to shoot accurately while
on the run is a game-changing skill in a firefight. Most people can’t shoot for
shit standing stock still, much less when they’re charging ahead at a dead
sprint. Furthermore, it is highly difficult to hit a moving target even at
close range. Developed through long hours of drill and practice, my ability to
combine marksmanship with speed and mobility has saved my life more times than
I care to count. Today was no exception.

A
figure resolved itself against the dim light filtering through the forest canopy
just like the silhouette targets I’d punched so many holes through on the
practice range. The ACOG sights on my SCAR lined up and I squeezed the trigger
twice. A couple of 7.62 millimeter rounds nailed the figure center of mass at
less than twenty yards away, close enough to blow his lungs out through his
back. He fell over backward with a horrid gurgling scream. I tracked over to my
next target. It was the guy with the carbine that shot out the Honda’s tires.
He was trying to sight in on me, but I was faster and shot straighter. A three
round volley stitched him across the chest and he went down.

Goodnight
motherfucker.

 Sarah
saw what I was doing, ran a few steps to my right, and brought her weapon up to
spray a wide arc at the gunmen ahead of us. Seeing me drop a couple of their
buddies in the space of three seconds had shocked them. Sarah sending a hail of
automatic fire at them sent them into a scrambling, bumbling panic. They fled
back further into the woods looking for better cover. One of them was too slow,
and I caught him high on his back with another shot. He hit the ground, but the
wound wasn’t fatal.