Wasteland Rules: Born to Fight (The World After Book 2) (13 page)

    A quick examination of the scene indicated that
Daron had been stabbed in the throat with a large blade like a machete. Bryan’s
neck must have been snapped quickly if the Major had time to also strike down
the brash young soldier from St. Louis. How could the target have struck them
so quickly and from so close a distance? He scanned the area and then had a
moment of clarity. Tom looked up into the tree and saw the scuff marks on an
overhanging limb. The man had scrambled up a tree and then hung down upside
down to grab Bryan from behind and snap his neck, which would have taken
impressive strength.

   Then he had launched himself off the tree and
onto Daron. The struggle had been brief. Daron had tried to bring his rifle to
bear and unloaded the entire clip. But the Major had been too close and had
simply pushed the rifle barrel away and then stabbed Daron in the throat. It
had been over in seconds and neither man had stood a chance. The Major was as
good, maybe better, than they had said. Tom feared that this was going to get
even uglier before it was over. Again he felt a twinge of fear but pushed it
back down. He had a job to do, and he never failed.

   “Daron and Bryan are down. Does anyone have the
target?” Tom snapped into the mike.

   That statement and question were followed by
multiple voices swearing and cursing over the radio. He could hear all of them
breathing heavily as they tried to converge on his location. He tried to pick
out their individual voices over the agitated chatter. They were angry and
excited and they were starting to lose it. He realized that in their time
together they had never really been tested. Most people broke at the mere sight
of the red berets on their shoulders and surrendered. No one had ever really
put up much of a fight. Even the merks had been broken by the bombardment by
the time they had attacked. He needed to regain control or they were going to
fall apart.

   “Snap out of it people!” He thundered over the
comm. “We need to focus on doing our jobs. Does anyone have eyes on the
target?”

  Silence suddenly fell over the channel. It was a
few moments before he got a response. “I see him!” Zach crowed.

   “He’s running ahead of us!” Rosa echoed seconds
later. “We are roughly due east of your position, maybe a quarter klick.”

    Tom took off at a full sprint in their
direction. He would come back to attend to the bodies of his men later. Now he
just wanted to catch the man responsible, complete his mission, and exact a
little payback. Their target had proven very resilient and very resourceful. He
might be the most dangerous man Tom had ever encountered. He didn’t know why
the man had been exiled instead of executed, leaving such a dangerous man alive
seemed very foolish. It was time to end this threat now, once and for all.

   “Where did he go?” Rosa suddenly called out.

   “He was right in front of us, there is nowhere to
hide. It’s like he just vanished.” Zach responded.

   “Keep looking, he must be hiding around here
somewhere.” Rosa ordered.

   “Wait for backup, I’m a minute away.” Tom
ordered. “Everyone get there on the double. This guy is incredibly dangerous,
do not engage alone.”

   There was silence from Rosa and Zach, but the
others were calling in their positions and they were several minutes away. The
thick brush and weeds were slowing all of them down as they rushed through the
muck to get to the location. The two of them were on their own until he and the
others arrived. From their silence he assumed they were communicating with hand
signals, but that gave him no idea of what they were doing. Moments before he
arrived he heard a sickening wet thud followed by yelling and gunfire.

   He burst through the brush and came out into a
clearing with several large pools of water. Zach was sitting in the muck with
Rosa cradled in his arms. Her head was nearly severed from her body and blood
poured out over her grief-stricken lover. His gun lay thrown to the side and he
desperately tried to stop the blood flow. He seemed oblivious to the fact she
was already dead and was completely lost in his grief. Tom swore as he saw
another of his soldiers down, killed by the seemingly unstoppable ghost known
as Major Storm.

   “What happened?” He snapped at the crying gunner.

   “He came up out of the water behind her and
chopped her head off with a freaking machete!” Zach screamed at him. “There was
no way he could have held his breath that long, no way!”

    Zach’s voice trailed off into incoherent
mumbling as he cradled his fallen lover. Tom looked for any sign of the target
but could find nothing. The man moved like the panthers that were rumored to
hunt the Everglades before the Collapse. The others arrived shortly and were
shocked and horrified by the scene before them. Their lieutenant and second in
command lay dead with her head practically chopped off in the massive arms of
their sobbing heavy gunner. This was spiraling out of control.

   “Which way did he go?” Tom demanded.

   Zach could only point. The Major seemed to be
continuing to head east, only pausing to ambush his men when they got too
close. He led the survivors as they took off at a fast run in the direction
their quarry had fled. Tom was winded and he could sense the others were tired,
but they pressed on. They had lost too much to give up now. The Major was
heading towards the coast and once he was there he would have nowhere to run.
They could surround him and cut him to pieces with their firepower.

   That plan went out the window when they broke out
into the open of a marsh just before the coast. Their target was almost a klick
out in the water swimming like a madman. And waiting for him in the calm waters
of the marsh was the speedboat that had left the marina at the beginning of the
attack. Tom opened fire, but the target was too far away. Before Saad could
arrive and position his shot, the Major was pulled on board the boat and it
roared away in a spray of water.

   Tom and his men watched in stunned disbelief as
their quarry escaped. It was inconceivable that this one man had managed to
evade and kill his pursuers with ease, and then end up at the exact spot his
rescuers were waiting for him! How had he been able to communicate with the
boat to have them come pick him up? Not to mention, how had he been able to run
all that way and still swim out to the boat so quickly? The bastard had even
managed a mocking salute as the boat pulled away.

  Even worse, how was Tom going to report his
failure and the death of three of his men? The General would not be happy. The
thoughts of rewards were gone, replaced with thoughts of possible punishments.
He looked at Wu, hoping that the other channels were open and he could call for
the helicopter. But the communications expert shook his head grimly indicating
the communications were still down.

   Tom looked at the faces of his men as they
watched the boat fade into the distance. They were angry and frustrated, just
like he was. This should have been a simple ambush, a maneuver they had
executed successfully dozens of times before. But this one man had managed to
not only escape them, but kill three of them during his flight. And he killed
them so easily it was as if he was a man amongst children. They had even had
him cornered in the marina at the start of the ambush. Yet he had managed to
escape the fiery conflagration and evade them, performing superhuman feats
along the way.

    Tom vowed to himself that he would never be
caught unprepared again. This man was something special and they should have
treated it that way. Waiting until the Cartel goons had left and taking out the
chopper first had been textbook; but that had been a mistake. Next time he had
a shot to kill Major Derek Storm; he wouldn’t hesitate, no matter the
consequences.

   “We will get him.” Tom assured his angry troops
with an air of finality. “Whatever it takes, we won’t rest until that man is
dead.”

   The vigorous nods of agreement from his men told
him he had hit a nerve. This was no longer just a mission. It was personal now
and they would never stop until he was dead or they were. Now all he had to do
was convince the General to let them stay on the mission.

June 20, 2029

Everglades National Park

   Rora breathed a sigh of relief as they pulled
Derek onto the boat. He had shown up exactly where they had been told he would.
Miraculously he seemed barely injured. He had blood all over his clothes, but little
of it seemed to be his and he wasn’t even breathing hard. That should have been
surprising given the amount of ground he had covered in such a short time and
how far he had swum so quickly, but the genetic alterations they had performed
on him had made him a superior physical specimen.

   “Are you ok?” She asked as the boat headed out
into the Intracoastal Waterway.

   “Other than a small bullet hole I’m good.” He
replied as he gave a mocking salute to the troops at the water’s edge.

   They fired at the fleeing boat, but they were too
far away to hit anything. Even at that distance, Rora could see the anger on
the soldier’s faces. She was sure they were frustrated for not catching them,
but it seemed like more. Derek must have done something to really piss them
off; which would be par for the course with him.

  “What happened?” She asked quietly.

  He laughed. “After I covered your escape, they had
me pinned down in the marina store. So I created a distraction to cover my
escape as I swam across the cove. I figured they couldn’t follow in their armor
and it would give me a head start.”

  “Let me guess. You blew up the fuel tanks at the
marina?” Rora asked almost sarcastically.

  Derek smiled. “You got it. Stick with what works.
They weren’t fooled for long, but it did get me enough time to get to the other
shore and start running. They were quick to follow. I had the Voice jam their
long range communications so they couldn’t call in the chopper and then radio
for you to come pick me up here. Good thing the phone and the device are
waterproof.”

   Rora had been surprised by the radio suddenly
coming to life as they had raced away from the marina and up the coast. Barry,
the man from the couple they had rescued had been driving the boat while she
and his wife checked on the scientists. Two had been hit by bullets during the
frantic escape. She and Liana had been treating them with the first aid kit
they found on board when the radio suddenly crackled with static.

  Then a voice. “Rora. Are you there?”

   It had taken her a few seconds to realize she
recognized the voice. It was The Voice, Derek’s supposed employer. How he had
gotten the exact frequency of their radio and was communicating directly with
them she didn’t know. But he was probably going to help. He seemed to be on
their side, but she wasn’t so sure. A mysterious man on the other end of a
phone who had access to satellites and other intelligence that was supposedly
only accessible by the Collective. It was very suspicious. Derek may trust him
but she didn’t.

  But she had still jumped up and grabbed the radio’s
microphone and replied. “I’m here.”

   “Good. Now listen carefully.” The Voice had
instructed. “Major Storm is evading the Red Berets and making his way towards
the coast. I will give you some coordinates and you can pick him up there. Do
you understand?”

  “I understand.” She had snapped, angry at being
patronized. “Is that it? Nothing else on how Derek is doing?”

  “I’m jamming their communications so they cannot
call for the chopper or any other back up. So they are on their own against the
Major. No one is after you so you should be able to slip in and get him and get
away, leaving them trapped on shore.” The Voice had replied calmly.

   “But he is outnumbered ten to one and they have
armor and heavy weapons…” Rora had worried aloud.

   “Sounds like the odds are in his favor then.” The
Voice had responded smoothly.

    Was that a joke Rora wondered? She had been
taken aback for a minute; The Voice had demonstrated nothing other than calm
professionalism bordering on disinterest thus far. Could he actually have a
sense of humor? She almost missed the rest of what he said because she was so
surprised. The Voice quickly gave her the coordinates before he cut the
transmission. Rora had memorized them and plugged them into the boat’s GPS. Barry
had given her a questioning look but she had just shrugged in response.

   “Let’s go pick Derek up.” She had told him.

   And as it turned out, The Voice had been right.
Derek had been just fine and had made their rendezvous without a problem. He
was on board dripping wet and his clothes stained with blood, but he was
smiling and seemed genuinely happy. That was a little disturbing. She had
noticed he seemed to be enjoying their frequent battles and escapes, almost as
if he enjoyed killing people. Not that she was a psychiatrist but that seemed
to indicate psychopathic tendencies. That had been a reported side effect of
Project SuPERHUMAAN. She would have to watch that carefully.

   “Are you hurt?” Rora asked, gesturing at the
blood that stained his clothes.

   “I took a bullet wound to my leg early in the
fight, but it was a through and through and it already stopped bleeding. Most
of this is theirs, my vest stopped the rest. I had to get up close and personal
to kill a few of them during the escape. I can provide the blow by blow if you
like.” He said with a grin.

   That had caused the scientists and the couple to
stare at him with barely disguised horror. Rora could see they were starting to
think Derek was a monster and quickly changed the subject.

   “Who were those guys?” She asked.

   “Red Berets. The elite special forces of the U.S.T.G.
Killing those teams of FedPol commandoes must have convinced them to get
serious.” Derek explained.

   “Wait. You killed teams, plural, of FedPol
commandoes by yourselves?” Barry asked in disbelief.

   “They aren’t as badass as you’ve heard.” Derek answered.
“They are used to bullying people and using superior force to overwhelm
unprepared opponents. They count on their reputations to intimidate their
opponents.”

   “And you just killed several elite special forces
soldiers in hand to hand combat?” Barry continued, still stunned by the
revelations.

   “It’s not that big a deal.” Derek replied more
subdued. “I used to be one of them before they exiled me. I have the same
training. But I’ve been surviving in the wastelands for years, so I’m way more
experienced than they are. And I know a lot more nasty tricks.”

   Barry seemed satisfied with the answers, but Rora
knew it was only a matter of time before people figured out how special Derek
really was. She noticed he didn’t mention the genetic alterations and how he
downplayed his own abilities. That wasn’t humility, it was survival. Rule #19
was, don’t draw attention to yourself. Eventually, their enemies would figure
out Derek was as big of a threat as the device and turn their attention to
killing him instead of retrieving the device. She needed to make sure they
completed the mission before that happened.

   “So what now?” She asked Derek.

   “We should have enough fuel to get close enough
to NASA to have them come pick us up.” He replied. Looking at the black couple
he smiled evilly. “You are gonna love their entrance exam…”