Feral Nation - Defiance (Feral Nation Series Book 8)
Page 18
Eric had felt terrible telling Ronnie Ferguson that his fishing boat was no more, but as soon as he was introduced to him upon the group’s return from Joe’s burial, he’d come right out with it. “I know it’s not the same at all, and that you’d rather be running your lines and traps in your own boat” Eric had said, “but I understand that you’re a hell of a boatman, and that makes you my first choice for captain of our new acquisition. It’s probably not worth a damn for fishing, but if you’re interested, I can run you through all the systems tomorrow when we go back upriver to rendezvous with Sam and the rest of his bunch.”
Ronnie absolutely was interested and eager to do his part in the fight after losing his best friend, Joe. He said he fully understood after yesterday that none of them would ever have a life resembling what they had before if they didn’t come together and resist what was happening at any cost.
“You’re going to have to make a choice, Jonathan,” Eric said, when he mentioned again how he wanted to learn how to run the M2 machine gun and be the boat’s official gunner. “You also said you wanted to work with me as part of a sniper or fire team. You can’t do it all, so figure out which one is more important to you, because whoever gets to waste ammunition learning that gun is going to be the man that gets assigned to it for the duration. Maybe we can capture more ammo from a vehicle mounted weapon or another boat later on, but I’m not counting on it.”
Eric also learned that Ronnie had taken a radio from the C.R.I. truck Keith and Willis had driven to the boat ramp, and Eric couldn’t wait for Bart to get to work on checking the frequencies it was set up to use and comparing them to the secure transmitter aboard the gunboat. If there was a match, that was going to be interesting information, and Eric would have more questions for the prisoner before they decided what to do with him.
As it was, Diane wanted to see him shot, and was willing to do it herself. Eric didn’t blame her, as they now knew for a fact that the attack team on the two boats that he was a part of was working in conjunction with C.R.I. With Vicky’s help, Keith had already learned where the boats came from, but Eric knew there was more to it than just chance that they happened to stop near the nondescript channel leading to an obscure oxbow lake off the Atchafalaya. There were countless channels and lakes like that, and it seemed too coincidental that they would happen to turn into the one that held such an attractive target for a random attack. It was almost as if they knew what they were looking for instead, and though they had passed by it at first, the narrow channel had stood out enough that it caught someone’s eye and made them turn around. Eric wanted to know how they knew to look for it, and who sent them. It took another half hour of questioning with Vicky’s help in translation, but Eric got the answers he was looking for. It wasn’t an accident that they knew where to find the boat, and the only way the people who sent them could have that information was through the description given to them by a desperate rat named Daniel Hartfield, trying to save his own sorry ass.
“What could he have possibly told them that made them care enough about killing us to send a special team to do it?” Shauna asked, when Eric related what he’d learned.
“Nothing,” Eric said. “It wasn’t about us; it was about me. Daniel must have been paying more attention than I thought when I was telling all of you about the raid on that cartel compound and the murder of Nantan, Red and Wolf. This proves how deeply Major Langley is involved with this C.R.I. occupation scheme, because someone working with them, maybe that Commander Reyes that you met, got Daniel’s story to him. He would very much be interested in making me disappear, knowing my background and knowing how much I know about their plans after going to Mexico. And if that is the case, when those cartel sicarios fail to return with a report of success, he’ll send someone else to do the job.”
“So, what are you going to do?”
“Right now? Follow the plan I laid out and get the militia ready. Some can stay here and conduct the operations against C.R.I. that we already discussed. But I’m going upriver as soon as I’m done with that to find out who was behind the slaughter at that Simmesport post. I think there’s a lot more to this conspiracy than just C.R.I. and the Fronteras Cartel.”
* * *
Thank you for reading Feral Nation - Defiance. I hope you enjoyed the story! Don’t miss the action that follows in Book Nine: Feral Nation - Alliances, available to preorder now on Amazon at this link: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08JLDVT7G
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More by Scott B. Williams
THE FOLLOWING LINKS WILL take you to the Amazon Kindle versions of my most popular books that are available now. New books are coming all the time so stay up to date by signing up for my book alerts via my New Release Updates
Feral Nation Series
Feral Nation - Infiltration (Book 1)
Feral Nation - Insurrection (Book 2)
Feral Nation - Tribulation (Book 3)
Feral Nation - The Divide (Book 4)
Feral Nation - Perseverance (Book 5)
Feral Nation - Convergence (Book 6)
Feral Nation - Sabotage (Book 7)
Feral Nation - Defiance (Book 8)
Feral Nation - Alliances (Book 9)
The Pulse Series:
The Pulse: A Novel of Surviving the Collapse of the Grid (Book 1)
Refuge After the Collapse (Book 2)
Voyage After the Collapse (Book 3)
Landfall: Islands in the Aftermath (Book 4)
Horizons Beyond the Darkness (Book 5)
The Darkness After Series:
Enter the Darkness (Series Prequel)
The Darkness After (Book 1)
Into the River Lands (Book 2)
The Forge of Darkness (Book 3)
The Savage Darkness (Book 4)
Apocalypse Series:
Sailing the Apocalypse: A Misadventure at Sea
Nonfiction:
On Island Time: Kayaking the Caribbean
Bug Out: The Complete Plan for Escaping a Catastrophic Disaster Before It’s Too Late
About the Author
SCOTT B. WILLIAMS HAS been writing about his adventures for more than twenty-five years. His published work includes dozens of magazine articles and twenty-five books, with more projects currently underway.
His interest in backpacking, sea kayaking and sailing small boats to remote places led him to pursue the wilderness survival skills that he has written about in his popular survival nonfiction books and travel narratives such as On Island Time: Kayaking the Caribbean, an account of a two-year solo kayaking expedition he undertook at age 25.
With the release of The Pulse: A Novel of Surviving the Collapse of the Grid in 2012, Scott moved into writing fiction full time. His post-apocalyptic and action & adventure stories draw heavily on his personal wilderness and ocean experiences to create believable scenarios often set in dire circumstances. To learn more about his upcoming books or to contact Scott, visit his website: www.scottbwilliams.com
Dedication
DEDICATED TO HARRELL; FRIEND, neighbor and fellow patriot.