by David Wilson
“Actually, we were having a quiet night last night before that squad of National Guard, and their DHS masters showed up and got everyone up. Seems a couple of days ago, while we were sleeping, a huge group of raiders was hitting a FEMA camp of the new government’s over on the George Mason Campus. From their description, that group of raiders must have numbered in the dozens, and all of them were eight feet tall. They blew up a bunch of homes with women and kids in them, and then the raiders made off with a notorious female criminal. Diane was made out to be ruthless and had reportedly cut the head off one of the guards, who, by the way, the DHS made out to be a saint. Diane had cut his head off just because she wanted to make an example out of the guard. Anyway, the DHS assholes, I mean gentlemen, told us to be especially watchful for this gang. Even offered the town a reward if we could bring the whole gang in, Dead or Alive, they said. Also, the head DHS guy made it very clear to me that I was not to allow the female killer to talk to anyone if we caught her alive. Now, I see that none of you are eight feet tall, so you can’t be that gang, but I thought you should know that the National Guard and DHS have vowed to hunt down these killers. They said they were running patrols and have out several roadblocks looking for the gang. Has your group ran into anyone matching the description of this gang?”
Talon smiled at the Lawman and said, “No, Sir, we haven’t seen anyone that matches that description. We are just heading out to our ranch in the valley, got caught by the power going out visiting in DC. Did the DHS guy say were they set up these roadblocks, we would like to get to our ranch without bothering the federal forces.”
The Lawman stood and walked over to stand by Talon’s horse, “He didn’t rightly say exactly where, but one of those boys was excited because he was going to be close to his home in Centerville, up by where 66 and 29 meet.” Lowering his voice, the lawman continued, “I don’t know what happened, but the way you are all armed, I figure it’s none of our business, but I’d appreciate it if you would move on down the road. We have been peaceful around here, and we would like to keep it that way.”
“Sir, I’m the most peaceful man alive until someone pushes me. But I understand, and we will be getting on down the road. Is it ok to water our horses in the creek before we get back on the road,” asked Talon?
“By all means, that is as long as it doesn’t take very long. Don’t know when those idiots, I mean our friendly FEMA representatives might show up again,” said the Lawman.
Back on the road after watering the horses, everyone rode in silence. The weather was almost perfect, and the moon was bright enough that it wasn’t necessary to have the NVD’s on all of the time.
Glancing back every now and then, Talon could see both Diane and Billy were dozing in their saddles. It was almost three in the morning when they hit the Fairfax golf range. Talon pulled his horse to a stop and waited for the others to come up to him. Explaining the situation with the time, Talon turned off into the golf park and made his way to the large lodge. Stopping at the tree line, Talon and Ben flipped their NVD’s back down. Talon told Diane to stay where they were until Ben, and he cleared the area.
Finding a nicely wooded area near a water hazard, Ben returned to Diane and Billy and guided them over. Within just a few minutes, Talon had two hammocks set up and got them bedded down. Taking care of the horses took a while, but Talon insisted they go over them carefully. If they ran into trouble, the horses would be the difference between life and death.
The day was uneventful with Ben and Talon taking turns on watch. Everyone was up and ready for something to eat by 4:00 PM. After a meal of dehydrated food, Talon heated up a pot of water and cleaned the welts on Diane’s back. Much of the swelling and angry red inflammation was gone from the welts, but her entire backside from the base of her neck to her knees was a mass of yellow and purple bruises.
Talon asked her if she was ok to ride, knowing that the bruising was painful from the way she gasped and jerked each time he touched them. She claimed she was fine but did ask for another pain pill. Talon gave her a couple of the 800 mg acetaminophen without the codeine. They needed her to able to think clearly if they ran into trouble.
Breaking down the camp, they still had over an hour before it was dark. Taking turns, Talon and Ben cleaned their weapons, with Talon showing both Ben and Billy how to break down the Tavor’s. While sitting with Billy, Talon noticed Billy constantly tugging on his armor vest. After asking him about it, Talon had him take it off as he got out a small box out of his backpack. Using a sail needle and some Kevlar thread, Talon took up the slack in all of the straps on Billy’s vest. Afterward, Billy put the vest back on, and it now fit snugly around his small frame. Turning to Diane, he did the same thing. Diane sighed as she put the vest back on as the now tight-fitting vest actually felt good on the bruises.
Talon did a quick once over of everyone’s gear, making adjustments as necessary. When he was finished to his satisfaction, they all led the horses to the water and let them drink. Once the horses were ready, Talon mounted up and headed out of the trees to scout the area. Riding over to the tree line bordering the highway, Talon sat his horse for several minutes, just observing the area. Seeing and hearing nothing out of place, Talon rode back to the group and had everyone change out the batteries on their NVDs just in case they would need them.
Leading the group off the golf course Talon turned the group north, staying to the grass alongside the shoulder of the road. After about 15 minutes of walking the horses, Talon gave Shadow a slight kick and moved him up into a trot. The group held this pace until they got close to the intersection with Highway 66. Pulling the group to a stop, Talon motioned the rest of the group to stay put as he dismounted and handed his reins to Ben.
Moving at a fast walk, Talon came into view of the intersection in just a few minutes. First, he scanned the intersection with his thermal binoculars. Not seeing any hot spots, Talon put the binoculars away and flipped his PVS-14 monocular into place. Advancing carefully from stalled car to stalled car, Talon finally reached the point where he could see under the overpass. Spotting nothing hostile, he keyed his radio twice, signaling Ben the all-clear. Talon remained in place, watching and listening. After a few minutes, he could clearly hear the horses moving through the grass coming towards him. Turning to check the underpass one more time with his NVD, he caught something out of place in the monocular. Closing his eye behind the NVD, he could not see the writing. However, when he looked through the NVD, he could. Triple clicking his push to talk button to stop Ben from bringing up the group, Talon moved toward the truck with the writing on the back window.
Moving to within about 20 feet of the truck, Talon carefully scanned the area but still came up empty on spotting any type of threat. Moving up to the truck, Talon could see the brief message obviously written in IR Chemical light. The message was nothing more than a large ‘TC, check glove box”. Talon stood and pondered the message. Was it a trap to get him to open the truck door or the glove box? But Jake and Maggie were the only people outside their own group that knew his name. The only reason for anyone else to know his name was Jake was trying to communicate with him. With his mind made up, Talon stood and moved to the passenger door of the truck. Confident as he was in his decision, Talon still held his breath as he pulled gently on the door handle. Cracking the door less than an inch, he flipped up his NVD and shined his small flashlight into the crack. Keeping the flashlight cupped in his hand, so only a small amount of light escaped, he examined the interior of the door as best that he could. Seeing no wires, he eased the door open a little more. Still seeing nothing out of the ordinary, Talon eased the door all the way open. Keeping the small light on, he gently pulled on the glove box latch and eased it open a crack. Again he could see nothing that posed a danger. Opening the glove box, Talon saw an envelope marked with ‘To TC from JR.’ Picking up the envelope, Talon stuffed it into his chest rig and backed away from the vehicle. Turning, he moved back to towards his group, which had stopped
about 100 yards to the south.
Getting back to the group, Talon told Ben to get out his poncho and to cover him while he used a flashlight to read the letter from Jake. Talon walked down to the ditch off the side of the road, he sat down and motioned Ben to cover him up. After Talon turned on his flashlight, Ben rearranged the poncho to make sure no light was showing.
Talon ripped open the envelope and began reading. It seemed that Jake had sent out several scouts to every major intersection along highway 66 to warn Talon and his group of what was going on in Winchester. Long story short, DHS had moved into Winchester with several dozen agents and taken over the Armory. Beth had wasted no time in cozying up to the senior agent in charge and telling the whole story of how Talon had indiscriminately killed his way across the two states. To include the current mission he had been on. The Armory had communications with other DHS detachments and had but together the attack on the FEMA camp with the rescue of Diane. The senior agent in charge had put out an arrest order for Talon, Ben, and Diane. With additional orders that if necessary, lethal force was authorized. Basically, Jake was confined to quarters, along with Don and Mat. Jake assured Talon that his troops were loyal to him, but as with any unit, several bad apples would suck up to the Federal agents. But that when Talon made his move, his troops loyal to Jake would support taking down the DHS agents. Lastly, Jake warned Talon that DHS had sent several agents and troops to the link-up site as a trap for Talon and his group. Jake stated that a total of 14 troops and two DHS agents were waiting at the farm. The troops had volunteered to work with the DHS agents, and Jake warned they were the worst of his unit. But the good news was, Beth had not known anything about the routes and the timeline Talon and Jake had worked out about picking up Diane. The last bit of information Jake had included was the team at Jake’s farm had taken radio equipment and were in communications with the DHS members at the Armory. Jake warned Talon that he needed to take that communications system out before the farm team could warn the DHS team at the Armory.
Talon switched off the flashlight and just sat and thought about what Jake had told them. Damn it, he knew Beth was going to be a problem. Now she was more than a problem. If that information got out, Talon would have both the Iranians and DHS looking for him everywhere. To include down in Texas and knowing how DHS was acting with emergency powers, they could very well target his family. This always happens; every time he tries and help people, it always backfires. Damn it.
Tossing off the poncho, Talon motioned Ben and Diane over and briefed them on the situation. Diane immediately swore to put a bullet between the bitch’s eyes, and Ben was pissed again about how they had all put their life’s on the line to save her ass after she got Jeff killed.
“Ok, so we kind of know what we are up against. I don’t see any way out of taking the farm team down. We have a big enough problem with taking out the main team at the Armory without worrying about another bunch of loyalists hitting us from behind. So we first have to take down the farm team then figure out how we hit the Armory, without harming any of Jake’s troops. And Jake was right, we have to take out that communication radio before they can call in our attack or we are going to have every DHS team down on us before we can even get to Winchester.
Riding at a canter for 15 minutes out of every hour, Talon held them to this ground eating pace for the next three hours before taking a break for thirty minutes. Back on their horses, the team continued until they made it to within five miles of Leesburg by 3:00 AM. Turning north, they began to retrace their route towards the Leesburg Water Treatment Plant. Talon called for a halt when they were about a mile from the water treatment plant and less than two miles from the farm. Leading the group into a thick stand of trees near the Potomac River, Talon and Ben got everyone bedded down. The two men made coffee and heated water for some food, but both Diane and Billy were asleep before the water came to a boil.
Making their food, they sat down and leaned against a pair of oak trees. Ben had a worried look on his face as he asks, “How are we going to pull this one-off, it’s really not just the team at the farm, we might have the local law enforcement try and get involved if they hear the gunfire, which they will. At least the guards out here by the water plant will.”
Talon waited patiently for Ben to express his worry. After Ben was finished, he looked over at and said, “I agree with your assessment, but that is why we have to use our brains. One thing I do want you to understand, we might have to get a little medieval on these guys to cut down the odds. If I suggest something that you have problems with, I want you to tell me at the time, and I will keep you out of that part of the plan. I will not think any less of you, but I do want you to be able to look at yourself in the mirror each morning without regret over something I ask you to do. Do you understand what I’m saying?”
Ben started to protest, but Talon cut him off, “I’m not saying you can’t handle anything, I’m just giving you an out if something comes up. As one of my ideas is to use one of the horses to deliver a surprise to the farm. If we packed up that smallest mare with about half our grenades and a couple pounds of the C4 all linked together with five feet of det cord, I bet we could get half or more of those troops in one swipe. We would just have to wait until they were all outside and turn her loose. She would run back to the farm the second we turned her loose. I doubt very much they would suspect a thing, board daylight, and no one around. What do you think?”
Ben grimaced, but when he noticed Talon watching him, he waved his hand, indicating he was dubious of the idea. “I’m good with that, but I doubt Diane is going to be doing any handstands over this one,” Ben got out before a voice came out of the dark.
Diane walked out of the dark and said, “And just want is Diane, not going to like?” Continuing over to the stove and fixed herself a cup of coffee and grabbed one of the still warm pouches of food. Turning around and finding herself a place to sit down, she said, “What I don’t like is hearing the two of you geniuses planning an attack on my farm without including me. And hearing you talk about killing one of my horses and blowing up the barn. Although it’s not a bad plan, it is incomplete,” she said as she gave a nasty grin.
Ben just hung his head and came back with, “Remind me not to get on your bad side.”
Diane grinned again, “See, you’re already smarter than you look when I’m around.”
Even in the dim light of the coming day, Talon could see Ben blushing from her retort. Talon jumped in to save Ben before he could continue the losing battle of words with Diane. “Ok, there, Boudica, slow down. I wasn’t finished,” said Talon. It was Diane’s turn to blush, well it was anger or blush, who knows thought Talon.
Even with his comeback, Diane wasn’t finished, “Well, what do you know, a Marine that can read.”
“Ok, enough,” Talon said sternly, “we don’t have much time, and we have to decide what we are going to do. We haven’t had much together time to get to know each other, but we must work together if we are going to pull this off. And yes, it might come to blowing up the farm or killing one of the horses. I don’t like it, and it won’t be my first course of action, but it might be. But first, Diane, we need for you to draw us a sketch of the farm and the inside layout of any of the buildings. Try and include any blind spots or hiding spots that Billy has used. Does the farm have any fuel tanks or vehicles in the garage or barns, things like that?”
Ben had jumped up and retrieved a notepad from his saddlebags, handing it to Diane as he came back. Talon asked Ben, “Can you check and see how much C4 and grenades we ended up bringing with us. I have two frag grenades and one smoke with me.”
After Ben had stepped away to inventory the explosives, Talon apologized to Diane, “I’m sorry if we sounded callous when we were discussing the horses and the farm. But I do want you to understand that any edge we can gain, we might have to do something like that. Plus you guys are never coming back to the farm, it’s going to be a long time before it is anything like norma
l again. Plus, with these warrants over your head, you are going to have to begin a whole new identity. I don’t know what Jake has planned, but I do know we have to try and limit how much information gets out of Winchester and gets combined with the information out of Fairfax.”
“I know,” said Diane, “It’s just hard to accept, but I do realize that we might have to do some damage to the farm to kill all of these assholes. I’m just still pissed off that we didn’t get the chance to kill that animal running the FEMA camp.”
Talon was a little startled with the venom in Diane’s voice and the look of hate on her face. He realized there was much more to Diane’s story than just pissing off the soldier that had beat her. Not really knowing what to say, Talon said nothing. Giving her a few minutes to cool off, Talon walked over and looked over her shoulder to see how the sketch was coming. She might have missed her calling by not becoming a professional artist.
Sitting back down, Talon sat quietly and let her finish the drawing. He must have dozed off as the sun was just peeking over the eastern horizon. Ben was finished with the inventory of the explosives at just about the same time as Diane was finished with her drawing. Everyone came back together to compare notes. Talon nodded at Ben first. Ben glanced down at his small note pad, “We have 4 one-pound blocks of C4, two Claymores, six electrical blasting caps, six HE grenades, two smoke grenades, just about 1000 rounds of 5.56, not counting what we have loaded in magazines, and almost 400 rounds of .308, and 210 rounds of OO buckshot for the shotguns. I didn’t take a count of the pistol ammo everyone has, but there are 300 rounds of 9mm in the pack saddle. The grenade count includes what both of us are carrying.”
Talon nodded at the count, “So we have enough for one firefight, and a full reload on ammo and enough grenades and C4 for one mission against a superior force. Keep back one pound of the C4 and two blasting caps and at least one smoke grenade for Winchester.”
