It wasn’t long after dozing off that John dreamt he was in Iraq again. Camp Stryker. Ten miles from the center of Baghdad and headquarters for the 48th Infantry Brigade Combat Team.
First Sergeant Wright entered the operations center. Tall and gangly, he didn’t have the squat, powerful build of a typical First Sergeant, but he commanded the respect of his men and that was all that really mattered.
“LT, we have a situation.”
John looked up from his morning briefing. The date was June sixteenth, 2006 and it was already hot enough outside to sap the moisture from your eyeballs in under a minute. Course, it didn’t help that the 48th was stationed inside the infamous Triangle of Death. John had been waist deep in situations since he’d come awake this morning at 0500 hours, listening to the distant sounds of an Iraqi man in a minaret singing Allah’s praises.
“What is it, 1SG?”
“Insurgents attacked one of our checkpoints near Yusufiyah this morning.”
“Any casualties?”
“Yes, three dead. Two more wounded.”
Nine times out of ten that meant a suicide bomber had driven up and detonated his payload as he approached the checkpoint. It was an all too common tactic and one the military was quickly trying to adapt to. John suggested as much, but First Sergeant Wright shook his head.
“This wasn’t a PBIED,” Wright said. “They came in on pickups dressed as Iraq army grunts and opened fire.”
A PBIED was army slang for person borne improvised explosive device.
John’s jaw clenched. America had the most powerful armed forces in the world. No one could stand toe to toe with them and live to tell the tale. And yet it was also beginning to look as though that was its greatest vulnerability. The enemy refused to engage them head on. The insurgents’ hit-and-run tactics were designed to sow fear and frustration in U.S. forces. Ever since arriving, John had felt plenty of the latter. Two thousand years earlier, the Romans had faced much the same problem while trying to conquer Britain. Celtic armies often waited for the legions to enter a dense forest where they would be forced to march only a few men abreast. That was when they would attack, denying the Romans the ability to use the awesome power of the legion in full formation.
“There’s more,” Wright said.
“Go on.”
“Two of our boys are missing. PFC Steven Hutchinson, nineteen years old, out of Luzerne, Michigan and PFC Ryan S. Davis, twenty-two, from Knoxville, Tennessee.”
John put his coffee down and felt a terrible weight immediately settle on the tops of his shoulders. He couldn’t deny the responsibility he felt to make sure all his men made it home safe and sound. It was one thing to be killed in action, but kidnapped, likely tortured and only God knew what else—the thought was difficult to fathom.
“Are either of them married?” John asked, not entirely sure he wanted to hear the answer.
“Only Davis,” Wright said somberly. “His wife’s pregnant, expecting any day now. I was in the MWR room when they were talking on Skype and they both seemed real…”
Happy. That was what Wright was gonna say before he cut himself off.
“Don’t worry, 1SG,” John said, mustering every ounce of faith he could under the circumstances. “I promise you we’re gonna find those boys and bring them home safe and sound.”
“Roger that, sir.” Wright straightened up, turned and left.
John opened a line straight away to his commander in order to push the CCIR (Commander's Critical Information Requirement) up through the chain of command. There was no telling what his men were being subjected to and he knew time was of the essence.
Within an hour, nearly eight thousand men from dozens of units were out searching. Tips began rolling in. A number of Stryker teams went house to house, knocking in gates with Humvees and searching suspected insurgent safe houses. The truth was the enemy counted a captured US soldier as a prized trophy, one that could be sold by the local insurgent leader to al-Qaeda. The clock was ticking and with every minute that passed, the chances of finding those men alive diminished exponentially.
Chapter 8
John came awake clutching the Blazer’s steering wheel. Beside him, Brandon was staring at him, worried. It took a minute and a handful of deep breaths for John to catch his bearings.
“You all right?” the boy asked.
Beads of sweat rolled down John’s face. “I’m fine.”
“You were talking.”
“Was I?” The camo netting was still draped over the front and sides of the truck, although the doors could be opened if done carefully.
“Who’s Davis?”
“Davis?”
“Yeah, you kept saying the name.”
John didn’t want to talk about it. “We should get going.”
“You said he was missing.”
“Did I?” A pause, then: “He was someone I knew from the war.”
“Vietnam?”
John smiled. “You watched too many movies. I knew him from Iraq. He and another soldier went missing and I promised I’d find them.”
“Oh.” Brandon seemed to be contemplating this. “And did you?”
“I did. Listen, we should probably eat something before we head out.” In the back of the truck, the goose sat in his cage, not making a sound. John threw a thumb over his shoulder. “You know, I forgot he was here.”
The boy laughed. “Who, George? Me too.”
John frowned. “I’m not sure naming him is such a great idea. Might not be long before George ends up on a spit over a fire, and it’s so much harder to eat something you’ve named, don’t you think? That was one of the reasons we got rid of the rabbits. Had a pen in the backyard and Emma named each and every one of those little buggers. Whenever we tried to grab the fattest one for dinner she’d raise a real ruckus. You’d think we were trying to cook her best friend.”
The smile on Brandon’s face betrayed a hint of pain at the mention of Emma’s name. John decided to change the subject.
After losing both cabins and just about all his preps, they’d been reduced to eating from the few cans they had left. There was plenty of game in these woods and Brandon’s aim was good enough to keep them freshly supplied with squirrels, but at the moment there really wasn’t time for all that.
The funny look on Brandon’s face made John ask what was wrong.
“I’ve gotta go to the bathroom,” the boy said.
John studied him from the corner of his eye. “You don’t need my permission, son. Go on and I’ll have the food heated up by the time you return.”
“The thing is, I don’t need to pee.”
One of John’s eyebrows rose. “I see.” Who would have thought that toilet paper would become such a prized commodity after a societal collapse? The average Joe might have told you gold or silver, maybe even batteries, but surely not toilet paper.
“All right,” John said, nudging the car door open. “Wait here with George. I’ll be right back.”
The search in the woods took him a little longer than expected, but John returned to the truck when he found what he was looking for. He handed a number of furry-looking leaves to Brandon who stared on with bewilderment.
“You want me to wipe with leaves?”
John shook his head. “These aren’t regular leaves. They’re mullein. One of the best toilet-paper substitutes you’ll find in the woods. You can thank me later.” John held up another plant that had a series of small white flowers. “I also grabbed some yarrow since I was out there.”
“What’s that do?”
“You apply it to bleeding cuts to promote clotting.”
Talk of bleeding created a noticeable change in Brandon’s face. “I hope we don’t need it.”
“Me too,” John said. “Go take care of your business so we can get a move on.”
Brandon took the leaves and waved them in the air. “This better not be poison ivy or something.”
John wasn’t much of a practical joker, a
lthough he had served with men who would relish any opportunity to pull a prank like that on a fellow soldier. He held up three fingers. “Scout’s honor. Now go.”
After a quick breakfast, John rolled the camo net back up and put it in the trunk. George looked up at him. He didn’t nearly have the fight from when they first met. John reached into his pocket and pushed some soft grasses he’d collected in a nearby field through the spaces in the cage. He knew geese preferred corn and grains, but for now this would have to do. George looked at the offering briefly before starting to eat.
John reached into his pocket to get some more and came out with Diane’s silver necklace with the sapphire heart.
“Whatchu looking at?” Brandon asked, returning from the woods.
John shoved it deep into his pocket. “Nothing.”
“You were right,” Brandon said, poking his head in to check on George. “It’s even better than the double-ply stuff from the grocery store.”
Back in the driver’s seat, John started the truck and put it into gear.
“What’s our plan?” Brandon asked. The crack in his voice made John wonder if he was still thinking about the blood clot remark.
“Plan’s simple,” John said. “First we find the ones who killed your dad, kidnapped our loved ones and burned down our cabins. Then we make them pay for what they’ve done.”
Chapter 9
They weren’t cruising along the back roads for more than a few minutes before they spotted a man with bloody clothes. He was staggering along the centerline, which meant he was either crazy, suicidal or somewhere in between. John slowed down, feeling for the familiar weight of the pistol in his leg holster. After coming to a stop, John rolled down the window and called out to him.
“Where you headed?”
The trick was to act as though nothing were out of the ordinary. The man spun and threw his hands in the air.
“I knew you’d be back to finish me off.”
“What’s he saying?” Brandon said.
“I’m not sure.” John asked him to clarify, after which the man burst into tears.
“He’s gone crazy,” Brandon observed, offering his clinical assessment.
John scanned the forest on either side of the road, then up ahead and behind them. There was no sign of anyone else. He opened the door and stepped out. His gut told him this wasn’t an ambush, since it hardly seemed reasonable that a man would wait for a vehicle to come along in a post-EMP world.
“Take the AR and cover me from here,” he told the boy, who did so by leaning slightly out the passenger window.
It was one thing being sure this wasn’t an ambush, but another thing altogether not taking the proper precautions in case he was wrong.
The man in the middle of the road was still sobbing. His clothes were ripped and it was clear someone had beaten him, possibly even left him for dead.
“You’re bleeding,” John said.
“My son,” the man said. “I’m looking for my son.”
“Where did you leave him?”
A string of drool ran down his chin. “I didn’t. He was taken from me.”
Chills ran down John’s spine. He checked his surroundings again, to calm the creeping feeling that they were being watched.
“Do you know who did this to you?”
The man nodded.
“Okay, come with us.”
He ushered the man into the back of the truck, checking him quickly for knives or weapons and finding none.
A second later they were off again, rolling down Carson Hill Road with a million questions coursing through John’s head. He still wasn’t sure what the source of the man’s wound was, or if the blood was even his. Sitting in the back, the man pulled his hand down over his face in an effort to clean away the tears and dribble.
“What’s your name?” John asked.
He drew in a deep breath. “Gary Bertolino. Thank you for stopping to help. Seems decent people are getting scarcer and scarcer these days.”
“I couldn’t just leave a bloodied man on the side of the road. Where are you from, Gary?” John wondered if perhaps the man had been in one of the waves of golden horders who’d fled the city.
“I have a house in Oneida and a cabin on Owens Ridge. Once the lights went out and the cars stopped working, my wife and son and I packed a few supplies together and made our way east.”
“You walked here from Oneida?”
Gary shook his head. He was a skinny man who floated in his clothes and moving his head only accentuated the impression. “We rode our bikes. It wasn’t further than twenty miles or so and I knew our cabin would be as safe a place as any to ride out the storm. Least, I thought it would be.” His face crumpled with fresh tears.
“I need you to hold it together for me, Gary. We’ve lost people too and I need your help to figure out who did this.”
Gary was pawing at the blood on his shirt as though he were seeing it for the first time. “All I know is that a bunch of men in trucks came onto our property and told us to hand over our firearms.”
“What?”
“Yessir. They waved around a piece of paper that looked official enough. Had the president’s seal on it. You know that thing on the carpet in the Oval Office?”
“Yeah, I know it.”
“Well, these guys looked real official, wearing black cargo pants and armed to the teeth. Said the governor for this district had sent them to disarm the local population by order of the president.”
“Governor for this district,” John spat, hating the way the words sounded. “That doesn’t make a lick of sense.”
“You said it. I told them as much too. They replied that I could keep one pistol and fifty rounds of ammo. ‘How am I gonna hunt?’ That’s what I asked them. And you know what they said? ‘That’s what the pistol’s for.’ You ever tried hunting with a pistol?”
John shook his head. “Can’t say that I have.”
“Course not, ’cause I can see you’ve got a good head on your shoulders. Man can’t hunt with a pistol. Wasn’t even gonna let me keep my deer rifle. Anyway, I told them to turn those trucks around and head back to where they came from. Told them to go have a read through the Constitution again if their recollection was rusty. That was when they opened fire. Killed my Beth right there in front of me. Then they went through the house and took my Ruger American and my brand new Glock 21 and anything else they fancied. Pretty much cleaned me out and then set the place on fire.”
“What about your son?”
“They threw him in the truck and drove off. Probably figured without food or water I wouldn’t last long. I wasn’t worth wasting a bullet on, I suppose. If I’d only given him my guns, maybe Beth would still be alive and I wouldn’t have lost Billy.” Gary was getting choked up again and John gave him a minute.
“Do you remember hearing where they were taking them? Knoxville, maybe?”
“I wish I knew.”
John gripped the steering wheel as they drove on. It was clear enough that whoever had done this to Gary and his family had also been the ones to kill Tim and kidnap the others. If ever there was a time when regular folks needed weapons to defend themselves it was now, with the grid down and the police no longer an effective deterrent. John couldn’t grasp the logic behind the president’s decree, nor the legality of such a move in the first place. Any proposal that threatened the Second Amendment had to first go through a long legal process. Thankfully, it wasn’t something a single figure could change with the stroke of a pen.
Unless, that was, there had been a coup. Or the rights that they had come to know and cherish had somehow been suspended.
Chapter 10
John made a right on Phillips Road, which led down from the mountains and into the valley near Oneida. Yesterday he’d gone a ways along the interstate without seeing any sign of the people who’d taken his family. Afterward, he’d taken one of the small back roads west and come across what looked like a roadblock of some sort. The
men pointing rifles in his direction had been an added incentive to save that route for last.
There was a systematic way to go about this. Gary had provided an important, although slightly vague piece of the puzzle. If they failed to find any sign of them between here and Oneida, John would then find a place to fill the jerrycans on Betsy’s rear door with diesel and consider heading back toward Knoxville.
He was contemplating that very possibility when he made his way around a curve and came to an older SUV on the shoulder of the street. Nearby were four men. Two of them were kneeling on the ground, their wrists bound behind their backs with zip ties. Two others were wearing green fatigues and aiming a pair of AKs at their prisoners’ heads.
John was about to throw the truck into reverse when he noticed the men on the ground were wearing dark cargo pants. Could they be from the same group that had attacked Gary and John’s family?
He slipped his S&W out from its holster and slid it over to Brandon. “Crack your window open and get ready to back me up if things go bad.”
John pulled the AR from between the seat and the middle console and opened the driver side door.
One of the two guarding the men on the ground swung his weapon in John’s direction.
“Don’t make a move,” he said.
John remained still. “Take it easy, friend. We don’t have a beef with either of you gentlemen. We’re looking for our families who were taken from us. We’re on the same side.”
“Drop your weapon and kick it over here,” the one aiming in his direction ordered.
If he’d been alone, John might have angled the car so he could take cover behind the wheel well, but that move would have left Brandon and Gary exposed. Contrary to the movies, 5.56 and 7.62 rounds could penetrate both car doors with ease.
“They’re going to execute us,” one of the men kneeling started to say, and John didn’t feel an ounce of pity, especially if they had done what he thought they had.
Last Stand: Patriots (Book 2) Page 3
