Rob appeared disappointed he couldn’t finish his spiel, “Oh, well I guess you can go then; we’ll keep the gun.”
But the young man had other ideas, “I know of another place you might be interested in.”
Robert perked up, “Where?”
“If I tell you can I have my Glock back?”
“Is it very far from here?”
“No.”
“Okay, why not.”
“Right down this road, not even a mile,” the young man pointed east down the highway, “on the left there’s a house about a hundred feet off of it. There are two women living there. We tried to beg some food off them but they didn’t give us a single thing. Bitches.”
“Are they armed?”
“Yes, the older one had a shotgun.”
“Dogs?”
“No.”
“And nobody else there with them?”
“No.”
He cleared the chamber and removed the magazine from the pistol. Rob started thumbing the rounds out into Peavey’s waiting hands. The couple couldn’t do a thing but watch.
Rob handed him back his gun and magazine, minus the rounds, and the man had something else to say. “I know of another place. Tougher than the one with the women, but I bet you guys could take it.”
He had Rob’s attention again, “How far?”
“Almost a day’s walk from here, but it’s worth the trip.”
“What do you want?”
“My ammo back ... and you could throw in a few cans of food.”
“All right ... if your intel is good. You know better than to lie to me, right?”
“Yes ... I know what would happen if I did.”
The young man told Rob everything he knew about this newest target, its strengths and weaknesses, and what treasures it held.
Robert turned to his men, satisfied. “Peavey, give him back the ammunition. Cornwell, give them three cans of food, whatever they want.”
The couple grabbed up their old belongings and new riches and were scurrying down the road and out of view in less than a minute.
Alone once more, the conversation restarted and Cornwell had questions, “What are we doing, Boss?”
“We’re going to check those two women out first, since they’re the closest.”
“But we already called the guys and told them to meet us.”
“So what? We’re going to take a look at both of these places. They’re not too far out of the way. We’re going to see if either is worth taking, and if they are we will. You can’t throw away opportunities.”
Before leaving, James said he had to go and asked for some privacy behind the truck. As the three of them were waiting, Robert was thinking of what he would have to do to make this boy grow up.
Chapter Three
In less than an hour, they were spying on the couple’s home from some dense brush right across the road.
After forty minutes of observing, Rob was raring to go. “I can’t believe these women; they don’t know the slightest thing about security. That one has a shotgun with her; like it matters, it’s like she’s in a fog. The two of them have been coming in and out of the house and they don’t even stop a second to look around. Those damn vegetables must be important. I’m going to check in with Alton at the top of the hour and get the guys over here. This one’s too easy to let go. We’ll take this place tonight.”
Hours later, Alton quietly approached with McCain in tow, and with less than an hour of sunlight left. “Sorry we’re late; it took some time to get packed up. Then we had to find you. So what’s up?”
Rob kept low to the ground, “After I called the first time we got some more info ... about a couple in this house here. We’ve been watching them since I called the second time. Where’s everyone else?”
“I stopped them behind that old barn there,” Alton pointed back to a broken down building about five hundred yards off. “I didn’t want to get them any closer until I found out what was going on. Okay, what are we doing?”
Robert was slightly annoyed, “What we’re doing is taking this house. Go on back, and after it gets dark bring everyone up. We’re going to do it tonight.”
“Tonight? You don’t want to gather more intelligence first?”
“No, we’ve been here for hours waiting for you. I’ve already seen all I need to see.”
“Okay, I’ll leave McCain with you and have everybody else up here right after it gets dark.”
Just as he said, Alton had the rest of the group there when the sun went down. They all sat around, their faces dimly lit by the moon above. Rob filled the rest of the group in.
“This is the situation. We have two women in there, looks like they’re in their late thirties and mid-forties. There doesn’t appear to be anyone else in there. No dogs or other animals either ... as far as I can tell. One woman has been armed with a single shot shotgun, the other didn’t have any gun on her at all. Here’s what we’re going to do, we’ll send Nicky up there to talk his way in ...”
Alton interrupted, “You sure you want to do that? Do we know enough about this situation ... about these women?”
From his expression it was obvious Rob was in no mood for questions. “Like I said before, we’ve been watching these women all afternoon and have a good idea about the ‘situation.’ Nicky is in no danger, if that’s what you’re thinking. These two women have been running back and forth from that garden the whole time we’ve been watching them. They’ve got to be pretty tired by now. They’ll sleep heavily tonight, I’m sure of that. But ... their windows and doors appear to be reinforced, that’s why we need Nicky on the inside. Once they’re out he can open a door or window for us. Then we walk right in.”
Although Alton didn’t seem impressed by the plan, he silently agreed.
Rob brought the boy to the front and gave him his mission, “Nicky, you’ve done this before. You know what to do. It’s not so hard, right?”
“No, I can do it.”
“This will be just like the last time. Go talk yourself into the house. They’ll have plenty of questions for you so answer them and get them to relax. You know what they want to hear. Be nice and friendly, do whatever they ask, get them to trust you. Look around for the easiest window or door to open, when they’ve been asleep a few hours go open it, and put this light stick out so we can see it,” Rob put the plastic stick in the boy’s small hand.
“Okay ...”
Rob pushed the child out of the brush and into the open. The boy slowly approached the house in the dark as he put the light stick in his pack. When he got to the front yard, he started yelling out. “Hello! Hello!”
The older woman opened the heavy front door while a window was opened and its curtains were swept aside. A lone shotgun barrel came out the window aiming in Nicky’s general direction. The woman at the door spoke to the boy through the screen door that was still closed. “What do you want?”
The boy took one step forward. “I saw your lights. Can you help me?”
The one at the door took a good long look all around, scanning the surrounding countryside with her flashlight, then shined it back on the boy, “I said, what do you want?”
The child took another couple steps closer to the porch, under the heavy glare of the light, “I’m hungry, I’m cold, can you please help me?”
She shut the door and for a moment the muffled sounds of an argument could be heard inside. She opened both doors this time, “Come here, kid.”
Nicky approached and got a far as the steps before the woman stopped him. She searched his pockets and bag while the gun in the window now held the light and kept the boy covered.
At last, she announced he was “good” and took the boy by his shoulder and walked him through the front door. With no delay the doors and window were sealed back up with the three of them inside.
Rob waited a while then sent team Jackal around to watch the other end of the house.
At approximately 02:45 the next morning,
the window that held the gun gently crept up. When it was wide open a green light stick fell from the dark cavernous hole and landed on the front porch. Teams Wolf and Coyote were ready and quickly moved into position. In less than a minute the operation was over.
Just as Robert predicted, it was an easy mission, the easiest they had in a long while. The two women had an abundance of food and the group stole it all, along with their shotgun and ammunition, and a few knives and some quality hand tools they found. They took all their water too, except the tears in their eyes. With their work done, they got a few hours rest and were ready to move on to their newest opportunity.
As their informant said, their next target was a good walk for them. They arrived just out of sight of their intended victims late in the afternoon. Rob sent Alton and McCain out to investigate and return by morning.
Both of them came back before daylight, Rob let them get some sleep and got them up for breakfast. When everyone had their fill, it was time for school to begin.
Alton was teaching today, “Well, Rob, that refugee wasn’t lying, this one’s going to be a lot tougher than those two women were.”
Rob was a little too positive for this early in the morning, “That’s all right. It’ll be worth it ... if that guy was right about all they had.”
“We couldn’t see anything they had inside, but I can tell you the outside is going to be a bitch.”
Rob’s optimism was already wearing thin. “Okay, let’s hear the ugly details.”
“They’ve set up inside an old drainage pipe, reinforced concrete with about four feet of dirt and a layer of asphalt on top of that. The pipe is five feet in diameter and about fifty feet long, it runs under that highway right before that on-ramp.” Alton started sketching out a map on his tablet. “Look here, each end of the pipe has a concrete highway divider pushed up against it, it covers most of both openings. They’re really shielded from gunfire. That pipe is an excellent defensive position too, each end has an unobstructed view for at least two hundred meters. They do have a blind spot, though, the road right on top of them, but they’ve taken care of that as well. There on the highway they’ve arranged three more of those dividers into a triangle. They have a guard up there all the time. Whoever is up there has a three hundred sixty degree view for at least two hundred meters too. They’ll see us coming long before we get there.”
“Could we take that guard out with a sniper?”
“Yes, but they would still know we’re coming long before we got there. No way to fix that problem.”
“How many are we talking about, anyway?”
It was obvious Alton wasn’t sure. “We never did get an exact count. It’s dark in there and they have the tunnel sectioned off with curtains. They always had a guard there on top and at least one of the entrances covered. My guess is six. It’s seems to be one family living there, an older couple, probably the grandparents, another couple in their forties, and two younger girls.”
“That would jibe with what that roadie told us, he said six or seven.” Rob turned to McCain, “What about you, McCain? Agree or disagree with that estimate?”
McCain was also not sure. “No, that’s probably right. There might be seven but six would be my guess too.”
Robert’s enthusiasm was now completely gone, “Okay, it’s probably six but we’ll assume seven for our plans. This is the toughest one we’ve seen in a while. I hate to give it up, that guy said it was jammed with food.”
But Alton still had hope, “Yes it is tough, but McCain and I did discover one weak spot.”
He had Rob’s attention again. “What?”
Alton smiled, “Water. They’ve diverted the drainage so water wouldn’t run through the pipe anymore. Now they have to go to a small creek about a hundred meters north of the highway. It runs parallel with the road and it’s just this side of a thick stand of trees,” he quickly sketched it out on the tablet.
“So maybe we could take some hostages, just like the other day?” Rob was now smiling too.
“My thoughts exactly.”
Rob started drawing on Alton’s tablet, “Okay, here’s what we do ...”
They made their plan, rehearsed it over and over through the day, and when the sun was nearly down they put it in motion. As darkness covered the world, Coyote – Alton leading Cornwell, D’Cruz, and Rudd – moved out, finally finding a good hiding spot in the trees north of the stream. Jackal – McCain with Martinelli – set up their rifles, covering the north side of the bunker, while Wolf – Rob, Peavey, and the boys – moved in a little closer to cover the south side.
Nothing happened during the night; they took turns resting, and waiting. As the sun came up things started stirring.
Two women brought out a large pot and started a fire by the entrance of the north side. A minute later the oldest man came out and replaced the younger one acting as guard on top of the road.
After a few more minutes, the younger man, armed with a Ruger Mini-14, and the youngest girl, about thirteen, started walking towards the stream taking the large pot with them. By now all three teams turned their radios on.
Rob was ready to go, “This is Wolf, everybody check in.”
“Coyote checking in, you’re fine.”
“Jackal checking in.”
“Okay Coyote, you’re running this show. When you’ve acquired the targets, call back in.”
The man and girl crossed the field to the stream as quickly as they could, carefully scanning in every direction as they went. The old man on guard kept a close eye on them.
Just as they arrived, Alton made his move. He, Rudd, and Cornwell rushed the man and knocked him to the ground. Alton disarmed him while Rudd and Cornwell hauled him back into the woods. At the same time, D’Cruz grabbed the girl while covering her mouth, dragging her kicking back into the shadows of the tree line.
Gunfire rang out. The old man fired two quick shots from his scoped Browning BAR at Alton and his men.
Rob was on the radio again, “This is Wolf. Everybody remember, no shooting unless I say. I’m talking to you, McCain. I can’t see what’s happening on the north side of the bunker. Somebody clue me in.”
“This is Jackal. Why do you have to call me out on the radio? You act like I’m a maniac or something ...”
“McCain, just shut up and tell me what’s going on.”
“There are three of them right in the opening, but they’re not coming out. They’re yelling to that guard. I could kill them all right now. Just give the word.”
“I told you no shooting unless I say. I’m going out to talk to them.”
“Fine, if you want to do it the hard way.”
Alton was at last able to get a word in, “Coyote here, we’re okay and we’ve got the targets under control. Standing by.”
“This is Wolf, good work, Coyote, stand by. Everybody listen up! I’m going out to talk to them and I don’t want any shooting,” Rob paused and thought for a moment, “unless they gun me down, then feel free to kill them.”
He turned to Peavey, “I’m going. You watch the bunker. If they try to come out this side you can shoot, but just to keep their heads down. If they get clear of the bunker, you have my permission to kill them, but only then.” Rob then addressed the boys, “You two keep behind cover. When you hear me calling, you help Peavey bring the cart up.”
Both boys nodded as they lay flat on the ground.
Rob left his guns with Peavey and took off running, keeping his head down. He made a long loop and then approached in the open, right up from the east side of the highway.
At last the old man saw him approaching and trained his rifle on Rob as he casually walked into earshot. “What do you want?! Where’s my son and granddaughter?!”
Rob slowed but still approached with his hands in the air. He spun around holding his coat open, making it quite clear he was unarmed. “What do I want? I want all your food. But I didn’t come empty handed. I’ve got something to trade.”
“What
?”
“The lives of your son and granddaughter.”
The old man brought his eye back up to the scope and took steady aim, “I should kill you right now, scum!”
Rob stopped about thirty feet from him and started using his sensible voice, “You could do that. But then you would never see your loved ones alive again. Isn’t your son and grandchild worth some food? You would let them die over some pork and beans, or canned ravioli? We both know you’re not going to do that.”
“There’s no way we can trust you. You’ll kill us all if you get the chance.”
“I’ll tell you what ...”
Suddenly the sharp report of a rifle was heard and everyone instinctively ducked. It was Peavey firing from cover on the south side.
After a nervous moment, the oldest woman appeared from the north side entrance and yelled out to her husband, “Andrea tried to sneak out the other side and they shot at her.”
The old man never took his eyes or gun off Robert, “Is she all right?”
“She isn’t hurt, just shook up. Beth is taking care of her, she’s hysterical right now.”
Rob could tell the old man was angry and decided to get the conversation back on track before it became any more emotional. “We have your place covered from both ends, you’re not going anywhere. We’ve got your son and granddaughter. All we want is your food, we don’t want or need to hurt anyone. Just give us the food and we’ll go.”
“Like I already said, how can I trust you, my son and grandbaby might already be dead.”
He lifted up a finger as if to say give me a minute, then Rob got back on his radio and spoke quiet enough that the old man couldn’t overhear. “Coyote ...”
“Go ahead.”
“Make the girl scream, loud, but just for a second or two.”
“Copy,” Alton turned to D’Cruz who was still holding the child, one hand wrapped around her and the other clamped down on her mouth. “You heard him, D’Cruz, make her scream for a second.”
D’Cruz let go of her mouth and then grabbed her by a pigtail and twisted it with all of his strength. She tried not to but at last started screaming.
Joshua (Book 2): Traveler Page 5
