by Payne, T. L.
“Tie him up. We can’t have him alerting them. If they search for him and don’t find him, maybe they’ll think he carried on through without stopping,” Walker said.
Walker and Jack gagged and restrained the man, placing him in a closet in a back room. With the boards on the window, the gangsters wouldn’t be able to see in, but Savanah wasn’t taking any chances. She moved everyone to the back stock room. Everyone held their clubs and bats. Some held knives and others machetes. Walker stood in the doorway with the man’s rifle.
“How many rounds are left in it?” Savanah asked.
“Two.”
“That’s two more than we had this morning,” she said, trying to be optimistic. Walker smiled.
She drew in a deep breath, attempting to calm herself. It didn’t work—not at all. She could hear the children crying through the walls of the freezer. If she could hear them, could the bad guys outside?
In the corner, a mother and teenage daughter prayed, holding on to one another. Her teenage son was still out there. He was on the lookout two blocks away. The drug gang hadn’t made it that far yet. Once they reached the boy’s position, there would be no other option for him but to stay put.
Savanah prayed the gang would turn and head east or west before reaching town; it wasn’t likely. There was a chance that they wouldn’t search the store. If they found it locked, would they assume that the drug addict wasn’t inside? She was grasping at straws now. The waiting was torture. She felt like a trapped animal as she took her place between Kendra and Karson. Cayden was next to Isabella. They were holding one another. Savanah thanked God for her. Isabella loved Cayden like her own. It was plain to see she’d defend him with her life. Will was so blessed to have found her.
“We need to quiet the children,” someone whispered.
Savanah turned. It was Francis. He’d joined the group only a week before they left the homestead. Will had found him barely breathing and dehydrated while out on one of his patrols. Savanah hadn’t had much interaction with him, but what she’d had wasn’t all that positive. He wasn’t a big fan of children. The boy had hooked up with the wrong group. But he was right. The crying could alert the bandits to their position.
“I’ll see what I can do,” Savanah said, releasing her daughter’s hand. As she drew near to the door of the freezer, she recognized the child’s cry immediately. That was her child—her problem child.
“Jane. Luca. It’s Savanah. Let me try to calm her.”
Jane yanked open the door and thrust Kylie into Savanah’s arms. Kylie cried louder when she realized it was her mother. Savanah rushed her down the short hall and into the bathroom. She dropped to the floor and pulled Kylie into her lap, took her by the shoulders, and looked her in the eyes.
“Kylie Jane, you have to stop that crying right this second. You hear me. There are bad, bad men on their way here, and if you don’t stop crying, they could find us and hurt us.” Her eyes grew wide, and she quieted to a whimper. “Do you understand me, Kylie? You could get hurt if they find us.”
She didn’t want to frighten her daughter, but Kylie's world revolved around herself so Savanah needed to make it personal to Kylie. Big tears streamed down her pale cheeks. “You are safe inside the freezer with Jane and Luca, but you have to be very, very quiet. Okay?”
“But they won’t let me play with the jacks,” Kylie whined.
She was seven and very bright, therefore intelligent enough to grasp the seriousness of the situation. Savanah couldn’t understand why the child could not control herself. She wished with everything in her that her grandmother was still alive. She would know what to do with Kylie. Savanah was nearing the end of her patience. Nothing she did seemed to make any difference to Kylie’s outbursts or behavior. Before, it was just her. She could deal with it, but now, it was putting the whole group at risk. She sighed heavily, stood, then took Kylie’s hand and led her out into the manager’s office.
“Sit.” Savanah pointed to the office chair. Savanah opened several drawers before finding what she was looking for. She held it up. “What’s that for, Mommy?”
Savanah handed the roll of duct tape to Kylie. “You are going back inside the freezer, and if you cannot control yourself…”
Kylie took it and jumped up from the chair. “Okay,” she said, heading back toward the freezer.
Jane looked shocked when Savanah explained. “If she makes any more noise, use the tape.”
They waited in the backroom for ten or fifteen more minutes before a knock on the back door came. The last two lookouts had spotted the marauders. They were heading straight for downtown. Savanah’s gaze fell to the man who’d brought them there. She narrowed her eyes. A part of her wished they’d taken Pete’s wife’s suggestion and left him dead in a ditch. Guilt pricked her heart, and she asked for forgiveness but if anything happened to the children, the man was as good as dead. The parents would see to it.
They could hear glass breaking in nearby buildings both at the front and the rear of the store. It sounded like they were just being destructive for the fun of it. A loud thud came from the front of the store and then another. Savanah’s heart leaped in her chest, and she felt Kendra squeeze her hand.
“It’s okay. They can’t break through the plywood.”
“What about the doors? Are you sure the steel bars will hold?” Kendra asked.
“Jason was sure.”
Kendra’s grip softened. Oh, how Savanah wished he was there now. She hated that he was so far away and there was no way to communicate with him. Before, just months ago, everyone took for granted that you could pick up a phone and call practically anyone in the world.
Another thud sounded, this one louder and sounding like boots on metal. Someone was kicking the door. Walker moved into the hall where he had a clear line of sight of the door. He raised the rifle to his cheek and aimed. Savanah moved into the doorway, holding her bat ready to defend the others. They would have to go through her to get to them. She prayed the bars on the door held. She prayed with all her might for her children’s protection.
“Smoke!”
“What?” Savanah said, whipping around to face the room.
“I smell smoke,” Jack said.
“Oh my God,” someone yelled.
Savanah rushed past Walker toward the rear service door. “Watch them. I’m going to check the back.”
The steel bars were still in place, but the smoke was seeping in under the door and around the sides. Someone had set a fire outside the building. They were going to be smoked out. Savanah felt the steel door. It was cold. She ran her hand along the wall. It was cool to the touch. She rushed back and pulled the door to the storeroom shut.
“Wait! What about the fire?” Jack asked.
“It’s just smoke. I don’t think the building is on fire. I’m shutting the door to keep the smoke out. Stay put. I’m going to check out the front of the building.”
“I’m coming with you,” Walker said.
As they ran toward the front of the store, Savanah could already tell that the gangsters had set fire to the front of the building. Heavy black smoke hovered near the ceiling. Savanah covered her mouth and nose with her shirt and ran toward the door. She placed her hand on it, then yanked it away. The front of the building was burning. How long did they have? She looked at the ceiling. Not long. The smoke would get them before the flames. Panic seized her throat. She tried to swallow but couldn’t. She couldn’t think straight. She had to get her fear under control. She had to figure out how to get everyone out without being seen.
Walker felt the glass windows. “They’re pretty warm.”
“What do we do now?” Savanah asked.
“We need to know where they are. We’ll have to find a way out without them seeing us.”
Walker ran to the back service door and began removing the steel bar across the door.
Savanah ran back and felt her way to the manager’s office. There was a small window near the ceiling that
wasn’t covered in plywood. Maybe she could see out and discover where the attackers were. She pushed and shoved, finally moving the desk under the window. She climbed on top of it and stood on the tips of her toes to look outside.
“See anything?” Walker asked as he entered the room.
All she could see was the building across the alley. “The warehouse’s doors are partially open. If we could slip out the back doors, maybe, just maybe, we could go through the warehouse and escape on the opposite street.” She strained to see if anyone was near the doors then thought she heard talking outside. She moved to the side of the window and listened.
“They’ll have to come out eventually,” a gruff male voice said.
“We don’t know how many of them are even in there, Ralph. They could be heavily armed. We just don’t have enough information for this,” another male voice said.
“Walt said to get them out of there. You gonna go questioning his orders?”
“No,” the other man said.
“But I don’t like risking my life just to capture some teen chick.”
Savanah gasped, and her hand flew up to her mouth. They’d spotted the girl she’d had on lookout and followed her here.
Dammit! She’d screwed up. She should have just hunkered down here. She had no idea what the hell she was doing. She was a homesteader and mother. She sold herbal teas and candles for a living. She was no soldier. She wasn’t a fighter, but she needed to become one—and quick.
“Can you tell how many are back there?” Walker asked.
“It sounds like just the two men.”
“We can take on two. If we can do it quietly, we could get everyone into the warehouse,” Walker said.
She climbed down from the desk and made her way to the storeroom. The others needed to know. They couldn’t make this decision on their own.
“The front of the building is on fire. The flames have not breached the walls, but the store is filling with smoke.”
There were gasps and groans. “Shhh,” she said. “We have to be quiet. We can’t let them know where we are in the building.”
“They’re going to kill us all,” one of the women cried.
“At least two men are waiting out back here. We may have to fight our way out.” More crying erupted from the group. Savanah held up her hand to quiet them.
“Savanah and I are going to attempt to take out the two men while you all get the children and get out,” Walker said. “There’s a warehouse across the alley. The doors are open.”
Some were shaking their heads. They were frightened. Savanah understood that. “We have to do this. We have to get the kids out.”
“Find your way out to the side street. I think it’s Eighth Street. Run as fast as you can west. Turn north on Pine, and there is a community center on the corner of Pine and Eleventh Street. The side door on the north side of the building is unlocked. I checked it yesterday. Go there. Wait as long as you can for us,” Walker said.
Savanah’s eyes searched for her children. Kendra and Karson were holding hands. Isabella was holding Cayden’s and Kendra’s hands. Her eyes met Isabella’s. Isabella nodded. She knew what was on Savanah’s mind, and she acknowledged it. Isabella would take care of her children if she didn’t make it to the community center. She’d find a way to get them to Will and Jason. She was a strong and capable woman.
Walker motioned toward the door. “Everyone line up. We’re going to go tell Jane and Luca. Everyone needs to grab a kid.”
When the door to the freezer opened, Kylie ran to her mother. Savanah felt to make sure the tape was secured across her daughters mouth then thrust her into Isabella’s arms. “You need to hold on to that child for dear life. Do not let her make a sound.”
She knew the child that posed the greatest risk of exposing them was her own. She closed her eyes and prayed that Kylie would behave. “Just this one time, Lord. Please let Kylie not be defiant.”
“I’m going to throw open the door. We’re going to jump out and confront the two men. When we do, you race across the alley,” Walker said.
It sounded so simple when he explained it, but nothing ever was. The men were likely armed. Maybe with pistols or rifles—at the very least, knives. The chances of taking them out quietly were next to zero. Despite the odds, they had no choice. She would not hand over the girls to those perverts. They would likely kill the children and men. The fate of the women and girls would be worse than death. She would never let that happen to Kendra and shuddered at the thought of those vile men touching Kylie.
Twenty
Will
All Will could think about on their trek back to the roadblock where the rest of their team were waiting for the communist military to arrive were the two words they had gotten out of the Chinese soldier. His urgency to get to Shreveport was intensified a hundredfold since learning that the presidential Doomsday plane could be there. If it was, that meant that some form of the government was still operational. He wanted to know what was being done to win this war and return the nation to its former condition. He needed to know. The toll this mess was taking on the citizens was enormous and would require strong leadership to bring it back from the brink.
Pete was ahead of him by a few paces. He stopped and slowly lowered the pipe bomb-filled crate to the ground.
“You really think those pipe bombs will explode?” Will asked.
“Right now, I’m not taking any chances. When we get them there, I pray at least one does.”
The plan was as weak as his legs felt. They were playing a game of Russian roulette. With every step Will took, that fact became clearer in his mind. He just hoped that by slowing the invaders down, they would be giving the government, or what was left of it, time to complete their mission in Shreveport or to secure that plane and its occupants—if indeed it still existed and was in Shreveport. There was just so much unknown. Would anything they did make any difference? Absent any other news, all they could do was try.
“It was mid-morning when Will, Pete, and Levi arrived back at the roadblock. Pete had everyone move back to a safe distance as he and Will placed the IEDs along the side of the road, inside a pothole and under one of the cars in the roadblock. They ran the wires along the ditch and into the woods to a large fallen log. That was where Pete would be located. He insisted that he was the only one qualified, even though he had no experience with bombs. Will didn’t argue. Part of him felt guilty for that. All he would have had to do was flip the switches. It wasn’t complicated. Pete had already inserted the bridgewires and set the switches.
“When the blast goes off, be ready to fire as soon as anyone exits a vehicle. We don’t want to give them time to set up and return fire. We don’t have the ammo for a prolonged gunfight,” Pete told the group.
From his position, Will had a clear view of the “kill box,” as Pete called it. He’d be firing on soldiers exiting from the driver’s side of the vehicles. Jason was hidden at the front of the roadblock and would be firing down the right side of the convoy. Pete was concerned about overlapping fields of fire and other terms Will didn’t yet understand. He felt way out of his element. He was an instrument technician—or had been. He was trained to turn valves, not fight wars. Yet there he was, about to face down foreign soldiers. All he could do was pray that his aim was true. “One shot. One kill,” he repeated to himself. “Inhale. Exhale slowly. Squeeze.” I can do this. I have to do this.
The convoy of armored Chinese military vehicles could be heard a mile off. They were moving fast. No doubt in a hurry to get to Shreveport and the United States presidential Doomsday plane. If Will and the others had their way, these soldiers would never see it. If they were successful, they’d acquire weapons and ammunition today that could be used against the next convoy that tried to come through. Will’s group couldn’t block every possible route to Shreveport but Will was banking on slowing them down long enough for the regular army to be able to repel any attack in Shreveport. If only they had some way to c
ommunicate with their military. Would they welcome the help or tell them to stand down? In the absence of orders, all they could do was what they could.
Will strained to see if Pete was in place as the first Dongfeng rolled into view. He spotted Pete’s boots. He was prone on the ground behind the log. Was it far enough away to be safe from the shrapnel? They couldn’t even be sure what was inside the pipes. Nails? Ball bearings? Glass? Maybe all three? How far would the shrapnel be propelled? They were about to find out.
The first vehicle halted fifty feet from the roadblock just like Pete had said it would. It was too far for the bomb hidden within the cars blocking the road to have any effect. Will hoped the others did the trick. Pete felt that if even one caused them to have to dismount the vehicles, it would prompt the others to as well. Will hoped he was right and that it wasn’t just wishful thinking.
Once all the vehicles had come to a stop, Will stood pressed against the tree, listening to the vehicles’ engines, and watching for any sign of doors opening. He waited and then waited some more. The rifle grew heavy in his arms as he trained his scope on the rear vehicle. What was Pete waiting for? Will heard the creak of a door opening and scanned to his left. He saw nothing. A second later, the sound of the explosion boomed and echoed through the woods. Will jumped, startled by the noise, and immediately repositioned himself to obtain a clear view of the driver’s side of the convoy. The vehicle in the middle was on fire. Smoke rolled out from underneath it. Pete had blown the IED he’d placed in the pothole.
As soon as the back driver’s-side door opened, Will trained his scope on the soldier. When his head came into view, Will inhaled, let it out slowly, and squeezed the trigger. His rifle’s report was joined by Jason’s and a few of the others posted on the right side of the convoy. It had worked. Their plan had worked. Now they just had to stay alive. The gunner in the second vehicle turned in the turret and began firing in Jason’s direction, ripping through the cars and trucks that made up the roadblock. Glass shattered, and rounds tore apart the metal and plastic. When the firing stopped, Will scanned the woodline on the opposite side of the road. Jason emerged with his rifle trained on enemy soldiers on the ground.
