Apache Dawn: Book I of the Wildfire Saga

by Marcus Richardson

  “It is,” Cooper whispered. “That Apache Dawn broadcast was no joke. Come on,” he said moving cautiously toward the redoubt at the far end of the basement. “We got to get the hell out of here.”

  By the time Cooper rejoined the rest of the survivors at the Emergency Department, explosions and gunfire were shaking the hospital to its foundation. The doctors and a few nurses were desperately trying to keep the President stabilized while being carried by two Secret Service agents. “Be careful!” hissed Dr. Honeycutt. “Don’t jar that IV or he’ll die before we get going.”

  “They’re coming!” called out Mike as Cooper and Sparky rejoined the group. “We got movement outside…”

  “Don’t worry, they’re killing each other for the moment,” said Cooper. “Someone hijacked a signal I had with NORAD. I told whoever the hell I was talking with that we were across Grand Avenue on the top floor of the Family Medical Building. They took the bait and I guess they’re tearing it up looking for us. Now’s our chance. Let’s—” he turned to look at the remaining vehicles of the Presidential motorcade and froze. “Those things are shot to hell…”

  “We ran into an advance element on the way here,” offered Agent Sheffield. “Didn’t know it was part of an invasion.”

  Both large Suburbans were riddled with bullet holes and leaking fluid. One had a smashed-up front-end. The driver must have plowed into something at a decent clip…another vehicle, Cooper guessed, by the white paint streaks down the side of the crumpled doors on the black SUV. The President’s limo looked dirty and dented, but there were no bullet holes. Big as it was, however, there was still no way they would all fit.

  We’re gonna have to find some wheels…he concluded with a frown. I don’t have time for this…

  “APC!” hissed Jax, crouching by the tail end of the limo. “Ten yards out, two o’clock!”

  Everyone dove for cover in a panic. They were dangerously exposed in the Emergency Department at the northwest end of the hospital, with the parking lot and covered bay in front of them and the empty receiving room behind them. Their only cover was the presidential motorcade, parked haphazardly in front of the main doors. Cooper ducked under the large windows and made it to the wall. He took a breath and slowly peeked around the open doors toward the street.

  Sure enough, a large, ugly, green and tan colored Korean APC with sharp, angular reactive-armor sat parked behind the limo, facing east, its big diesel engine idling like a flatulent rhinoceros.

  “Shit, shit, shit,” said Charlie over Cooper’s headset. “Coop, main hatch is opening…foot-mobiles comin’ out!”

  “Hold your fire,” whispered Cooper in a dead calm voice, devoid of emotion. He watched as the North Korean soldiers exited down a big ramp and peeled out to run down the sides of the armored eight-wheeled vehicle, a mish-mash of sharp angles and a half-assed attempt at stolen designs and aerodynamics. Cooper frowned in disapproval. In his experience, doing things half-assed usually got you killed.

  The North Koreans continued running east across the parking lot, heading toward the doomed Family Medical Building. They didn’t give more than a casual glance toward the shot-up motorcade parked at the Trauma Center. A hatch opened on the top of the APC through the turret that housed what looked like a 20mm canon, and a helmeted head popped out, followed by the shoulders and chest of what Cooper figured was the vehicle’s commander. The man pulled up large binoculars that looked oddly-similar to his own night-vision binos.

  “Now what?” asked Charlie in a whisper.

  “Stay put—I’m gonna get us some wheels. Sparky, on me. Charlie, give us a diversion when we get to the rear.”

  “Roger that,” said Charlie as the platoon sniper appeared next to Cooper like a ghost out of the shadows.

  “Let’s go,” Cooper whispered. The two SEALs slipped around the double-doors and crouch-walked across the open space to the side of the APC. He could hear someone talking in Korean from the inside. The engine noise was tremendous and it almost felt like the ground was trembling as the big armored troop carrier sat there waiting.

  Behind him, a loud explosion rocked the Family Medical Building and more gunfire erupted. Cooper had to force himself to ignore the commotion and crept quickly to the rear of the APC. He was standing just on the outside of the open hatch and moved the MP5 to his side to draw his Sig Sauer P226. Cooper pumped his fist in the air to signal Charlie.

  There was a loud bang and the street lit up in a flash ten yards in front of the APC. He heard the commander cry out in pain from above and heard someone inside yell in surprise. That was his signal. He stepped around the open maw of the APC and charged in, weapon up, Sparky right beside him.

  Cooper raced up the ramp and pulled the screaming commander down through the turret and out of the way. As Sparky slipped past, he dispatched the driver with a shot to the back of the head from his silenced pistol. Cooper then plunged his K-Bar into the commander’s neck before ripping it free in a jugular spray. Without hesitation, he snapped his wrist and flung the bloody knife at a third North Korean who looked like a radio operator. The man died with a knife in his chest, slumped over at his station.

  “Still got it, Hoss,” Sparky said from the cockpit. He grinned. “Nice.”

  Cooper flipped his sniper the bird and keyed his mic: “Okay, we’re secure. Get everyone over here, Charlie. Move!”

  Cooper let Sparky cover the advance of the Secret Service agents who carried the President over first, followed by the three doctors and a few nurses. They quickly and efficiently packed the open bins and shelves of the APC with the supplies they needed to keep the president alive.

  Once satisfied that the President was secure, Cooper had Mike and Jax dispose of the North Korean bodies out the back hatch. They stripped weapons and vests off the corpses and passed the gear out to the agents.

  Cooper wiped the blood off the computer screens in front of the driver’s seat and took the place behind the wheel. “Turret!” he said over his shoulder.

  “Got it,” replied Mike, who reached up and quietly pulled the armored lid shut on the turret. He knelt next to Cooper. “They got NV binos just like ours,” Mike said in amazement.

  “Okay,” said Cooper, scanning the controls and knobs arrayed in front of him. Everything was labeled in Korean symbols. He quickly spotted a blinking red light next to a toggle switch. “Clear the rear hatch!” he called out.

  “Clear!” was the muffled reply from twenty feet behind him in the crowded crew space.

  Cooper flicked the switch and could hear hydraulics come to life. A ding-ding alarm went off and an amber light flashed in the crew compartment as the heavy armored hatch began to move. The ramp retracted smoothly into the floor of the vehicle just before the hatch closed and sealed itself. The amber strobe light went out, interior lighting kicked in, and the entire cabin area was bathed in a red glow.

  “Hatch secure!” someone called out.

  Cooper tried to ignore the noise of the medical personnel tending to the President and the wounded agents they had carried with them. He could hear Dr. Alston calling out numbers to a nurse and tried to ignore the sound of her voice. That made him think about the way her hair looked—

  “Hey, Coop, I think I know how to work the turret,” said Mike. Cooper reigned in his thoughts and looked over his shoulder to see the smaller SEAL standing in the turret bell, watching some video screens, his hand on a joystick. He twisted his grip to the right and the turret came to life, electric motors whining as the little tube Mike was in rotated.

  “Yeah, baby, daddy’s got a new toy,” he laughed, swinging the turret around to the left as he practiced maneuvering the main gun up and down. The electric motors driving the turret drowned out the noise the doctors were making in the crew cabin.

  Cooper noticed the APC’s radio was squawking excitedly in what he assumed was Korean. Different voices were competing with each other for air-time. Cooper frowned at the din. They were assaulting the building they assumed t
he President and his team to be in and he didn’t want to hear about it, even if he could understand the gibberish.

  He found what looked like a headphone jack dangling from a bloody helmet the APC driver had been wearing. The helmet had been blown off by Sparky, along with most of the driver’s head. He inserted the plug into the jack and the obnoxious chatter was pumped through the helmet on the floor, effectively silencing the noise. As an after-thought, he snapped the microphone stalk off the helmet with a vicious twist. He was taking no chances.

  Mike’s voice echoed down from the turret: “Coop, I think I got the hang of this thing. I think all I gotta do is line up this thing here on that line over there…then it should be on target and I pull the trigger. Like a video game, man.” He dropped out of the turret and crouched next to the driver’s seat.

  “Should we go hunting?” Mike said with his characteristic lopsided, gap-toothed grin.

  “Negative,” Cooper said, glancing at the crowded crew area behind him. “We’ve got to get the President the hell out of here. Just keep an eye out for me. Your new toy may come in handy if we need to clear the road.”

  “Roger that,” said Mike. He stood up into the turret again. “Ready when you are.”

  “Sparky, see if you can figure out comms. We gotta re-establish contact with…someone.”

  “On it.”

  Cooper looked at his computer screens, showing everything in front of the APC through a video feed. He could see there were armor plates blocking the actual driver’s window. There was a solid, green light to the left of the armored plate. He pushed the button next to it and the light went dark, while the metal shielding the arrow-slit of a window retracted and he could see straight-ahead.

  “That’s better,” he said. Even if it was just a tiny glimpse of the outside world, he wasn’t sure if he could successfully drive the massive vehicle looking down at a screen instead out a window.

  Cooper grinned. “All right…does anyone know how to drive this bitch?”

  CHAPTER 15

  Glacier National Park, Montana.

  South face of Mount Vaught.

  CHAD WOKE TO THE sound of thunder booming in his ears. The world was warm and dark, punctuated by the flash of lightning and the ever-present, chest-rattling thump of thunder. He figured the storm to be right on top of him.

  “He’s coming to!” someone’s voice split the night. Chad twitched, surprised. He figured he was the only one out there on the vast grass-covered plains, watching the storm that night. Strange, he thought, that voice sounds familiar.

  More thunder. “About time! Get ‘im on his feet and cover the right flank!” said someone else. The voice was close.

  “Mr. Huntley, can you hear me?” asked the first voice, anxiously. “I need you to wake up, sir!”

  Chad screwed his eyes shut tight against the violence of the storm. Even the ground was shaking now. Then he felt the wind buffet his shoulders. No, not the wind—someone was shaking him.

  “Get up! NOW!” bellowed the second voice. The shaking increased. Chad felt a sudden flash of pain across his face and heard the sound of flesh striking flesh.

  Chad opened his eyes to an unreal pain that threatened to force his eyeballs right out of his head. He screamed something unintelligible, even to himself, and clutched bruised hands to his face.

  A loud crash and a deafening boom tore the breath out of his lungs. His chest clenched tight trying to pull in air on an exhale. His lungs felt like they were on fire by the time the ringing in his ears stopped. At last his chest relaxed and he could suck down a lungful of hot, smoke-filled air.

  “What the hell is going on?” he heard himself half-scream. He doubled over, coughing.

  Someone laughed. “You’ll be all right! You’re a tough one, for a civvie, sir,” chuckled a blurry shape in front of Chad’s abused eyes. “That was what we call danger close, sir.” More ragged laughter flitted around him.

  Screaming and thunder filled his head, threatening to shake his skull apart. Above it all, smoke wafted over him, choking the air. Something hard and cold was thrust into his hands. “Here!” said the slowly coalescing shape in front of him. He looked down through gritty eyelids to see the blurry shape of his rifle.

  “Can you see?”

  Chad blinked, watching flashes just at the edge of his peripheral vision flare up to the accompaniment of thunder. “I think so…” he rubbed a grimy hand over his face and felt wetness on his palm. His vision cleared and he could just make out a mixture of white and red covering his hand. An overpowering cold suddenly swept over him.

  Gunfire. The thunder was gunfire. Chad ducked instinctively as something exploded past his face. He looked around. He could see the Rangers that had accompanied him the night before all ducked down behind an expedient redoubt wall constructed of fallen logs, snow, and ice. Bits of bark and snow rained down on them from the impact of a cascade of incoming rounds on the other side of their temporary protective wall.

  The memories of his hunt-gone-south, the flight from the North Koreans, the Rangers herding him out of the Park…it all came rushing back to his tortured mind. He was flooded with snippets of fear, adrenaline, excitement, and dread. Floating over all of the swirled confusion in his mind was a frothy scum of the mystery flu, was the nuclear strike on Atlanta. His hands started to shake. It was like waking from a nightmare, only to find you were merely dreaming inside a dream and were still trapped in the nightmare.

  “What the hell is going on?” Chad repeated, clutching his lever action rifle to his chest as he slammed his back against the redoubt wall in a cloud of snow.

  “Ambush!” said Garza, the figure that had loomed in front of him as he regained consciousness was now clear as day. He had blood smeared on his face and scarlet swatch on his white winter-camo.

  “There’s a lot more of them out there than we thought!” barked Deuce on Chad’s other side. He inched his way around the end of a log and let fly with a controlled burst from his M4. In the distance, Chad heard a scream.

  Chad could hear the rhythmic whup-whup-whup of a helicopter’s rotors cutting the air, despite the din of the firefight, the howling wind, and the screams of men on both sides.

  He saw Captain Alston stand farther down the line to his left, braving a hail of enemy fire, and wave for the dark shadow in the sky to come down. “Land already, dammit!” he roared. “I’ve got wounded!”

  “Uh…Negative…we have new orders−” Chad heard in his ear.

  “New orders? What the—get your ass down here before we’re all killed!”

  “Negative, Hammer—hey! What’re you doing? You know our orders—get that−”

  Chad heard some grunting and the sounds of a struggle over his headset. He followed the big Black Hawk in the sky as it fought the wind. The helicopter seemed to wobble and sway back and forth for a few seconds before a second of sharp static burst over his radio.

  A sickening smack echoed down the line behind him. Chad turned to see the body of one of the Rangers fall backwards and collapse into the snow, arms spread out wide.

  “Deacon’s hit!” someone yelled, out of Chad’s line of sight.

  Garza left Chad’s side in a flash, ignoring bullets that traced his movement. He dove for his wounded comrade and struggled to get his gloves off and feel for a pulse. He tensed, hunched over, and then slowly dropped his helmet down to his fallen brother.

  “Deacon’s gone, Cap.”

  “Goddammit, you get that fucking bird on the ground NOW or so help me, I will shoot you down myself!” roared the Captain, turning back to the wildly gyrating aircraft a few hundred feet above them. He ducked when the snow to his left exploded as a round buried itself in the white powder.

  “Anvil! Come in! What the hell are you doing?” screamed Captain Alston. A round clipped his shoulder and tumbled him into the snow. He landed face first in the snow with a grunt.

  “They’re surrounding us!” someone called out.

  “Cap’s hit!�
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  “Bastards!” another voice called out, followed by a long blast from a rifle.

  “Tuck, watch our six!” said Garza.

  Chad saw the Captain struggle to get to his hands and knees and in the distance beyond, spotted a dark-clad figure move around a tree and raise a rifle. He tried to yell and found his throat closed with fear. He was deep in the middle of an honest-to-God battle and it seemed the North Koreans were no longer interested in just capturing him.

  Across the meadow, Chad could see the enemy behind his tree, as he spotted Captain Alston, still on his hands and knees in the snow. A bright red mist had been scattered all around where he had crashed into the snow.

  Something clicked inside Chad’s bruised psyche. Without thinking, Chad shouldered his well-worn Henry and racked the lever in one smooth motion. The scope came to his eye just as he saw the North Korean soldier raise his own weapon. Chad was just a split second faster and he knew it as he squeezed the trigger and felt the long gun buck against his shoulder.

  The report from the .45-70 was incredibly loud compared to the sharper bark of the military rifles around him. When his vision cleared, the Korean soldier was on his back in the snow, one hand raised up in the air, clawing feebly at the wind. The hand slowly fell into the red-stained powder and lay still.

  “Oh my God…” Chad said, hands starting to shake.

  Captain Alston turned, still on his hands and knees, and nodded at Chad. In a hoarse, pain filled voice, he pleaded, eyes skyward: “Anvil…you gotta do something…”

  After some static, a different, younger voice replied from the helicopter: “Roger that, Hammer, I have the reigns now, so keep your heads down, ‘cause we’re gonna plow the road. Danger close, boys!”

  Captain Alston drooped his head down. With supreme effort he bellowed over the din of the battle, “Rangers, hit the deck! Air support is danger close!”