by John Chapman
Both of the assaulters had been conditioned by years of training to not fire into a building where hostages could be present. Luckily Andy, the Sebring cop and machinegunner on top of the MRAP, had no such conditioning. In fact, his training in the infantry had been the direct opposite; if some shoots at you, kill them. Andy immediately began putting bursts into the window where he saw the rifle firing, pushing the billowing curtains back into the house. The fire from the target house stopped, however Andy kept working over the window with bursts of fire. Trent yelled, “Cease fire! Assaulting through!” It took two times yelling and finally banging on the vehicle with his ASP baton before the 7.62mm belt-fed went quiet. Trent yelled, “Cover the neighborhood. We are assaulting.” Andy replied, “Roger.”
Trent looked behind him and saw his seven assaulters and Mark, Kasey, and Gary behind him, ready to go. He stepped to his left and pulled Ernesto up by the shoulder strap of his plate carrier, while saying, “Stand.” As soon as Ernesto was on his feet he barrel released Trent, and the entire group moved up to the target house. As they moved Mark pulled a small ‘C’ shaped explosive charge from the breacher’s pouch hanging from the left side of his plate carrier, and a pre-made section of shock tube with a loop of detcord and a blasting cap at the end of it, called a red devil, from his right cargo pocket. As they jogged to the breach point he clipped the red devil to the charge and said, “I’ve got breach.” Gary and Kasey adjusted their path to work the breach with him. Mark was peeling the carpet tape off the door side of the charge as they ran up the steps of the porch, and quickly checked the door handle. It was locked.
The knob was on the side of the door opposite the living room, so three assaulters, one of them Doc Zimmerman, turned their back to the door to cover the big window through the broken glass and shredded curtains. As Mark was placing the charge around the door handle, Doc called out, “I see one armed dong down in the far-left corner of the living room.” Trent said,” Roger.” As Mark was unspooling his shock tube from the small PVC piece he used to contain the loose end, he said, “Doc, anchor shot that dude if he’s armed.” Doc shrugged, aimed at the dongs head, compensated for offset, and shot him once in the head.
Mark finished unspooling the shock tube, taking the time to make sure it wasn’t wrapped around anyone’s legs (especially his), and handed it to Kasey, who held the Royal Arms ignition device she pulled from her breaching pouch. She quickly made sure there was a cap in the device, then loaded the end of the shock tube into the receptacle on the top of the initiator, tightened the locking lug, and pulled the safety pin. Mark brought his 7.62X51 carbine up to cover her as she nodded to Trent. Trent checked to make sure his assaulters were placed safely, and quickly gave Kasey a barrel release.
Less than four minutes from Trent seeing the unconscious woman being drug by the hair into the house, the 50 grain detcord C shaped breaching charge cut the entire handle and deadbolt mechanism out of the door. The team surged through the breach point, with Bravo team focusing on the first floor and basement, while Mark took Kasey, Gary, and Doc Zimmerman to the immediate right of the breach point, where they found the narrow stairs leading to the second floor.
Mark and Gary led up the stairs, with Kasey and Doc staying one landing behind them in case the point element needed room to back up. There wasn’t room for both Mark and Gary in the space, so Mark was slightly ahead of Gary on the outside of the first angle, where the stairs turned left. As Mark got a couple of steps from the first landing, and the 90-degree angle of exposure of the left turn, he heard shots from upstairs. Whoever it was, they weren’t shooting at them, which concerned him. In a hostage rescue you want the bad guys shooting at you, not the hostages. Mark sprinted up the stairs, Gary right on his heels and Kasey and Doc at a full run, taking two steps at a time, to catch up with them.
Mark could see the muzzle flash and hear the reports of what sounded like a pistol coming from the right side of the second floor, so when his feet hit the second floor landing he pivoted right and drove hard in that direction. His Knights heavy carbine was in the high ready position, with its stock down near his holster and the tip of his muzzle even with where he was looking. Mark liked this position a lot, and preferred it to low ready, when it was safe to use. He was happy he was using it today, because as soon as Mark drove to the right he came face to face with a dong holding a pistol aimed at the floor and a dumb look on his face.
P-Hound didn’t have time to react, as Mark’s momentum covered the 3 feet separating them faster than his mind could process the giant man in SWAT gear pointing a giant rifle in his face. Before Mr. Hound could process what was happening, Mark had rammed him in the face with the conveniently located muzzle of his 11-pound rifle. Mark’s Surefire flash hider somehow found its way past P-Hound’s lips, through his teeth and against the roof of his mouth. Mark continued driving to the far corner, now with P-Hound swinging from the end of his gun.
Aside from some missing teeth, this wouldn’t have been too terrible for P-hound; except that when his back found the hallway wall, his sudden stop was met by the mass-times-velocity of 220 pounds of assaulter and 60 pounds of gear, focused on the very small surface area where the top half of the tip of Mark’s flash hider was touching the roof of P-Hound’s mouth. The result was messy. Mark’s continued forward momentum not only turned his flash hider into a bayonet, but it imbedded P-Hound in the drywall.
Mark held the dong against the wall and let go of his rifle with his left hand. He took the Taurus Millennium 9mm pistol out of the guy’s hand as he continued to convulse and leak blood, and grey gelatinous matter, out of his mouth, all over Mark’s rifle and boots. Looking around and seeing that Gary and Kasey had flowed past him, he waited for Doc to come into his peripheral vision before he let the pressure off the guy. When Mark stepped back and ripped his muzzle out of the dude’s face with one hard tug, the dong remained trapped in the drywall. Doc grimaced and said, “Not much I can do for that wound. Holy shit.”
Mark reached up, grabbed the still convulsing body, and succeeded in getting it out of the drywall. He let the dude flop to the ground, then kicked the guy over onto his face, Cobra cuffed him and searched him for weapons. Finding nothing other than some bunk weed rolled inside blunts, Mark and Doc looked for more work to do. Doc said, “Everything behind us is clear.” Mark nodded and led Doc into the closest room. The door was marked with a chemlight, so Mark knew Gary and Kasey had already been here.
As they did a quick secondary search of the room, they heard Kasey broadcast on the radio, “Three-Bravo-One, Knight Five-Alpha. Three Hotels’ recovered on level two. We are going to need a few minutes to get them ready to move and…” Kasey was interrupted when Gary, who was looking out one of the bedroom windows to the southwest, brought his rifle optic up to his eye, dialed more magnification on his Khales 1-6, and fired 10 rounds quickly. The three hostages screamed and tried leaving the room, probably because the BCM 5.56mm 14.5 inch carbine with the Warcomp on the end felt like a flashbang was going off in the room every time Gary fired.
Kasey managed to get the women under control as Mark and Doc moved inside the room. Doc helped Kasey with the girls while Mark went to the window to see what Gary was shooting at. When Mark looked out the window he said, “Shit.” then pushed his PTT, “Three-Bravo-One, Knight Five. Two large groups of armed dongs are approaching from the west and the southwest. Both are less than 100 yards away. You need to get out of here now. We will try to fix them in place from up here, Kasey and Doc are moving the Hotels to you. Get them to the truck and haul ass. Don’t wait for us.” Gary resumed firing as soon as Mark stopped talking, and Kasey and Doc pushed the hostages out of the room and down the stairs.
Mark motioned for Gary to take a knee, then stood behind him in the high/low position, and both of them began shooting. Mark could hear the M240 working on top of the MRAP, and saw dongs falling down in the group to the southwest, as that group scattered under the intense machinegun fire. He focused on the g
roup of about 10 dongs filtering through the houses to the south, an area that wasn’t visible from the MRAP. Mark picked out a white kid in a Nike hoodie carrying a lever action rifle, and tried to steady the red dot of his Short Dot optic as much as possible, given the target was jogging and he was shooting from an unsupported standing position, and fired two rounds at him.
With so many bad guys, Mark didn’t want to become too focused on any one threat. He moved onto the next target, then the next, delivering controlled pairs to everyone down there as fast as he could transition targets. The dongs finally wised up and scattered, taking cover behind the houses in the area. Even with the active hearing protection provided by their MSA headsets, the concussion of the unsuppressed rifles in the 10X8 foot room was deafening. The only way Mark knew the MRAP was moving off target was Trent came on the radio and said, “Three-Bravo-One off target. Knight Five, move.”
Gary and Mark didn’t need to be told twice. They reloaded their rifles, then sprinted out of the room, past the Cobra-cuffed dong on the floor, and down the stairs. They paused long enough at the front door to regroup, then Mark gave Gary a barrel release and they pushed outside. Sporadic gunfire snapped around them, but none of it seemed to be impacting close to them. Mark took a knee on the front lawn, facing the south, and said, “Set.” Gary sprinted about 25 yards east, turned around and took a knee and yelled, “Set.” Mark got up and ran about 50 yards east to their quads, turned around and took a knee and yelled, “Set.” Gary got up and sprinted the last 25 yards to the quads, got on his quad and started it. Once it was running, he brought his carbine to the high ready, prepared to cover Mark.
Mark got on his quad and started it, then hesitated. He hated to leave Kasey’s quad here; he didn’t want to give the dongs any transportation. As he thought about how to destroy it, the answer came in the form of a ranger green HMWWV screeching around the nearest corner to their east and skidding to a halt. Ken Branch got out of the passenger seat and said, “Where do you want us?” Mark replied, “Get on this quad and let’s get out of here.” Branch didn’t hesitate; he ran to the quad, got on, and started it. Mark turned his quad around to face east and said, “Moving.” He gunned the engine and took off to the east, with the other two quads and the HMWWV on his tail.
After they turned north off Auld Street onto Mahoning, Mark pushed his PTT and said, “Knight Five off target. Last man. Units rally back at the FOB.”
In the MRAP, Kasey breathed a prayer of thanks to the Lord. When Mark ordered her and Doc to get the hostages to the MRAP and leave, she hadn’t hesitated. But as soon as the MRAP pulled away from the target she realized Mark and Gary were still stuck in that house, and were being surrounded by dirtbags with guns. She should have stayed behind once the hostages were secure in the armored vehicle. In the two minutes or so between them pulling away and Mark calling off target, she had convinced herself he had sacrificed himself for her, and he wasn’t going to make it out. She said her prayer of thanks and tried to let it go.
As she watched the chaotic scene in front of her inside the cramped MRAP troop compartment, she found something new to focus on: Doc Zimmerman was having a rough time checking one of the hostages, a young black girl who looked about 12 years old. The girl kept batting his hands away and yelling, “Get off me!” Kasey fought the motion of the truck and the confined space until she was next to the girl and said, “He’s a doctor, let him check you.” The girl stopped resisting and let Doc check her for gunshot wounds. Finding nothing, Doc checked the last hostage, then started making the rounds of the team, making sure no one was wounded or hurt and unaware because of the adrenalin dump of the hit.
Kasey wanted to say something to the girl to comfort her, but the noise of the truck and the general pandemonium in the troop compartment prevented anything but the most basic communication. It didn’t help Ernesto was obviously trying to qualify for the pole position in a NASCAR race, the way he was driving. Carol, her already nauseous stomach pushed over the edge by the violent and unpredictable movement in the virtually windowless troop compartment, croaked, “I’m going to be sick,” and promptly projectile vomited all over Trent, who was sitting across from her. Trent, a blank look on his face, stared straight ahead into space.
After a few seconds, he yelled up at Ernesto, “Slow down bro, it’s like a roller coaster back here.” The roller coaster reference, along with the smell of fresh vomit, was apparently enough to make the girl next to Kasey violently toss her cookies, followed closely by a chain-reaction of assaulters spewing the contents of their stomachs all over one another. Kasey looked at Trent and said, “Have fun cleaning this up. Not it!” Looking pretty green himself by now, Trent could only flip her off before he too lost his dignity.
Chapter 23
Norfolk Southern Railroad Right-of-way
One mile north of Alliance, OH
Earlier that morning, as day two of the apocalypse dawned, Chris was walking to the FOB bathrooms and looking at the cold grey sky, after waking up from whopping 3 hours of sleep. As he strolled along minding his own business, Kyle stopped him and said, “Good Morning Chris! Congratulations, you’ve been volun-told! You’re now in charge of ‘Salvage and Resource Recovery’ for the City.” Chris could only stare at him blankly for a minute, not really understanding what Kyle was telling him. When he didn’t speak Kyle said, “It’ll be fun buddy!” with a grin. Chris replied, “What will be fun? I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about.”
Kyle grinned and said, “You’ve been reassigned to be in charge of all the salvage work the city needs to survive; gathering all the food, fuel, stuff like that. We were just discussing who would be best to do that job, and I dropped your name. Aren’t you excited!” Chris began to understand what Kyle was telling him and said, “You’re an asshole Kyle.” Kyle laughed then got serious for a second, “Seriously bro, You’re perfect for the job. We really do need you in that slot.” Chris sighed and replied, “Buddy is only half the name. Holy crap that’s a huge undertaking.” He paused to think, then said, “Can I have Ed to help?” Kyle said, “You know I’m the King of the Blue Falcons buddy. Yes, you can have Ed; and the Mayor is instituting a plan to gather as much manpower as we can get. You’ll have priority for all of the appropriately skilled labor.”
Chris made one last-ditch attempt, “I’m not sure I’m the best person for the job bro, and my team needs me.” Kyle shook his head, “You are the best person for the job; and I have trigger pullers coming out of my ears. What I don’t have is anyone else that can plan, think logically, organize, and execute big jobs with no supervision, who also has your depth of experience moving and keeping track of lots of big things, and leading the huge amounts of manpower needed to get it done.” Chris sighed and said, “Well, alright I guess.” Kyle smiled and said, “That’s the spirit of half-hearted indifference we’ve come to expect from you! You’re welcome,” then walked away laughing.
Chris spent the first 5 minutes of his new job trying to find Ed. He finally tracked him down in the FOB kitchen, eating a peanut butter sandwich and sipping a Diet Pepsi. Chris stood over him and stared. Ed ignored him. Chris sat down across the narrow plastic classroom table and continued to stare. Finally, Ed said, “Do you have to register with the cops for that thing?” “What ‘thing’?” Chris replied. Ed said, “That weirdo perv thing you’re doing, watching me eat like you’re putting cash in your spank bank. I doubt I’m your first victim.” Ed looked at Ken Branch’s wife, who was in the kitchen having an early morning cup of coffee, and continued, “I mean, seriously Karen, you seeing this sicko assaulting me with his eyes? Hashtag ‘me too’, right sister!”
Karen spit coffee out her nose laughing. Chris couldn’t help himself, and busted up. When the laughter died down Ed said, “What’s up brother Chris?” It was Chris’ turn to smile, “We got a special mission buddy, just me and you.” Ed was a former Marine, and noticed the ‘buddy’ Chris just dropped on him. Anytime someone called you buddy, you were abo
ut to get the big green one in the exit only chute. He groaned and said, “Uh oh.” Chris smiled even bigger and said, “That’s right buddy, you and me. I just got assigned as the City Salvage and Resource Recovery Director, and guess who is now my right-hand man? That’s right buddy; you! Aren’t you excited!”
Ed groaned louder and exclaimed, “Oh no you didn’t! No way bro, I’m a shooter, not a supply clerk. I’m on a squared away team; we are deploying in like 20 minutes. For the first time since I got out of the Marines, I feel useful bro. No way; not happening! Find someone else.” he crossed his arms and gave Chris his best mad-dog Marine scowl. Chris just grinned and said, “Squadron Commander Kyle Wilson himself assigned you to me buddy. If I gotta come off a team and do this job ‘for the greater good’, you do too buddy. Look on the bright side.” Ed waited for Chris to tell him what the bright side was, and when he didn’t Ed said, “What bright side?” Chris grinned and said, “Oh, there isn’t one. I was just trying to sound positive.” Karen found that one much more amusing than Ed did. Ed finally sighed and said, “Alright. We’re burning daylight. Where do we start?”
