She hadn’t been able to get a good swing at him and the cuts were only shallow; they were bleeding, but the material of the uniform was soaking it up. There was no blood anywhere on the ground that he could see.
Jack took one final look at the girl he’d killed and shook his head before turning and sprinting along the road towards the rear entrance of the school. It was completely out of sight of the main building and the only danger of being spotted was from the other soldier patrolling the perimeter. He figured he had at least another eight minutes before that guard turned onto this road though.
At the rear entrance, Jack weighed up whether to climb or try and squeeze between the chain-link gates that were secured by a chain and padlock. The gates were slightly bent out of shape, and it looked like a vehicle had backed into them. He tested by pushing them inward and found the gap was around nine inches.
He decided to squeeze through; climbing would only aggravate the cuts inflicted by the dead soldier. He slipped his knife and the automatic through the gap them commenced his contortionist act. It took him a good four minutes and a few more nicks and cuts before he got through. At one point he even thought he was stuck and would be at the mercy of the soldier, who was sure to be turning onto the road any minute. He made it through with a final supreme effort and then checked he hadn’t left any blood behind on the pavement.
He spotted two small streaks which he quickly covered with a handful of dirt before sprinting for the school gymnasium.
32
Jack paused behind the gym then furtively made his way past the rear of the A and B classroom blocks. Apart from the administration building and the compound that had been constructed on the parking lot, the invaders did not seem to be interested in the rest of the school and he came across no evidence of them until he was in view of the big red brick admin building.
Peering from the shadows, he spotted a bored looking guard posted at the front entrance. That was okay, he didn’t intend knocking politely on the front door. By his estimation, there would only be two or three more soldiers and the Camp Commandant inside the building. If he could get in quietly, he was hopeful he could take them by surprise and get at least one before they killed him.
The soldier guarding the front was facing the compound, so there was no risk of him being seen as he ran quickly across the space separating Block A from the administration block.
The windows on the rear side of the building were head high so he crouched and ran along the wall until he found what he was looking for, a small window at ground level. He knew it belonged to the small storeroom where the shooters club stored their Browning BT-99s and other equipment.
Jack squatted at the window and looked through the grimy glass. It was dark inside, but he could make out enough to see that it hadn’t been disturbed by the new owners. As luck would have it, the basement was at the bottom of a flight of steps. At the top of the steps was a solid door that led into a storage room at the end of the long main corridor. The other end of the corridor opened into the main reception.
He didn’t know exactly where the enemy had based themselves, but he figured it would be near the large staffroom and offices in the center of the building on the other side of the reception. He judged he could afford to make some noise by breaking the glass of the small window.
He wrapped his hand with the sleeve of the uniform and smashed the glass with the heel of his hand. The sound of the glass falling inside was muted, as he expected, and he immediately began clearing the jagged shards away from the frame with the handle of his knife.
When he was satisfied that he wouldn’t cut his skin to ribbons climbing through, he threw the automatic weapon down into the room and got down on his hands and knees. He backed up, feet first to the window, and put his feet through before lowering himself. It was a bit of a drop, but he managed to land without breaking his ankle or any other disastrous complication.
Jack took stock of his progress. He knew he was on a suicide mission. Counting the perimeter guard, the one stationed out front and the minimum of three inside, there were at least five highly trained soldiers he would have to go through. Only the element of surprise and a lot of luck would see him survive the next 10 minutes. He knew he had the element of surprise, but whether he could count on luck, only time would tell.
Jack Monaghan, former student, picked up the Chinese assault rifle and switched it to full auto before heading for the door.
33
Jack climbed the steps as silently as possible. There was no light from the crack underneath it which meant its door was also closed. He opened the adjoining door and went through. The only light in the shelf-lined room came from under the door that opened onto the corridor.
That light probably meant the door at the other end of the corridor was also open. If it was, anyone looking into the corridor from the reception area would see him when he pulled this door open.
He raised the gun, holding it one-handed like a pistol, and slowly pulled the door open. The door into the reception was open, but only a crack of a few inches. With his heart beating fast, he emerged from the storeroom and padded the length of the corridor, praying that none of the rooms on either side were occupied.
He paused in the shadow behind the open door and listened. He heard nothing but the hum of low but distant conversation. He got down on his hands and knees, the shallow wounds inflicted by the female soldier stinging in protest and peered underneath the door into the reception area.
There was a cool breeze on his face but he could see no booted feet in the vicinity. Jack stood up and put his hand on the door handle before easing it open. Luck was on his side. The door was as silent as death as he opened it enough to see around. The reception was empty. The front doors were open, which explained the cold breeze he’d felt on his face. He didn’t spend too much time pondering why they had left the doors open, only that he had a full view of the back of the soldier on the front steps.
The soldier was bobbing his head up and down, and it took a moment for Jack to realize that he had headphones in his ears. Resigned to dying in a bloody firefight, Jack understood immediately that he would never have a better opportunity to pick off one of them quickly and silently.
He pulled out his hunting knife and opened the door wide enough to go through. The hinges made a faint creak, but not enough for the soldier to hear over whatever he was playing in his ears. Opposite Jack’s door was two more, both closed. The one on the right was the door to the principal’s office, the one on the left a staff room. There was a good chance that the Commandant and the other soldiers were in one or both rooms.
All the more reason to be nice and quiet.
With his automatic weapon slung over his shoulder, and his knife held out in front of him, Jack began to quietly cross the polished timber floorboards towards the open entrance. One of the boards creaked. He held his breath and stopped in his tracks. Neither of the doors flew open and the head-bopping soldier did not flinch. On he went.
He allowed himself to breathe again when he stepped off the interior flooring onto the concrete porch. The soldier was close enough for him to hear Taylor Swift singing her vengeful ‘Look what you made me do’ through his headphones.
How appropriate.
A vision of the soldier back at camp stabbing Katie in the neck ran through his mind. With his mouth grim, Jack stepped up to the soldier and gripped his head, pulling it back, exposing his throat to the wicked, black blade.
The soldier’s hands scrabbled first at Jack’s hand and then his throat as he tried to stem the tide of blood that spurted into the cold air. Jack held him until the pulsing fountain subsided, then let him drop. The body slipped down two steps before coming to a rest, the soldier’s pale surprised face reflected in a scarlet mirror of his own blood.
The memory of his sister’s death still stoking his furnace of anger, and now imbued with bloodlust, Jack wiped his bloody blade on the soldier’s uniform before pulling the strap of his automati
c weapon over his shoulder and heading back inside.
He stopped at the first door, the staff room. Jack kicked the door, just under the handle, with his boot. He was already squeezing the trigger as it flew open. The three men inside had no chance. They were sitting around a table in the warmth of the closed room, one with his back to the door and the other two to the side. They’d been playing cards, and a haze of tobacco smoke hung over them like a poison cloud. He mowed them down, one after the other, stepping into the room to ensure he got them at close range and before they had a chance to reach for their weapons.
When the job was done, he stopped shooting and replaced the ammo clip while he inspected the bloody, ragged bodies. He had only just slammed it home and turned to head back out when a sudden cracking sound from the wall to the principal’s office sent him diving to the floor.
With the acrid smell of cordite and spilled blood mingling to assault his nose, he quickly realized that whoever was in the principal’s office was shooting blindly through the wall. As if to emphasize the point, a bullet punched through the wall and whizzed by his ear.
Jack crawled for the doorway and when he reached the threshold he stood up beside the doorframe and ducked his head around the corner. The door to the principal’s office was still closed. He took a second to think about his next move.
If he burst through the office door the shooter would turn him into Swiss cheese. He had to play smart. Deciding a course of action, he flipped the fire mode selector switch from full auto to three-shot burst and turned to face the common wall. He fired twice, sending two volleys into the wall.
The return fire was heavy. Dust flew as splinters of timber and plaster flew in all directions. Jack darted out into the reception and stopped, poised outside the door to the principal’s office. When the gunman stopped firing, Jack burst through the door, hoping against hope that he caught the shooter mid-reload.
34
The sight that greeted him was unexpected to say the least. The shooter was a naked soldier wearing only boots, and behind him crouched the naked Camp Commandant. The terrified soldier swung around, still mid-reload, as the woman screamed angrily in Mandarin.
Jack fired, and the man’s chest exploded. He flew backwards over the desk, knocking over the office chair and landing heavily behind it. He didn’t get back up.
The woman fell to her knees and immediately put her hands up as Jack swung his gun back to her.
“Don’t shoot! Please, don’t shoot! I’m unarmed!”
Jack, despite himself, blushed. He’d never been in the presence of a naked woman, and with her cowering and vulnerable, the bloodlust that had powered him just moments before, faded.
Now he felt like nothing more than a bully.
Jack thought furiously. This wasn’t a part of his plan, but now that he was faced with the defenseless woman, he couldn’t just shoot her in cold blood. He pointed the muzzle of his gun at the pile of clothes on the floor next to the desk.
“Put some clothes on.”
The woman clasped her hands together.
“Thank you, sir. Please don’t shoot me.”
“I won’t shoot you,” he said roughly. “Just put something on.”
Nodding, she stood up and padded to the clothes on the floor. Jack partially turned away to give her some semblance of privacy.
He hadn’t contemplated taking a prisoner and wondered what the hell he would do with her. He couldn’t shoot an unarmed woman. He was still pondering the problem when he heard a yell from the front entrance of the building followed quickly by pounding footsteps.
The last perimeter guard!
He glanced at the woman, she had her underpants and bra back on and was just pulling on one leg of her pants. In a split-second Jack judged it safe to turn and face the intruder. He swung back around to the door just as the soldier skidded into the doorway. The enemy soldier jerked like a puppet on the strings of a crazed marionette as the bullets thudded into him.
The soldier fired too, his bullets splintering the doorframe and thudding harmlessly into the ceiling before he fell to the floor unmoving. Jack felt a cold ring of steel pushed against the back of his neck before he had a chance to turn away.
“Drop your weapon, you little asshole.”
Jack’s hands were trembling. Not with fear but with the adrenaline in his system. It felt like his body had been on high alert for hours and the pent-up fight or flight response suddenly manifested itself in a strange way.
He giggled.
Somehow, the idea of this woman, who barely came up to his shoulder, calling him ‘little’ seemed like the funniest thing in the world. The woman nudged the gun harder against the vertebrae in his neck.
“I said drop it!” Her steely voice now had a confused tone to it.
Jack laughed harder and almost fell as he bent over and placed his weapon on the floor. The mirth really got a hold of him now and he couldn’t stop, he put his hands over his belly as peals of uncontrollable laughter wracked his body.
“What are you laughing at!” screamed the woman.
Jack took a long breath as she pulled the weapon away and grabbed his shoulder, swinging him around to face her with surprising strength. Looking down at her angry face set Jack off again and he pointed at her, guffawing.
The woman, her pants now on but still shirtless, turned beet red and pointed her pistol at his face. Jack held up one hand, the other still holding his aching belly. She yelled at him again, so worked up that she slipped into her own language.
“I’m – I’m sorry,” Jack got out. “It’s just – just that you called me ‘little’.”
His laughter slowly subsided as the reality of his situation sank in. This wasn’t supposed to be how it worked out. He was supposed to be dead or victorious – no in-between.
Still pointing the pistol at him, she sneered in disgust. Her whole office had been wiped out by a chuckling moron.
“Put your hands on your head, and turn around,” she said in a cold voice. “Now, outside. We’ll see how you like being naked and on your knees. Your dead body will be a nice reminder about behaving to the prisoners.”
Jack knew he should end it now. She had the upper hand. All he had to do was turn around and try to grab her gun. He’d fail, and she’d end it the way he knew it would end all along – with a bullet to the head. If there was some chance though, some small chance...
She poked the gun into the small of his back.
“Move!”
Jack allowed himself to be herded out of the office. He stepped over the body of the recently deceased perimeter guard and headed for the door.
“Easy big boy!”
Jack slowed, careful not to get too far ahead. He needed her nice and close. His heartbeat sped up as he approached the large entrance. He couldn’t let her take him outside.
He slowed his pace and was rewarded with a sharp rap of the gun barrel to his neck.
Good.
As they passed the threshold of the door opening, he would make his move.
Three paces. Two paces. One pace. Jack took a deep breath and stopped in the large doorframe. When the inevitable poke from the gun came, he pushed backwards off his feet as hard as he could, flinging the back of his head like a wrecking ball at his unseen captor.
The crack of the gunshot ruptured his left eardrum… that wasn’t the worst of it.
35
Jennifer and Robert Cousins, who happened to really be cousins by birth, listened to the firefight from their cell. The room had been an office in its past life and had been converted into a sparse cell with two cots, a bucket for a toilet and bars on the only window.
The door to the room was one of those that Jack had passed in the corridor barely five minutes before. It had been their home for two weeks and the only times they’d been allowed outside its four walls was to prepare meals and deliver them to the kids in the barracks. It was tough but whenever Jen was feeling blue, Robert told her again that they had it bette
r than the kids in the road gangs.
They had looked at each other with concern when the first shots rang out. Robert had peered through the grimy window but could see nothing from the rear facing glass. It didn’t matter, the shots sounded like they were coming from the lobby anyway.
“What do you think is happening?” asked Jen, her eyes big. “Is it the army? I mean, our army?”
Robert sat down on his cot, his face drawn.
“I don’t think so. I mean, it can’t be. I have no idea who else it might be though…”
16-year-old Robert had gleaned enough from their captors to know that help from the US government was not coming. It was gone. Of that there was no doubt. What then? Rebels? In-fighting between the Chinese?
Another burst of gunfire, this time closer.
“Quick, grab your mattress and drag it over here,” said Robert standing up and flipping his bed onto its side. He helped drag Jennifer’s into place beside it and they knelt behind the perceived safety of the two mattresses.
“Keep your head down. If we hear anyone at the door, duck down as low as you can.”
He knew the inadequate barrier wouldn’t stop bullets, but it was all they had.
There was more gunfire and not long after they heard an angry voice they knew only too well. Senior Field Officer Chiu, the commandant of the camp. Jennifer gripped her cousin’s hand. That angry voice, and the lack of any more shooting seemed to indicate the commandant had been victorious.
That wasn’t necessarily a good thing.
A couple of minutes later, a single shot rang out causing them to jump. It was the last. Silence ensued.
✽✽✽
An hour after the last shot, Robert got up and went to the door. He placed his ear against it and strained to hear anything he could. There was nothing. Outside the door it was deathly silent and he couldn’t hear anything further afield. Normally there would be something. Doors slamming, conversation… sometimes even music.
Lone Wolf: A Post-Apocalyptic Survival Thriller (America Falls - Occupied Territory Book 1) Page 11
