by Bradley West
Noise from below distracted her, and she rushed back to the foxhole. The kids sat perfectly still, their eyes wide at the sound of someone’s approach. Down the road she saw the Telluride creeping up. She waved her hands over her head and windmilled with her right arm to encourage a faster ascent.
A minute later, Jaime stepped out to the shocking sight of Carla’s facial burns and bloody head wound. Hearing that Katerina was on the loose up top, he searched the area with an expert’s eye and declared it safe. Jaime repeated the all-clear gesture at the edge, and Derek and Kyle made their way up into the open.
“Did you see Johnny?” Jaime asked Carla.
“He shot Muller twice, once at the pickup, and then he got up and ran. Maybe thirty yards from the pickup, I saw Muller go down hard on the second shot and thought he was dead. I brought the kids up here, and by the time I looked again, Muller had disappeared. Johnny was down at the pickup ten minutes ago and gestured that he was going into the woods after him.”
“Whose body is that by the pickup, next to the rifle?” Jaime asked.
Carla teared up. “It’s Uncle Sal. I shot him by mistake.”
Jaime sent Derek down the hill and motioned for Kyle to join him at the wreck. Jaime turned to Carla, whose former centerfold face looked like a Hellraiser extra’s. He focused on the beautiful person inside and the urgency of the task at hand, and kept his expression blank. “You said Katerina’s gone even though you beat her senseless. Are there any missing weapons?”
“I have Norris’ M-4, the same one I fought Katerina over,” Carla said. “Muller had the other M-4; there were only two. If there’s one by the pickup, that will be it. They buried two remote-controlled bombs along the road. One of them blew up the minivan; the other one’s still there.” Carla instinctively looked toward where she’d last seen the devices and blanched. Reassured by the presence of adults, the kids felt safe enough to start playing. They were in the middle of a combat reenactment and gestured with mock weapons. “She’s got one!” Carla said.
Jaime ran toward the children and shouted. “Kids! Kids! Stop what you’re doing!”
Little Lupita, still naked as a jaybird save for her shoes, waved her arms animatedly as she and her brother made gun noises toward the make-believe bad guy, Schway. Lupita’s fake weapon was a remote-control device. She aimed it at the preteen and shouted, “Bang! Bang!”
Far down the road, an enormous explosion sent dirt, rock and wood debris high into the early evening sky.
* * * * *
The shadows were long, but the light was still good as Johnny followed the blood trail off the back of the hill and into the unlogged old-growth pine forest. He thought about firing another three-round burst to call in more help, but he didn’t know what challenges the others faced. Besides, he didn’t want to tip off Muller to his location. A kilometer away, an IED detonated and raised many questions. He stepped around a broad tree trunk and a lightning bolt exploded inside his eye sockets.
Muller looked down on the unconscious man and reversed the Walther. The butt had a bit of brown flesh from his target’s forehead. Muller knelt to collect his enemy’s M-4 and a spare magazine and almost couldn’t stand back up. With the help of pine tree branches, he pulled himself upright before lurching deeper into the forest, wounded but still tougher than anything the Maggio clan could throw his way. Again, he rued his lack of a blade: that mulatto’s throat richly deserved cutting.
* * * * *
The second IED detonated fifty meters downhill from the first. The ball bearing–filled shaped charge dispersed its lethal array in a cone of death that anticipated a vehicle approaching from the other direction. The blast spared the 3Mers gathered behind the Voyager. Nevertheless, the explosion frightened and disoriented all concerned, sending Stephanie and Tyson into hiding inside the minivan while Erinn covered the newly awakened Arkar with her body. Yonten decided to head down the road to check out the disturbance. The sixteen-year-old’s bold plan hit a roadblock when blood loss, shock and painkillers frustrated his attempts to walk. Erinn brought Yonten the M-4 and told him to stay put and shoot anyone coming up the road.
* * * * *
Katerina made the climb of her life. She’d always been a winner, from teen national gymnastics star to gifted biotech research fellow to, as of today, world-class rock climber (junkie division). Quite a career arc for someone not yet thirty. She stood at the bottom of the ninety-foot-high jumble of boulders perched at fifty-degree angles and wondered how in the hell she’d descended without ropes, with her eyes half-swollen shut and stab wounds in her neck and chest. Her fingertips were bloody, as were her elbows, abs, thighs, knees and shins from hugging rocks where she could, and controlled skidding where she couldn’t. To top matters off, she’d done it with nine small grenades stuffed into her pockets and an M320 launcher slung over her back.
She had an hour of light left to work her way through the woods to a place where she had an unobstructed view of the Maggios’ celebration. She knew everyone would gather around the blue RV to mourn their losses and relish their ultimate victory. Through split and swollen lips, she smiled at the prospect of raining high-explosive 40mm bomblets down on those fools.
* * * * *
Derek and Kyle found Sal conscious. Kyle poured water into the grievously wounded man’s mouth and he swallowed a little before coughing the rest out.
“You did it!” Derek said. “The kids are free. Carla’s safe on top of the hill. We saw Stephanie and Tyson, and they’re fine too. Just hang on, buddy! Erinn’s back down the road tending to Arkar who was hit hard by the bomb. Yonten was shot in the arm, but he’ll be fine.”
“I’ll run down and bring Erinn up,” Kyle offered. “We’ll transfuse blood and patch you up. Sal. Stay awake!”
Sal struggled to open his eyes. “Muller?” he rasped.
“Shot once before you tackled him and another time when he ran off,” Derek said.
“Body?”
“Johnny went looking. He’ll be dead in the woods near here.”
“Kill him. Help Johnny.” Sal’s eyes closed as the world faded.
“Fuck!” Derek said to Kyle. “You go up and tell them Sal’s shot twice, once in the guts and once in the upper arm, and I’m following Muller and Johnny. Take all the spare weapons you can find and search that truck too. We don’t want Muller circling back here and opening up on us with something he hid inside. Better yet, burn the truck when you’re done. Leave nothing for him.”
“Got it,” said a suddenly spooked Kyle.
* * * * *
Jaime ran through the mental list of the weaponry that Johnny reported missing—two M-4s, check; IED ingredients including a kilogram of C-4, check; and what else . . . fuck! “Carla, did you see a grenade launcher? It looks like a stubby rifle.”
“Yes, Muller showed Norris, Burns and Katerina how to use it. It’s just over . . . shit. It was on the ground. There’s the grenade bag!” she announced with hope in her voice.
Jaime picked up the green canvas shoulder pouch and dumped the one remaining grenade on the ground. It was a cylinder an inch and a half across and not even five inches long—an unimposing device that killed in a five-meter radius and wounded out to one hundred and thirty meters. “Fuck! It looks like your friend has the launcher and a handful of HE grenades. We need to get out of here ASAP. Who has the keys to the RV?”
“Norris drove it up here. Maybe he does.” Carla knew she was to blame for Katerina’s escape. With an urgency bordering on panic, she dug through the dead biker’s clothes and came up with the key fob. “Got it!”
Jaime was halfway to the RV and didn’t bother to turn around, flashing her a no-look thumbs-up in acknowledgment.
Carla turned to the kids. “Lupita? What happened to your clothes?”
“I made her take them off,” Schway said.
Carla looked in shock at the little boy. Had Katerina’s sick questions poisoned his mind?
“I didn’t want the scar-f
ace man to see us, so I told Juanito and Lupita to take off anything that wasn’t brown or black.”
Carla smiled and rubbed the boy’s head. “You did well. Run down and pick up all the clothes you dropped. We’re leaving very soon.”
The kids scampered off and Carla sank to her knees in pain, both emotional and physical.
CHAPTER thirty-eight
Gambits
Tuesday, July 21, 2020: near Ruby Ridge, Idaho, twilight into night
Katerina could climb down rockfaces, but she was hopeless at sneaking through the woods. The only thing that saved her from a jumpy Muller’s hair-trigger was that his guard was down from blood loss and infection as he rested on a fallen log. Johnny’s first shot had pierced Muller’s left shoulder and the second one had torn up the right rear trap where the muscle anchors to the neck. That one was an inch away from being a game-ender and cost him a fair amount of blood and mobility. However, he was still somewhat combat effective. Muller heard footfalls and swung the M-4 around to face his flanking enemy. Who should he see but his favorite sadistic scientist, Ms. Katerina Kiel, worse for the wear and carrying the golden goose.
“Whoa!” she said. “I didn’t expect you here.”
He lowered his weapon. “Someone beat the shit out of you. Norris?”
She snorted. “Norris caught one in the head just after you ran down the hill. Carla woke up and I had her choked out, but the bitch freed herself and punched me senseless. When I came to, everyone had gone. I grabbed your launcher, almost fell to my death climbing down the rocks on the backside and here I am.”
“How many grenades?”
“Nine. If I know the Maggios, they’ll have a weenie roast up there tonight. I plan on supplying the heat.”
“You’re looking at the world’s M320 master,” he said. “They sent one man after me and I put him down in the woods. I didn’t want to risk a shot. Let’s go back and finish him, then bomb the fuck out of them from the tree line. We’ll kill them all and drive out of here in an RV filled with a fortune in Dark Cure.”
“With luck, you’ll wound as many as you kill outright.” Katerina reached inside her blouse and pulled out Norris’ tooled leather sheath. She extracted the big folding knife and locked the four-and-a-half-inch blade in place. “I’ve always wanted to apply triage theory in practice.”
Muller chuckled even if it hurt like hell to do so. He might be dead of MRSA in a few days, but at least he could still enjoy himself. “Help me stand up. I squeezed a handful of pus out of my gut-hole just now. I can’t think of a better way to spend the night than blowing up the Maggios and sending you in to take scalps.”
“Let’s do it, lover boy.”
* * * * *
Travis and Tien found Shorty and Tom on the Harleys prospecting off the far end of Route 20. The Silverado’s map function said they were thirty-one miles away on forest service roads. The only question was whether the pickup had enough gas in the tank—the warning light had been on since lunchtime.
* * * * *
Fifty-six-year-old Derek Strub was a self-made man who raised two children singlehandedly after his young wife’s death. He moved his family to Texas on the pro bass fishing circuit, lost his fishiness and transitioned to corporate life in California. Five years ago, he plopped down his life’s savings to buy the Rage. He refurbished the thirty-year-old, one-hundred-foot car ferry and ran charters in San Francisco Bay. His daughter Erinn worked as a nurse at a retirement home before Covid-20. Dodging a bullet, she’d spent the last weeks helping her brother Tom and her father with the ferry. When their last customer Sal Maggio asked if they wanted to join the 3M, the Berkeley Marina gunfight was less than a half-hour old and the ferry’s deck was still slick with blood. In a daze, the three Strubs unanimously signed on. That was a tumultuous week ago, and if he’d known then what he knew now, Derek would have taken his chances on the Rage. But he did appreciate the lifesaving vaccines and his newfound extended family.
All these thoughts and more flooded through his head as he knelt by the prostrate Johnny Gratton. The man’s forehead had a large cut and a giant welt, and Johnny’s missing M-4 scared the piss out of him. Muller was alive, nearby and deadly. Derek appreciated the difference between the convoy’s military superstars—Travis, Jaime, the late Melvin and Johnny—and amateurs such as himself. Muller was as good as anyone on their side and Derek was only a seasonal hunter. The waterman had an attack of nerves and was barely able to drop his pants before his bowels self-emptied. He composed himself and looked around—no one was in sight, and even the birds had gone quiet.
The Strub patriarch had half a mind to turn and run like hell back to the command post, report to Jaime and let the pros handle matters. Instead, he took the measure of the unconscious man and estimated his weight at one hundred and fifty pounds. Derek had hauled out enough back country mule deer haunches to know he could handle half that weight for five miles. This evening he’d try for double the load and a tenth the distance. The Canadian staggered as he hoisted Johnny’s limp body, found a balance point and stepped lively—in one hundred yards, they’d be out of those cursed woods.
* * * * *
Jaime stopped the Telluride next to the blue ’Bago and transferred medical supplies, food and water at a manic rate. He got behind the wheel and drove, looking for Carla. He spotted the bruised and burned redhead and braked to a halt. “Carla! We have to get off this ridge. Bring the kids to me. I’ll take them down and come back after looking at the damage done by that last IED. Keep an eye out for Muller. When I get back, take the RV down and park it behind the van until we can move it off the road.”
Out of one eye, Carla had supervised the children putting their clothes back on, while with the other she watched Kyle unload the XLT one hundred meters down the hill. She’d seen the graduate student bend down several times to check on Sal. “Sal might be alive. I’m going down to look,” she said as she shepherded the kids into the SUV.
Jaime didn’t have time for a debate. “Dammit, stand sentry up here until I return. Fire three quick shots if you see something.” He gave her a stern look and drove down the hill. A spat brewed over a contested seat belt, and he turned his attention to the back seat. A generic “Kids, knock it off!” suppressed the insurrection.
Two hundred meters below, the second IED had done little other than excavate a second large hole in the middle of the road. The shrapnel had missed everyone sheltering behind the Voyager, and no friends or foes had emerged from the smoke either. Erinn stayed busy and silently lamented both Tina’s death and the scarcity of medical supplies. Providing an ongoing pep talk to Arkar had worn her out, so she alerted Yonten and he moved over to speak to his father urgently in Naga. Mona was out of it, exhausted from tending to the others with only one lung functioning.
Steph rejoiced at Tyson’s regained vigor and prayed that it signaled a permanent turnaround. She deeply questioned her recent actions leading to murder. Yes, it was in self-defense, but the experience left her numb. She experienced an out-of-body sensation as she recalled the horrible episode, simultaneously observing from above while also replaying the action and remembering how her out-of-control emotions swept from anger to terror and now, remorse.
Erinn heard a vehicle and watched in exhaustion—if it was Muller, she was too tired to raise a gun. It was Jaime and he’d brought the children. Schway was first out and made a beeline to his idol, Yonten, and his uncle. That blood covered both of them didn’t bother the youth, and his unharmed state brought smiles to their faces. Juanito and Lupita crept over to sit next to Mona, who looked like she needed a friend. Lupita offered her the rest of her water while Juanito stared at the bloody ground behind the ruined minivan and wondered why his mother wasn’t here too.
Erinn unloaded the SUV while Jaime hurried down the road to see if anyone was approaching on their flank. The road was clear, and he returned at a trot, his new maximum speed. His left side was all but paralyzed and, every time he inadvertently moved hi
s left arm, the sharp pain gave him pause. As he walked past Erinn, he said, “I’m driving back up and will send Carla and Kyle down with the blue ’Bago. She won’t be able to pass the wrecked minivan with all that loose dirt and stumps. We’ll have to tip the Voyager over to clear the road. Then we load our wounded, and you and Carla drive off before Muller drops grenades on us.”
“If you can spare a minute, I’ll put a sling on your left arm, and it will hurt a lot less,” Erinn said.
* * * * *
“Dammit! Dammit to hell!” Travis knew that losing his temper didn’t help, but his normal cool was long gone with Carla missing the past two days. Out of gas in the middle of the backcountry wasn’t acceptable—driving eighty mph had been a great idea until it wasn’t. Not helping matters, before setting out Shorty had suggested that Travis limit his speed to forty mph to maximize mileage.
The trailing Harleys pulled up next to the bone-dry Silverado. “Hop on the back of our bikes,” Tom said. “Tien and I have plenty of gas.”
“Do you have a GPS unit?” Travis snapped. “Because if you don’t, we can’t find where they fucking went unless we drive all the way to the 3M camp and take the green ’Bago to the gunfight. Oh, wait, maybe we just call AAA and wait for them.”
Shorty exited the cab. “There should be a siphon in the toolbox. Transfer over what’s in the bikes, drive slower and we’ll get there by and by.”
