by Hunt, James
The lantern rattled against the floor of the trailer, providing a false light that everyone huddled around to avoid the darkness that filled the trailer’s corners.
The inside of the trailer was huge, but all of them were drawn to one another by some deep embedded instinct in their DNA that told them survival was more likely in groups, and that the only way for them to fight against the growing threat was to stay together. It was such a simple concept, but one that was forgotten when times were good.
Mary stroked Jake’s hair, his head in her lap, doing her best to keep him cool in the hot box. She thought of James back at the ranch, still upset about his decision. The man had always walked his own path, and it was a path that he would continue to walk no matter what stood in his way.
Mary glanced down at their son, and then to her stomach where she prayed that there was still life growing inside. And while she had first been nervous about the pregnancy, what with the complications that she had with Jake, she now desperately wanted to have the baby, no matter its health or condition. She just wanted to bring life back into the world that had been so darkened by death and destruction.
“You don’t have anything to worry about,” Nolan said.
“You don’t know that,” Mary replied, and then glanced around, noticing that everyone else was eavesdropping on the conversation. Not that there was much room to have any privacy.
“What are you worried about?” a woman asked, tucking her knees into her chest. “Are we in trouble again?”
“No,” Mary answered, casting her reassurance to every member of the group. “No one is in danger.” She glared back at Nolan for bringing it up in the first place.
“Then what’s the matter?” another woman asked. “Is it Jake?”
“She’s pregnant,” Nolan said.
Mouths dropped, and even Mary couldn’t hide her surprise over the fact that Nolan had spoken so openly about her private life, but when he started to laugh, she couldn’t suppress the smile.
Congratulations were given, and Mary thanked them for their kind words.
“How far along are you?” the woman asked.
“About two months,” Mary answered.
And just like that, the conversation transformed from something so dreary and lifeless to the hope that a child brought the world. Maybe it was because a child represented a blank slate, a fresh start, a chance to do something good again, but for whatever reason, Mary was glad to have the conversation shift from survival to life.
With all of the talk shifting to babies and memories of family and childhood, the rest of the trip passed quickly and it wasn’t until the trailer slowed to a stop that the chatter ended and they were taken out of their reprieve from life on the run.
The engine continued to idle, and Mary wondered if they should try and get out, but she knew that it would be better for them if they stayed inside. She didn’t want to cause any more trouble or concern.
Finally, the back doors opened and the early gray of dawn lightened the darkness of the trailer. Even though the sun hadn’t fully risen, the light was still incredibly blinding and it wasn’t until her eyes adjusted that Mary saw a dozen rifles aimed into the trailer.
“All right,” one of the men said. “I want everyone out. Nice and slow.”
“We have people who need to be carried,” Mary said.
Two men were sent inside to collect Jake and Nolan.
“Careful with him,” Mary said, her joints cracking and screaming at her as she stood. “He just had a procedure.” She kept hold of Jake’s hand until his fingers slipped away from her own and was carried away.
Nolan was carried away next, and then the rest of the survivors were marched outside along the side of the truck, Mary joining the others as she was the last person out.
“We came here because of my husband,” Mary said after a time when no one was speaking. “He said that there was safe passage for us here.”
None of the men answered, and their leader simply stared at Mary as if she were speaking a foreign language.
“He was the one who brought you the piece of the bomb!” Mary screamed and stepped toward the men, who raised their weapons at the sign of aggression. “He was the one who told you about the enemy that’s coming your way! He was the one who told you about what’s coming! And he needs your help!”
“Ma’am, you need to step back with your group,” the man said.
But Mary refused to back down, and she refused to be ignored. “He said he made a deal with you! He said that you would help us!”
The leader took an aggressive step forward. “Ma’am, I’m warning you one last time—”
“Stand down!”
The order barked came from the front of the truck and the weapons were immediately lowered, the soldiers standing at attention as Mary watched another officer make his way toward the group.
The man was tall, around James’s age, but more muscular and clean-cut. A brief conversation was held, and after their sidebar was over, the group leader stepped forward.
“You all will follow my men inside where you will be given food and a medical examination,” he said, then turned toward Mary. “Ma’am, you will stay here for a moment longer.”
Mary’s group looked at her for confirmation that it was okay to leave, and it was only after she nodded that they followed the men.
“Mary Bowers, I presume?” he asked.
Mary shook her head, confused. “Should I know you?”
“Jonathan Banks.” He extended his hand, and Mary shook it.
“You’re… not what I expected.”
Banks laughed. “We can talk inside.”
Mary shook her head, breaking herself from the trance, knowing that they had already wasted too much time. “James needs help.”
“Mrs. Bowers, I—”
“The people who did this? The people who wanted to build that bomb? They’re already on their way to the ranch. James stayed behind to fight them off, but they’re going to kill him. Do you understand me? He’s out there by himself fighting a goddamn war!”
Mary waited for an answer from him, but Banks just stood there with his gaping maw, and Mary nearly broke down into tears. But she forced herself to stay strong and then turned back toward the road they’d traveled, back toward her home.
“He’s alone,” Mary said. “And he needs help.”
“Mary,” Banks said. “Your husband and I made an arrangement. I keep you safe, and he leads the enemy away. It’s the only reason why you’re here.”
Infuriated, Mary refused to back down. “And how much longer do you think it will be before those men come knocking on your door? How much longer do you think you can hide?”
50
Khan mobilized his men before the sun broke over the horizon. The march of boots thundered like a brewing storm, and Khan basked in the orchestra of power that trailed him. He knew of no greater rush than war. And as all great leaders and generals had done during their conquests, Khan made sure to lead from the front.
The fact that the scouts hadn’t returned from their mission told him that the man they were charging into battle to meet was stronger and more cunning than anyone he’d faced before. And for a man like Khan, it was refreshing to finally meet an equal.
It hadn’t been since he started out as a young man when he had tried so hard to build an empire that he had anticipated a battle like this one.
Of course, he knew that no matter what force was waiting for them at this ranch, he would crush the enemy by sheer force. He could lose half of his men, three quarters, all of them, so long as he was victorious.
It was dawn when Khan saw the buzzards circling overhead in the distance. He knew that they were approaching their destination, and he brought the convoy to a stop when they reached the dirt road that Dillon had described.
The entrance had been marked with the bodies of his scouts, both of them tied up, festering in the early morning sun. Some of the buzzards had already started to
feast. Nature wasted no time in taking back what was rightfully theirs.
“He’s only a man.” Khan looked past the bodies and onto the dirt road that stretched onto the property. He smiled, excited for a challenge as he returned to his vehicle. “Forward.”
The driver hesitated, looking to the pair of men that were still strung up by the poles. “Sir, shouldn’t we try and take them down? They’re—”
Khan pressed the pistol against the driver’s head and squeezed the trigger, blowing the man’s brains across the window.
The inside of the Humvee had gone silent, but Khan sat there, saying nothing. Eventually, one of the men from the back seat moved behind the wheel.
“The dead only slow us down,” Khan said after the vehicle was moving again.
James had grown stiff waiting near the house all night, but when he noticed the sky lighten from a dark black to a dull grey, his heart pumped faster. He knew that it was almost time, and while James and the others had prepared, he secretly hoped that he would see nothing. He hoped that the morning would fade into afternoon without a single drop of blood.
And when the sun burned away the muddy grey and transformed the sky into a brilliant blue, cloudless morning, his wishful hopes were shattered when he saw the metallic glint of a car and the caravan marching slowly and steadily toward the ranch’s entrance.
James counted a dozen Humvees, and between each vehicle were close to twenty men, putting the fighting force somewhere close to one hundred and twenty soldiers. And James could see that every one of them was armed with automatic assault rifles. Mostly AK-47s by the color and shape, though he saw a few M-16s scattered about.
Only a few of the soldiers had body armor, but in addition to the automatic weapons, each of the Humvees were outfitted with a fifty-caliber gun mounted on the roof, each of them manned.
It was a convoy meant for one thing and one thing only, to wipe out anything in its path. But what was even more concerning was the organization of the units. The men that were marching were doing so in formations, in rhythm, and in step with the man beside them.
The fighters weren’t just some ragtag team that had come together in hopes of sparking rebellions, these were men who had come to win.
James removed his eye from the scope and glanced over to Zi, who was standing guard at the other end of the house, or at least what was left of it.
“You didn’t have to stay,” James said.
Zi turned her eye from her scope to James, the lines on her face hardened as she squinted from the sun. “Yes. I did.”
James had mixed feelings about her staying, because he knew that Luis had felt something for her, that there had been a growing chemistry between them. And James knew that Luis would want her to survive all of this.
“He was a good man,” James said. “The best.”
Zi’s expression softened, but only for a moment, and she masked her grief by returning her eye to the scope. “I wish I could have known him better.”
James nodded, returning his attention to the enemy, the progression slow and steady.
All that was left to do was kill as many of them as they could. And while James Bowers had spent a lifetime preparing himself to survive the worst that the world could throw at him, he knew that every ounce of his will and strength would be tested in this fight. And he hoped that he could pass the test. Because while he wanted to stop the war, he didn’t want to die.
Once the Humvees passed the halfway mark, James and Zi retreated to their rendezvous points with Ken who had dug themselves into trenches as they awaited their fate.
After wiring and burying explosives, they’d spent the majority of the night digging trenches from their current position all the way to the woods that would act as their last stand.
“They’ve got tanks,” Ken said, unable to hide the trembling in his voice.
“They’re just Humvees,” James said. “We stick to the plan, force them to fight us on our terms.” He studied their formations and saw the chink in their armor. “They’re too close together.”
“Huh?” Ken asked.
“Their marching formations,” James answered. “They’re too close to the units in front and behind them.”
“We can jam them up,” Zi said, following James’s line of thinking.
It wasn’t much of a break, because James knew that they didn’t have enough explosives to wipe all of them out, but it was better than nothing. “We’ll wait till the end of the convoy is past the house and the barn.”
“Won’t that put them close to us?” Ken asked.
James nodded. “You’ve always had bad aim anyway, Ken.”
There was silence at first, but then Ken chuckled, followed by Zi and lastly James. And while it might have seemed like madness to laugh in such times, it helped lighten the mood, and it reminded all of them that they were human, and that it was their very humanity that they were trying to save.
The laughter finally died out when the front of the convoy reached the house, their forward progress painfully slow. The heat bore down on the back of their necks, and as James stole a quick glance down the line of trenches, he thought how odd it was that only three days ago he was riding these lands on his mare, chasing down stray cattle, with his biggest worry being if his latest buyer had dropped out. “Mary’s pregnant.”
He knew the statement was oddly timed, and everyone in the trench with him glanced around at one another, unsure of how they were supposed to react to such news.
“At least she was,” James said, needing to speak the words aloud before the fight began. “We don’t know if she lost the baby when she was shot. We won’t know for a long time now, I guess.” He cleared his throat and then adjusted his grip on the rifle as he kept his attention on the enemy. “I just needed to say that aloud, I guess.”
It was quiet for a while, but it was Zi who spoke first.
“Congratulations, James,” Zi said.
“Yeah,” Ken said. “Congrats, boss.”
James smiled. “Thanks.”
And for some unknown reason, James felt an odd shift in the mood and body language of the fighters beside him. They were fighting for something other than themselves, something more abstract. They were fighting for the future, even if they might not live to see it.
With less than twenty yards separating them from the enemy, James reached for the detonator to the explosive devices, his hand steady as a rock, and he flipped the switch.
The explosions erupted by the house and barn, chopping off the tail of the caravan, shaking the ground and tearing into the heart of the terrorist army.
The aftermath of the explosion caused everyone in the trench to lose their footing, but while the explosions might have rocked James and the rest of the group, it took the terrorists by surprise and momentarily halted their slow progression forward as grown men scrambled to find a safe place to wait out the storm.
However, with the enemy on its heels, James knew that now was the perfect time to strike, and unable to hear his own commands, he shouted for his people to open fire and started picking off the enemy one by one.
The stunned army fired randomly, their shots missing as they struggled to regroup. But their chaos was James’s opportunity, and he used it to bring down as many terrorists as he could bring into his crosshairs.
But when the front Humvee lurched forward again, James started his slow and steady retreat through the trenches and toward the forest.
“Keep moving!” James remained crouched even when he wasn’t in the safety of the trenches, and while they put more distance between themselves and the enemy, James knew that they had to keep moving, they had to make the enemy chase them.
The enemy recovered faster than James would have liked, but they didn’t let up on their assault.
After the fifth trench, James reached for the detonator once more and flicked the switch, but instead of a boom going off, there was nothing.
“The trigger’s dead!” James shouted while the
other two fired into the encroaching enemy, who had now regained some of their lost momentum as they approached the first trench.
Enemy gunfire forced James back down into the hole for cover, but he managed to sneak a peek at the front line, where the enemy had organized the Humvees into a wall of armor to protect their fighters and the big fifty-caliber guns mounted on top of the vehicles were being unleashed.
The plan was unraveling.
“Run for the woods! Go!” James led the charge, making sure that everyone made it to the next trench before he moved on, the three of them working together on their retreat, the thunder of the fifty-caliber weapons sounding like the explosions of C-4 that they had set to charge before the battle.
With James and company in full retreat, the enemy grew wise to their plan and weaved around the trenches to avoid the Humvees getting stuck, but the small maneuver gave James and the others the needed time to head into the woods.
Branches smacked James’s face as he led all of them into the thick foliage. “Just keep moving!” James made sure to keep everyone in front of him, not wanting to lose anyone, and eventually the gunfire faded.
Sweaty, exhausted, the three of them hunched over to catch their breath, and James checked his ammunition. “I’ve got three magazines left.”
“Two,” Ken said.
“One,” Zi said.
It was quiet for a moment, the silence finally interrupted by the rumbling of the Humvees nearing the woods.
“Anyone who wants to make it to the river,” James said. “Now’s the time to go.” He looked at each of them in turn. “We’ve done what we can.”
Ken winced, grimacing as he clutched his side. “I’m staying with you, boss.”
James smiled and when he turned to Zi, she had tears in her eyes.
“Luis would have stayed,” Zi said. “I’m staying for him.”
“Thank you,” James said. “Thank you for this.”
The roar of the enemy grew louder, the first fighters entering the woods.
