Point of Crisis (The Perseid Collapse Post Apocalyptic Series)

by Steven Konkoly

  “Stand by,” Alex said, grabbing the crew chief’s binoculars and shoving them into McCulver’s face. “I need a positive ID on someone!”

  McCulver stared through the binoculars for a moment. “Roland Byrd! He’s one of the squad leaders.”

  “Weapons free!” Alex yelled through the cabin, flipping the selector switch on his rifle to automatic.

  The cabin exploded in a discordance of gunfire. The Marine gunners fired repeated short bursts of automatic fire from their M27s. Pressing the trigger rapidly, Alex tried to keep the scope’s bouncing reticule on the torso of a man next to a black SUV. A red cloud burst behind the man’s head after the hail of bullets shifted across the windshield and found their target. A crack passed through the compartment, followed by the distinctive, repetitive clang of bullets hitting metal. The helicopter tilted forward and surged over the trees, robbing them of targets. He turned to the crew chief.

  “Tell the pilot to put us down at the entrance to the clearing! I don’t want any of the cars getting off the point! We don’t know if Eli is here!”

  A few seconds later, the helicopter banked hard left, causing everyone to grab on to something bolted to the helicopter. Alex let his rifle hang by its sling and put an arm around McCulver, whose legs dangled freely over the edge. He caught the staff sergeant’s eye as the helicopter leveled.

  “Tempting!” he said, pulling McCulver toward the cockpit, where the assault team secured him to the fixed medical litter with zip ties.

  The crew chief grabbed him while he repositioned. “Tell your gunners to concentrate on the ground level of the house during the approach. There’s an automatic weapon in one of the windows. This is a one-shot deal.”

  “Just get us low enough to jump!” said Alex.

  “Team, we’re on final approach. Assault team exits on the port side. Out the door in less than two seconds. Starboard-side gunners, concentrate your fire on the ground floor. Possible automatic weapon in one of the windows or doors. Starboard gunners stay with the helicopter and provide cover for their departure.”

  “Ten seconds!” yelled the crew chief.

  Alex reloaded his rifle, mentally counting the seconds. He’d exchanged rifle magazines and reached seven when the starboard-side automatic rifles erupted, tearing into the windows partially obscured by the home’s wraparound porch. A red pickup truck lurched forward, speeding down the dirt road and closing the distance to the helicopter.

  “Concentrate all fire on that vehicle!” said Alex, sliding past the crew chief to help.

  The two gunners tracked the moving target with short bursts of fire, and the road exploded around the truck. Alex canted his rifle and lined up the iron sights with the hood, hoping to lead the target enough to send all of his bullets into the front seat. The rifle bucked repeatedly against his shoulder. The pickup truck’s tires exploded, and the windshield disintegrated from the concentrated fire of three rifles. The red vehicle swerved off the road and rolled to a stop, smoke pouring out of the crumpled hood, its lifeless driver visible through the shattered passenger-side window.

  “Time to go, sir!” yelled the crew chief, pulling him away from the starboard opening.

  Alex followed the last Marine out the door, jumping several feet to the hard-packed road. Bullets snapped past as the helicopter rapidly climbed out of the way, heading for the cover of the eastern tree line. The Marines wasted no time sprinting for the remnants of a crumbling rock wall fifty feet in the direction of the house. Several closely spaced cracks exploded overhead, confirming the crew chief’s warning about an automatic weapon. They slammed into the knee-high pile of rocks, bullets striking all around them. He crawled next to Evans, keeping his head well below the rocks.

  “Hit the house with 40 mike-mike until the incoming automatic fire stops, then move your men forward,” he said, as another burst of gunfire whipped overhead. “I’ll see if I can find your target.”

  “Copeland, Derren, 40 mike-mike at the windows. Now! Kennedy, Bradley, put the targets hiding behind the vehicles out of business,” said Evans, pulling a gold-tipped 40mm grenade from the Velcro pouch attached to his tactical vest.

  Alex crawled along the stones until he reached a break in the wall. He nestled the vertical fore grip against a rock and scanned the house through his scope. All of the ground-floor windows were partially broken or missing. Gunfire reached his ears, immediately followed by stone fragments and dirt striking his face.

  “Leftmost bottom window!” he said, lining up his scope’s reticle with the corner of the house.

  He fired steadily until he heard three nearly simultaneous thumps from the Marines’ M320 grenade launchers. A few seconds passed before the high-explosive, dual-purpose grenades struck the house. The first projectile hit the roof of the porch, penetrating several inches before exploding the overhang above the corner window. The second and third grenades hit milliseconds later, passing through the shingle siding under the porch roof and detonating inside the house. The three windows spaced evenly to the left of the front door ejected a cloud of wood fragments and drywall twenty feet into the front yard.

  With the automatic weapon neutralized, the M27 gunners tore into the bullet-riddled silver sedan hiding two men. A short burst of automatic fire knocked one of the men into the open, where he dropped to his hands and knees. A second burst stitched across the side of his torso, collapsing him in a cloud of dust.

  “Hold your fire!” yelled Alex, spotting two empty hands held palms forward through the car’s missing windows.

  “Hold your fire!” repeated the Marines, up and down the rock wall.

  “How far away are the cars? Rough guess.”

  “One hundred yards.”

  “All right. Here’s the plan,” he said, talking loudly enough for the entire team to hear. “We’re gonna move up with Kennedy and Bradley covering the front of the house with their M27s. We’ll move them up after we secure the prisoner and clear the house. Ten seconds. Do not fire on the man behind the vehicle unless he presents a weapon. Clear?”

  “Clear, sir,” they responded.

  “Reload and get ready,” he said, dropping the magazine from his rifle and stuffing it in one of his cargo pockets.

  The Marines reloaded their weapons and inched forward against the rocks, waiting for his signal. Alex pushed off the ground and jumped over the wall, motioning for them to follow with his left hand. He wanted to be the first Marine over the wall, in case a sniper watched them from the house or trees, but he also needed a head start. Most of the Marines in the battalion were twenty years younger than Alex, and he didn’t want to arrive at the cars embarrassingly far behind the rest of his team.

  Halfway across the field, the Marines overtook him, yelling for the lone survivor to step into the open with his hands above his head. He arrived a few seconds after the first marine, sliding between the leftmost cars and scanning the front of the house. Dark gray smoke poured out of the windows on the ground level, indicating a secondary fire caused by the grenades. A quick look at the second floor showed a few broken windows, with all of the shades closed. He turned to Evans.

  “Keep the M27s in place at the rock wall. I don’t think we’ll get the chance to clear the house.”

  Evans nodded, grabbing the zip-tied prisoner delivered by Corporal Derren and shoving him to his knees against the black SUV’s hanging bumper. Alex approached the scruffy, bearded man, who spit a combination of dirt and blood onto the ground, keeping his head low. He squatted and used his rifle barrel to lift the man’s face.

  “Look at me, you piece of shit. Is Eli here?”

  “No,” he croaked, shaking his head and avoiding eye contact.

  We beat him here?

  Alex didn’t think it was possible. The Matvee’s navigation software calculated the driving distance between Limerick and Rangeley Lake to be one hundred twenty-nine miles, roughly three hours utilizing the most obvious roads north. He doubted Eli would take a predictable route, so he adjusted
the course through rural western Maine and added another thirty minutes to the trip. Eli should be here, unless he drove straight to Charlie’s place.

  “Have you seen him this morning? Feel free to expand your answer beyond yes or no,” Alex said, jamming the barrel into the soft spot above his trachea.

  The man coughed. “He left about fifteen minutes ago with the other half of the squad. Two cars.”

  “Do you know where he was headed?” said Alex, moving the rifle barrel to his forehead.

  He closed his eyes and shook his head, “No. He drove in and sped off. Said he’d be back later this afternoon.”

  Eli wasn’t wasting any time.

  “He said that?”

  “Yes.”

  “Later this afternoon. Exact words,” said Alex.

  “Exact words. Are you gonna kill me?”

  “I haven’t decided yet,” he said, watching the man’s eyes tear up. “Do you have a way to get in touch with Eli?”

  “Handheld channel 11, subcode 33. If he asks you to jump stations, go to channel 14, subcode 21.”

  Evans wrote the codes on the top of his wrist with a black marker. “Got it.”

  “Is there anyone left in the house?”

  “I don’t know. Ron had the drum-fed AR. He stayed behind to cover us.”

  “I think it’s safe to say Ron is out of the picture. How many more?”

  “Five.”

  “You better hope the math works out,” said Alex, pressing the barrel against the man’s left eye. “We should have four bodies, Staff Sergeant. I see one to the left of this SUV and at least one in the pickup that tried to escape.”

  “Pretty sure there’s two more over here,” said Evans, scooting to the far right vehicle and poking his head over the hood. “Two dead!”

  “That makes five. Where are the keys to these cars?”

  “I have the keys to the Honda over there,” he said, tilting his head to the left. “Everyone had different keys. The plan was to split up.”

  “We’ll start searching the bodies, sir,” said Evans.

  Alex stood. “Roger that, Staff Sergeant. I want to be on the road in two minutes, assuming we didn’t disable every car in the lot.”

  “We’ll figure it out, sir,” Evans said, mustering the Marines.

  Alex yanked the prisoner to his feet by his shirt. “I need one of your radios.”

  “Byrd had the squad’s radio,” he said.

  Alex shrugged his shoulders. “Which one is Byrd?”

  The prisoner nodded at the bullet-riddled red pickup truck burning in the middle of the field.

  “That figures,” said Alex, rubbing his face.

  “Sir?” said the prisoner, still avoiding eye contact.

  “Yes?”

  “I assume you’re using a PRC-153 radio to communicate with your squad?”

  “Go on,” said Alex.

  “Your radio is basically a spiffed-up version of Motorola’s XTS-2500 line. It can access the same UHF frequencies used by Eli’s radio, with the same coding functionalities. I used to work at the Radio Shack in Windham.”

  The black SUV behind them roared to life, startling the prisoner. He dropped to his knees, pleading for his life. The gray, four-door sedan to the left of the SUV started next, followed by the pickup next to it. A rifle stock punched through the milky-white windshield, knocking hundreds of safety glass particles onto the hood and dashboard. Staff Sergeant Evans dragged his rifle over the dashboard and grinned.

  “I think we’re ready to roll, sir. Is he coming with us?”

  Alex kicked the prisoner’s feet, gaining his immediate attention.

  “If you can show me how to access those UHF channels, I promise we’ll slow to ten miles per hour before we toss you out of the car. Deal?”

  The terrified man nodded.

  “He’ll be along for part of the ride.”

  Chapter 45

  EVENT +21 Days

  Belgrade, Maine

  Alex raised a hand to cut down on the gale-force wind battering his face between the front headrests. At least he wasn’t in one of the front seats. He’d eaten his lifetime quota of bugs on the way to Boston in Ed’s Jeep. Boston felt a lifetime away.

  “Take a right after that collapsed barn,” said Alex. “That should be North Pond Road.”

  He picked up the computer tablet on the seat next to him and checked the map, making sure this turn was correct. They couldn’t afford the slightest delay. Despite the severely unsafe speeds endured during the Grand Prix-style, sixty-seven-mile drive between Rangeley Lake and Charlie’s lake house, Alex’s convoy didn’t have a shot at catching up with Eli. A twenty-minute head start guaranteed Eli would arrive first. He just hoped Kennedy’s driving had closed enough of the time gap to catch Eli in the planning or surveillance phase of his attack. If Eli opted to skip the prudent course of action and drove his Bronco right through Charlie’s front door, the Marines might arrive too late.

  “North Pond Road, sir! Hang on!” said Private First Class Kennedy, yanking the steering wheel right.

  The oversized SUV skidded into the turn, barely slowing as it fishtailed toward a utility pole on the other side of the crumbly asphalt road. Alex dropped the tablet in his lap and braced himself. The tires screeched, and the wooden post loomed in the rear driver’s side window. The SUV’s tires quickly regained traction, propelling them forward. The utility pole swiftly disappeared behind them in a cloud of dust, and Kennedy floored the accelerator. He twisted in his seat, peering through the rear cargo hatch window. The pickup truck and sedan carrying the rest of his team slid into the turn, successfully emerging from the dust cloud unscathed.

  “One point two miles to the turn onto Crane Road. Let’s slow down for that one so we don’t alert the entire lake,” said Alex, patting Kennedy on the shoulder.

  “Got it, sir,” said Kennedy, flashing two thumbs-up from the steering wheel.

  “I can’t imagine we’re too far behind him, sir. Not with Formula One’s driving,” said Evans, shaking his head. “They’re probably still sitting around tying their boots and adjusting their gear.”

  Alex nodded. “I don’t think he’ll wait around too long. He knows exactly what he’s up against.”

  “Which is why I doubt he’ll rush the process. He’s facing some of the same folks that kicked his ass the last time.”

  “I hope you’re right, Staff Sergeant,” Alex said, focused on the computer tablet.

  One mile until we find out.

  He thought about the layout of Charlie’s cottage. The 800-square-foot A-frame’s first floor was an open-concept design with floor-to-ceiling windows facing the lake. A spiral staircase situated in the middle of the house led to a suspended loft. Front to back, the only closed room in the house was the bathroom, which was located behind the kitchen next to the pantry. Two small windows and a door adorned the street-facing side of the house, which mostly shielded them from direct observation, but also restricted their view of the most logical approach. The steep roofed sides of the A-frame design came down to the ground, creating wide blind spots next to the house. From a tactical perspective, Charlie couldn’t have chosen a more difficult house to defend. Now Alex understood why Eli only brought half of the militia squad. Eli could effectively surround the structure by taking up positions on opposing sides of the house.

  The only feature of the house that might work in his friends’ advantage was the cellar. Robert Duhaime never set foot in the house, and cellars were not a common feature in lake houses, unless you were a prepper. Charlie had insisted on buying a plot of land high enough above the water table to dig a suitable cellar to store his supplies. With a little warning, they could take shelter underground and keep Eli at bay. Part of him wanted to fire an entire magazine out of the window at the trees, hoping that the gunfire might warn them of the impending danger, but he knew this might also warn Eli. With a threat at his back, Eli’s best chance of survival was to attack immediately and secure host
ages. If he hadn’t killed them already.

  His decision to attack Eli at Rangeley Lake put his friends at risk. The choice had been clouded by a selfish desire to put an end to this once and for all. He just hadn’t counted on losing the helicopter and missing Eli by twenty minutes. The RRZ’s return to base directive had arrived at the worst possible moment. He didn’t have time to consider how they would reach Charlie’s if they missed Eli.

  He glanced past Kennedy’s arm at the speedometer. Ninety miles per hour. Several seconds later, they passed a long, tree-wrapped gravel road, which satellite imagery showed to be the last driveway on their right before the Crane Road turnoff. He’d know really soon whether the decision to take the helicopter to Rangeley had been a mistake he’d live with for the rest of his life.

  “Start slowing down. The turn is five hundred feet on the left. It’s the only turn showing on the map,” he said, lurching forward in his seat from the car’s immediate deceleration.

  “All stations, prepare for dismount. Coming up on the turn,” said Evans over the squad radio.

  “I got it,” said Kennedy. “Green street sign right next to the utility pole.”

  “Let’s try to miss that pole, Kennedy,” said Alex, searching the woods surrounding the turn. “Looks clear.”

  “And I don’t hear any shooting,” added Evans. “We need to roll in quietly. Take the turn extra slow, Kennedy.”

  The Marine nodded, gently easing the SUV onto a smooth asphalt road flanked by signs announcing “Private Road. Dead End.” They cruised past the signs, slipping into the shadows cast by the tall pines bordering the road. Alex slid across the rear bench seat to the driver’s side and angled his rifle out of the window. The tires crackled over acorns, twigs and pebbles strewn across the asphalt, each sound exploding in Alex’s ears.

  “We’re looking for a black Bronco and a red Chevy Tahoe,” said Alex.

  “Or seven guys in woodland camouflage with rifles,” said Evans.

  “That too,” said Alex, peering through the trees.