Invasion

by G. Allen Mercer

  Ian rotated back to the helicopter controls and lifted the bird off the ground. Once airborne, he keyed his microphone. “Bob, this is Bulls-eye, go ahead. Over.”

  “Ian, we’re under attack! One of the Scouts has been shot and we’re pinned down at the pipe terminal. We need your help now! Over.”

  CHAPTER 15

  Leah looked at the number of men jumping out of the back of the truck, the communications equipment and then at Grace. She watched her daughter fire several shots, dropping one of the soldiers as they jumped from the truck.

  This place is really important to them, Leah realized.

  “Would three grenades do the trick?” she asked Joshua, holding up the three Vietnam era, fist sized bombs.

  Grace stopped firing and looked back at her mother. “Where did you get those?”

  “Mr. Rivers.”

  “Mr. Rivers?” Grace questioned. “Like old man down the street, Mr. Rivers?”

  “I would trust that man with my life anytime,” Leah said with a grin. “Be careful,” she said, handing the grenades to Joshua.

  Joshua took the grenades as if he were moving a nest of bluebird eggs. “Thanks, Mrs. Burrows.”

  “What can we do to help?” Grace asked. She then fired a shot towards the troops at the bottom of the hill.

  “Mrs. Burrows, I need that parachute cord that you have clipped on your pack. Is that all you have?”

  “Yes,” she answered, while unclipping the cord. She started unraveling the 25 feet of black nylon.

  “Okay, that’ll have to do. I’ll need about two minutes to tie these together. We just need some time before they make it to us.”

  “Guys,” Grace said in a warning. “They’re pulling out a mortar launch tube. I don’t think we have two minutes.”

  < >

  Ian rotated the throttle and manipulated the collective and the cyclic so the bird lifted away from the farm with aggression. Within a minute, he could see the ridge where his wife and daughter were pinned down.

  The wind and the rotor noise washed through the open door in the back. Mary had her feet mounted to the rungs at the bottom of the opening and death grips on the machine guns grips; her finger flexed on the trigger. She suppressed a scream as the earth passed under her feet.

  The ridge she had seen earlier appeared in the distance. Mary settled her nerves and tried to focus on where they were going. The helicopter was still there, buzzing around the water tower, but this time she could see the flash of rifle fire on the ground.

  “Is that where they are?” she asked through the headset.

  “Yes,” Ian said, as he banked the helicopter away, and towards the ridge they had flown over earlier. “Get ready to shoot.”

  < >

  Despite Bob’s efforts to save him, Bob watched the life leave the young boy. The remaining three Boy Scouts looked shocked, at the death of their friend, but Bob couldn’t deal with their shock the now. He needed them to focus if they were going to live.

  “Zack, you need to shoot there,” he said, pointing towards the trees across the street. Muzzle fire was consistently coming from the shade of the trees.

  “Why are they shooting at us, Mr. Tiller?” the youngest one asked, his voice barely audible above the firefight.

  “They want this terminal,” Bob answered loudly. “I guess it’s important to them,” he said. He fired one round at the truck, chipping the glass. “It’s bulletproof glass,” he said to no one. “Damn!”

  Thankfully Bob had heard the truck approaching seconds before it arrived. In those seconds he was able to get the boys in a defensive position behind the pipes. When the truck stopped outside of the gates, Bob dropped the first two soldiers that jumped out of the back. He counted at least ten more after that.

  Bob looked at the body of the dead boy on the ground. He didn’t like the odds.

  Get focused Tiller, he mentally told himself.

  Bob searched for targets through his scope. Finding one, he shot, and watched the target drop in a spray of blood. Three down.

  Zack was the only other boy old enough to handle a gun. He was shooting an assault rifle that had belonged to one of the dead Chinese soldiers. Bob saw that the boy dropped one target, before they were sprayed with a hail of bullets. The bullets bounced off the giant pipe, pinging and ricocheting in all directions.

  Bob analyzed the enemy’s tactical position against his own. The only way they were going to reach him and the Scouts was to lob something over the pipe, which was unlikely as it might cause an enormous explosion. They could mount a full on assault, but that would end with many of them dying. Or, they could circle around them and try to out flank their position…and the last option is exactly what they were doing.

  “Do you think you can handle this?” Bob asked one of the smaller Scouts. He held out another one of the Chinese rifles; he couldn’t remember the boy’s name, but knew he was no more than eleven years old. The rifle was over half the boy’s height.

  “Yes sir!” the boy said, taking the rifle.

  Bob positioned him next to Zack. “Help him out. Keep shooting towards the truck and the rocks, I’ve got our six,” he told Zack.

  “Yes sir,” Zack responded.

  Bob flipped around and scoped from the truck to woods on the other side of the long field. If the Chinese were going to get across the field without him seeing, they would need to crawl. Bob found two targets in his scope almost immediately. They were trying to cross the field at about fifty yards away. He fired and dropped one of them. The second pulled back into cover.

  “Bob, this is Bulls-eye, we’re coming over the ridge now. What do you need? Over.” Ian said, pointing the nose of the helicopter down as soon as they crested the tree line on the ridge separating Bob’s farm from the pipeline terminal.

  Bob keyed his microphone. “Suppression fire along the tree line in front of the truck. Over.” He heard the high-pitched thumping noise of the helicopter. But, so did the Chinese soldiers.

  “Guys, don’t shoot at the helicopter; that’s Ian. Okay?” Bob yelled at his Boy Scout gunners.

  Ian looked back at Mary. “Are you ready to shoot?”

  “No, but I will,” she said through the headset of the helicopter.

  “Fair enough,” Ian responded. “I’m going to drop us between the pipe and the street. I need you to start firing at the tree line as I fly. We’re going to be exposed for a second, but if I’m right, they’ll think this is their bird, and they wont shoot.”

  “What if you’re wrong?” she asked.

  “Let’s hope I’m not,” he said, getting a visual on the truck. “Get ready, 30 seconds.”

  Bob watched the bird descend along the treetops of the ridge. The Chinese stopped firing, thinking that support had arrived. He pulled his rifle up to look through the scope and saw the second soldier attempt to cross the field. Bob fired, but didn’t think he had a clean shot. The target went down anyway, but Bob couldn’t confirm the kill.

  The helicopter buzzed down over where the two soldiers lay in the field as Ian manipulated the controls of the bird to allow it to fly just above the ground at a slow speed.

  “Fire now!” Ian yelled into the helicopter headset.

  Mary had already said a dozen prayers since she shot the soldier earlier. She figured that those prayers would cover her actions now. She pulled the trigger on the machine gun and fired hundreds of rounds along the tree line and into the truck.

  < >

  Joshua threaded the nylon cord around the three grenades, binding them together to create one charge. He then cut the string, leaving enough to wrap and tie the grenades around the rusty third leg of the water tower. Finally, he took the remaining nylon and tied them gently around the pins of the grenades so that one tug would pull all three at once.

  “Okay, I need about twenty to thirty seconds of suppression fire so I can tie this to the front leg,” Joshua said, looking at the women.

  “You’ve only got fifteen feet of co
rd left, that’s not a lot of room for error,” Leah said, looking at the contraption. “Especially with three grenades.”

  Joshua looked at her. “Yes ma’am, that’s why I’d like to use the dog,” he said, looking down at Daisy.

  < >

  Violet looked worried, her son had lost a lot of blood.

  “Anna, can you please go into the bunker and get me a bag of plasma from the refrigerator at the end of the hall,” Violet asked calmly.

  “You have plasma?”

  “Yes. Can you please go get me one bag,” Violet asked again.

  “Is he going to die?” she asked. Fear had just started to break down the barrier of her earlier defenses.

  “No, he’s not, but you need to hurry,” she said.

  Anna turned around to go into the bunker.

  “Anna,” Violet said, stopping the girl in her tracks.

  “Yes, ma’am?”

  “Go ahead and get three bags, I think we’re going to need more before today’s over.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  < >

  Mary focused her aggression at everything that had happened to her over the last several days into firing the gun from the helicopter. These were the people that had knocked her airplane out of the sky. These were the people that set off an EMP over the U.S. These were the people that nuked Atlanta. These were the people that killed her parents and…This is for Elizabeth, she kept repeating in her head.

  The truck exploded, sending a fireball into the sky. The light brush and small trees along the side of the road did nothing to protect the soldiers. They were cut down with the violence of the high caliber rifle, and the person that fired it.

  “I think that’s good!” Ian yelled into his microphone.

  Mary stopped shooting. Her breathing was rapid and her hands were sweating. She released the handles of the gun and let it hang on the post. Ian set the helicopter down in the field and jumped out with his pistol drawn. Mary slid open the door on the other side of the helicopter.

  Bob was ready; he had the boys running towards Ian before Ian could make it to them.

  “Zack, take the front, the rest of you in the back,” Bob yelled over the sound of the helicopter. He was carrying the body of the slain Boy Scout.

  Ian kept an alert eye on the woods around the truck, looking for movement, but there wasn’t any.

  “I think I dropped two in the field,” Bob yelled as he ran past Ian and dove in the back. “I’m not a hundred percent about the second one, though.”

  Ian scanned the field and the pipes one more time; he didn’t see anything. He then jumped into the helo and rotated the throttle. Once he was off the ground, he aggressively nosed the helicopter forward. They were heavier, and it took longer for them to build up speed, but after a few hundred feet of gaining speed, Ian pitched the bird up towards the top of the ridge. Mary re-engaged the gun and kept it pointed towards anything that might be moving. She squeezed off a few more rounds at the general area, whether it was helpful or not.

  “Violet, we’re all in the bird and coming in hot. I’ll need you once I land. Over.”

  Ian looked back, but couldn’t see Bob directly behind him. “You okay?” he yelled.

  “I will be,” Bob tried to yell back.

  Mary pivoted around to look at Bob. Between them were the two living Scouts and the one that Bob was cradling. “He’s been shot, Ian,” she said.

  Bob looked pale.

  Mary slid the gunner door shut. “Let me hold him,” she demanded, holding her arms out to take the lifeless Boy Scout.

  “No, I’ve got him,” Bob countered; he wasn’t putting the boy down until he could let him rest in peace.

  “Violet, this is Ian, Bob has a gunshot wound…where?” he asked, tilting his head back.

  “Left abdomen,” Bob said.

  “Left abdomen,” Ian relayed. “As soon as we land, I’ve got to go help the others. Meet us when I touch down in 60 seconds. Over”

  “Ian, this Violet. Roger that, over.”

  “Bulls-eye to Momma B, what’s your status? Over”

  Leah and Grace were laying down suppression fire at as many soldiers as they could. The truck was parked directly in front of the communications equipment providing it as much protection as possible. Most of the soldiers had stayed behind the guardrail, or the truck, waiting for the mortar tube to be deployed. Obviously, charging a hill, when their enemy had the high ground advantage was not something they wanted to do.

  Leah heard the call from her husband and looked over at Joshua. He was wrapping the cord around the tower’s leg, and then around the grenades.

  “Give me a minute. Over,” she said, and then firing a few more round.

  “Joshua, are you ready?” Grace asked. “I only have one more clip left,” she admitted.

  “Yeah, I’m ready,” he said. He threaded the last piece of cord and then started walking back towards the back of the tank with the cord running through his hand.

  “You can’t pull that from ten feet away,” Leah said, she wasn’t about to let him put himself in danger like that.

  “I’m not,” he said. “Will your dog sit by the grenades and then run to us when called?” he asked, looking at Daisy.

  “Yes, she will,” Leah said.

  Joshua handed her the end of the cord. “Will you tie it to her and make her sit and stay.”

  Leah saw the logic of what the boy was proposing. Daisy could easily out run and get to a sprint faster than they could. Daisy would already be in motion to get out of the way once the grenades detonate.

  “Good idea,” Grace said, rubbing the dog’s ear.

  Leah took the cord, and then walked Daisy back to the grenades and had her crouch down. She then tied the cord to a ring on Daisy’s pack. “Alright girl, you can do this,” Leah said, feeling a lump in her throat. She loved this dog.

  Daisy wagged, but seemed ready to follow direction.

  “Alright,” Leah said, “you two head back that way. Watch out for the helicopter, you’re exposed. Let’s find a tree or some rocks. Go!”

  Both teens took off running back down the path that had brought Leah and Daisy to the water tower.

  Leah looked down the hill in time to see them launch the first mortar. “Damn it!” she said and hugged Daisy as the mortar hit the top of a tree and exploded close by. “Daisy, on me!”

  The dog went to total attention, with keen focus on Leah. “Daisy, stay,” she said, spreading five fingers out in front of the dog’s face. She then turned and ran, following the kids.

  Ian set the helicopter down roughly. Violet and Anna were there instantly; one of them opening the back door where Bob was sitting. Bob pivoted his legs, and stepped out. He wasn’t letting go of the dead boy.

  The other Scouts piled out of the helicopter, leaving Mary and Ian. Violet opened Ian’s door before he could take off again.

  “Bring back my other boy,” she yelled.

  He nodded to her, and allowed her to shut the door. Once she was clear, he applied throttle and the bird jumped off of the ground.

  “How much ammo do you have left?” he asked Mary.

  “I don’t know,” she answered.

  “Don’t worry about it,” he said. “We’ve got what we’ve got.”

  “Momma B, this is Bulls-eye, what’s your status? Over.”

  He got two clicks of the microphone, which mean that she couldn’t talk.

  Leah slid to a stop next to Grace and Joshua. They were fairly exposed, but this was far enough from the grenades.

  “DAISY, COME! HURRY HURRY HURRY!” she yelled at the top of her lungs.

  It took a second, and then they saw the dog round a small tree at full stride.

  “Hurry, hurry!” Leah reinforced.

  The dog took two more strides and the grenades exploded behind her radiating a shockwave or pebbles pine needles and dust. The blast pushed Daisy’s legs out from under her and she rolled along the path. Grace broke from cover and ran
towards the dog.

  A large section of the rusty third leg of the 1930’s era water tower vaporized from the detonation. The weight shift on the tower and the buckling of the wounded steel leg was instant; the tower was going down.

  “Holy crap!” Joshua said, now kneeling next to Grace and Daisy.

  The back two legs of the water tower bent forward with so much momentum and torque that the 90-year-old concrete footings that had held them to the earth were pulled from the ground, and the tower was free. The weight of the falling mass of water and steel knocked down any tree that was in the path of the tower. Once the actual tank, filled with 75,000 gallons of water, hit the ground, the entire vessel exploded and released the liquid, causing a torrent of carnage and destruction down the hill.

  The three would be soldiers edged up so they could see down the hill; Daisy walked next to them.

  “Holy shit is right,” Leah said, watching Joshua’s handiwork sweep away most of the side of the hill, the truck, the soldier, the communications equipment and a large section of the road over the side of the cliff.

  “Son-of-a-bitch” Ian said, into the helicopter’s headset. “Did you see that?”

  “Yeah, I did,” the words leaving Mary’s lips on a whisper.

  The tower tumbled down the hill, hit what was left of the road, and bounce over the side of the mountain.

  “I’m sure Leah and Grace weren’t taken by that,” Mary offered, hoping she wasn’t lying.

  “Momma B…Leah, come in. I saw the tank explosion. Are you okay? Over,” Ian asked desperately.

  “Bulls-eye, we’re here,” Leah reported back on the radio. “We’re okay. That was Joshua’s doing. He just saved us. Over.”

  Ian breathed a deep breath. “I think I want to meet that boy,” Ian said, smiling to himself. “What’s your location? I have a helicopter, over,” he told her.

  Leah had figured that he had the helicopter listening to the radio traffic between Ian and Bob.