“Prowler this is Watchman, sorry he must have been running without lights.”
“It’s okay, you know what to do.”
“What to do?” I asked.
“Yeah, he’s going to record everything that happens next for us.”
“He’s calling for back up,” radioed Watchman.
“Good; out.”
Ilene said, “I’m recording.”
“Okay, great. I’ll kept an eye on the area till Rico’s van is out of sight,” he said without lowering his binoculars. They were armed, but only for their own personal protection, in case of muggers and whatnot.
“Okay everyone, here’s the layout of our next target. It’s a substation only about ten miles from where the raid is taking place. Here’s what we’re going to do.”
The substation was located on an east-west four lane next to a strip shopping center. Everything in this part of town is next to a strip shopping center. Most were closed or abandoned and emblazoned with graffiti.
Smitty and Hector, code named Eagle Eye, climbed up on one of the buildings across the four lane while Craig and Laura, Old Timer, took up positions about ninety degrees from them where they could keep an eye on the back. The rest of us made up the strike team, Piccolo. For obvious reasons Rico didn’t use the same call sign nor channel as with Watchman.
“Help me paint these vehicles first,” said Rico. We poured our sticky mix onto the patrol cars making sure to open the covers to the fuel tanks with screwdrivers and removing the caps. The area around the opening was given special attention.
“Come on,” ordered Rico.
We got our ski masks on and almost made it to the door when three cops emerged with pump shotguns out. “Get ‘em,” said Rico as he opened up. We knew we had been made.
Rico broke into a hard run with us at his heals, and we were in the station just in time to run smack into several zombies still putting on their combat gear. “Freeze!” ordered Rico. “Get your hands up.”
A couple of guys reached for their weapons but never made it. I opened up with automatic fire and twelve-gauge buckshot. “Drop it,” I ordered the next one.
“Cover them while we check the rest of the place,” instructed Rico. Rico indicated Slime and Ricki.
They found one person monitoring the radios. She was an overweight middle aged bottle blonde with exceptionally short hair. She needed to lose some serious weight or buy bigger uniforms, if they made them that big. “Don’t make any fast moves,” said Rico. “Come on sister, let’s go. You guys smash the radios.”
“Okay the place is clean,” Rico called out as we came back into the entrance area with our new prisoner.
“One at a time, come over here. We’ll start with you.” He handcuffed the portly matron.
Outside we could hear one of the sniper teams open up. All of us had our ear pieces in. “Piccolo, we’ve got company,” radioed Eagle Eye. Hector had put a round through the engine compartment of a cruiser, and they had the cops pinned down.
“We’ve got a couple more coming,” called Old Timer.
“Take ‘em out.”
The patrol cars were quickly disabled. Craig opened up behind the first pair with a warning shot. There was no place to hide.
“Okay the sprinkler system’s disabled,” said Tim who had just returned.
“Here’s the juice,” I said as I brought in the last of our mixture. Tim and I spread it around.
“Okay boys, we’re going to take a little walk,” Rico said to the handcuffed cops. A couple of them were red faced with anger.
Rico lowered his weapon on one particularly big and aggressive cop. “Don’t get stupid pal.” To the rest he said, “Come on outside.”
Tim lit the match and set the station on fire. I suspected Ricki had been giving him firebug lessons.
It was uncomfortably cool in the parking lot as we marched out. We could hear more police cars in the distance. Rico had helped himself to a megaphone.
“Cease fire, cease fire,” he called out. After the firing stopped he held the megaphone up to the sergeant.
“Tell your men to put down their weapons and join us.”
He didn’t say anything. “Look, do it, and we won’t have to kill them.”
The sergeant looked daggers at him. “Okay, I’ll do it.”
Rico held up the megaphone. “This is Sergeant Williams; hold your fire.”
“Tell them to put their weapons down and join us.”
“Drop your weapons, and walk over to the parking lot. Do it now, or these terrorists will kill you.”
“We’re not terrorists pal, you are,” said Rico.
“What do you mean?”
“You’re the ones running around in your ninja suits kicking in people’s doors and killing them. No knock, no warrant, you’ve turned our country into Nazi Germany. You’re no better than Hitler’s Gestapo.”
“We’re protecting the country from you extremists.”
“You’ve been lied to pal. Now let’s go.”
After we passed the patrol cars, Rico ordered, “Torch these pig-mobiles.”
One after another Tim set them off, and soon the gas tanks exploded. We were still a bit close; the blast wave shook us pretty good. I thought my clothes would catch fire.
“Hold off just a second; let us get a little farther away,” instructed Rico.
“Getting a little hot for you?” Tim chided.
The other cops began to join us and were promptly handcuffed with their own handcuffs. We crossed the street with them.
“Okay, you guys turn around and sit down. You can watch it burn.”
“You’re not going to get away with this,” said Williams.
“What have you been getting away with? What has Washington been getting away with? We didn’t create the police state. Washington did and you played along. Remember this next time you go to kick in a citizen’s door without a properly signed warrant.”
Then he addressed all the cops, “All of you remember this. If you were serving and protecting the citizenry, this would not be happening. You’re behaving more like an occupying army than peace officers."
Two more police cruisers pulled up and the snipers had them in a crossfire. “You said you wouldn’t kill them!” said Williams.
“Stand up.” Rico helped him to his feet and held the megaphone up to him.
Into the radio Rico said, “Hold your fire.”
“Tell them.”
“This is Sergeant Williams, put down your weapons, and come over here. They win this round.”
Smitty radioed, “They’re starting to hold back; I think they’re coming in on foot.”
“Okay, send in one person from each team to collect weapons and ammo.”
“Keep an eye on these prisoners,” Rico said indicating me. “We have some patrol cars to burn.” Everybody got busy and soon collected enough .40 caliber cartridges, .223 rounds, and shotgun shells to start a small war. Then we burnt the cars.
Craig began firing his rifle up the cross street. “Boss, we gotta’ move,” he radioed.
“Okay don’t bring the van here. Park over at the end.”
“Okay people move out,” ordered Rico.
The station was burning now as well as several cars. We had pulled quite a few assets from the raid. Would it be enough?
“Laura, get the eye in the sky up.”
“You got it boss.” She opened a box and took out a remote controlled four bladed helicopter. Then she took out the control and a helmet that looked like something out of an old science fiction movie. It was wired all over the place and a battery pack had been duct taped to the side. It even had a little antenna.
“What the heck is that?” asked Smitty.
“My new secret toy,” she responded cheekily.
Quickly she launched the tiny aircraft and leapt in the passenger’s seat with the antenna of the control box stuck out the window.
“You getting a picture?” asked Rico.
“Oh yeah. Hang a right here,” she said to Craig.
“How does she maintain control of the model aircraft?” I asked Rico who was sitting beside me.
“Help me with this window,” instructed Rico. The windows were removed or rolled down. Tim and Ricki were in the back where they could fire at any pursuers.
“Thanks. You see her helmet? She sees what the camera sees with the visor down, and when she turns her head, the camera turns.”
“We got our own drones now?”
“Oh yes, we’ve gone modern,” Rico replied with a grin.
“Turn left quick.”
“But there’s a median.”
“Screw the median, turn left!”
Craig slowed, swung wide, and stopped momentarily. He then carefully brought the van up on the median, crossed it, and drove down a side street.
“Okay, at the end turn left.”
“Wait a minute,” cautioned Rico. “That’ll take us back toward the last target.”
“Stand by.” With that she brought the little copter around and headed off to the right.
“Okay go right, but take the next left. Will that work Rico?”
“Looks okay on the map.”
“Pull over here and wait,” she instructed. “There are three police cars coming. Once they pass we should be able to get across the street.”
Craig pulled over and killed the lights. This street was another major east/west four lane. She was keeping us on the side streets.
“Look here,” Rico handed her the map. She could see though the visor to the map. “Get us to here. This is where we’ll set up and take out any backup that comes down this way.”
The target area was a major intersection of two four lane streets about a mile or so from where the raid was occurring. It would take longer on the side streets but lessened the chance of us hitting a checkpoint.
Hector had been monitoring the police radio. “You getting anything?” asked Rico.
“Oh yeah, and I’m recording it. They are running in a dozen different directions.”
“Anything on the main objective?”
“They’re not able to get in and are taking fire from at least one of our relief teams.”
After a few more minutes of driving and constantly changing direction, we arrived at another boarded up strip shopping center. There was a taller building next to it.
“We need to get two people up on top of that building. Otherwise your visibility will be limited. Tim, you and Ricki see if you can get up there.”
“The fire escape goes almost to the top. Ricki, bring the rope.”
“Got it.”
“You guys are young; you’ll have a better chance of getting up there than some of the rest of us,” said Rico.
“Okay, you geriatrics take it easy. We’ll handle this,” teased Ricki.
“Keep that up, and I’ll hit you with my cane,” responded Craig.
They were out and Rico said, “Smitty and Hector I need you across the street. Craig let’s go.” Craig maneuvered the old van across to another strip shopping center and stopped around back.
“Pacho, help them up.” I got out and gave Hector a boost. He stepped in my interlocked hands, then on my shoulder.
“Make sure you throw me my boot,” he said and pulled himself up onto the roof.
“Will do.”
He dropped the rope and Smitty climbed it while Hector belayed. Once he was on the top, I tossed Hector his boot and fastened the rifles to the rope which Hector used to retrieve them.
“Pacho you’re with me. Craig, hide on a side street. Laura, get your toy up high and keep a sharp lookout. Slime, find a place near the van to hide and provide security for it.”
With that everyone went to their assigned locations. I followed Rico.
“Help me with these trash cans,” ordered Rico. We began dragging the containers out into the street and in a few minutes we had a passable set of roadblocks. It wouldn’t hold them, just make them stop long enough for our people to get off a shot.
We found a boarded up building where the plywood had already been partly removed and climbed through the window.
As we entered, we saw three stoned druggies, but they were out of it. In another room there were two more who went out the back when they saw us.
“Okay, the place is clean, and there is a way out the back,” I said to Rico.
“Great,” and with that he finished knocking the plywood loose from the window giving us a view of the street. To the left we could see the intersection.
We had the intersection covered from three angles. Now we waited.
“How we doing?” I asked.
“We’re doing pretty good. I’ve only caught bits and pieces, but it looks like we’ve stopped the raid dead in its tracks and have them off balance. We’ll see if we can get our guys out of there.”
“Good, but I don’t see why we didn’t just go in.”
“That would have allowed the police to concentrate all their firepower in one small area. This way we’ve got them spread out all over town. They can’t concentrate their overwhelming firepower.”
“I guess I just want to be there, where the action is.”
“This hasn’t been enough action for you?” Rico said incredulously.
“That’s not really what I meant.”
“Angel’s on the team that went in, isn’t she?”
“I think so.”
“Don’t worry. We’ll get our guys out. Angel can take care of herself.”
“I know that, but still …” I didn’t know what else to say.
We didn’t have to wait long. We heard the siren before we could see the flashing lights. As planned the patrol car stopped for our barricade. Our guys opened up.
They disabled the vehicle. “Come on,” said Rico. We eased up on the two men.
“Hold it boys,” said Rico. We had them at close range.
They turned around in stunned silence. “Put down the weapons, and get your hands up.”
The younger one went into a crouched shooting position. Rico cut him down with a short burst.
The other one set down his automatic and stood up with his hands over his head. He was quickly cuffed, and after the body was dragged away from the patrol car, I set it ablaze.
We returned to our post with the prisoner and waited on the next one. I began to wonder how Red’s unit was making out.
Chapter 22 – The Torch is Passed from Patriot to Patriot
Commander Lee led his unit down a narrow alley. His plan was to get behind the zombies who were firing on the safe house before they had a chance to get the CS gas in and possibly burn the place down.
He was the tip of the spear. Angel was the fourth patriot back. They were armed with a collection of AR-15s, mini 14s, and AK-47s. One guy even had a stockless semiautomatic twelve gauge with a drum mag.
They could see the zombies now down behind their armored vehicle. It was actually an old command APC painted black with S.W.A.T. emblazoned in large letters on the side. The zombie on top was pouring short bursts of automatic fire into the safe house.
They were about seventy-five-yards out when a bright light fell on the lead troops. “Freeze!”
Lee hit the deck and began firing. Angel and the others near the front dropped as well. Shotgun slipped around the side and opened up. The firefight didn’t last long, but they were no longer able to conceal their approach.
The units behind him left the alley and approached on the main street. As they did so, they too began drawing fire. The APC attempted to move up the alley, but it only did so by knocking down fences and trash cans.
Shotgun went over a fence into someone’s yard only to be attacked by the property owner’s dog. He managed to get out without being bit. Dogs were barking all over the neighborhood and for some distance away. Sirens were wailing in every direction.
Angel called out, “Hey over here; I think we can get through.”
Shotgun crossed ove
r to join her. “Thanks.”
“You hate dogs or something?”
“Next time I’ll bring dog biscuits.”
“If we can get just a little farther, we’ll be behind the track.”
At that moment an older gentleman came out his back door. “What the hell is going on out here?”
“Sir,” called Angel, “get back in the house.”
“Who are you?”
“Sir, please get back in the house.”
At that moment he saw the APC, but it was too late. The zombie shooting out the turret was hosing down the alley with fire. The old guy caught a round.
“Cover me,” she said.
Shotgun laid down a steady stream of fire, and she bolted for the house. The old guy was hit but alive.
“Sir, I’m going to get you back inside.” She slung her rifle and picked him up under his armpits while he managed to use his feet to help her.
Once inside she laid him on the kitchen floor. “What happened?” Angel looked up into the shocked face of the man’s wife.
“Your husband’s been hit.”
“You shot him?”
“No, the police did.” More shots sprayed down the alley, blew out a kitchen window.
The woman stood there in shock. Angel jumped her and got her down on the floor. “Please stay down.”
She returned to the injured man. He was bleeding from two wounds, one in the arm and one in the shoulder. She applied pressure to both.
“Can you help me?” she asked the woman.
“Please save my husband.”
“Here I’ll hold pressure on it myself. I haven’t been shot since Korea. What the hell are you people doing?”
“The government attacked one of our safe houses. We’re getting our people out. Now help me!” she said to the woman.
She crawled over to her husband on hands and knees. “Here, apply pressure here.”
“Angel where are you?” radioed Lee.
“I’m patching up an injured civilian, an older gentleman who was hit by police fire. I need a medic.”
“Where are you?”
“Do you see Shotgun?”
“Yes.”
“Unless he’s moved, I’m in the house next to him.”
World War III - Home Front: A Novel of the Next American Revolution - Book One – As Day turns to Night Page 22
