Fire From the Sky: Firestorm Page 4

  “Just nailed your sister,” Heath said, then reddened as the others laughed.

  “Shut up,” the quiet teen swore. “You know what I meant you perverted bastards.”

  “Shut up, all of you,” Gordy said without rancor. “I'm surprised she was in the open like that,” he admitted, getting their attention back on the game. “All right. Heath, take any targets of opportunity. Zach, Titus, are you in place?”

  “Ready to rock,” Zach replied from the far side of the field. They were in position.

  “Open fire.”

  –

  “Wha….? .Hey! We're takin' fire!” Bryon Jessup yelled. He jumped up from his position to call attention to himself and got it at once when three pellets found his torso.

  “Damn,” he swore, falling down as he had been told. Under the rules, he was now 'dead'. In the barn, Matthew Webb saw what happened and turned from his place in the loft.

  “Abby! Bryon is dow-…..Abby?” he asked as he saw her lying on her back, hands under her head as she stared at the ceiling.

  “Dead,” she said flatly. “For probably five minutes now,” she looked at her watch.

  Wha. . .well, who's in charge now?” he demanded.

  “Can't tell you,” she shrugged. “Dead, remember?”

  –

  “I think Abby must have been in charge, judging by how disorganized they are,” Gordy mused. He turned to Corey and Kade.

  “Start moving in.” The two nodded and began following the narrow ditch that led toward the barn at an oblique angle.

  “Heath, what's your count?”

  “Five,” his friend replied. “Six, now,” he added a few seconds later.

  “We're moving,” he warned. “You're on your own.”

  “Roger that.” Gordy shook his head at the simple reply, grinning slightly. Of all of them, the 'soldier' thing had fit Heath the best. The most, anyway. He took just a second to laugh silently before following his friends into the damp ground toward their target.

  –

  “That's six, maybe seven,” Titus said.

  “I think it's time we move,” Zach nodded. “I'm going to the right. Once I find a better spot, I’ll open fire and you take that chance to move my way. Further we are from where they're headed, less likely it is they spot them.”

  “Got it.”

  –

  “There's not enough fire,” Lainie said. She was on the floor of the barn, trying to look out a knot hole and see what was happening.

  “What?” Beverly Jackson said, looking up from her own peephole.

  “There's not enough fire,” Lainie repeated. “There are six of them, but if I'm seeing this right, only three are shooting. Maybe four at the most. Two out there,” she pointed in the general direction of where Bryon had been shot, “and one behind,” she pointed out the rear of the barn.

  “Where are the other three, then?” Beverly asked.

  “Good question,” Lainie nodded. “Where are they?”

  –

  “We're almost in position,” Gordy called. “Count?”

  “Seven for us,” Zach called. “There are still two people at the building on our side. Pretty sure one of 'em is Sammy Webb. He's hard to spot and harder to hit.”

  “Stay on them,” Gordy ordered. “All you have to do is keep their attention anyway. Heath?”

  “Seven,” Heath replied. “I think they've abandoned the rear of the barn. I can just reach the other outbuilding, and tagged one there, but the others are out of sight.”

  “You can move to a new position whenever you're ready,” Gordy said. “Call it and let us know when you're up again.”

  “Moving,” Heath said simply, already having picked out a new place.

  “Kade, keep going until you get into position,” Gordy ordered. “Me and Corey will wait for Heath to get set up again and for you to start firing before making our move.”

  “Got it,” Kade nodded and continued to crawl through the mud to reach his destination.

  –

  “They've got over half of us and we haven't even seen them yet!” Matt Webb complained.

  “Nate did tell us we were taking this too lightly,” Martina Sanchez nodded. “They're proving that now.”

  “We still hold all of our buildings so far,” Lainie said.

  “And have lost sixteen people defending them,” Martina nodded, as if Lainie had made the point for her. “We're getting our asses kicked here.”

  “True,” Lainie nodded. “What can we do?”

  “We can start taking this training more seriously,” Martina replied. “As soon as they get done killing us again, of course.”

  “I'd like to take at least one of them with us,” Beverly all but snarled. She was not accustomed to rolling in the dirt, let alone the floor of an actual working barn. She was not happy.

  “Well, if we could see one that would help,” Lainie sighed. “So far I haven't seen anything except pellets.”

  –

  “Ready,” Heath said softly from his new position. He was now lying in a small wallow left by either a horse or a cow rolling on the damp ground. Over time that produced a small indentation where he was now prone beneath a grassland ghillie suit. From here he could see several other 'targets'. He looked through his scope and smiled ever so slightly.

  –

  “Kade, open fire,” Gordy ordered. “Make a fuss.”

  “Got it, dude,” Kade replied. Gordy and Corey heard him yell as he started firing at the people around the nearest outbuilding.

  “One minute,” Gordy said. Corey nodded and got in position to move.

  “We move in one minute,” Gordy repeated over the radio.

  –

  “I guess that's where the rest of them were,” Lainie sighed as they heard shouting from the other side of the barn.

  “And we just lost that outbuilding,” Martina agreed. “Along with four more people,” she added sourly.

  “We haven't lost it if they don't have it,” Lainie objected.

  “It's just a matter of time, now,” Martina shrugged.

  –

  “Go!” Gordy hissed and he and Corey erupted from their place in the shallow ditch, running straight for the 'bunker'. The people inside were so occupied with the noisy Kade that no one saw the approaching danger until the two camouflage clad figures opened fire on them, spraying the occupants with plastic pellets.

  “Bunker clear,” Gordy called as he and Corey took cover there. The 'dead' occupants glared at the two but then glumly sat down.

  “Crib clear,” Kade called as he moved to occupy the outbuilding that had lost all of its defenders.

  “We're going to have to rush this one to clear Sammy Webb out,” Zach complained. “He's the only one left, but he's impossible to get a clean shot at.”

  “All right,” Gordy replied. “I want everyone to make a run on the barn at the count of three. Zach, you try and take out Samuel while Titus supports the run on the barn. Heath?”

  “Here,” came the immediate and soft reply.

  “Start laying down suppression fire now and keep it up. Don't worry as much about accuracy now as just keeping their heads down and keeping their attention at least partly on you.”

  “Roger that,” Heath acknowledged.

  “All right, fellas,” Gordy told the rest. “On three. One. . .two. . . three!”

  At 'three' all five charged for the barn. There was no yelling, no sound at all in fact aside from their footsteps. Just movement.

  The barn occupants, having expected at least some kind of sound, were caught flat-footed at the appearance of their enemy. Even Samuel Webb, who up until that moment had made practically no mistakes, was caught off guard. As he tried to draw a bead on Titus Terry, Zach Willis appeared over him and placed a three-round burst of pellets into his back, marking him as 'dead'.

  The others swept into the barn like a whirlwind.

  –

  “I thought you said they could do it i
n less than fifteen minutes!” Lainie semi-accused as she and the rest gathered for the after action 'lessons learned' session.

  “Gordy?” Nate said by way of answer. Gordy pulled up the stop watch he wore around his neck and examined the screen.

  “Thirteen minutes, forty-eight seconds from first shot to last,” he reported.

  “It was more like a half-hour!” Bryon Jessup argued.

  “No, it wasn't,” Nate shook his head. “I never said they had a time limit, or when they had to attack. You think you’ll get that kind of consideration from an enemy that's out to kill you and take what belongs to you? Not hardly. Unless you have something your enemy needs immediately then he can take as long as he likes or needs to make his attack. Gordy didn't wait a full twenty minutes and still you had already gotten lax. And thanks to that laxness, all of you ended up 'dead' and you didn't even manage to wound a single one of only six attackers.”

  “You lost this entire farm to six men without a single casualty to show for it on their side, and they fired less than one hundred fifty rounds to do it,” he stressed as he looked from one to the other in the group. He could finally see a somber realization appear on some faces as that news sank in.

  “It's lunch time,” Nate announced suddenly. “I want all of you to think about this while you eat. Had this been a real attack, you wouldn't be eating lunch, you'd be food for worms. Go,” he waved them off. “Get out of here. Be back in two hours.”

  A defeated and sober crowd left the training area to find lunch and think about their day so far.

  “Good job,” Nate told Gordy. “You guys get some chow, too. Thanks for helping out. After you eat, get back to what you were doing.”

  “Got it,” Gordy nodded. “Out of this gear and let’s eat!” he told his friends. Nate shook his head as he watched them go.

  He could vaguely remember being that young, once.

  CHAPTER Three

  -

  “You look dejected,” Clay noted as he sat across from the small table in their kitchen, eating. He had spent all morning driving logs into the ground to form the wall of a fighting position between the farms and the cabin area.

  “Just thinking about our little training exercise,” Lainie grimaced.

  “Bad, huh?” Clay asked sympathetically.

  “Pretty bad,” she nodded in agreement. “Nate told us that Gordy and the other teens could take us all in fifteen minutes or less. Most of us just laughed at that, so he called them over.”

  “I take it they managed to do it?” Clay had a bemused smile threatening to crack across his face.

  “Just over thirteen minutes, killing us all in the process, with less than one hundred and fifty rounds fired according to Nate,” Lainie nodded as she pushed her food around on the plate.

  “Well, not to go against Nate's training or counter his argument, since he is right, but remember that we spent most of the winter training Gordy and the others, and they've actually been under fire before. Nate is trying to get you guys to see how serious things are, that's all.”

  “Mission accomplished,” Lainie said grimly. “We get it. Now.”

  “Good.”

  –

  “What are these?”

  'These' were a collection of olive drab bundles laying on a table outside the new communications 'hut', which was actually just a room inside Building Two along with the clinic and apartments. A larger case was on the floor beneath the table.

  “These are EE-8 field telephones,” Tandi Maseo informed her. “Ideally, we should have already had them dug out and working, but we've had so much other stuff going on we just haven't taken the time. With the radios and what not, there was no need anyway, but now. . .” he paused as he opened one of the phones for the teens to inspect, “it's time we put them to use.”

  “How?” Deuce asked.

  “You're going to run them to the fighting positions you've been building,” Jonathon got it.

  “Not just there, but yes,” Tandi nodded. “We will be putting one at the mess hall for the cabin area, and one here of course, and then every bunker will get one. Once we get them set, every phone will ring in to the comm shack on a switchboard,” he pointed to the larger piece of equipment still in its case on the floor. “The operator, likely one of you, will then connect the caller with whichever phone he or she needs to call.”

  “So that crank on the side is the generator then?” Deuce examined the phones. “Like those emergency radios and lights, and stuff like that?” he looked up at the medic.

  “That's a good guess, but no, these phones require a battery,” Tandi shook his head. “The crank is actually how you ring the switchboard. We'll make sure everyone knows how to operate them before we start using them, but for now we just need to get them set up. So, we start putting these in place, and then we have to run the wire. And that is going to present a challenge,” he warned.

  “Seriously?” Leanne scoffed. “Running wire from here to there? How hard can that be?”

  Tandi just grinned.

  –

  “How hard can that be?” Deuce muttered as he continued to hack his way through tree roots and other debris. “Dumb ass.”

  “Shut up!” Leanne scowled as she and Jonathon worked to bury the communications wire in the small trench Deuce was creating.

  “Don't forget to mark the trees so we know-” Deuce began, only to be cut off.

  “Who do you think you're talking to?” his sister hissed as she spray-painted a red slash on a tree to either side of the narrow path they were on.

  “You really don't want me to answer that,” Deuce said darkly.

  “Working with you two makes me more thankful every day that I'm an only child,” Jonathon chuckled.

  –

  “Better,” Nate Caudell nodded as his training group collected once more. “Still not there, but you are showing improvement. Good. Can you see your mistakes now?”

  “Patience,” Beverly Jackson said at once. “We don't exercise enough patience.”

  “Possibly one of the worst mistakes you can make, too,” Nate nodded. “Anyone else?”

  “We've lost our carelessness, but we're still. . .” Abby trailed off a minute, looking for the right word.

  “Stiff,” Lucas Webb offered. “We're too stiff. Our movements aren't fluid enough.”

  “Yeah,” Abby nodded her thanks. “Yeah, that works. We're not smooth enough. We're still struggling with knowing what to do. No, that's not it,” she shook her head. “No, we know what to do. We don't know how to do it the most efficient way. That's what it is. That's what makes us stiff. We hesitate, or we're unsure of ourselves, or we second guess every action. That slows us down and makes us vulnerable.”

  Nate looked at Abby for a long minute as the others digested what she had said. Nate had not been overly pleased at Abby's inclusion back into the group, her attitude and superiority complex seemingly making her a poor choice for a group operation or for any situation where discipline or the lack thereof could mean life or death. But Jose Juarez had ordered it done and that was that. With Big John Barnes gone, Jose was now second in command and the Bossman had made it clear he couldn't trust himself to make good decisions where his niece was concerned.

  So far however, Nate had to admit that Abigail had done better than most and was definitely making the effort to be a team player. Even now she was trying to contribute in a meaningful way and doing pretty good at it.

  “That's a pretty good description,” Nate said finally, nodding in approval. “Good eye. And you're right, that is one of your biggest problems as a group. But that comes with practice and experience. The fact that you guys are starting to catch your own mistakes in training is a good sign. Very good in fact. Let’s wrap this up for today, since I know all of you have other things you need to get done, and I do too. Store the gear, police the area, and then we're good. Tomorrow morning, eight o'clock, back here ready to go. Dismissed!”

  The group laughed at the
term 'dismissed' and set about to clear away their practice area. They did have work to do, after all.

  –

  “You think your little deception worked?” Leon asked Clay. It was evening and Clay had made the walk up to Leon's to report on their progress. The Old Man was still having difficulty breathing, though he had shown good improvement according to Patricia. Clay tried not to make him talk more than necessary, but Leon was Leon, and was going to do just exactly what Leon wanted to do, regardless.

  “No way to know,” Clay shrugged. “We'd have to be watching the site, and then have someone close enough to know what they were saying, whoever 'they' turn out to be. It was a good effort, and worth trying. That's all we can do.”

  “You know that someone else will still be out here, regardless,” Leon warned.

  “Sure,” Clay nodded. “I just hoped that the few hours that took will buy us an extra day or two. If nothing else, they’ll need to find new trucks, or manage to fix those. And we took great pains to make the vehicles hard to repair, assuming it was possible at all.”

  “Well, all that aside, what's your next move?” Leon asked, settling back in his chair.

  “I don't have a next move,” Clay told him. “My move is prepare this place to be defended and then get ready to put a crop in.”

  “Got plenty of fuel?” Leon asked.

  “For now,” Clay nodded. “We scrounged up several tanker trailers and drained Jake's fuel tanks at the truck stop. That's atop what we already had. We can definitely put in the crop and harvest it this year, and if we're careful we can do it next year. Hopefully we will be making bio-diesel by then. That's part of the crop we’ll be planting this year.”

  “You can stretch over and plant that area behind us, probably,” Leon suggested. “Not our land but I don't see Mister Big City coming down here.”

  “I'd rather plant on someone we know instead, just in case,” Clay was shaking his head. “We can always trade out something to lease the land with. And we don't want to spread out too far since that makes us vulnerable. Right now, we're pretty compact. Not easy to defend, but easier.”

  “Well, just a thought,” Leon shrugged. “I wish we knew who was running this 'Committee' in town, though,” he got to the real problem.