A Guardian Angel (22 page)

The air cleared up
and a sigh of relief aired when Frank could be seen rolling to his
left and behind some sandbags. They could also see two guys with
rifles walking into the clearing. One of them was looking to see
where Frank had gone while the other scanned the wall. Before they
could see him, Tim opened fire. He sprayed in a horizontal line,
dropping both of the militants. Frank popped up from behind his
sandbags and shot into the smoking hole in the wall. A body tripped
and fell through, dead.

Barney and Tim ran
right along the ramparts while Chance jutted left and rejoined Gus,
who had recovered from the blast. They all aimed over the wall and
strained their eyes for further militia. When he saw none and Frank
confirmed that it looked all clear, Tim used his scope to spy along
the highway. There were two sedans parked in a roadblock on the
asphalt and the rancher could see a truck weaving off of the highway
into the field west of the ranch. They were much too far to shoot at.

“They're on
the highway and driving into the field, far west!” Tim yelled
out for everyone.

“Yeah, well,”
Barney said, “keep your head down. If I were them, I would have
snipers.”

Tim turned to the
man with worry. “We need to plug that hole in the wall. They
can't sneak inside behind us or we're dead,” he stated.

“I got it,”
Barney said after a moment's thought, bolting toward the stairs. He
clambered down with his head as low as he could hold it and ran out
of the entrance.

Tim stood up and
watched over the railing as Barney crawled into his car and started
the engine. He pulled out and swung it around, parking it straight in
the hole in the wall. It almost could have fit all the way through
until it got snagged somewhere around the gas tank. Barney heaved
himself out of the car and jumped behind the sandbags opposite of
Frank.

“How'd they
manage to blow a hole like that?” Barney asked, out loud but to
himself. Frank pointed to the strings of gore that had spread itself
around like debris. Barney's color flushed out. “Oh,” he
said.

“People are
getting out of the truck!” Tim yelled down to them. He lifted
his AK again and watched the militia through his scope. He pulled
away from it a second time and addressed Barney. “Get up here
and help me.”

Barney skipped up
the stairs and took a post beside the rancher. He raised his own
rifle and dropped it just as fast out of surprise when Tim opened
fire. Small cracks of return fire could be heard in the distance as
Barney raised his gun again. He started getting a bead on the
passenger of the truck when the driver dropped dead over the wheel.
Tim had shot him.

“What's that
in the bed?” Barney asked as he scanned the vehicle. He heard
Tim's gun scrape along the railing as he looked himself.

“Looks like,”
Tim started, squinting hard to identify the object, “a cannon
or something.”

“That's what
I was thinking, too,” Barney commented.

Tim watched the
militants work as they assembled the rig, a homemade contraption
composed of metal tubing and wires. One of the men carried a crate
over to the men loading the rig. Tim took a shot at him and missed,
popping one of the truck's tires.

Barney took shots
at each flash of light as he saw them, but failed to stay on target
for long. Somehow he felt that blindly shooting at them would produce
as good of results as if he took careful, deliberate aim. This way he
didn't have to watch their bodies rip open as he snuffed out their
lives.

Tim continued
taking his shots, hitting whatever he could as he watched the
invaders start loading shells from the crate into the artillery rig.
He finally pegged the guy carrying the crate right in between his
shoulder blades. He spilled the rest of the shells from the crate as
he dropped, but it was too late. Two shells were loaded.

“They're
loaded,” Tim said, just loud enough for Barney to hear. The
rancher spun around and screamed to his crew, “Hit the deck!”

Barney and Tim
dropped to the floor and kicked up dust around them. They looked up
at each other as a loud crack rang out from the field. Whistling
through the air, a shell dropped down and exploded into the roof of
Tim's house. The rancher sat up and his mouth dropped in horror.
Flames sprouted up from the shattered structure.

“Goddamn,”
Tim said to himself. He felt a hand tugging at him.

“Get down!”
Barney urged him, pulling the rancher to the floor again.

Another explosion
cracked out, but this time none of them heard it. Instead, Tim's eyes
slammed shut in strain and his ears were muffled with ringing. His
head felt like it had just been slammed into a cliff face by a tidal
wave. Sloshing in his skull, his brain tried to scream itself to
sleep. His eyes opened but all he saw was static. Colorful and
distorted snow danced on his cornea. Shapes moved as silhouettes in
the backdrop. A dark form grew and consumed his vision. His tingling
body was pulled upright by something and noises started to form. They
gurgled and muffled together into an almost extraterrestrial dialect.

Barney screamed and
he didn't know it. “Tim, are you okay?” he cried into the
rancher's stone still expression. He didn't care that he was
screaming.

“Barney?”
Tim asked with disillusion. He reached out until he found something
to pull himself up with. His vision still shook and his ears rang,
but real sounds started to grow and crystallize.

Someone was
shrieking.

“I'm
alright!” Gus called out. Chance nodded the same message when
the rancher peered over to him.

“I'm hit!”
Frank cried through desperate gasps and struggled grunts. Everyone
abandoned their positions and rushed down to aid Frank. A hole about
the size of a silver dollar gleamed in the man's side. Blood trickled
out from the wound and soaked the man who laid on his stomach. Barney
came up to him and tried to put pressure on the injury as well as he
could through Frank's pained flailing. He screamed at Barney's touch
and Barney said whatever he could think of to calm him.

Tim had rushed to
the entrance and retrieved the first aid box that he mounted up there
a week ago. He stirred his hand around in the contents while he ran
back to Frank. Pulling a huge bundle of gauze from the box, he pushed
Barney aside. Still shaken up, he dropped the rest of the first aid
kit and slammed the gauze down on the wound. Frank screamed in agony
and the rancher beckoned Gus over.

“Keep
pressure on this,” Tim ordered. “Hard.”

He turned around
and rummaged through what he had dropped until he had a bandage. Just
managing it, he wrapped Frank's wound before stumbling backwards to
his gun.

“There's
painkillers around here somewhere,” he told Gus. “Give
them to him, then redo that bandage so it's tight. And make sure it's
clean. Take him somewhere safer.”

He got a nod in
reply as Gus set off to do as he was commanded. Tim snatched up his
gun and with just a quick gesture to Barney was back up in his
sniping position.

“Shoot all of
them,” Tim said, raising his gun. “All of them.”

Barney didn't say
anything at all and raised his rifle as well.

The air around them
exploded and rang with gunfire as they opened up, stopping no longer
than it took to point. The truck had sprung a leak from gunshot holes
and a similar experience was shared by the militants in front of it.
A couple men dived behind the opposite side of the vehicle. Tim saw a
head pop up from within the bed of the truck. He shot and missed.

Barney focused on
one of them that had grabbed what shells he could off of the ground
and tried scampering toward the cannon. He shot the runner in the leg
but still he carried on. Fueled by faith, he climbed up into the bed.

Tim spotted him as
he waited for his target to come up from cover again. He shot the man
in the torso several times before he dropped, tripping over the side
of the truck and vanishing.

The other militant
in the bed jumped up and opened fire, only to be shot down by Barney.
He reloaded his weapon after a brief sigh of relief while Tim
continued to shoot around the truck. Every now and then an enemy
would return fire, popping up from either end of the vehicle. They
clung to their cover, seldom risking the chance to be shot. From his
angle, Tim could spot a denim covered leg sticking out past the tire.
With a squeeze on the trigger he dropped the man to the ground. The
rancher could see him as his face strained and he clasped onto his
leg. One more shot laid him still.

The last man at the
truck abandoned the scene, running back toward the roadblock. Barney
watched him through his scope.

“He's getting
away,” he breathed, dropping his gun and allowing a slight
smile of relief to flicker through his lips.

“No, he's
not,” Tim said. He fired three times and the runner sank away
from view.

A little surprised,
Barney looked through his scope and scanned the truck. “It
looks clear,” Barney told the rancher.

“What about
the roadblock?” Tim asked. “Can you see anyone there?”

They both stood
silent for over a minute and peered, coming to the realization that
the vehicles were empty and not a soul was to be seen around them.

“No one's
there,” Barney said as Tim set his gun down.

Gus appeared at the
bottom of the stairs just as Tim and Barney were climbing down them.

“How is he?”
Barney asked.

Gus had a
frightened expression. Barney could see the fear in his eyes with no
idea how he could escape it. He opened his mouth and dispersed the
heavy sweat from around his lips. “He's asleep. It looks bad.”

“Will he
die?” Tim asked as he started filling his empty magazines with
more bullets.

Barney turned back
and looked at the rancher while Gus struggled with his words. “He
will if he doesn't get to a hospital,” he answered. “Like
now.”

Tim looked up and
into Barney's eyes. Barney stared back at him. Then the rancher
looked up at Gus and with a weak smile, said, “Well, let us
hope we live to take him to one.”

“What're you
talking about?” Gus cried. “He needs to go now!”

“Tim, we can
go now,” Barney spoke. “They're not shooting, no one's
charging right now. Just let us take him to a hospital.”

“And then
what, Barney?” Tim asked, clicking the magazine into his
firearm. “Say it's just White Shrek here and he does manage to
drive past the roadblock as if no one is going to stop him,”
Tim proposed. “And then they attack again? Down one man, and if
you make that two, then it's just the three of us left defending this
whole place against all of Heaven's Crusade.”

Barney lowered his
head.

“What do you
think our chances are then, Barney?” Tim asked. His face hung
in such a way that it looked like a smile was beyond its
capabilities.

“Why defend?”
Barney shot at him. He sat up straight and looked Tim in the eye.
“Why do we need to stay here? We can all get out of here
alive.”

“Leave?”
Tim asked. “This is my territory. My home! I am here to protect
it and I need your help.”

“It's not MY
home, Tim!” Barney declared. “You want me to die for –
what? A house? A rusty angel?”

“What if,”
Tim started. He paused to look at everyone's faces. “What if it
is my destiny to protect this angel?”

Chance came out of
the wall where Frank slept, slipping in to listen to Tim with his
skeptical colleagues.

“What if it
is God's will that this angel be safe? That it's sacred?” Tim
asked.

“God's will?”
Barney asked, stupefied. “Tim, listen to yourself.”

“Where else
could it have come from?” Tim asked. Barney tilted his head in
confusion as Tim carried on. “I mean, really? Where? Did a
random satellite just crash into my livestock? An angel shaped one?
That no one seems to have an account for?”

“What you are
talking about is crazy,” Barney said. “It doesn't matter
where it came from, I am not going to die for it. I am not going to
get my friends killed for it. Not for it, not for you.”

A biting silence
lingered for a moment before Tim pointed his weapon at Barney. “Then
how're you different from them?” he asked.