Dark Days Rough Roads (54 page)

“Take the
damn shot,” Roger told him. “Forget that center mass bullshit.”

The man
steadied his rifle and kept aim at the militia position. Haliday was crouched
down low and looked at his watch. After almost five minutes, he was about to climb
the tree himself when he heard the shot. He looked up and jumped to the side
just in time as the man threw up. The guy had taken a perfect shot from ear to
ear, cutting a channel through the militia member’s head.

Haliday
yelled up to him, “It’s them or you. Get the hell out if you can’t hang or get
ready to do it again.”

The man
said he’d be ok. Roger asked him if there was anyone else in the position there
and the guy told him no, it looked like just one guy.

“What
about the ones to the left and right?” Roger asked.

“Looks
like two in each.”

“Ok, keep
your rifle on them, take the kill shots. You’re doing good.” he told the man.

Roger
moved back toward the west breach area. Chuck was still there. “What do you
think, Roger?”

“Chuck, I
think we need to get our asses in there as soon as possible. The center
position has been taken out, and we need to get the ones on the sides of it.
Let’s try and work on the one to the right first.”

“How are we
going to do that?” Chuck asked.

“Give me
a minute to think about it, Chuck.”

Haliday
thought for a few minutes. He called Rob over, “Look, this is what we’re going
to do. We have to concentrate fire on the southeast side. A light rate of fire.
We need these guys to shift in their positions. At the same time, I need the
east side to have some men move in a little closer, not try and rush the east
side, just make a few good attempts to get in closer.” Rob said he would get it
taken care of. “You wait for my signal Rob; I’m going to have Mark pop a few
rounds of smoke over there.”

Rob
headed over to the east side in the four wheeler and told the guys what they
were going to do. The men who volunteered got ready, while over on the west
side Haliday told the town’s snipers what to do. Haliday himself climbed up into
a tree and got ready as well. He could hardly see the guys behind their
fighting positions; admittedly it was harder than he thought.

He took
aim on the inside of the fighting position and keyed his mic. “Mark, do it
now.” Mark launched four rounds of smoke toward the east perimeter and Rob had
some of the guys fire into the east side positions as four of the guys made
short advances through the woods to get closer. The advancing men just
concentrated on getting closer and they fired just a few rounds from the SKS’s
they had.

Rob was
helping them suppress the militia on this side. He spotted the militia shift in
their positions to provide more return fire toward the advancing townspeople.
One of the militia was able to fire toward the advancing men and struck one in
the abdomen. This man went down and crawled behind a tree. Rob and the rest of
his men opened up.

Haliday
was aiming at the sandbag and saw the color change in his scope. He fired the
round and watched it penetrate the man’s back square between his shoulders. The
man went forward and Haliday could only see his arm and hand on his rifle.
Haliday fired another shot and the man’s hand came off at the wrist. Haliday
knew the guy was dead from the first round, but with Haliday himself going in
soon, he was just making sure.

The men
firing with Haliday managed to wound two and kill one more. Out of the three
positions, they still had one fully capable militia, two injured and two dead.
Going into the compound directly from the south was their best option. Chuck
came over and Haliday explained the change in plans and they moved the two
building entry teams to the south.

Back up toward
the main gate, Mark ordered them to launch a dozen of the tannerite cans. They
made a last minute change and used fluorescent green highlighters to paint the
tape so they could be spotted more easily. A few didn’t make it over the line
of cars the militia was using, but that worked out in Mark’s favor.

Mark had
one of the guys fire at one. The can exploded in front of the cars and they
could hear the nails peppering the sheet metal. The militia just looked at each
other. One more exploded and the nails flew everywhere. The militia looked
around and saw a few of these lying on the ground behind them. They didn’t know
what to do with them.

Mark had
the guys pepper the whole north side of the compound and around the admin
building with the remaining tannerite cans they had. Haliday’s and Chuck’s
teams each had five of their own that they would use. These were turning out to
be nice little devices. Haliday was surprised he hadn’t thought of it before.

Mark had
them blow a few more tannerite cans and the word had thoroughly spread
throughout the militia what these things were about. They all kept a very close
eye on them. A few of the militia had taken their jackets off and tossed them,
trying to cover the cans up. One guy managed to cover up the one by him and
then he shot it himself. Kind of like the redneck who says, ‘Hey y’all, watch
this.’ Fortunately the jacket contained the nails, although it was fairly well
shredded.

Haliday
was ready to move in. He was behind the wheel of his Jeep and he had four other
men with him. One in the passenger seat, one on each nerf bar and one in the
back seat. He had Rob behind the wheel of the four wheeler and the rest of
Chuck’s entry team barely hanging on so they could exit quickly. Haliday had
secured the Barrett and was ready with his pistol and AR180.

Each team
was four men. Two with shotguns, two with AR’s and everyone had pistols with them
as well. Haliday was the only one carrying a Smith. The rest had Glocks. He
never liked Glocks;, something about a pistol that was dishwasher safe didn’t
appeal to him. That and the fact that once on the range at the police station
years ago, he watched a hot reload blow the top of the grip off one. The guy
ended up with 25 stitches. He had seven magazines for his, so he didn’t worry
too much about interchanging mags.

The plan
was not as suicidal as it sounded. They had the two injured and one full bodied
man to deal with. With any luck they would already be neutralized before they
got there. Haliday clicked his mic, “Ok everyone, we are a go.” Haliday and Rob
had about 450 yards to go and left one behind the other.

As they
approached the southern buildings, they criss-crossed paths a couple of times
and would widen and narrow their space between them to try and randomize their
approach and throw off the target acquisition anyone might have on them. The
groups on the east and west side started firing into the militia positions
while the snipers looked for targets.

One of
the injured militia raised himself up to take aim on the approaching vehicles.
He went down before he could pull the trigger on them. The other militia
positions on the east and west sides didn’t have enough cover to help out. To
shift fire and help out would mean exposing themselves and possibly be overrun
themselves. They continued their fight to the east and west.

Of the
three positions they needed to neutralize, the center one was empty. The one to
the east only had one injured man left and this was where Rob was heading. The
one Haliday was near was the one to worry about. They still had that one guy in
there with his injured partner. Haliday kept a steady pace as he approached it.

The west
tree line positions opened up with everything they had. As the Jeep came to a
stop, the men on the nerf bars hit the ground running and fired into the
position as the other two exited the Jeep. The return fire dropped one of the
men with a hit to the chest and one to the man’s leg. The other three advancing
men fired into the position with 10 rounds of buck shot and a full 30 round
magazine.

The guy
was hit multiple times and the advancing men heard screams from the other man
who had been injured and was now lying down on the ground with his hands in the
air pleading to not be shot. One of the advancing members rolled the guy over
and placed handcuffs on him and left him there. Haliday moved the Jeep toward
the building as they rushed toward the last of the three positions.

Rob’s
four wheeler approached and before it came to a stop the militia member came up
firing. Chuck, who was next to Rob, fired back along with the other two. One of
the men in the back fell off the four wheeler and tumbled along the ground
dead. A sniper from the east side had to fire three shots, but hit the injured
militia member, ending his life.

The
militia group on the east fired up into the trees when they spotted this man
and hit him. The man had only been hit in the leg, but lost his footing on the
reversed tree stand and fell to the ground breaking his arm and some ribs. He
laid there unable to move and the militia finished him off as he laid there
trying to get behind the tree.

Mark’s
area was much harder to assault. With most of the buildings and fortifications
in place on the north side, it was hard for them to find suitable targets. Mark
ordered a cease fire unless the snipers could definitely get a shot in. They
couldn’t afford to waste any more ammunition on just trying to suppress fire.

He called
over to Brad. “We need to see about getting these people moving and exposed.
See if they can fire into any of the tannerite cans and let’s see what happens.
If we can’t get to them, it’s a waste of our effort.” Brad and Mark both passed
the word along. A few of the guys started to take some shots on the tannerite
cans, hoping to hit them.

One of
the cans near one of the militia’s northeast positions exploded, sending its
nails flying. The two people in the fighting position were hit causing multiple
cuts on their backs and the backs of their necks. Two nails embedded themselves
in one of the men’s neck. He reached around and tried to remove them, but his
jacket was in the way.

The other
man moved over quickly to help him out. Mark saw this and waited. When the man
went back to his side of the fighting position, Mark fired and struck the man
in the left arm and shoulder. The militia called in for aid and this is when
they discovered the situation was worse than it actually was. They were on
their own with what they had with them.

The deuce
couldn’t provide cover for delivery or extraction. The militia would have to
stand their ground the best they could until the opportunity arose when someone
could get more supplies to them. They had plenty of rounds, just no food or
first aid capability for those who needed intensive medical treatment.

Mark
called a cease-fire again. He told everyone to save their rounds and not to
fire on the tannerite anymore until they could plan a new strategy. Mark called
Haliday. “Roger, how’s it going down there?”

Haliday
responded. “We are in the perimeter. We have most of the south side now. I need
you to get some guys down here to help take out the other two positions.”

Mark and
Brad gathered a few guys together and went around to the south side of the
airport. Once there, he assigned four guys to move forward to the brick
emplacements and then work there way forward to take over the militia
emplacements that had been seized. They would have to alter the positions to
make them more effective, but right now they would serve them well enough.

Mark
would then concentrate on helping Rob and the rest of the guys take the other
positions out of service. With Haliday and Chuck’s entry teams clearing the
three most southern buildings, they would use these to help continue moving the
assault closer to the admin and motor pool buildings. In between these
buildings and the ones Haliday would take were the food and supply storage
buildings.

Over by
the northeast corner of the compound, some of the townspeople started to take
fire from behind them. They scrambled for cover. They were now practically
caught in a cross fire. The militia had a couple of members heading toward the
airport to join them.

They had
stopped to wait out the assault and then come help if they were called in. One of
these militia vehicles had come up directly from the east and was now in a
position to help out. The people in this vehicle had found an area to hide.
They were now engaging the townspeople in the fire fight.

Haliday
adjusted the entry teams. He now had two teams with only three guys each. Chuck’s
and his. They decided to go with two shotguns and an AR in order to prevent over
penetrating the buildings. The first building they went to enter was a large
hangar building furthest south. One of the guys went up to the back door and
used the shotgun to blow through the lock.

Once the
man blew the lock he swung the door open and he tossed a tannerite can inside
which Haliday then fired on. The can exploded, but instead of nails they had
used the small airsoft beads. Basically homemade stun grenades. They didn’t
want to damage what might be inside. Both teams entered the building and
conducted the building sweep. This building was completely filled with food.
They noticed Walmart tags on most of the items.

The next
building was very small. This one they could not reach yet because there was no
back door. It was the building the militia had used for interrogating people.
Haliday went to the back window and pulled out his mirror and took a peek. He
waved Chuck over. Chuck took the mirror and looked in the window as well. There
were a couple of chairs and a table, but there was also more.