“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.