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.
Chapter 34
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.
They had built a rack to suspend people from. They would use this to keep the person’s hands tied over their heads and their feet barely touching the ground. There was blood on one of the chairs and on the floor. The worst part was a man still hanging from one side of the rack. It looked like he had been dead for a few days already.
Chuck looked at Roger, “I know that guy.”
“Who is it Chuck?”
Chuck looked pissed. “That’s the chief of police. He went missing the second day of the outage. No one knew what the hell happened to him. We all thought maybe he bugged out. He and the sheriff never got along. I guess we know now what happened to him. Seems like the chief wasn’t going to put up with any BS and they decided he was a liability.”
Roger keyed his mic and told everyone what they had found. This re-ignited the rage that the people had for the militia. They went back into the first building and made their way over to the west side of it. They went out and Haliday’s team provided cover while Chuck’s team made it to the back of another building. This was going to be the last easy building to clear.
Mark had heard the shots being fired over at the north east corner and knew something was wrong. He called and confirmed that there was a problem. “Ok, Brad,” he said, “We need to get over there and see what’s going on.” He called on the radio and told everyone to keep checking their rear. Roger and Brad took off. Rob stayed to make sure everyone got up to the emplacements.
Roger got one team at a time moved up toward the three buildings. They got all three manned without any problems. They spent a few minutes arranging them to make it a bit safer. The next piece of the puzzle would be to get the other two positions emptied out. They had a couple of parlor tricks left to do this. He called a couple more guys up to his position. They came up and each brought a couple of large plastic toolboxes with them.
Over the next 30 minutes they made two more trips with more supplies and ammo. They were almost ready to make the assault on the two positions. They had to wait for Chuck to enter the other building and clear it first. Chuck was there at the back. They blew the door, tossed in and then blew the tannerite can. As soon as they entered the building more shots were fired.
Roger and his team got down low. They waited until the firing stopped. Haliday ran over to the building and crouched down low. He yelled into the door. “Chuck, what’s the status?” he asked.
Chuck’s voice came back, “We’re clear. We have one wounded and we took out one militia.” Haliday entered the building. Inside was a woman lying there dead and Chuck’s man who was hit in the hip.
Haliday walked over to him and checked him out. Chuck had put a pressure bandage on his hip. “How bad?” Haliday asked. Chuck said he would be ok, but wouldn’t be able to move. “We can’t get him out of here for at least another hour,” Roger said. He looked at the guy; “Can you make it until then?”
“Ya, sure, it just hurts.”
Haliday grabbed a bottle out of his pocket and handed him a vicodin. “Take this. It’ll help.”
Haliday told Chuck he was heading back to the other building to get ready. Once he got there, they looked out and saw the target. Haliday asked the guys if they were ready and both nodded. They would be launching a small assault from two buildings, his and the one Chuck was in. Haliday clicked his mic. “We go on my word. Everyone ready, three, two, one, go.”
Mark and Brad had gone slow and came up across the street from the brickyard. They saw a truck over in the yard. “I wonder if that’s their truck?” he said.
Brad said, “Yep, that’s where we got the tractor and it wasn’t there before.” Mark and Brad checked the woods around the brickyard. They spotted some movement and kept their eyes on it.