Max has gone on ahead of us with his team — as usual — setting up the homemade reconnaissance and explosives. Omega will be passing through in a small convoy, and we intend to ambush them.
It will confuse them and give us time to enter the area, take their weapons and split. We sink into the tall grass, right at the edge of the road, watching the stretch of highway. All of us are wearing scarves over our faces, covering everything but our eyes. My hair color is also hidden with another scarf, over which I’m wearing a hat.
Keeping our identities secret from Omega will go a long way in keeping us alive. If they know us by sight and by name, they can track us down quicker. So we’ve found ways to work around that. Every time we bring in new recruits, they’re not told anybody’s real names. Codenames work. Omega doesn’t need to know anything about us — we should be a dangerous mystery to them.
Chris is Alpha One.
Thanks to my reputation as a speedy little riflewoman, I’ve been codenamed Yankee, if that makes any sense.
Sophia is Echo.
We don’t refer to each other by our real names unless we’re in private, and those who know what our real names are may never use them unless it’s absolutely necessary.
“Let’s make this clean and fast,” Chris says.
“Roger that, Alpha One.”
He rolls his eyes.
“What? It’s fun to say.” I settle back into the prone position, sweeping the road for any signs of Omega. “Right, Echo?”
Sophia stifles a laugh beside me.
“Copy that, Yankee.”
“Shut up, you two,” Derek hisses, but I can tell by the way his eyes are crinkling that he’s smiling. “They should be coming any minute now.”
Heck yeah. Max and his team are making their way back to us, coming around behind our group. “All set?” Chris whispers.
“Ready to go.” Max dips his head. “We’ll have to move fast. Some of our scouts are saying there’s at least five vehicles. Big ones.”
“We can handle that.” Chris throws a glance at me. “Stay in place, Yankee.”
“Yes sir, Alpha One.”
The clouds momentarily part, letting the moonlight shine through. A shadow falls across my face. I look up, startled, and then relax again when I hear the soft call of an owl. He drifts across the sky and makes an epic dive towards the ground, nabbing a small rodent for dinner.
“That’s so nasty,” Sophia mutters.
“That’s the great circle of life,” I say.
“Still. Nasty.”
“Not if you’re an owl.”
“Hold. Here they come,” Chris snaps.
He’s right. Because it’s so still, I can feel the slight rumble of vehicle engines as they make their way up the road. I look down my rifle sights, shutting my mouth, flicking the safety off. Listening and watching.
Below us, Alexander Ramos is in place with his team. He’ll be the first one to hit Omega after the explosion takes out their cars. Despite the arguments and tension between him and Chris, there’s no denying that Alexander is a good soldier, and not utilizing his skills would be a waste. He just has to learn to be a guerilla fighter.
The trucks come into view. They’ve got their headlights on, rolling slowly, seemingly unconcerned with hiding themselves from potential enemies. I’m guessing they’ve never encountered any trouble in this area before. As they round the bend in the road, I brace myself for the explosion. Max is counting down under his breath.
Nothing.
“Where are those detonations?” Chris hisses.
“I don’t know.” Max leans forward, watching the convoy rumble past the spot in the road where the explosions were supposed to go off. “They didn’t go off.”
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” Sophia says.
As the seconds tick by, the convoy crawls towards us, getting closer to our ambush point. We remain still, camouflaged. “What do we do?” I whisper, tense.
“We can’t engage them now,” Chris replies. “We can’t—”
The sonic thunder of automatic weapons fire cuts him off. Of the five vehicles in the convoy, the first two swerves off the roadway, rubber squealing against the asphalt as the drivers desperately try to control the vehicles. One hits a tree and bursts into flames, spitting out billows of black smoke. Another vehicle tumbles down an embankment, doing a rollover, its tires still spinning as it lands on its roof. I stare, openmouthed at the sudden destruction and confusion. A daisy chain of linked blasts detonates under the wheels of the remaining vehicles, tossing one aside and forcing the others to grind to a halt.
“What just happened?” Sophia demands.
“I have no idea.”
“Engage,” Chris says. “Now.”
Our team opens fire. I relax into position and set my sights on the scene below. Omega troopers stumble out of their vehicles. Most of them are slow and disoriented, making them easy targets to take down. Rapid gunfire rips through the trees — both from us and from below. Alexander and his team have opened fire, too. Omega troopers are dropping left and right, smoke is spilling into the night sky. Screaming and yelling echoes off the otherwise silent foothills. Omega doesn’t even have time to return fire. We’re cutting them down too fast. And in the middle of all of this insanity, I’m firing as fast as I can, dropping an empty magazine onto the ground, inserting another one into my gun.
I’m a real Amazon warrior princess these days. Whoopee.
It doesn’t take more than a few minutes for the bloodshed to cease — but it seems like hours. My ears are ringing from the gunfire and I’m choking on diesel fumes and smoke.
“Should we go down there?” I ask.
“Let Alexander check it out first,” Chris answers.
We stay in position as Alexander brings his team to the so-called “kill zone.” They check the dead and attend to the wounded. He gives us the all-clear signal and we slip out of our hiding places and make our way down the side of the hill, walking onto the road, keeping our formation, constantly scanning the perimeter.
“Okay, just like you practiced,” Chris tells me.
I nod, kneeling at the feet of a dead Omega trooper. I have to make a monumental effort not to gag as I touch his lifeless fingers. They’re still warm, reminding me that just a second ago, this guy’s heart was beating.
Stop, I warn myself. Just do your job.
I take his weapons — guns, ammunition, and knives. The works. Next I strip off his jacket and boots, including the helmet on his head. I also commandeer his socks, because mine are full of holes.
“Pants too,” Chris says. “You’ll need them, believe me.”
Awkward. I shouldn’t have to be yanking the pants off dead people, but I guess that’s one of the less glamorous aspects of guerilla war fighting. When I’m done, I’ve got the full uniform of an Omega soldier in my arms, along with all of his gear. Sophia hands me an empty backpack and I stuff all the items inside — everything except the rifle. I sling that across my back and toss the backpack to one of the men.
We move fast, collecting everything in record time. When we’re done, I have to fight the urge to take a can of spray paint and etch some kind of epic slogan over the vehicles. “You’re thinking of graffiti right now,” Sophia remarks.
“You know me too well.”
She shrugs.
Chris gives the signal and we clear out of the area, retreating back into the hills. Our trucks are only parked about a mile from here. Alexander has some of his men take the Omega trucks that are still running. They’re full of food, water, and best of all, more weapons. I give him a suspicious look. Obviously he was responsible for stopping the convoy when Max’s detonations failed.