Event Horizon

Chapter 25

EVENT +60:04

^{Limerick, Maine}

An unfamiliar digital tone resonated from the kitchen. Kate walked out of the steamy dining room and looked around, unable to identify the source of the sound. Her stomach knotted. More visitors? Maybe today’s law enforcement visit had been legitimate. She hesitated, not wanting to leave Emily alone in the surveillance hub. The two “deputies” had triggered one of the sensors on their way back to the road, but they had agreed to monitor the room 24/7. Tim Fletcher bolted through the sitting room doorway next to the intercom station and saw where Kate was headed.

“That’s the satellite phone,” he blurted. “It’s charging next to the coffee maker.”

“Is that the satphone?” yelled Samantha from the great room to Kate’s left.

“Yes!”

She snatched the phone off the granite and read the display: “GOVT.”

“Shit. It says government. Are they calling us with messages now?”

“Who cares?” Samantha said impatiently. “Pick it up. Either way it’s important.”

Everyone crowded around her as she pressed the green button. “Hello?”

“Honey? It’s Alex.”

Kate found herself unable to answer for a moment. “Yes,” she uttered finally. “It’s me. Is everyone all right?”

“The kids are fine. Ed and Charlie are fine. I’m a little beat up, but I’m fine too. We did it, honey. The kids are with me right now, and we’re headed home.”

She started nodding, tears streaming down her cheeks. “Everyone’s fine. They’re on the way home,” she said to the group gathered around her.

Everyone cheered, and Amy ran over to the dining room. “They got the kids. Everyone made it!”

“Honey, I’ll talk to you in a couple of minutes. Pass the phone to Chloe so her mom can talk to her. She’s worried sick,” said Kate, holding the phone out to Samantha.

“Like you weren’t worried,” said Sam, eagerly taking the phone and walking onto the deck.

Kate hugged Emily and was quickly joined by Amy. They held each other while the phone was passed around. Tim peeked out of the dining room, smiling and nodding.

“How far out are they?” he asked.

Linda handed the phone to one of her daughters. “Charlie said they were still in Medford. They’re moving slowly because the streets are jammed with people. They’re thinking it might take four to five hours to get back. After dark for sure.”

“I hate to have them drive into Gelder Pond with those nutballs out there. They could be waiting near the entrance for all we know, with more fake cops,” said Tim.

“Charlie said they’re with a convoy of marines,” said Linda.

“What?” said Kate, making her way toward the screen porch.

“I love you too, Dad,” said Alyssa Walker, handing the phone out to Kate.

She took it. “Charlie?”

“Kate? Great to hear your voice. You won’t believe what we went through. Apocalypse-fucking-Now kind of shit. Your boy will heal up nicely and probably get a Silver Star! Alex too.”

“What do you mean? Charlie, can I talk to my son?”

“Oh sure, sorry. Here’s the hero right now!”

In the background on the phone, she heard Charlie say, “I think I screwed up, Alex.”

“Mom, I’m fine,” Ryan slurred on the other end of the phone. “Mr. Thornton was being a little overdramatic.”

“You don’t sound fine. What happened?”

“They had to give me morphine. I got hit in the leg.”

Kate found herself unable to breathe. “Hit by what?’ she said, sitting down on one of the chairs.

“A bullet. We had some serious trouble getting out of Boston, but I’m totally fine. Mom? You there, Mom?”

“I’m just a little… it’s so good to hear your voice. We didn’t know how bad it would get down there. I can’t tell you how happy I am,” she said, sobbing in between sentences.

“Me too, Mom. I thought about the sailing trip and—”

“I know. I know, sweetie. We barely made it back,” she said, rubbing her eyes.

“How is Chloe doing?”

“She’s doing great, Mom. I went to her apartment right after the shockwave hit. The city got pretty weird.”

“You can tell me all about it in a few hours. I don’t think I’ll be able to sleep tonight. Let me talk to your father. I love you very, very much, Ryan.”

“I love you too, Mom. I can’t wait to get back.”

“Me either.”

“Here’s Dad.”

Kate waited for her husband’s voice to fill the digital void.

“Kate, Ryan is fine. I didn’t want to worry you. We ran into some trouble.”

“You’re bringing him back in one piece. That’s all that matters. I love you,” she said, her voice cracking.

“I love you more, honey. I would have done anything to get him back.”

“I know you. That’s why I was so scared. I wasn’t sure I’d get to see both of you again,” she said.

“You almost didn’t see either of us. The situation down here is beyond comprehension. If we had waited another day… we might not be having this conversation. We can talk about it over an ice-cold dirty vodka martini down by the pond. How was your trip out? Sounds like everyone made it fine.”

“I think happy hour will have to wait. We ran into a bit of a problem,” she said.

“Everyone’s okay, right?”

“Everyone is fine, but we were stopped by two drunken idiots in Waterboro claiming to be part of a militia group. It didn’t end well for them. They wanted us to give up our weapons or pay a toll to use the road.”

“How much did they want?”

“They didn’t want money,” Kate stated.

“What did they want?”

“I think they had something a little more personal in mind.”

“Shit. Sorry, hon. One of us should have gone with you.”

“I don’t think it would have made a difference. Actually, it might have confused the situation. We did fine. Linda shoots an AR better than you do,” she said.

“That’s good to know,” he said, pausing. “So what’s preventing happy hour?”

“We ditched the bikes and took their SUV. I didn’t want any of their buddies running us down on Route 5. I think someone in Limerick recognized us. The York County Sheriff’s Department paid us a visit this afternoon.”

“At the compound?”

“They buzzed the intercom from the gate, but we ignored it.”

“Good. Trust me, Kate; the Sheriff’s Department isn’t making house calls, and they’re certainly not launching murder investigations. They’re tied up at the borders.”

“That’s what we thought. The guys had badges, but no uniforms.”

“Definitely not legitimate. York County sheriff’s deputies shower in their uniforms,” he said, “How were you able to see them?”

“With the cameras at the gate,” said Kate. How else?

“Wait. How were the cameras working?”

“We installed the replacement cameras at the gate,” said Kate.

“Those are wireless.”

“Abby Walker’s a little IT wizard. She replaced the router and sorted out all of the surveillance equipment. Amazingly, she can read your hieroglyphics. Good thing she was here. Your dad was scratching his head.”

“Motion sensors?”

“That’s how we knew the bullshit deputies took a stroll through the woods to check out the house. Everything is up and running according to your nearly indecipherable logbooks, including the backup solar array.”

“How-how close did they come to the house?” he uttered.

“They stayed in the eastern tree line, opposite the garage.”

“Why the hell would anyone announce themselves at the gate, then trespass for a look at the house?”

“They were probably looking for the car,” said Kate.

“Please tell me the car isn’t in the garage.”

“The car isn’t in the garage,” she said.

“It is, isn’t it?”

“We covered it with a tarp and boarded up the windows. Dead-bolted the garage door. We couldn’t leave it sitting on Old Middle Road—not that it took them very long to find us.”

“Did the guys in Waterboro mention which militia group they were with?”

“No, and they weren’t dressed in any type of uniform. They might have been full of shit. They were certainly full of beer.”

“Maybe, but we ran across something Deliverance-like near the New Hampshire border. We’re talking sick and twisted stuff, involving a militia group. The crew we ran into was disturbingly organized.”

“This doesn’t sound like the same thing,” said Kate.

“Did they have out-of-state plates?”

“Yeah, how did you know?”

The line stayed silent for a few seconds.

“Alex, you still there?”

“Did you set up the sensors like I indicated?” said Alex.

“Yes, but we still have a lot of gaps in the perimeter.”

“What about the sandbags?”

“We filled about two hundred sandbags before the rain started, and we’ll start up again once it stops.”

“You should have enough to build two safe boxes. I’d get started on that immediately. You’ll have to run the table saw.”

“Linda and I decided to focus on the firing positions. We can’t repel an attack from the safe boxes,” she said, expecting some pushback.

“Good point. You’re right. Sorry to pepper you with questions. It sounds like you have things under control.”

“If you want to call it that. We had enough sandbags to build five positions. One in the master bedroom covering the eastern approach; two in the great room, giving us full coverage of the barn and lake approaches; one in the sitting room facing south; and the last one upstairs in the small bedroom. You can see most of the backyard and some of the barn from that one. If something goes down, we’ll herd the non-shooters into the basement with your mother.”

“Make sure you stack some spare mags at each position. I’m sure Dad is still walking around with one mag for his Vietnam-era relic,” said Alex.

Kate detected an ease that she didn’t expect.

“Linda duct-taped a spare to the stock, with a quick release tab. She’s like MacGyver.”

“Night vision?”

“Both of the spotting scopes are sitting on the kitchen island.”

“Sounds like you have the situation under control,” he said.

“We’ll all feel a hell of a lot better with you guys inside the perimeter.”

“I’m not sure how much of a difference we’ll make. Ryan needs crutches to get around, Charlie’s a refrigerator trip away from taking nitroglycerin pills, and I could probably use a wheelchair at this point. Ed and Chloe are the only fish you won’t throw back in the water.”

“I’m sure I can find a few uses for you, if you know what I mean,” she teased.

“I could use a visit or two from the naughty nurse,” he whispered.

“We left that costume back at the house,” she said.

“That’s what you think. Did you check the bottom of your rucksack?”

Kate burst into laughter, drawing a few stares from the kitchen. Alex’s mom hovered near the kitchen table, stealing glances at the phone.

“I’m getting dirty looks from everyone, so stop. Charlie said you were with the marines. What’s up with that?”

“Crazy story. One of my old platoon commanders is in charge of the reserve marine battalion based out of Fort Devens. He kind of saved my ass down here. I’m doing some intel analysis on militia groups for him. Stuff I can do on the couch. Got us an official escort back, which is a good thing. The borders are pretty much closed.”

“Well, I’m glad everyone is safe. Let me put your mother on before she blows a gasket. I love you. Call again when you’re in Limerick.”

“Will do. Love you too, honey.”

“Here’s your mother,” Kate said, nodding for Amy, who abandoned all pretense of staring at the floor and ran for the phone.

Chapter 26

EVENT +61:33

^{Parsonsfield, Maine}

Tyler Hatfield’s eyes shifted left and right through swollen eyelids when he lifted his bloodied chin to look Eli in the face. His breathing, made difficult by several broken ribs, appeared erratic and forced. The young man slowly cleared his throat and spat a mouthful of blood onto the dirt floor.

“You spit on me again, I’ll cut out your tongue and force feed it to your fiancée, along with a few other select cuts of meat.”

“Eli, I swear I was gonna come find you as soon as I could. I was on my way over right after—”

“After what? By my watch you’re about thirty-five hours late, unless the EMP fried your watch and—”

Hatfield started to respond, but Eli cut him off.

“And opened a black hole that suspended time!” said Eli, rushing up and pressing the flat side of a serrated knife against Hatfield’s cheek.

“Don’t you dare lie to me, Hatfield! You deserted my brother’s unit in the middle of battle. Got them all killed!”

“No. No,” he whimpered. “It wasn’t like that. Everyone was dead already. I had to get to the church to bring back reinforcements.”

“They found a radio in your car, deserter,” said Eli, twisting the blade and pushing it a few centimeters into his left cheek.

Hatfield screamed and twisted in his bindings against the thick wooden post holding up the dilapidated barn’s loft, succeeding only in digging the knife deeper into his face.

Eli put his face next to the man’s head and hissed, “You better come clean, boy, or I’m gonna gut your bride right in front of you. Tell me everything, and don’t leave out a single detail.”

“Okay. I’m sorry, Eli. Please don’t hurt Mary.”

“That all depends on you,” said Eli, slipping the knife out of his cheek. “Gentlemen, I got this from here,” he said to the two uniformed militiamen standing next to the closed barn door. “Why don’t you head up to the house and grab a few cold ones. It’s hotter than hell in here. Good work bringing this piece of shit in. Hatfield and I are about to have a heart-to-heart talk. Send Mr. McCulver down in about ten minutes.”

Eli wasn’t sure why he was congratulating these two idiots. It took them a day and a half to track down Hatfield’s fiancée’s home address and follow the trail to her sister’s house in Buxton, where Tyler and his disgustingly plain bitch were hiding. God help them if he couldn’t find better recruits. When the hatch next to the barn door slammed shut, exposing tendrils of dusty sunlight, he wiped his knife on Hatfield’s pants.

“Start talking.”

Several minutes later, Eli stood up from a scratched, unfinished wooden stool.

“You’re a hundred and ten percent sure they weren’t some kind of Special Forces unit? Just regular guys you say?”

“More than that. A hundred and twenty percent.”

“You can’t have more than a hundred and ten percent, Tyler. Everybody knows that.”

Hatfield continued pleading for his life, oblivious to Eli’s facetious comment.

“I don’t know how they got the jump on Jimmy, but by the time we got there, the whole west side of the bridge was throwing lead at us. Bikers, women, everyone had a gun. You stuck your head up; you got shot.”

“Is that so?” said Eli.

“I swear it.”

“I believe you, Tyler. Don’t go anywhere. I’ll be right back.”

Eli checked Hatfield’s bindings, ensuring that his wrists, ankles and neck were secured to the post. Confident that his captive couldn’t execute an embarrassing escape, he scurried to the left rear corner of the barn and pulled on a thick metal ring attached to the floor. A trapdoor inched open, revealing a rectangle in the hard-packed floor. Holding onto the ring, he leaned back, and the door swung on its hinges, stopping perpendicular to the ground.

He pulled a flashlight out of a pouch on his belt and descended the stairs. At the bottom, he activated the light and shined it in Hatfield’s fiancée’s face. Her head twisted away from the powerful beam. A muffled scream barely penetrated the thick layers of silver duct tape.

“Damn, it’s nice and cool down here,” he said, grabbing her thick brown hair and yanking her upright.

“You’ve been a good girl so far; don’t fuck it up now,” he said, breathing against her face.

He meant what he said. The underground chamber had been designed as a hide site and couldn’t be locked from the outside, which presented a risk. Then again, the trapdoor weighed at least fifty pounds, which made it nearly impossible to open with hands zip-tied behind your back. Eli had kind of hoped to hear some faint knocking at some point in the afternoon. The thought of her ramming that ugly face pointlessly against the impenetrable slab made him smile. Some people have the good sense to know when they’re beat. Maybe she wasn’t as dumb as she looked.

“Up the stairs. You try to run and I’ll kill your sister, her family, your brother, parents—everyone. You got me?”

She nodded repeatedly, and he pushed her up into the musty barn.

“Now, I’m gonna take this tape off your mouth, but you don’t say a word, or your husband-to-be is going to lose something important for your wedding night.”

She nodded again, and he went to work on the tape, which proved to be difficult to remove without taking a little skin along with it. She cried and whimpered, but kept quiet.

“Very good girl.”

“Mary, is that you?” said Hatfield, straining his head to see around the square beam.

“Shhhh,” said Eli, walking her right behind him, keeping her out of view.

He slipped a combat knife out of a leather sheath attached to his belt and spun her around, jamming the seven-inch marine KA-BAR blade to the hilt inside her stomach. His stabbing hand mechanically forced the razor-sharp knife in and out of her abdomen several more times while his left hand pulled her tightly against him. She dropped to the ground without making a sound. He nudged her onto her side with his foot, surprised to see her eyes wide open, staring lifelessly at his legs.

“You were supposed to scream like a stuck pig!”

“Mary? Mary!”

“Mary’s gone,” he said, stepping in front of the post.

Hatfield’s bloated, black and blue eyes fixated on Eli’s gore-covered knife and hand.

“You promised not to kill her!” he managed to choke out.

“No, I promised not to gut her in front of you,” Eli said, reversing the grip on the sticky knife handle. “I politely did it out of sight.”

“Why?”

“Because you told her the wrong version of what happened at the bridge,” he said.

“No. No. I told her the same thing I told you!”

Eli buried the knife in the right side of Hatfield’s throat, stepping left to avoid the bulk of his pulsing arterial spray. “Exactly.”

The side door sprang open, revealing a wiry, red-haired man holding a short-barreled AR. Eli’s second in command stepped through the opening.

“Clean up in aisle one,” said Eli.

“Shit. Both of them?” he said, closing the door and latching it behind him.

“Unfortunately, it came to that,” said Eli, wiping his blade clean on Hatfield’s pants. “We’ve got a problem.”

“We can get these two buried where nobody’ll find ’em,” said McCulver.

“I’m not worried about that. Hatfield confirmed what I more or less already knew. He said a black Jeep Wrangler with Maine plates approached the eastern bridge at Milton Mills right before all hell broke loose. Possibly fired point blank into the three men. It’s the only way they could have killed them that quickly. Jimmy reported the Jeep over the handheld and heightened their security posture, but the fight on the eastern bridge was over before it started. The guys on the western bridge loaded up and raced over, but were caught in the ambush. This turd never got out of his vehicle. Turned tail and left his buddies behind.”

“Is it possible that he was captured and released? Maybe to lead the hit team here? Finding them seemed a little too easy,” said McCulver.

“No. Those two have the combined brainpower of a trash bag, plus I worked them over hard enough to get the truth out. That’s why she had to go,” he said, pointing his knife at the bloody heap behind Hatfield. “I had to be sure.”

“Should I get some guys to clean this up?”

“I want to leave Hatfield up for everyone to see. This is what happens to traitors.”

“The girl?” said McCulver.

“String her up behind Hatfield. I want the message to be clear. You die with your brothers, or you die with your loved ones. The men we have now will form the essential core of the Maine Liberty Militia. They have to serve as an example for the new recruits. We need committed, disciplined patriots for the fight ahead.”

“There’s a balance, Eli. I trust your judgment with my life, but remember that there’s a line. If you go too far over, you run the risk of losing people.”

Spoken by anyone but McCulver, the words would have resulted in an immediate, excruciating death.

“That’s why I keep you close by. To reel me in when my temper gets the best of me,” he said, patting him on the shoulder. “You and I go way back.”

“I think we might want to bury the woman and limit Hatfield’s viewing to current members.”

Eli fought the urge to pummel McCulver with the base of his knife. “All right. Let’s get her out of here. When we’re done, we need to start looking for that Jeep. Maine plates? Either the Special Forces team is using local government sympathizers, or they’ve been here all along.”

“Like a sleeper cell?” said McCulver.

“I caught something about it on the internet. Part of that Wikileaks thing. Domestic Indigenous Response Team. It was stripped off the web almost as soon as it went up, which tells you something,” lied Eli.

“DIRT?”

“Yeah. They ain’t very creative with their acronyms.”

Chapter 27

EVENT +64:59

^{Limerick, Maine}

Alex scanned the road ahead through the AN/PVS-15 Generation IV night vision goggles (NVG) generously provided by 1^st Battalion’s supply chief. He held them like binoculars, instead of attaching them to the ballistic helmet at his feet. Battalion supply offered him a full set of “battle rattle,” which he had graciously accepted, despite the unlikelihood of ever using any of the gear. You could never predict when a second set of Dragon Skin armor might be useful.

“The turn is coming up on the right,” said Alex, lowering the NVGs.

“Striker escort turning right in five-zero meters,” said the driver into his headset.

“Almost home,” Alex said to the pitch-black cabin behind him, eliciting a few exhausted comments.

The marines drove without lights for most of the trip beyond the New Hampshire/Maine border. Human traffic disappeared after the state police checkpoint, making it safe to open up the convoy’s speed. All standard operating procedure designed to minimize the risk of ambush. What seemed a little overcautious thirty minutes ago, felt reasonable now that they were close to Gelder Pond. The less attention they drew to the compound, the better.

Alex dialed the ruggedized MSAT as the tactical vehicle eased right onto an inky stretch of packed-gravel road.

“Where are you?” said Kate.

“Turning into Gelder Pond. We should be at the gate in a minute or two. What’s for dinner?”

“Dinner? Didn’t they give you a few MREs for the trip?”

“Road snacks didn’t make the list.”

“Your mother just volunteered soup and sandwiches,” said Kate. “We’re trying to unload the fridge.”

“Good thing my mom’s on the scene.”

“We’ll see how long that attitude lasts. Meet you in front of the garage,” she said.

“Make that the barn. I want to keep the Jeep out of sight. Love you.”

“Love you too.”

The Matvee veered left onto the eastern side of the Gelder Pond loop, eventually straightening on a rutted dirt road. A sudden jolt reminded Alex that not everything had improved since the Humvee.

“Looks like someone forgot to pave this side, sir,” said the driver.

“You should see it in the winter. Not too much further on the right.”

The convoy crept down the road while Alex peered through his binoculars at the forest fifty feet ahead of the vehicle, looking for a break in the underbrush.

“You can hit the lights now,” said Alex.

“Roger, that,” replied the driver, raising his NVGs. “Lead vehicle, lights on.”

Alex squinted as the road and surrounding trees appeared. Insects flashed in front of the tactical vehicle, streaking like meteorites until they cleared the beams. The Matvee slowed in front of the gravel driveway.

“Looks like a tight fit, sir,” said the marine.

“It’s designed to accommodate a small tow truck, but I think we can call it good right here, Corporal. We’ll toss all of the gear into the Jeep and take it from here.”

“Embarrassed of your new friends, sir?”

“Never, but I have a little explaining to do, and the fewer armored vehicles they see, the better.”

“Embarrassed,” said the turret gunner.

“Hey, I’m trying to let you guys down easy.”

“We’ll get your gear transferred and hit the road.”

A few minutes later, the Jeep sank on its axles, burdened by five adults and twice the volume of gear they had originally packed in Scarborough. Alex opened the lead Matvee’s front passenger door and extended a hand across the seat.

“Thanks for letting Captain Chaos take a turn in the turret. Sorry about the noise.”

“Don’t apologize to me, sir. That was the longest thirty minutes of PFC Jackson’s life,” he said, shaking Alex’s hand.

“Sorry, Jackson.”

“No sweat, Captain. He looked happier than my daughter at Disney World!” yelled the marine through the roof hatch.

An uncomfortable, palpable silence enveloped the cabin as Jackson’s statement synched. Alex suddenly felt like a complete asshole. They’d spent nearly five hours in the Matvee, and he’d been too self-focused and tired to ask about the marines’ families. They’d become an instrument, their sole purpose to deliver him safely home to his family amidst jokes and stories about their experiences in the marines.

“Sorry,” said Alex.

“Nobody wants to talk about it, sir. Trust me. We all signed up for this,” said the corporal.

“Still,” he said, pausing. “Has anyone been in contact with their families?”

“Negative, but Jackson lives thirty minutes away in Fitchburg. His wife knows to head over to Devens.”

“What about you?”

“Worcester. CO said they’ve started to evacuate military families to Fort Devens. I’m hoping they send a truck down. Four guys from the battalion live in the area. Good chance, right?”

“I think so,” Alex said. “Either way they’ll be fine. Corporal Lianez, see you on the other side.”

“Not if I see you first, sir.”

Alex left the door open for the convoy’s senior marine, Staff Sergeant Evans, who stood behind the vehicle.

“Staff Sergeant, good luck with the rest of your mission.”

“Same to you, sir. Give us a holler if you run into trouble. Colonel said they shifted our tactical SATCOM network one hundred miles north of Boston. Use the ROTAC to reach us. We’re programmed into the system as Striker Five-One.”

“Which one is the ROTAC?”

“Small, green handheld. Ever use ROTAC before?”

“Sorry, I’m a bit of a dinosaur. Sincgars was new tech in my day,” said Alex.

“Shit. I’ll have to break this down Barney style for you.”

“Thanks,” said Alex, sarcastically.

“Menu button brings you ‘channel select.’ Scroll to Striker Five-One and press ‘Lock.’ Push to talk after that. It works over EMSS, typically in a regional DTCS configuration,” said the staff sergeant.

Alex shrugged his shoulders.

“Satellite stuff. Two hundred fifty mile range. PFM. You just press the button like a walkie-talkie, sir.”

“Pure fucking magic is right. What’s my station identifier?”

“I have no idea, Captain, but we don’t screen our calls.”

“I’ll let you roll. You’re welcome to swing by on your way south, grab a warm meal. Just saying.”

“I’ll keep that in mind. Welcome aboard, sir,” Evans said, coming to attention and snapping a salute.

“Carry on, Staff Sergeant.”

Alex jogged onto the gravel road, using the light from Ed’s Jeep to guide his way to the gate. He turned to watch the last Matvee rumble past the driveway entrance, headed south on Gelder Pond Lane. The dark shape disappeared, swallowed by the trees and thick brush. He turned his attention to the gate’s touchpad and pressed “Intercom.”

“No solicitors,” said a male voice through the speaker.

“Looks like I’ll have to take your grandson elsewhere.”

“We’ll have none of that. Coffee’s brewing! Welcome home, son!”

Alex inserted his key into the metal box and turned it clockwise to manually override the fried circuits in the touchpad. The gate sprang into action, squeaking on its track. He heard his mother above several voices yelling in the background.

Chapter 28

EVENT +65:18

^{Parsonsfield, Maine}

Eli leaned forward to examine a piece of stained poster board that featured a crudely drawn map of the Fletcher compound. The ancient velvet sofa creaked with his movement, causing one of the men standing in the background to break the silence.

“Damn, Eli. This is close quarters, and I’m not ready for a chemical attack.”

A few of the men stifled laughs, but quickly straightened up when he fired a murderous stare at the disheveled, overweight bald fuck that made a joke at his expense. The room was pushing ninety degrees from the late day sun, compounded by insufferable humidity. The ten men jammed onto folding chairs in the cramped living room of Eli’s mobile home had turned the place into a cesspool of body odor and shit breath. He’d have held the meeting outside if the mosquitos and no-see-ums hadn’t pushed him to his limit earlier. He was looking for an excuse to reinstall some discipline in his organization, and Dennis whoever-the-fuck looked like a good candidate to serve as an example.

“Dennis, I need to have a word with you outside.”

“I’m sorry, Eli. It was just a joke. I wasn’t thinking, and it just flew out of my mouth. Won’t happen again. I promise. Seriously.”

“You done?”

Dennis nodded with a pained look of regret and fear.

“Outside.”

“Eli, I really—”

The handheld standing on the kitchen counter next to the sofa squawked. “Liberty Actual, this is Recon One, over.”

Now he had Jeffrey Brown dicking up his job, too? There was no feasible way for Brown’s radio to transmit eight and a half miles. They had been lucky to get a mile and a half out of these pieces of shit. Either Brown had abandoned his assigned reconnaissance position early, or every hill and tree between here and Limerick had been obliterated. His bet was on the former. Eli reached out and grabbed the radio, never taking his burning eyes off Dennis.

“Why are you out of position, Recon One?”

“I saw something that needed to be reported, sir.”

“Unless you saw my nephew’s SUV, you better get your ass back into position.”

“You need to hear this, Eli. I just witnessed a small convoy of military vehicles pull into Gelder Pond.”

“Say that again?” said Eli, noticing most of the men in the overcrowded room shift uncomfortably.

“Three vehicles approached from the west on Old Middle Road and turned into Gelder Pond. Two Matvees and one Jeep Wrangler running with no lights. I say again. They were running dark, with no headlights. The two military vehicles reappeared seven minutes later and turned east on Old Middle, heading toward Limerick.”

Kevin McCulver, his second in command, stood from his chair next to the couch and mouthed, “Jeep?”

“Are you positive that you saw a Jeep Wrangler?” said Eli.

“Affirmative. I watched them through night vision. Four-door model. Driver only,” echoed Brown.

“Could you determine the color?”

“Negative. Too dark without the night vision scope. Definitely Maine plates, though. Do you want me to head back to the OP?”

A sudden combination of exhilaration and uncertainty forced Eli to pause. He needed a moment to process the implications and spin them in his favor. On one hand, he was thrilled by the sudden appearance of a Jeep matching the description of the one used to ambush his brother, especially in the vicinity of the Gelder Pond compound. Connecting the Jeep to the assassination of his nephew should remove any shadow of a doubt that the attack on the compound was legitimate, not that he had heard or detected any opposition to the proposed operation. His men seemed eager to put their training to use, however he suggested.

On the other hand, he couldn’t readily explain the presence of a military convoy, unless the story he had concocted had been some kind of subconscious manifestation of his true suspicions. He’d blurred the lines between fact and fiction so many times in the past three days, he could barely keep it straight himself. Shit, maybe he’d been right all along. He hoped that wasn’t the case. A government-sponsored, false-flag operation of this magnitude meant they were headed for trouble. Federal trouble. Once he mopped up the Fletchers, or whoever they claimed to be, he needed to accelerate the recruitment and training of his army, on the off chance he had to lead a real fight against a government occupation.

“How many men do you have at the OP?”

“Three, including myself. I left two behind to keep an eye on the road,” said Brown.

“Roger. Here’s what we’re gonna do. Head back and tell your two men to stay in position and observe the entrance to Gelder Pond for the rest of the night. Then drive straight to HQ. We have some decisions to make. How copy?”

“Solid copy. Turning around now, sir.”

“Good work out there. Make sure those two don’t fall asleep. We need to know if those military vehicles return. Did you see any mounted weapons?” said Eli.

“Affirmative. M240s.”

“Roger. See you shortly. Out.” Eli placed the radio on the counter and resumed his position on the couch. “Dennis?”

“Yes, sir!” he said, standing at attention.

“You pull shit like that again and I’ll hang you from a tree. Copy?”

“Copy, sir.”

Dennis’s ghost-white face betrayed no emotion. He stared at the middle distance like a good soldier. One more slip-up and he’d join Hatfield in the barn.

“Mr. Brown’s sighting can’t be a coincidence. Hatfield confirmed that a black, four-door Jeep Wrangler participated in the attack at Milton Mills yesterday. My brother reported it over his radio, right before the ambush.

“Here are the facts. Gunmen in Waterboro kill two of our own and steal their car. Witnesses have them approaching the two sentries on bicycle and shooting them in cold blood. Very accurate shooting, I might add. We tracked this group to an isolated property on the eastern side of Gelder Pond, complete with security gates, cameras and solar panels. This place is not your ordinary lake house.

“Now the same Jeep involved in the bridge ambush arrives at the Gelder Pond location—under heavy military escort? This confirms it. We have a government-sponsored Special Forces unit operating in southwestern Maine, and I think we just found one of their safe houses, if not their primary safe house. We need to hit this location with everything we’ve got. Break these sons of bitches and send the government a message. They are not welcome in southern Maine.”

The men stared at him, paralyzed by his suggestion for a moment.

“Tonight?” said one of the squad leaders.

“Against Special Forces?” said another.

“Early morning at the latest,” said Eli, standing up to establish some dominance over these quivering bitches.

“Mr. Russell? I heard that the shooters were women.”

“What’s your point?”

“Well, I didn’t mean to imply—”

“I didn’t ask to hear you chatter away like a bitch. If you’re gonna interrupt me, you better have a fucking point. What’s your point?”

“I guess it’s that a bunch of women with guns doesn’t sound like a Spec Ops team,” the man blurted.

The room catapulted into silence, everyone avoiding eye contact with Eli.

“Why is everyone so quiet all of a sudden? Bertelson had the first sensible question of the evening. Thank you, Mr. Bertelson. Look, I don’t believe we’ll find a Special Forces team here. I’ve read about this kind of thing on Wikileaks. We’re looking at a government sleeper cell put into place after the 2013 pandemic. They go about their lives until the government initiates the next false-flag crisis. You should have seen the place by Gelder’s Pond. Definitely a self-sustaining compound—with electricity.

“They probably got caught off guard by the EMP like the rest of us. No way the government would risk any kind of advanced warning, even for the sleeper cell. The bridge attack occurred around the same time. I bet the men took the Jeep and sent the women on bikes so they didn’t miss the ambush deadline. Brown and his crew probably witnessed one of the sleeper agents returning from a face-to-face meeting with Homeland and military commanders in New Hampshire. Whoever they delivered must be pretty damn important to rate a heavily armed escort. I say we take them out before they have time to execute the next phase of their plan.”

“How many men?” asked McCulver.

“Three squads. Twelve each. Two to breach the house, one to provide suppressing fire. We’ll put the thirty-cal into action for this one,” said Eli.

“No shit! That’s what I’m talking about,” shouted another squad leader.

“Count my squad in,” said Paul Hillebrand. “I have two men trained to use the thirty-cal.”

“The job’s yours,” said Eli. “Any more volunteers?”

Everyone stood at once, vying for Eli’s attention.

That’s more like it.

He settled on Bertelson’s squad, against his better judgment, but looking around the room, the crew-cut wearing, beady-eyed ex-army specialist was the only squad leader beyond Hillebrand that didn’t look like a crumpled bag of dog shit. He stepped outside to cleanse his nostrils of their stench. Nobody followed except for Kevin McCulver, who joined him for a cigarette on the muddy gravel driveway. They walked until they were far out of earshot of the mobile home.

“I’m a little concerned about the military escort,” said McCulver, lighting Eli’s cigarette.

“A little? I nearly shit my pants when Brown passed that over the radio. I thought he was fucking with us.”

“What does it mean?”

“For what?” said Eli. He took a deep drag and blew the smoke at the mosquitos above his head.

“For the operation. What if you’re right about this group being linked to the military?”

“What if I’m right?” he said, taking a step back from McCulver.

“Eli, it’s me you’re talking to. I knew this whole government angle was a ruse when you first suggested Special Forces kidnapped one of our guys. I played along, because I don’t care. I’m in this for the long haul.”

Eli stared at him, wondering if he should cut his throat and bury him or continue listening. McCulver had skills essential to the cause and had been a loyal friend for years. It bought him another minute of oxygen.

“You have a chance to make something big of this, and I’ll do whatever it takes to help. I just think we need to evaluate the possibility that this operation may not be a walk in the park. They might have left some men behind, especially if the guy in the Jeep is a high-value local.”

“Kevin, I feel like I’ve learned more about you in the last three days than the past twenty years. I made the right call bringing you on board after Campbell gave you the boot.”

“Harry doesn’t like explosives,” said McCulver.

“But I do, and I think we’ll need one of your special projects for tomorrow. Just in case we run into more than we bargained for,” Eli said. “I’m thinking the fifty pounder ought to do the job.”

“That’ll definitely do the job.”

Chapter 29

EVENT +66:19

^{Limerick, Maine}

Alex collapsed onto the couch next to Kate, fighting to keep his eyes open. A warm shower and change of clothes had sapped him of any remaining energy. The soft glow of candles combined with the warm evening air threatened to knock him unconscious. All he wanted to do was close his eyes for a few hours, but the day wasn’t finished. His mother held up a coffee mug from the kitchen.

“Alex? Anyone?”

“No, thanks, Mom,” he said, reaching a sore arm out to grab a glass of water. He stopped halfway, not wanting to put the effort into leaning forward.

“Still that bad?” asked Ed, holding Samantha on the love seat across from them.

“I think I pulled my back out at some point, and my body just figured it out,” said Alex.

“You want to borrow my back brace?” Charlie offered.

“Thanks, but I popped a thousand milligrams of ibuprofen. I should be set through tomorrow,” said Alex. “I might need a kidney transplant, but that’s the least of my problems. Why don’t we get this rolling so we can get a few hours of sleep.”

“You guys can sleep in as late as you want. We can handle the security watch,” said Linda.

“I’ll pitch in for that,” said Charlie. “All I did was sleep next to the Jeep while they were getting shot up in Boston.”

“Don’t listen to SEAL Team Six over there. We wouldn’t have made it out of Maine without him,” Ed remarked.

“Exactly, which is why I wanted to have a talk before we shut down for the night,” Alex said. “We might have a more serious problem on our hands than any of us can imagine. I was only aware of one organized militia group based out of southern Maine, the York County Readiness Brigade. There’s a group out of Augusta that has members throughout the state, but they’re mostly focused in central Maine. We ran into something highly organized and heavily armed at Milton Mills. Called themselves the Maine Liberty Militia. I’ve never heard of it, and my contact at the York County group never mentioned it either.”

“What were they doing at the bridge?” Alex’s dad asked from his recliner.

“Blocking traffic, both ways, unless you were willing to pay a toll. Sound familiar?”

The women shook their heads slowly, looks of disgust flashing around the room.

“Not the same kind of toll, though I wouldn’t be surprised if that was involved too. The group guarding the bridge let you across if you gave up your car. We found a church a few miles back from the border. The parking lot contained at least a dozen out-of-state vehicles, mostly SUVs and minivans, which is why I suspect they are connected to the two that stopped you in Waterboro. A luxury SUV with Massachusetts plates?”

“Who in their right mind would give up a working car?” said Samantha.

“It’s nearly impossible to get into Maine unless you can prove that you’re a resident. They promised these people a ride to Sanford, where they could hopefully continue their journey unhampered by law enforcement. Apparently, the prospect of getting into Maine appeals to a lot of people. Based on what we saw spreading north from Boston, I can’t say I blame them.”

“It doesn’t sound like a fair trade, but it’s their choice,” Amy, Alex’s mom said. “How is this a problem for us?”

His parents were the only two that hadn’t received some kind of a debriefing from one of them. Most of their time after arriving had been spent hosting, gleaning a few details here and there from mostly private conversations.

“They didn’t drive anyone to Sanford. They executed the people in the forest behind the church,” said Charlie.

“That’s what we think,” Ed said.

Not this again.

“We found piles of gear in the church. Footwear, camping gear, jackets, electronics. They stripped the people clean and walked them into the forest. We found several child-sized backpacks in one of the piles.”

“I’m just saying,” Ed cut in, “until someone verifies the bodies, we don’t have proof. They might have shaken the people down for the rest of their stuff and sent them walking. Still a shitty deal…”

“You know that’s not what was going on.”

“I agree with Alex,” said Charlie.

Ed sighed. “All I’m trying to say is that we’ve all jumped to conclusions, some more than others, and it has the potential to put us all in danger.”

“Why are you saying this now?” said Alex, finding himself wide awake.

“Because I can finally think! I’m out of the pressure cooker. At least I thought I was. Now I have angry militia stalking the forests around me. What if they weren’t executing women and children in the forest? What if we killed the guys at the bridge for no reason, and now we’re at the top of their shit list?”

“I didn’t kill the guys at the bridge because they were executing civilians. I killed them because they chose to stand in the way of rescuing my son and your daughter,” he said, glaring at Ed.

Ed looked away for several moments while the words hung in the room.

“It was the right thing to do,” admitted Ed, running his hands through his hair. “I’m just exhausted. I didn’t think I’d come back to living in the Alamo. Sorry to get riled up like that. What do we need to do?”

“We’ll all feel a little less punchy after some sleep. Unfortunately, it’s not going to be as much as we all probably expected. I think we need to have at least half of the house up by 4:30 AM. Firing positions manned to cover 360 degrees, minimal lighting, all guns ready. We’ll need to stay like that until at least eight. If they attack, it’ll most likely come between those hours. If they make a move against us, they’ll probably use the early morning darkness to move into position, then spring the attack when the sun comes up.”

“What about the rest of the day?” Ed asked.

Alex knew his words might not go over very well with Ed, but he didn’t want to sugarcoat the truth. If Ed was going to have a problem living at the compound, he needed to know sooner than later, so they could adjust the plan. He hated to think like this, but the threat they faced was organized, lethal and depraved. A bad combination in Alex’s experience. They couldn’t afford to make any assumptions about the commitment level of anyone in the group. He’d never ask his friend to leave, but if Ed’s heart wasn’t in the fight, Alex would craft the plan around him. Nothing personal. Purely pragmatic.

“We’ll have to be extremely cautious. If we want to work outside, we’ll have to carry weapons and post pickets in the tree line, just in case they avoid the sensors. I say we stay close to the house, so we can get inside if the sensors pick up a threat or one of the pickets spots something. We have to work the garden. That’s non-negotiable. We’re in peak harvest time.”

“Sounds like prison. How long will we have to live like this?”

“Until the threat no longer exists. We might be able to get the marines to help us with that, given my new role. If this group represents a threat to the region’s stability, I could make a strong case for destroying it.”

“What exactly is your new role, Alex?” said his father, eyeing him skeptically.

Alex decided to give them the short version, skipping the part about Homeland’s extensive data files. The information was classified anyway, “eyes only” for three members of Grady’s battalion at this point, so he didn’t feel guilty about concealing it.

“The commanding officer of the reserve marine battalion down in Boston is an old friend. He served as one of my platoon commanders in Iraq. We were both injured by the same RPG outside of An-Nasiriyah. The situation in Boston required the battalion to withdraw and reform north. He thinks they’ll eventually pull back to Maine. Apparently, Maine has been designated as a priority recovery zone, which explains why we saw an immediate deployment of National Guard units at the major border crossing chokepoints. I guess they’re worried about militia groups starting trouble inside the recovery zone. He asked me to apply my knowledge of the Maine-based groups and provide a threat assessment.”

Kate looked at him sharply. “Does he want you to go out and visit these groups?”

“No. I can sit right here and do the work. They gave me a laptop, satellite communications gear, everything I need. It’s an easy gig.”

“Until it isn’t,” she said, “and the Marine Corps sends you wherever they think you’re needed.”

“It’s a provisional appointment. I’m more like a consultant. Colonel Grady did this as a favor,” said Alex.

“Sounds like you’re the one doing him the favor,” said Samantha.

“He gave us an armed escort back to Maine, and this position comes with benefits. I’m designated as a security/intelligence officer, which is one of the highest tiers,” he said, digging the provisional security card out of his pocket. “It gives me one of these, which I—we— can use to access significant resources. Unrestricted travel, hospital privileges, no more worrying about walking around with firearms. I can authorize any of our families to enter the recovery zone. Probably get them picked up and delivered. From what Grady said, Maine is about to become one of the most sought-after pieces of real estate in New England. This is kind of our golden ticket.”

“Sounds good to me,” said Charlie, followed by a swig of coffee.

“I don’t know,” said Kate. “Sorry to be a downer about this, but the sooner you get that work done and cut yourself off from the marines, the better off we’ll all be, especially if Maine becomes a recovery zone, or whatever it’s called.”

“Grady did this as a favor. It got us a ride back and a little insurance policy if things get wild. I’ll finish up the threat assessment, designate the Maine Liberty Militia as a critical threat to recovery zone stability, and we’ll all be able to sit back and relax while the marines hunt them down. Threat neutralized.”

“I hope you’re right, Alex,” said Kate.

“I’m only right when you say I’m right,” he said, eliciting a few stifled laughs. “Who’s on watch at 4 AM?”

“I’m on from two until six with Alyssa,” said Linda.

“All right. Why don’t you wake Kate, me, Ed and Charlie at 4:15. Have some coffee going and some snacks available.”

“I’ll get up and make sure everything is ready,” said Amy.

“You don’t have to do that,” countered Linda.

“I won’t be able to sleep anyway.”

“Thanks, Mom.”

“Well, if she’s up, I’m up,” said Tim Fletcher.

“Sounds like that’s all we’ll need. I like the idea of having all of our rifles available during those hours. It might make sense to modify the nighttime watch rotation to keep our rifles off the ten to two in the morning shift. Set it up so that one is in the two to six, and the rest get a reasonable night’s sleep in preparation for the dawn watch.”

Everyone signaled agreement by mumbling or nodding. The group was exhausted and needed to power down. Waking up tomorrow morning was assured to be miserable for the recently returned Boston group.

“Well, if Charlie’s too tired to talk, we should probably break this up and catch some sleep,” he said.

Everyone rose in unison, eager to put the day behind them.

“Prep your tactical gear and weapons before you lay down. Trust me. You don’t want to be fumbling around with that stuff at zero dark thirty. You should sleep in your clothes too. That includes sturdy footwear. I know that sounds crazy, but you’ll be thankful if something happens. Plus I’m pretty sure most of us could fall asleep on a bed of nails tonight. See you in the morning.”

A few minutes later, Kate caught Alex washing his face in the downstairs bathroom and closed the door.

“You again?”

“At least you’re cleaned up this time,” said Kate. “How is your shoulder?” She reached out and gently touched his right arm.

“Which one?”

“The bad one. You’re lucky you didn’t get more than a grazing,” she said, standing behind him and pressing her body into his.

“Ryan bailed me out of that one. He did an amazing job out there. Everyone did.”

“What happened with Chloe? She doesn’t seem herself. She barely looked at Ryan all night.”

“It’s not a big deal,” Alex said, leaning backward into her. “She froze on the bridge. Complete lock down. Ryan was hit carrying her to the other side on his back. She’s a little embarrassed. That’s all.”

“She always seemed really sturdy. Nothing else happened?”

“Not that I’m aware of. She needs a little time and distance. We’ll need to make sure Ryan respects that.”

“And doesn’t feel like he did anything wrong,” she added. “Ed sounded like he might go for round two of the blame game. If he’s doing that right to your face, who knows what he’s saying to his kids behind closed doors?”

“Ed has a bad habit of second-guessing everyone’s decisions and input. It’s his quirk, and I’ve learned to work around it while keeping an ear open. He comes up with some good ideas. Ed functions best when he’s taking orders or making his own decisions. He saved my bacon again.”

“How many times did you need saving?”

“More than I’d care to admit. We’d be dead if it wasn’t for the marines. For Colonel Grady.”

“I didn’t mean to come down hard on you for that. I’m just nervous about the whole arrangement.”

“I’m a little nervous about it too. Ed’s hit the nail on the head,” said Alex.

“About what?”

“Being out of the pressure cooker long enough to think straight. Accepting Grady’s offer sounded pretty damn good with the city falling apart around us and a Boston militia unit chasing me down.”

“You pissed off more than one militia group?”

“Look who’s talking,” he said, drying his face with a towel.

“I guess we need to steer clear of any militia groups from now on,” said Kate, kissing his neck.

Alex turned around and put his hands on Kate’s lower back, pulling her into him while kissing her passionately. They grasped each other tightly, lowering their hands until Kate pulled back.

“There’s a line outside of the door,” she whispered into his ear.

“What?” he hissed. “Are you serious? And here I was thinking this might be the one place we could get some privacy.”

“We kissed privacy goodbye when we invited two families to join us.”

“Maybe they could all stay in the barn. They’d have a wood-burning stove.”

She squeezed his bottom. “Or we’ll just have to make better use of our 22 acres.”

“Not until those crazies are gone,” he said and kissed her. “See you up in our communal bedroom.”

“It’s not that bad.”

“I know.”

Chapter 30

EVENT +71:11

^{Limerick, Maine}

Alex opened his eyes to pitch darkness. He lay on his back next to Kate, which was the extent of his situational awareness. A cool, pine-scented breeze poured over his face, providing the first clue. He gently worked his left hand from under Kate’s head, careful not to wake her up, and checked his watch. 4:11. His alarm had been set for 4:15. It took him a few seconds to figure out why. Shit. He could use about eight more hours of sleep—and some real painkillers. The ibuprofen had clearly worn off overnight.

He pushed his torso up with his left hand, finding himself sore along the left side of his body, extending through his abdomen. He felt like he had done a few hundred atomic sit-ups right before retiring for the night. For a moment, he seriously doubted his ability to get out of bed without help. He lay there, considering his next move, when the back of his right thigh cramped, locking him in position on the bed. He extended his leg and fought the muscle spasm for a few minutes, until he was sure it had passed.

Not a good start to the day.

Kate hadn’t moved throughout the ordeal, presenting Alex’s next challenge. How in the hell was he supposed to wake his wife up at 4:00 in the morning? She was a notoriously deep sleeper, barely functional until two cups of dark roast coursed through her system. He’d wait as long as possible before attempting to stir her.

Alex grabbed his flashlight from the nightstand and illuminated the room. Nobody shifted—of course. They had all inherited their mother’s morning gene. He walked around the bed, careful not to step on Emily, who lay in a sleeping bag between the full-size bed and the elevated air mattress supporting Ryan. The room had been reconfigured to accommodate a sandbag position facing the backyard. The bed, normally under the backyard window, had been pushed across the room against the opposite interior walls. They had done the same in all of the rooms, hastily rearranging couches, beds, end tables and chairs to free up space for sheet metal and sandbags. Ed was right. The house had been transformed into the Alamo.

The door cracked; Charlie Thornton poked his face through the opening.

“I couldn’t sleep either,” he said. “Brought some coffee for your wife. Linda said she’d need it.”

Alex stepped into the hallway and closed the door behind him, taking the hot mug in his hands. After a long sip, he patted Charlie on the shoulder.

“Thank you, Charlie.”

“It was Linda’s idea,” he said, reaching for the Walkers’ door.

“No,” he said, stopping Charlie. “Thank you for everything. I mean it.”

“That’s what friends do for each other, man.”

“Friends collect your mail while you’re away on vacation. You’ve redefined my concept of the word. It’s not a word I’ll use lightly again. Thank you.”

“Dude, you’re evoking man tears, which means—”

“No. We are not going to—”

“It’s time for that hug,” he said, embracing Alex.

Alex held the coffee mug away and let it happen. Charlie had been angling for this “man hug” since he arrived at the reservation with the battalion’s armed escort, and Alex had deprived him long enough, artfully dodging his outstretched arms.

“When the two of you are done hugging, I’d appreciate it if you started waking people up,” said Linda from the bottom of the stairs.

“He started it,” said Charlie.

“Thanks for the coffee. See you in a few,” said Alex.

Twenty minutes later, everyone was in position, scattered throughout the dark house with coffee. Alex found himself back in his bedroom, facing the forest behind their house. He’d moved Ryan onto the bed and given Emily the air mattress, sliding it against the bed to make room in front of the sandbags for a folding chair. Through the open window, he scanned the length of the tree line with his night vision goggles, catching the occasional flicker of a lightning bug. Linda had a similar view on one of the computer monitors in the dining room, but the surveillance cameras couldn’t penetrate the forest like his generation IV gear. He could detect a smoldering cigarette or the glow of a night vision scope eyepiece deep in the trees.

Kate watched the open expanse of land in front of the house through one of Alex’s old night vision spotting scopes, a Russian knock-off with 2X magnification and an infrared illuminator. With nearly one hundred fifty feet of clearing separating the southern tree line from the house, a diligent watch through the scope could pick up any unusual activity. Their concern with the southern approach extended to the buckwheat and oat fields, which could be used by intruders to close the distance undetected.

The eastern woods extending from the road to the house fell under Charlie’s watch. The Generation III night vision scope attached to his rifle gave him better magnification than Alex’s goggles, along with the best chance of catching headlights if their attackers were foolish enough to use them on Gelder Pond Lane. Tim Fletcher covered the pond and left side of the barn with the second spotting scope while Ed kept Alex’s mother company in the kitchen, waiting to relieve anyone that needed a break. With Linda in the dining room, they had all of the “fighting” adults on station to respond.

Their defense had a few flaws, the most glaring being their inability to effectively shoot at targets in the dark. Only Alex and Charlie had integrated night vision systems, leaving the rest to scan with their devices and shoot in the general direction of movement. Hardly ideal. The motion-activated lights mounted to each side of the house and barn had been fried by the EMP. He’d kept two spare lights in the basement surveillance kit, which Tim chose to install on the unobserved sides of the barn to give them some advance warning if anyone got past the motion sensors.

Later today, Alex would rig trip flares in the yard, fifteen feet from the house, and run the trip wires back to the house. A solid tug on the wire by one of Alex’s lookouts would detonate a 35,000 candle power M49A1 trip flare, illuminating the open ground for a minute and providing silhouetted targets for shooters in the house. With any luck, they could engage attackers in the open at relatively close range. Failing that, the flares served as a powerful deterrent against repeated attempts to reach the house.

Beyond the limitations imposed by a nighttime battle on his motley crew, Alex’s second-biggest concern was the barn. Located less than fifty feet from the house, it blocked their view of a significant portion of the clearing’s northeast corner and represented the closest point of approach to the house. The militia team that scouted the property yesterday afternoon would have seen the barn and recognized the opportunities it presented. If the militia managed to break through one of the unobserved outer walls, they could open the barn door and rush the house. Ideally, they should place a team in the barn to stop this, but nobody besides himself had the training required to pull it off, and he’d be needed inside the house to keep this motley crew from falling apart under fire—if that was even possible.

Like any static defense, their best strategy was to inflict as many casualties as possible within the first few minutes of the attack, forcing a withdrawal. He also planned to put as many guns as possible into the first few salvos to give his attackers the impression that they had a large number of defenders. Marine Corps and army infantry schools teach combat leaders that they need a minimum three to one attacker to defender ratio when assaulting a fortified position. If he could throw enough bullets out of several windows at once, regardless of the caliber used, he might be able to pound some battlefield sense into the rush and stop its momentum.

If not, and they persisted, he wasn’t sure how long he could keep his civilian army in the fight under sustained gunfire. He hoped they were all wrong, and the men scoping out the house decided they had stumbled onto the wrong location. However, he knew that was wishful thinking.

A light flashed deep in the woods. Possibly a lightning bug, possibly not. Alex stared at the spot for a few minutes, not seeing a repeated flash. He considered “lasing” the area for Charlie’s magnified scope, but dismissed the idea. If the militia guys had some form of night vision gear, his IR laser would draw too much attention. He settled in for a long morning.

Chapter 31

EVENT +74:30

^{Limerick, Maine}

Eli Russell waved the three oncoming SUVs onto the path leaving Old Middle Road and followed them past a thick stand of trees after checking the road for observers. He was going to skin these idiots alive. They were an hour late arriving at the rally point and had failed to respond to his radio calls. He’d considered abandoning the attack altogether, fearful that they had been intercepted by the returning convoy. Larry Bertelson jumped out of the SUV and sprinted to Russell, saluting as he arrived.

“Eli, I’m sorry about the delay. One of my guys wanted to grab a different scope from his brother. It was supposed to be on the way, but it turned out to be further than I had thought. Ended up in Limington; then we kind of got lost. Something’s wrong with my radio, too,” he said, keeping his salute raised and his eyes lowered.

Bertelson had definitely been the wrong choice of squad leaders for the attack. Unfortunately, Eli’s pickings were slim beyond Hillebrand’s and Brown’s squads, and he didn’t have time to call in reinforcements. Like one of the head honchos said during the Iraq War, “You go to war with the army you have, not the army you want.” Of course, he’d have to switch things around a bit. There was no way he could trust this turd to co-lead the primary breach team.

“Sergeant Hillebrand! Front and center!”

A lanky man with unruly red hair broke free from a group of nearby men and snapped to attention in front of Eli.

“Hillebrand reporting, sir!”

Eli saw the barely concealed look of contempt on Bertelson’s face and decided if the man survived the attack, he’d turn him into his personal piñata.

“I’m switching your squad with Bertelson’s. You’ll be my right-hand man for the breach. Bertelson’s squad will provide suppressing fire from the northern tree line. Bertelson, you have a crew that can work the thirty-cal?”

“Yes, sir,” said Bertelson, pausing. “I can bring the attack in with you.”

“Negative. Showing up late for beers is one thing; putting me an hour behind schedule on an operation is another. We’ll talk about this later. Brief your troops and transfer the thirty-cal. We step off in five minutes. End of discussion. Oh, Bertelson?”

“Yes, sir?”

“Make sure you get a working radio from one of the guys staying at the rally point, if yours is still broken,” Eli said, frowning.

The two men dashed off to take care of the last minute adjustment, making room for Eli’s executive officer, Kevin McCulver.

“Surprised you didn’t beat him over the head with his rifle.”

“I wanted to, Kevin. I really wanted to, but we need everyone we’ve got for this. Keep a close eye on the road. If the convoy returns, I need an immediate heads-up. You know what to do after that.”

“Roger,” McCulver said, nodding hesitantly. “I wish we had a chance to test it. This is my first ammonium nitrate bomb.”

“And it won’t be your last. Not with Homeland digging its heels into the area. Just make sure the guys jump out far enough away. A fifty pounder will screw you up a long ways out. They need to roll that thing into the military convoy.”

“Copy. We’ll follow them in and set off the explosive as they dismount.”

“Hopefully, it won’t come to that,” said Eli.

McCulver nodded. “I’ll send the rest of the vehicles in when you give me the signal.”

“Primary extract will be at the gate. I’ll march the men up the driveway when we’re finished. Secondary extract is where the two roads split, right where we enter the woods.”

“Roger. Once the pickup vehicles depart, I’ll park the car bomb on the turnoff from Old Middle in case we have late arriving guests.”

“Sorry to sideline you like this, but I need someone I can trust running rear security. If this goes south for any reason, you’re the only one with the tactical awareness to unfuck the situation for me,” said Eli, gripping McCulver’s shoulder.

“I got your back, Eli. I suspect this won’t be our last operation.”

“Not if the federal government plans on imposing martial law on us. Not by a long shot. If you’d do the honor of mustering the troops, I’d like to kick this off before I melt. Gonna be a scorcher today.”

Eli stepped into the shade and repeated the plan in his head. He’d accompany Hillebrand’s squad, followed closely by Bertelson’s, into the forest past Gelder Pond Lane. They’d head slightly southwest until they reached the lake, where they’d turn left and follow the water’s edge until his rangefinder put the dock at about a hundred yards. At this point, he’d lead them away from the shoreline at a forty-five-degree angle until they could see the clearing.

He’d send a few scouts from there to scan for sentries before moving Hillebrand’s group to a position hidden from the house by the barn. Bertelson’s crew would take positions in the tree line behind the house, and they’d all wait for Brown’s squad to settle in along the eastern woods in the same location they had used to survey the compound yesterday.

Once everyone was in place, Bertelson’s squad was to pour rounds into the back of the house while Eli breached the door attached to the screen porch with Hillebrand’s squad. Brown’s team would establish fire superiority on the eastern flank and rush to the garage, looking for a second breach point along the front of the house. With two squads converging on the target, radio coordination played a critical role in avoiding fratricide, a point he needed to reinforce.

With the three squads formed up in the woods, he stepped forward to address the troops.

“I’ll keep this simple. Today we strike the first blow against tyranny. I don’t expect this will stop the government’s plan to take over York County, but it’ll sure as hell make them think twice about putting boots on the ground,” he said, amazed that he could conjure this stuff up on a whim.

The men muttered in agreement. He might have heard a “hell yeah.”

“We show no mercy here—like they showed no mercy at the bridge. Kill everyone in the house, no matter what you find. They’re harboring the enemy, and we need the word to spread. Harboring the enemy is the same as taking up arms against the people.”

More cheers.

Man, this is fun.

“Squad leaders, keep your radio earpieces in at all times—and listen up. I don’t like repeating orders, and we have two squads breaching the house from opposite ends. There’s potential for a blue on blue engagement if we’re not careful. Got it?”

The squad leaders verbally confirmed his warning.

“Rifles on safe until I give the order to open fire. You do not want to accidently discharge your weapon and compromise the operation. If you do, just put the barrel in your mouth and pull the trigger. Save me the effort. Keep your eyes open and your mouths shut. Are we ready to take the fight to the enemy?”

A mixed garble of chants erupted, most of which seemed to indicate they were ready.

“XO, make a note. Task Force Liberty crossed the line of departure at zero seven forty-two hours. Let’s move out!”

Chapter 32

EVENT +75:03

^{Limerick, Maine}

Kate checked her watch and rubbed her face. This wasn’t how she wanted to start the day, let alone every day until the Maine Liberty Militia was—how did Alex put it? Neutralized? She wondered what it might take to make that happen. Did Alex really have the power to list them as a critical threat and summon a giant boot to crush them? She’d thought his statement sounded heavy handed and Gestapo-like, especially on the heels of waving his magic badge around, but now she’d gladly help him craft the words required to prevent a continuous string of 4 AM wake ups.

After breakfast, she’d suggest that he draft his first report, emphasizing the immediate need to hunt down and stamp out this group, if they even existed. Maybe the kids had been full of shit, running their mouths after four too many tallboys. Maybe Alex had crossed paths with a one-off gang of opportunistic weekend warriors. Unfortunately, it didn’t matter, just the off chance of an organized attack meant she’d continue to experience the pleasure of studying a grainy, light green image while mosquitos found their way through the open window with the sole purpose of distracting her free hand from her coffee mug.

She sighed, knowing full well that she’d never complain about any of this in front of the others. Leaders didn’t whine, and they certainly didn’t put up with whiners.

“A few mosquito bites are a small price to pay for vigilance,” she mumbled, imitating Alex.

“What was that?” said Alex, appearing in the doorway to the sitting room.

“Nothing. Just muttering to myself. I ran out of coffee, and I can’t think straight,” she said.

“I think we’re out of the attack window for now. We’ll resume these positions about a half hour before sunset and keep them manned until 10 PM. Militarily, these are the most likely periods of time for an attack. I’ll put up a bunch of trip flares around the house later today, which should give us an advantage if they hit us in the dark.”

“Good, because, uh, I couldn’t see shit out there. I might have spotted them moving toward the house, but that’s about all I could do about it,” she said, standing up from the folding chair.

“I know. Tonight and tomorrow morning, you’ll have two wires running through the window, each attached to a flare. If you see something through the scope, pull the wire and fire.”

“You’re a poet. What’s for breakfast?”

“Chef’s surprise. The fridge isn’t working right, so my mom is clearing out the perishables, which somehow includes frozen bacon.”

“She likes bacon. How much coffee do we have left?”

“There’s a fresh pot brewing.”

“No, I mean like, in the grand scheme of things. Stockpiled.”

“The good stuff?”

“I don’t really care at this point.”

“You might once you taste the instant stuff.”

“How close are we to tapping into it?” she said, suddenly looking concerned.

“Six pounds.”

“That’s not good. Time to switch to instant. Most of them won’t know the difference. I saw Charlie watering his coffee down with tap water. What’s wrong with that man?”

Alex raised an eyebrow.

“I heard that!” said Charlie from the kitchen. “Not my fault you’re serving this fancy mud stuff.”

Kate picked up her backpack, which was filled with spare rifle magazines, and slung her rifle.

“You can leave that stuff here. No sense clunking it around the kitchen,” he said, stepping out of the sitting room.

Kate didn’t argue. She hated carrying the rifle around, constantly adjusting the sling and checking the safety—worried that it might discharge accidently. Logically, she knew it was impossible, even with a chambered round, but the very act of carrying a deadly weapon felt awkward. Alex handled his rifle like a natural extension of his body. Barely an afterthought. He shifted it out of the way with no apparent effort while navigating tight spaces or working. To her husband, the rifle was a simple tool. To her, it was a killing instrument to be feared and distrusted. She wondered if she’d ever adjust.

Most of the kids were at the kitchen table, including Ryan. She didn’t see Chloe on the screened porch or in the great room. Hopefully, she was still sleeping and not avoiding Ryan. He was crazy about her.

“How’s my big man doing?” she said, approaching the table.

“Feeling better, Mom. My leg is still throbbing, but the battalion surgeon said I could expect that for a week or so.”

She hugged and kissed him in front of everyone, noticing a rifle slung over the back of his chair.

“No more battalion surgeons for you. I can take this,” she said, grabbing the rifle barrel.

“That’s all right, Mom. I feel better having it close,” he said.

Alex walked in from the screened porch. “I’m gonna check the barn. Make sure it’s empty of guests.”

Linda spoke up from the great room. “It’s clear, Alex. The camera was on the door all night. I didn’t see anything on the time-elapsed feed.”

“Call me paranoid. Mom, why aren’t you wearing the vest?”

“I’m not wearing that thing around the house. I can barely move in it. If the shooting starts, you’re going to stuff me in the basement anyway. Give it to someone on the front lines.”

“Dad?”

“I can’t make her do it,” said Tim.

“Then you can wear it,” replied Alex.

“Put it on one of the kids that isn’t going into the cellar.”

“I’m not going down there, by the way,” stated Ethan Fletcher.

“Yes, you are,” snapped Alex. “You’re in charge of guarding the bulkhead door.”

“That’s kind of bogus,” returned their nephew.

“The house has five points of access, not counting the windows. The bulkhead is the only point we can’t adequately cover from any of the windows. It’s a bigger responsibility than you realize.”

“I guess,” said Ethan, not looking convinced.

“If I can’t get the old folks to wear these,” he said, patting the vest hanging over the five-foot-by-five-foot sandbag emplacement next to the kitchen island, “we’ll keep one vest in each of the safe boxes. If you leave the safe box, you put the vest on. Fair enough?”

“Alex, I think you should wear the vest. You’ll be moving around the house,” said Ed from the table on the porch.

“I’d feel better if one of the kids wore it,” said Alex.

Logically, Ed was right, and Kate hoped he took him up on the offer. They had talked about the vests last night and agreed that they could become a point of contention if not handled properly. Each parent wanted his or her children in one of those vests. According to Alex, the Dragon Skin’s silicon carbide ceramic plates could stop a .30-caliber armor-piercing bullet. Alex’s solution was to give them to his parents, but even that could be interpreted as favoritism. With Ed making the suggestion, it gave Alex the opportunity to wear the vest without raising eyebrows.

“Take the vest, Alex,” said Linda. “You’re prone to getting shot.”

“Thanks,” he shot back at Linda.

She locked eyes with Alex for a moment and nodded imperceptibly, giving him permission to take the suggestion.

“Fair enough,” said Alex, unclipping his tactical chest rig.

Kate helped him adjust the straps to accommodate the bulk of the body armor, which was configured with MOLLE points to carry the same ammunition pouches attached to Alex’s rig.

“Would it be easier to transfer magazine pouches?” she said.

“We can do that later. I’ll be right back,” he said. “Mom, don’t mix the bacon with the tofu.”

Alex was in rare form, which was good to see. He’d looked utterly sapped of energy and enthusiasm last night.

“You want some company?” said Kate.

“It’s probably better to keep everyone inside until later in the day,” he said.

Rare form and all business.

Chapter 33

EVENT +75:05

^{Limerick, Maine}

Eli Russell crawled beneath the fallen tree, cursing under his breath. The half-mile walk through the woods had turned into a slog through decades-old untamed forest, slowing their progress to the point of madness. Soaked with sweat and covered in mud and dried pine needles, he stopped twenty feet beyond the rotten trunk to catch his breath and scan ahead. They’d kept the pond at least forty feet to their right, avoiding the shoreline bog that had swallowed a few boots and painted most of them dark brown at the beginning of their journey.

He raised a pair of compact binoculars and peered through the dense woodland, following the reflective waterline. The gray dock peeked through the trees at the far edge of his view. Maybe another fifty feet and they could turn southeast for the barn. The men had started to gather around him, breathing heavily and wiping their red faces. He’d have to impose more rigorous physical standards for his men. He had no delusions about turning this crowd of thirty- to forty-something weekend warriors into a Ranger battalion, but anything had to be better than the sorry sacks that slithered under the rotten log and spilled into the forest. One of the men pulled a pack of cigarettes from his left breast pocket and fished around in his pants for a lighter.

“What the fuck are you doing?” Eli whispered.

“I thought we were taking a break,” the man replied.

Paul Hillebrand stepped out of the foliage next to the man and slapped him on the back of the head.

“Stow that shit and form a hasty 180-degree security perimeter facing south. You know the drill!” he hissed. “Sorry about that, Eli.”

The men scattered and took up positions in front of the log while Bertelson’s squad struggled through. His crew looked worse than Hillebrand’s. Watching them drag the thirty-cal through the dirt and dead leaves under the log made him want to cut off Bertelson’s head and shit down his neck. Of course, Bertelson was nowhere to be found, because he led from behind. As the gun crew emerged, Eli sprang forward and ripped the vintage thirty-two-pound M1919A6 Browning medium machine gun from their grip.

“Do you cocksuckers realize you just dragged a vintage weapon through the dirt?” he said, shaking soil and leaves off the weapon. “You better pray to God this thing works, because we don’t have time to field strip and clean it. Lucky for you, this son of a bitch is tougher than the two of you combined. Bertelson?”

“Yes, sir,” he heard from the other side of the downed trunk.

“Get over here and square your men away.”

Bertelson shimmied under the tree and stood up, staring at the machine gun in Eli’s hands.

“I want you out in front of your men. We don’t lead from behind in my army. You might have seen them trying to fill the barrel with dirt,” he said, throwing the weapon at the squad leader.

Surprisingly, Bertelson caught it without stumbling backward into the tree, which had been Eli’s intention. He’d hoped to crack his face open on the barrel.

“I like to keep an eye on the squad. I can’t do that with my back to the men,” he said meekly.

“It’s easier to pull a string than it is to push it. Get out in front, or I’ll find someone who better understands the concept.”

“Roger that, sir,” Bertelson said, walking over to his shamed gun crew.

Eli pressed the transmit button on his radio. “Liberty Three, this is Liberty Actual. We’ve reached the turn. Commence your approach and hold at the tree line, over.”

“This is Liberty Three, commencing approach,” squawked his earpiece.

He strode to the front of the group and held up his right hand without looking behind him. Forming a knife hand, he chopped the air in front of him, waiting a few seconds before stepping forward. A quick glance behind showed that nobody had moved.

“On your feet. We’re moving out,” he barked as low as possible.

Tactically, the regular arm of the Maine Liberty Militia was a mess, better suited for basic military maneuvers, checkpoint duty and static defense. If he had known how bad they’d look after trudging for thirty minutes, he might have considered a different set of tactics. Too late now.

Without the distractions of modern-day life, things would change at the training compound. He’d put the few remaining members of Jimmy’s old unit to work squaring them away. One way or the other, he’d whip this crew into a reasonable fighting force, if they didn’t kill each other this morning. He gave the hand signal to move out again, guiding the column forward on an old game trail.

Chapter 34

EVENT +75:15

^{Limerick, Maine}

Alex flipped the light switch, darkening the barn before stepping into the glaring sun. The impeccable blue sky held no clouds to shield the blistering orb peering above the eastern tree line. The house usually gave up the fight around noon, reaching intolerable levels of heat and humidity by two. The late afternoon was a complete loss, as the house absorbed everything the sun had to offer and radiated the misery inward. The pond served as their only possible refuge at that point. With the militia threat looming on the horizon, he didn’t foresee frolicking in the water. He almost wished for rain.

“Alex, we have movement along the northern perimeter, near the pond,” said Linda’s voice from the radio.

Alex locked the door from the inside and closed it. “Right along the pond?” he said, testing the door.

“Close enough. Something triggered the sensor facing inland from the waterline.”

“I’ll take a look. Get everyone in their positions. Someone needs to keep an eye on the sensors, in case we have another group out there,” said Alex, heading toward the front of the barn.

“Let’s just hope it was a deer,” she said.

Alex jogged along the red siding and reached the far front corner, taking a knee. He dug into one of his tactical vest pockets and removed the handheld radio’s earpiece, plugging it into the radio. Hollow static echoed through the earpiece as he leaned a few inches beyond the corner and peered through the ACOG scope. Bright green from direct sunlight, the trees and bushes along the edge of the clearing formed a dense screen. He’d have to get into the woods.

“Linda, I’m heading into the forest to take a closer look. I can’t see anything from here. I’ll be right back,” said Alex.

“Are you sure that’s a good idea?” asked Tim over the line.

Alex had forgotten that everyone was on the primary tactical frequency.

“Just a quick peek to give us something to work with. I’ll be back in less than two minutes. Out.”

End of discussion.

Alex crouched and sprinted toward the northwest corner of the clearing, cursing the entire two hundred feet. He’d taken a questionable risk running across flat, exposed ground, gambling on the enemy force’s concentration in one location. If others had slipped the sensor net and taken positions closer to the clearing, his darting figure would have attracted immediate, lethal attention. Maybe they were waiting until he stopped. He hit the ground next to a thick raspberry bush and crawled through a low opening in the thorny mess. Lush raspberry bushes ringed the edges of the clearing, where they thrived in the sun. They also formed a low-budget barbed-wire fence along the closest points of approach to the house. Anyone sprinting out of the forest was in for a nasty surprise.

Squirming onto the soft pine-covered forest floor, he pressed forward several feet and rested behind a thick spruce. Alex listened for a few moments, hearing a snap in the distance, followed immediately by another. Unless the clumsiest, bumble-footed buck in all of southern Maine had just wandered onto his property, they had uninvited guests. Alex eased his head around the tree, taking in the scene. At first glance, the forest looked like it always did—a shadowy, multihued canvas of greens and browns, dominated by tall vertical lines and random thickets. Organically alive, but typically motionless on a macro scale. A few more seconds of observation explained the sensor hit. Darkened figures moved in a line, spaced at least ten feet apart, due east.

He brought the rifle to his shoulder and examined the lead man in the column. MultiCam-patterned uniform, tactical vest—no body armor, same boonie cap worn by the militia at the bridge, AR rifle with unmagnified optics.

Definitely not Bambi.

Their trajectory through the forest puzzled him. They couldn’t be more than two hundred feet from the clearing, which meant they’d have seen the barn through the trees. The best approach to the house was from behind the barn, pretty much taking the same path he had travelled to arrive in the forest. The barn put them less than fifty feet from the house. A charge from the tree line directly behind the house forced them to cross triple that distance, while navigating a fenced vegetable garden.

What am I missing?

A quick scan through the line of militia soldiers showed them all moving in the same direction. Parallel to the tree line. The last man in the line didn’t appear to be moving. Alex peered through the 4X scope, centering the red arrow on the man’s chest.

“Shit,” he muttered, slowly retracting his head and rifle behind the knotted trunk.

It hadn’t been the last guy. He’d found himself staring at the point man for a second squad moving in his direction. The militia deployment made more sense now. One squad could take advantage of the blind spot created by the barn, while the other provided suppressing fire from the trees beyond the backyard. He started to low-crawl back to the edge of the forest, but stopped. Did it make sense to punch a few holes in the squad headed toward him and make a run for the barn? The thought was tempting, but he preferred not to attract the combined effort of two dozen rifles to his return trip across the clearing. The suppressor might keep his position concealed long enough to make it through the raspberry bushes, but he’d be fair game after that.

He wiggled under the thorns and turned left, lying along the edge of the grass and surveying the land behind the house and barn. It was clear.

“Alex,” said Kate through his earpiece, “we have a second group approaching from the east. Sensors picked them up about a hundred feet from the driveway, which puts them about even with the house.”

“Roger. I have two separate squads inbound from the north. One looks like it will line up along the trees behind the house. The other will probably use the barn to get as close to the house as possible. I want everyone with optics scanning the northern tree line for their positions. We’ll give them a full magazine welcome to make them think twice. Everyone who can shoot needs to be in on this. Once the initial salvo is finished, everyone goes back to their assigned positions. If they can safely aim and shoot a weapon, they need to be doing that. We’ll only get one shot at making a strong impression. I’m heading back, so don’t shoot me. Have someone open the front door.”

“Got it,” she said.

He gripped the rifle’s hand guard and took off in a crouch, half-expecting to hear the supersonic snap of incoming bullets. Careening past the corner of the barn, he didn’t ease up on his legs until he reached the front of the house, where he slowed to a jog and struggled for breath. No matter how many miles he put into running, sprinting three hundred feet remained a thoroughly unpleasant experience. Fighting waves of nausea, he took the stairs on the porch in a single leap, pulling himself up by the railing. The front door swung inward, and Kate, who looked all business, took his hand and pulled him inside.

“Are you sure you want the kids involved?” said Kate.

“Yes,” he insisted.

“Then you need to provide some hands-on guidance.”

“Is Ryan upstairs?” he said, running through the foyer hallway.

“Charlie and Linda took him up,” said Kate.

Alex surveyed the kitchen and great room area, not pleased by what he saw.

“Samantha, just for now, get everyone behind the safe box, not in it. When I give the signal, Daniel and Chloe will move next to their father by the sliding door and you’ll stand behind the sink. At some point, very soon after that, I’ll order everyone to start firing. I want you to empty the shotgun at the far right corner of the garage. Try to hit it as many times as possible.”

“You want me to shoot the barn?”

“Yes. Tear the corner to pieces. I want the kids to shoot six rounds each into the forest, wherever their father is shooting, followed by the rest of their magazines at the barn. Got it guys?” he said, staring down Chloe and Daniel until they nodded.

“Sam, when you and the kids have emptied your weapons, get inside the safe box and reload. You should be safe behind the sandbags before they fire back. The rest of you will rapidly shoot half of your rifle magazine at visible targets in the trees, the other half at the corner. Targets of opportunity after that,” he said, running to his father in the great room.

“Dad, I want you to focus on both sides of the barn and anything to the left. Use both of the firing positions in the great room. I expect them to send a guy to the left corner to fire into the house. Concentrate on putting that target out of action, even if you have to slow down your rate of fire and take well-aimed shots. Yell out if you need backup.”

His next stop was Ed, who kneeled behind a wide sandbag wall built five feet back from the open side of the deck slider.

“You good with the AR?” said Alex.

“I prefer the Ruger, but I think we’ll need the extra punch for this one.”

“If it jams, switch to the Ruger and yell for me. I’ll put the AR back into action. Here’s what I need you to do. After the first full magazine salvo, reload and cover the right corner of the barn, along with anything you can identify in the tree line behind the house. Take three quick shots at each target, reacquire or find a new target and repeat. If men push forward from the barn, yell out a warning and focus your fire on them until they are no longer moving toward the house. Their most likely breach point is this sliding door. If it gets too crazy behind your sandbag position, fall back to the safe box,” he said, slapping Ed on the shoulder. “Easy enough?”

“Easy enough.”

“Kate, you’ll start out in the bathroom. After the first mag, you focus on the tree line. If the eastern group makes a dash for the garage, you relocate to the sitting room. You’ll have a clean line of sight down the front of the garage, which is their fastest way into the house. Cover that approach until Linda and Charlie get downstairs. Check?”

“Check,” she said and jogged toward the mudroom.

“I’ll be back down in a few moments. Pass anything you see over the radio.” He opened the door to the basement and came face to face with his mother holding a 20-gauge shotgun.

“Mom, I need—”

“The kids stay down here. You have too many moving parts up there as it is. A few shaky pistols isn’t going to make or break the day,” she said.

“I love you, Mom. Keep the door locked and watch the bulkhead. Tell Emily I love her,” he said, heading upstairs.

At the top of the staircase, he turned left and walked into their bedroom. Ryan sat on a folding chair, pressing his rifle’s vertical fore grip against the top row of sandbags, scanning the tree line through the 4X ACOG scope. The Enhanced Combat Helmet issued to Alex by the marines protected his head. Over his clothes, he wore a loose-fitting tactical vest jammed with rifle magazines. Several magazines lay flat on top of the sandbag wall, ready for immediate use. More sat stacked on the floor beside the chair. With twenty magazines at his disposal, Ryan would fire the Marine Corps issued HK416A5, providing their only source of automatic gunfire. The weapon was essentially the same as the M27 Infantry Assault Rifle used by the Marine Corp as a squad support weapon, without the bipod and higher capacity magazines.

“You all right?”

“Ready for action,” Ryan said, knocking on the helmet.

Alex kneeled next to the chair, putting a hand on Ryan’s shoulder.

“You’re the closest thing we have to an infantry support rifleman. I want you to burn through mags as quickly and accurately as you can. Short, controlled bursts. Spread the love around. You’ll draw a lot of attention doing this, so keep your head as low as possible. If you see men coming from the barn, you engage that group until they stop. We can’t let them get into the house. I love you, buddy,” he said, letting go of his son.

“Love you too, Dad.”

“Call out anything you see on the radio,” he said.

“Got it.”

“If the volume of incoming fire makes it impossible to engage targets without getting hit, you’re done. You call it in and stay out of sight.”

“How will I know when it gets to that point?”

“You’ll know, and so will your mother. No heroics,” he said, patting Ryan on the shoulder.

Alex hovered at the door, afraid to leave. When the shooting started, his son would attract hundreds of bullets. They’d reinforced the position with leftover sandbags, extending the sides to protect against shallow-angled fire and adding an additional layer facing the front. An extra piece of sheet metal had been brought up early this morning and wedged against the right side of the fortification to slow down projectiles heading into the side extension. This had been the only modification to Kate and Linda’s work that Alex had directed.

Alex had initially considered taking this position, since it offered the best view of the exterior situation, but the rest of the adults quickly talked him out of it. They needed him to remain mobile, constantly assessing their defenses. Much to Kate’s dismay, Ryan was the next best candidate for the key position. He didn’t like placing his son here either, but Ryan could fire accurately at a sustained rate, which was exactly what they needed overlooking both the barn and backyard. When explaining this to Kate, he left out the part about their son becoming the primary target on the battlefield. He took one more look at his son and sped down the hallway toward the master bedroom.

The second safe box sat about five feet beyond the door to the vast room, in the middle of a windowless sitting area extending from the entrance to the master bathroom to a bay window facing south. Both of the Thorntons’ daughters poked their heads above the sandbags. Linda turned her head from a pair of binoculars to acknowledge his entry before returning to the critical business of spotting the group approaching from the road. He noticed that she wore the Dragon Skin body armor. A good decision, given her job of holding the eastern line. She’d draw a considerable amount of gunfire trying to keep an entire squad at bay.

“That you, Alex?” said Charlie from the window facing the backyard in the northeast corner of the room.

Charlie must have changed as soon as the alarm was sounded. Loaded down with tactical gear, he sported Vietnam-era tiger-striped camouflage and his famous raccoon cap. Everyone had their combat rituals, ranging from specialized uniforms to a simple mantra spoken before firing the first round.

“Looks like the Thorntons have this side of the house locked down,” Alex commented.

“Damn straight,” uttered Linda.

“Charlie, move to the other side of the bed. Any rounds fired from the north at your current position run the risk of catching Linda in a crossfire. Better to draw fire away from the corner. She doesn’t have much protection on her left side.”

He passed Charlie in front of the bed, stopping him for a moment.

“Stay low. No crazy shit. Fire three to five rounds at each target. Shift immediately to the next. Work your way down the line. If someone makes a break for the house from the trees, stopping them becomes your only focus. I suspect they’ll use the northern tree line for suppressing fire in support of the breaching team, so your job will mostly consist of staying alive and reducing their numbers. Be ready to help Linda if the squad in the eastern woods makes a run for the house. I suspect they will.”

“Got it, brother,” said Charlie with a fearful look.

“It’s gonna be hell, but we’ll hold them off,” said Alex, believing the first part more than the second. “Linda, your job is pretty straightforward. Keep them in the woods as long as possible. If they have any tactical sense, they’ll feel you out for a minute before giving it a go. They’ll send a few into the open under heavy suppressing fire. You bury your head in that rifle and keep it flush against the sandbags. Don’t remove your shooting glasses for any reason, or you’ll be put out of action by flying debris. It will not be a pleasant experience. Keep firing and call Charlie. Charlie?”

“Yo!”

“When Linda calls you over, take the window next to hers and concentrate on the men in the open. With a bit of luck and good shooting, you’ll take three to four attackers out of the equation. Keep your heads low. If it gets too intense to fire accurately, rapidly empty a few magazines using the Jihadi method and assess the situation.”

“Jihadi method?” asked Linda.

“Yeah. You just fire over the sand bags without looking,” he said, demonstrating with his own rifle. “If you can’t stop them from reaching the house, call it out over the radio. Charlie returns to his original position, and you head downstairs to watch the eastern breach points. Good to go?” he said, slapping Linda on the back.

“Don’t you have somewhere to be?” said Linda, keeping focused on the trees.

He heard a branch snap in the distance.

“Good luck,” he whispered.

On his way out of the bedroom, he racked his brain for anything he missed. ROTAC. The battle would be finished by the time the marine detachment sent to Brunswick could arrive, but it was worth a try.

Chapter 35

EVENT +75:20

^{Limerick, Maine}

Eli stared at the barn through the trees, catching part of the gray colonial beyond the far left corner of the red siding. He needed to lead the squad to the right, on a due south heading, so they could enter the clearing safe from observation and direct gunfire. Of course, this theory assumed that the people in the house didn’t have a man situated in the barn. A half-opened window high up on the roofline stared down at him, casting serious doubt on an uninterrupted, near football field length jog across the grass. Like every window on the house, the screen was missing. He’d have to position at least two men to cover the window, bringing them across if the journey proved uneventful. His radio squawked.

“Liberty Actual, this is Liberty Three, we have a problem.”

“What is it, Liberty Three?”

“Last man in my column found a motion detector thirty feet from our ingress route. I can see another one, maybe one hundred feet away in the opposite direction. Looks like a wireless model. I think they know we’re coming.”

Shit.

He’d counted on cameras and motion-activated lights, but a perimeter of motion sensors was overkill for a bunch of summer folk. This might be a game changer.

“Can you tell if they’re live? The EMP should have killed all of this gear.”

“Most of our unplugged electronics gear survived. We have to assume this stuff works. They probably caught us watching the place yesterday. Might explain the late night military convoy. What if they offloaded a surprise? This whole thing could be a trap,” said Brown.

Double shit.

It was definitely possible. Eli glanced nervously around the forest, wondering if he’d already passed a hidden gun emplacement. Was his second squad lining up on the tree line to be hit from both sides? No. This was crazy thinking. A couple of stupid bitches got the drop on his drunken nephew and stole his SUV. Hatfield’s description of the bridge battle didn’t include a Green Beret A-Team. Jimmy’s group was hit by three guys in a Jeep during a blinding rainstorm, helped by a bunch of Hell’s Angels. Only one guy was in the Jeep spotted by Brown. None of it added up to a clever ambush by Special Forces. But how the hell did he explain a military convoy driving around at night without lights? Maybe the driver was some rich out-of-stater with connections. Who the fuck knew—or cared? They’d give it a try.

“Liberty Three, continue your approach. Hang back about thirty feet from the clearing to avoid visual detection and wait for second squad to engage the house. Give it about thirty seconds, then execute your mission.”

After a lengthy pause, Brown responded. “Roger. Liberty Three will advise when in position.”

“See you inside the house, Liberty Three. Actual, out.”

“I say we send a few guys across to test the waters. Just in case,” said Hillebrand, from a crouched position buried inside a familiar-looking plant.

“Don’t touch your eyes, Paul,” said Eli. “You’re sitting in poison ivy.”

“Son of a bitch,” said Hillebrand, stepping out of the bush and kneeling next to Eli.

“You got a few volunteers to send across?” said Eli.

“We don’t have volunteers in my squad. Ain’t a democracy. We’ll get set up on the edge and send two out. If we get hit by automatic fire from the barn, I’d say we might have a problem.”

“I agree. If we can get the whole squad to the barn, it won’t matter who they dropped off last night. Not with the thirty-cal firing seven hundred rounds per minute into the house.”

“Liberty Two, this is Liberty Actual.”

“Send it, Actual.”

He hated Bertelson’s radio protocol. The kid just didn’t get it. You didn’t tell your commanding officer to “send it.” You answer with your call sign and wait for orders. Why the fuck couldn’t he get this right? Now wasn’t the time to let this kind of shit bother him, so Eli took a deep breath and pressed his lips together before transmitting.

“Keep your squad thirty feet back from the clearing until I give you the order to move up. I don’t want them spotting you too early. The only exception will be the machine-gun team. I want them up near the edge of the tree line in a concealed position, prepping the thirty-cal for action. Bipod extended, round in the chamber. When I give the order, they will push that barrel through the foliage and sweep each floor of the house with sustained fire. After that, I want them focused on the right-side windows and the sliding door. Fire until the gun is out of ammo. How copy?”

“Solid copy, Actual. I’ll be on the gun myself, so we don’t have any screw ups.”

How the hell was he supposed to direct his squad sitting behind a thirty-caliber machine gun? Bertelson was getting under his skin.

“Negative, Liberty Three. I need you in a command and control position, not behind a machine gun.”

“Uhhh, I made the decision when we split off. I sent Raymond to lead the column across. He’s on the far left flank.”

Eli peered through the forest at the skirmish line formed by Bertelson’s squad, barely able to see past the fifth man in line. He didn’t need this kind of shit right before the attack. His gut instinct told him to relieve Bertelson before he made a decision that botched the entire plan. He could send Hillebrand to take over Liberty Two while Eli spearheaded the house breach. Tactically, it made more sense for him to leave Hillebrand in place and take over Bertelson’s squad, but then he’d miss all of the fun. There was no way Eli was going to pass up an opportunity to put his pistol grip shotgun into action. He’d just as soon miss his own son’s wedding, if he had one.

“Never mind. Just make sure nobody starts firing until I give the order.”

“Roger. I’ll let you know when we’re in position.”

Several minutes later, Brown had arranged his squad underneath the impenetrable raspberry bushes, with orders to cover the second-story barn window. Satisfied that they were ready, he gave Eli the signal to send the two men who lay in the deep grass on the other side of the thorny barrier. Twenty seconds later, Eli exhaled gently as the two men safely reached the closest corner of the barn. So far, so good.

He sent two more across, just in case they were dealing with a well-disciplined gunner. If Eli was positioned in that window, he’d let the obvious Guinea pigs cross, waiting for a juicier target, but he’d never let more than two attackers across. Four men represented a full fire team—almost half of a standard squad, which was more than enough to do some serious damage in close proximity. When the second pair lined up against the barn siding, he knew the barn was empty. There was nothing he could do about the camera mounted next to the window, though he suspected it was disabled. Plugged into the grid, it would have been fried by the EMP.

“Liberty Two, this is Liberty Actual. Bring the thirty-cal up to a well-concealed position and get it ready. Advise when the gun is ready to fire.”

“Copy all. Out.”

Chapter 36

EVENT +75:22

^{Limerick, Maine}

Alex watched the rest of the militia squad disappear underneath the camera view. Thirteen heavily armed men had streamed across the grass, utilizing procedures that indicated a high degree of tactical awareness. The good news was that Striker Five-One had just turned north on Route 5 in Waterboro, on their way back to cash in on Alex’s offer of a hot lunch. He just hoped his group could hold out long enough to benefit from Five-One’s arrival.

“Striker Five-One, I have twenty-five plus confirmed bad guys converging on the house. Suspect one additional squad east of the house, in the trees. I have to go.”

“Copy. We’re 16.9 kilometers from your position. ETA nine minutes, seventeen seconds.”

“Roger. Patriot Two Alpha, out.” He triggered the handheld on his way out of the dining room. “We have thirteen men behind the barn. Call out any locations in the trees. The marines are on their way. Ten minutes out,” he said and turned toward the great room. “Dad, scope in on the left side of the barn. I saw one of them break off and head in that direction. If he’s partially obscured by the corner, shoot the corner. Your .308 will punch right through.”

Alex kept moving.

“Ed, got anything?”

“Nothing.”

“Does anyone have anything?” he said into his headset, surprised they hadn’t picked up any movement.

“Affirmative. Two in the trees,” said Ryan.

“Alex, I have a small cluster of guys, maybe two, directly back from the house,” said Charlie.

“This is Linda. I’m all clear.”

“I have movement!” yelled Kate from the mudroom.

“Let’s get all shooters in position for the first volley,” he said into the headset, running past Samantha, who immediately stood up and moved around the sandbags.

Kate stood in front of the toilet in the bathroom, a few feet back from the open window. The sandbag position in front of her had been built taller to accommodate the bathroom’s shoulder-level privacy window, a consideration he hadn’t built into his theoretical calculations. To compensate for the additional rise, they stripped sandbags from the side of the barrier and jammed them against an additional piece of sheet metal higher up against the wall.

“When the shooting starts, stick the barrel out of the window and lean into the bags. What do you have?”

“I see the two Charlie is talking about dead ahead, and I have a few more moving to the right and left, a little further back in the trees,” she said, staring through the EOTech STS magnifier.

“Sounds like this is it,” he muttered, aiming his rifle into the bushes directly across from the window.

“How bad is this going to get?” Kate asked.

Alex had no intention of telling her the truth. Twenty-five rifles pounding away at the north face of the house would be cataclysmic, likely wounding or killing a third of them within the first minute. If they didn’t significantly reduce the number of militia rifles, they stood little chance of surviving. He needed her focused on killing, not dying.

“The marines are eight minutes out. We’ll get through this. I love you, honey.”

“I love you more,” she said, leaning her shoulder into him.

Her gentle bump shifted his scope’s field of vision, exposing a thick gun barrel supported by a bipod near the ground. He centered the scope’s red reticle on the barrel and sharply inhaled. The tapered, perforated barrel was unmistakable. Alex reached for his handheld radio, raising the reticle a few inches above the Browning thirty-caliber machine-gun barrel.

“Fire on all targets! Fire on all targets!” he said and pressed the trigger.

Larry Bertelson pushed at the thicket with gloved hands, trying to give his gunner a better field of view. He didn’t think Cole could see the second floor through the tangled mess. Not that it mattered. There was little chance of elevating the barrel high enough to reach it. The bipod wasn’t tall enough.

“Fucking thorns!” he hissed. “Can you see the whole house?”

“Good enough for government work,” said Randy Cole, spitting out tobacco on his shoulder and pushing the machine gun further into the opening.

“Not too far or I won’t be able to reload,” said Bertelson.

His radio squelched.

“Say again. I did not copy your last. This thing is a piece of shit,” he said, adjusting the earpiece.

“Liberty Two, this is Liberty Actual. Commence firing on the house.”

“Roger. This is Liberty Two. Firing on the house at my command,” he said, patting Cole on the upper arm. “Just got the order to fire, bitch. Holy shit, this is going to rock.”

“You want me to start firing?” said Cole.

“Fuck yeah!” he said.

“Does this thing have a safety?”

“I didn’t see one,” said Bertelson, examining the metal along the right side of the machine gun. “Didn’t you train on this gun?”

Bertelson knew how to load the ammunition belt through the tray, remembering the trick with the extractor. You had to manually lock the extractor forward before closing the feed tray cover. Beyond that, he’d never fired it, which was why he swapped out with Randy. Rank had its privileges.

“I fired it once at a demo, but it was already loaded.”

“Pull the bolt back and light these fuckers up already.”

Randy Cole yanked the charging handle back and slammed it forward, sighting in for a few seconds. He pulled the trigger and nothing happened. “Are you sure this thing doesn’t have a safety?”

“What’s the hold up, Liberty Two?” he heard through his earpiece.

Cole examined the left side of the gun and the area under the trigger.

“Pull the charging handle back again,” Bertelson said. “Maybe it didn’t chamber right.”

“Liberty Two, this is Actual. What the fuck is the hold up?”

Bertelson leaned on his side to access the radio attached to the front of his chest rig. A wet crack stopped him from pressing the transmit button.

What the hell?

The raspberry bush above the gun barrel snapped and fell on the metal cylinder, immediately followed by a sickening wet splash. He twisted on his back to face Cole.

“Pull the Goddamn—”

The gunner’s head rested against the machine gun’s stock, still facing down the weapon’s sights. Eyes wide open, he looked fine except for the two small holes punched through his forehead. A bright crimson mist settled over Cole’s gore-covered legs. Bertelson felt a deep, driving pain in his upper back, paralyzing him in place as gunfire erupted. He never felt the rounds that ended his life.

Chapter 37

EVENT +75:23

^{Limerick, Maine}

Eli Russell leaned against the barn and waited for Liberty Two to respond. By now, he’d expected to hear the comforting chatter of a thirty-caliber machine gun pouring seven hundred .30-06 rounds per minute into the house. Right now, he’d settle for a few rounds from the dozen AR-15s spread among the trees.

Anything but dead silence!

“Liberty Two, this is Actual. What the fuck is the hold up?” he said, squeezing the handheld radio to the point he felt the plastic start to give.

Two sharp sounds, spaced less than a second apart, reached his ears. Hillebrand backed away from the corner, nearly knocking him over. Before Eli could regain his footing, the morning stillness erupted in a vicious barrage of gunfire. The corner of the barn exploded, spraying Hillebrand and Eli with splinters. Bullets ripped past the barn, forming a virtual wall of steel that caused all of the men to drop to the ground. Screams from the trees rose above the sustained roar of what had to be dozens of guns raking Bertelson’s men.

Short bursts of unexpected automatic fire added to the chaos, driving the men, including Eli, to hug the ground even tighter. Bullets penetrated the siding several feet back from the edge of the barn at waist height, showering them with sharp pieces of broken cedar. The gravity of their situation weighed heavy as Eli fought through the paralyzing fear that glued him to the ground. They couldn’t advance against that much firepower. Not with the thirty-caliber out of action—and he had to assume it was out of action. The first two shots came from a suppressed weapon, likely a sniper targeting the machine-gun crew. He didn’t see much of a choice at this point. They’d have to retreat unless one of Bertelson’s men put the machine gun into action. Judging by the cries of agony rising above the gunfire, he wasn’t hopeful. He reached for his handheld to order a retreat when he noticed that the gunfire had slackened to a few scattered shots emanating from the forest.

“They’re reloading! Fire! Fire!” he screamed, flipping his rifle’s selector switch to automatic and lunging past Hillebrand.

Eli slammed into the ground at the corner, firing into the house without aiming.

Alex sprinted into the kitchen, stopping in front of the safe box. He waited for Samantha to clear his line of sight and fired the rest of his magazine well over Ed’s head at the barn, hoping to penetrate the walls and drop a few of the militia on the other side.

“Nice job, Walkers!” he yelled, nodding at Samantha as she climbed over the sandbags.

His hands automatically reloaded the rifle while he assessed the situation. He didn’t detect any return fire, which confirmed his panicked suspicion that the thirty-caliber machine gun had been the centerpiece of the militia’s attack. Panicked for a reason. If the thirty-caliber had come into play, most of them would be lying in their own blood on the floor. Designed to stop standard .223 projectiles, the sandbag barriers would prove little match for the .30-06 bullet fired by the Browning machine gun. He’d spent more than half of a thirty-round magazine putting the gun out of action, killing its crew and disabling the ammunition box. The gun was still serviceable, but he doubted anyone would heave the bodies out of the way and try to work the gun.

A bullet snapped through the pine cabinet to the right of the kitchen window, knocking the door open and spilling blue ceramic fragments onto the granite counter. Another bullet hit the top of Ed’s protective barricade, spraying dirt over his clumsy attempt to reload the AR. It was taking everyone too long to reload. Ryan’s HK416A5 answered the sporadic crackle of distant small arms with a sustained burst of automatic fire. Alex caught movement beyond Ed, near the corner of the barn.

“Get down!” he screamed, kneeling behind the safe box.

Bullets sliced through the kitchen, shattering the sliding glass door and splintering the kitchen table. He felt the safe box shudder as projectiles hammered through the sheet metal, their energy absorbed by the tightly packed dirt. He dashed across the open area in front of the basement door in an attempt to reach his father, who was firing rapidly at the left side of the barn. He slid into the great room on the hardwood floor, bullets puncturing the wood behind before he reached Tim Fletcher in the corner. A quick glance through one of the western windows showed a figure stumbling into the open, a victim of the .308 bullets that his dad had fired through the barn. A single aimed shot from Tim’s Vietnam-era relic collapsed the man on his stomach.

“Focus on this side!” he yelled and sighted in on the men exposed beyond the right corner of the barn.

The sandbags and windowsill in front of Alex exploded, driving him beneath the top of the barrier. He spit dirt and pieces of wood onto his vest as the fusillade continued. An extended burst of automatic fire from Ryan’s position slowed the rate of incoming fire long enough for him to put his rifle into action. Jamming the vertical fore grip against the sandbags, he canted the rifle and fired rapidly using the forty-five-degree angled iron sights. Under heavy fire, the men disappeared behind the barn; one pulled lifelessly out of sight by his legs.

Tim squeezed beside him, seeking some of the cover provided by the barricade. Bullets snapped and ricocheted through the great room, clanging off the wood-burning stove behind them. Alex glanced around the half wall separating the great room from the kitchen and watched their once beautiful kitchen methodically disintegrate as the rate of fire increased.

Most of the cabinets sat wide open, knocked off their hinges to expose broken plates and glasses. The stainless-steel refrigerator’s door panel was dented in three places around small holes. Water spewed out of the shattered chrome faucet. A bullet burst through the half wall a few inches left of his head, splitting the distance between Alex and his father. Unfazed by the fresh coating of drywall dust, Tim Fletcher kept shooting his M14 at the trees.

The men hidden in the woods were finding their rhythm after the intense fusillade that sent over two hundred rounds of various calibers into the trees without warning. Even if Alex’s crew managed to kill or disable half of the men, six ARs in semi-proficient hands were capable of returning the same number of bullets twice every minute. Alex wiped his yellow-tinted shooting glasses with his sleeve and leaned into his father’s ear.

“Ryan, what’s your status?’

A few nervous seconds passed.

“Busy. They’re finding good cover behind the trees.”

“Copy. Keep your fire rate high. Out.”

Another round of bullets sliced through the drywall, stinging his face.

“Watch the left side, in case they send another guy. I’ll be right back,” he said to his dad and slid along the floor to Ed’s position. “What are you seeing?” he asked Ed, firing three rounds at a head peeking around the barn.

“Not much of anything! I can’t see shit anymore!”

Alex scanned the tree line through his riflescope and saw the problem. The bright light reflecting off the leaves and bushes contrasted with the dark forest behind them, making it nearly impossible to find a well-concealed, man-sized target in the short period of time allowed by the incoming bullets. The effect was similar to looking inside a dark house on a sunny day. The militia had the opposite situation. Even though they couldn’t easily identify individual targets within the house, the windows and doors made obvious targets for their rifles. Dirt sprayed Alex’s face, followed by several thumps against the sandbag barrier.

“It’s holding together nicely,” he said, patting the sandbags.

“Doesn’t matter. It’s getting harder to put my head over the top to fire,” said Ed.

Alex checked his watch. “The marines arrive in seven minutes.”

“That’s too long,” said Ed, rising to fire.

Somewhere in the distance, the sound of a second battle rose to a crescendo, competing with the gunfire from the northern tree line.

“What the hell is that?” said Ed, ducking as dirt sprayed and the sandbags thumped.

The Thorntons.

Linda leaned into the sandbags and sighted in on the first man to emerge from the trees. Bullets tore chunks out of the drywall around her and fractured the windowsill, stinging her face as she fired three steady shots into the man, dropping him in the tall grass. Alex wasn’t bullshitting about needing these glasses.

“I need some help here!” she said, catching Charlie’s arrival in the adjacent window through her peripheral vision.

A bullet or splinter grazed her hat, followed immediately by a metallic crack that almost knocked the rifle out of her grip. She jammed the rifle into her shoulder and stared through the EOTech, quickly determining that the sight had been destroyed. Linda flipped the sight’s quick-release lever and yanked it off the tactical rail, tossing it aside. She triggered the rear flip-up sight and leaned into the gun, finding a staggered column of four men sprinting toward the house. One of them fell to his knees, a geyser of bright red arterial spray erupting above his left clavicle as he pitched forward. She aligned her rifle’s sights with the next uniformed target and pressed the trigger rapidly, tumbling the man into the patchy field.

She shifted her aim and started to press the trigger when a bullet exploded through one of the sandbags in front of her, striking her in the chest below the rifle and spinning her forty-five degrees to the right. Unable to breathe from the hammer strike to her ribs, she attempted to turn and face the window. Still kneeling, a second bullet caught her in the left ankle.

Charlie fired at the magnified target in the middle of the green holographic circle and shifted the rifle to find another. He aimed at the next man’s stomach, knowing that the bullet would arrive a fraction of a second later, when the man’s upper torso crossed the bullet’s path. Leading a target moving toward or away from the shooter at this short distance required minimal adjustment. He eased the trigger as the man tumbled out of view, leaving a splash of red in his field of vision.

Linda’s stealing my targets!

He glanced at her in time to see the second round explode her ankle, knocking her to the floor before she disappeared in a shower of dirt and drywall.

“Linda!” he yelled, diving between the spilled sandbags and his wife.

He slung his rifle and grabbed the drag handle at the top of the Dragon Skin body armor. A second fusillade of heavy-caliber bullets ripped through the second barrier, obliterating the barrier he had just left.

Sweet Jesus!

He had to get Linda behind the safe box before another burst of that tore into the house. Bullets punctured the sheet metal in front of them, hissing past Charlie as he dragged his moaning wife to the safe box. He saw blonde hair poke above the sandbags.

“Stay down! Stay down!” he screamed.

He lifted Linda over the top of the sandbag wall and dumped her in, eliciting a scream of pain and anger. Foul words chased him out of the room.

“Shit, sorry, honey!” he said.

“Dad!” his daughters screamed. “What do we do?”

“Use the first aid kit to stop the bleeding. I have to go!”

Charlie sprinted out of the bedroom, fumbling for his radio.

“All units. All units. The eastern flank has collapsed. I say again, the eastern flank has collapsed. They’re using a heavy-caliber rifle. Went right through the sandbags!”

“Copy,” said someone.

Bullets splintered the doorframe leading to Ryan’s position as Charlie approached the stairs, answered by a long burst of automatic fire from the kid’s rifle. He hit the stairs hard, smashing his right hip into the handrail before descending. A few steps below him, a bullet fragmented the stair riser, followed by a second projectile three steps higher, a few inches to the right of his left leg. The splinters of wood stung his leg, but he felt lucky enough to smirk. A third round passed through the stairs, entering his left calf and erasing his smile. Blood splatted the white balusters, one of the last details he’d remember after tumbling down the rest of the staircase.

Kate ducked below the sandbag barrier, thankful for the momentary reprieve, despite the sinister implications of Charlie’s report. Incoming fire from the backyard had reached the point where she barely aimed the rifle before firing a few rounds and dropping back down. Bullets snapped by her head each time or exploded dirt in her face. Struggling to activate her radio, she observed the bathroom behind her for the first time. The sink was shattered, most of it lying in large pieces on the tile floor. A few jagged chunks remained in place, attached to the drain and the faucet. The top half of the mirror clung stubbornly to the white frame, the bottom sprinkled in shards among the white porcelain on the floor. The toilet next to her remained intact, perforated in at least four places. Water flowed out of the tank, spreading across the tile. The bowl cracked in half and dropped to the floor, causing her to scream. She pressed the radio transmit button.

“Copy,” she said, leaning her head down to speak into the radio attached to the top of her vest.

“Fuck it,” she muttered, using the rifle to push off the sandbags.

She stayed low, running out of the bathroom and colliding with Alex, who gave her a once-over and hugged her.

“You okay?” he said, letting go quickly and pulling her toward the sitting room.

“I’m fine,” she said, shaking loose of his grip. “I got it.”

“It’s just us on the eastern side,” said Alex.

“What about Charlie and Linda?”

Alex pointed through the French doors leading to the foyer and slid behind sandbags. “We’re on our own! Flip down your magnifier. This is close-up work,” he said, pulling her in tightly behind him.

Kate stared through the oddly intact matrix of glass panes at a body slumped on the floor at the bottom of the stairs. Charlie’s fur hat was visible through the lower left pane. Her gaze drifted up the stairs. The few intact balusters were sprayed bright red.

“What about Linda?” she said, releasing the lock holding the magnifier in place and flipping it out of the way of the EOTech sight.

“She’s not answering her radio,” he said, raising his head high enough to see out of the window. “Here they come!”

Alex lifted his rifle over the sandbags and fired rapidly, spurring Kate to react. She braced her weapon against the right side of the barricade and fired into the men advancing along the garage bay doors, not bothering to aim through the holographic sight. Crimson stains bathed the white garage bay doors as the men dropped in a maelstrom of .223 caliber projectiles. Kate kept firing long after they had plunged to the gravel driveway in twisted heaps, stupefied by the sudden, devastating violence they had unleashed.

“Get back,” he said, grabbing her vest.

Dirt exploded through the center of the barricade, knocking Alex backward. Kate felt a hard tug and fell with him.

Chapter 38

EVENT +75:27

^{Limerick, Maine}

Eli peeked around the corner at ground level, only able to hold his head there for a few seconds before splinters burrowed into his face and neck. He’d seen enough. Three shooters, positioned to pour rounds into the barn—only one of them making a persistent effort. The guy with the automatic. He could take care of that for the breach team. Staying low and squirming back along the concrete foundation toward Paul Hillebrand, bullets tore through the siding above him.

“I got a plan!” he shouted. “We’ll use our two automatics to suppress the gun position above the porch and the one inside the door. You’ll lead your squad into the house, firing as you go. Send one more guy around the other side to draw fire from any other shooters. Make sure he has a radio.”

“Are you sure, Eli?”

Eli’s earpiece activated.

“Liberty Actual, this is Liberty Three, commencing assault.”

“Copy, Liberty Three. Let me know when you’ve reached the house.”

“Roger.”

Staccato gunfire erupted in the distance, rising in tempo as Eli smiled.

“Brown’s squad is tearing up their eastern flank. They’ll have to pull people away to stop him. It’s now or never, Paul!” he said, putting a hand on his shoulder. “I want you moving on the house in thirty seconds. Get everyone briefed and ready.”

“All right. Let’s do this,” said Hillebrand, rising to a crouch.

While Hillebrand briefed his men and picked one to fire from the opposite corner of the barn, Eli jogged over to the guy with the automatic rifle.

“What’s your name, son?”

“Bob Harper,” said the stocky, goateed soldier, resisting Eli’s attempts to physically lift him off the ground.

“Get up, Harper. If I’m standing, you’re standing.”

Harper got up slowly, kneeling and looking nervously past Eli at the splintered siding.

“You and I have a critical job. Your squad leader is taking the rest of the squad forward while we suppress the house. Reload your weapon and listen up.”

Twenty seconds later, Eli and Harper lay behind the foundation at the corner of the barn, side by side with Eli closest to the barn. Two spare rifles sat propped against the side of the barn within reach of the edge. Paul Hillebrand crouched directly behind Harper’s feet, holding a radio and his rifle.

“Liberty Actual, this is Liberty Three. We’re approaching breach positions,” his earpiece announced.

“Get moving!” Eli yelled over his shoulder, waiting for Hillebrand’s voice over the radio.

“Liberty One. Breach. Breach. Breach!”

Eli scrambled to his feet and kneeled next to the corner, feeling Harper pressed against his left arm. He leaned left and braced his rifle against the fragmented corner, quickly finding the bullet-riddled gray siding through his red dot sight. He caught the top of a Kevlar helmet as the gunner swung the smoking barrel in his direction. Eli’s rifle bucked against the chewed wood, unleashing a steady burst of automatic fire. He released the trigger, adjusted his aim and fired again, repeating this until the firing bolt locked back. At some point during the fusillade, the rifle above the porch disappeared.

He let the rifle drop in its sling and grabbed one of the spares, putting it into action against the gun position inside the sliding door. Hillebrand’s squad stumbled across the patio, knocking plastic furniture out of the way to reach the porch. After several trigger pulls, he noticed his hands and the rifle were coated red. Eli looked over his shoulder to see Harper twitching on the ground, a thick stream of blood pumping out of his neck onto the barn. A bullet snapped through the wood next to his head, forcing him back. He’d have to watch this one from a distance. The sight of a Kevlar helmet in the house didn’t bode well for Hillebrand’s men.

The intensity of fire directed at his sandbag position had taken on a surreal, almost nonthreatening quality for Ryan. Pressing his automatic rifle down into a small gap between sandbags and burying his face into the ACOG scope, he presented little target area for the attackers to hit. Combined with his Enhanced Combat Helmet, eighteen inches of packed dirt and reinforced sheet metal continued to protect him from the barrage of projectiles.

He fired a long burst at a target he’d been dueling with since the start of the attack; his only goal at this point was to prevent the man from taking aimed shots into the house. Several tightly spaced .223 bullets had done the trick so far. He loaded a new magazine and searched for fresh targets. Movement in his left-side peripheral field drew his attention, along with his point of aim, to the barn. He didn’t have time to analyze the scene. Dirt exploded in his face, and he pressed the trigger, focused on the two men leaning around the corner. Ryan started to shift his aim to the group of men that appeared behind the shooters, but never lined up a shot. Bullets hissed and popped around his head, one striking his helmet and knocking him off the chair.

Unable to stand, he grabbed the flimsy chair and tried to pull himself upright, but didn’t gain any momentum. Hell-bent on putting the gun back into action, Ryan crawled against the sandbags and used the rifle to prop himself high enough to reach his hand over the top of the sandbags. He dug his hand into the splintered wood and pulled his body up. A bullet grazed his hand, burning like fire, but he held tight and heaved himself upright. The men headed toward the house were here for one purpose, and it was his job to stop them. Cresting the top of the windowsill, another bullet hit his helmet, snapping his head sideways. He braced the rifle against the top of the sandbags and pushed up on his good leg, giving him a view directly below.

Three men lay sprawled across the patio, one of them sliding face down off one of the white Adirondack chairs, leaving a thick, dark red streak. He caught the last man in the group rushing up the wraparound stairs leading into the covered porch. Without thinking, he fired the entire magazine into the shingles directly below him.

Chapter 39

EVENT +75:29

^{Limerick, Maine}

Alex rolled on the hardwood floor, clutching his stomach. Unable to breathe from the 2,800-foot-per-second punch to his gut, he lay there mustering the will to move. He had to move. He tried to call out for Kate, but couldn’t expel enough air to form words. The sandbags had been shredded; most of the dark brown dirt poured onto the floor below the window or scattered across the room. Judging by the fact that he was still alive, he guessed a .308 or similar caliber had done the damage. Anything less would have been stopped by the barrier, anything more would have penetrated the Dragon Skin armor.

“Alex!” a panicked voice cried.

A pair of hands pulled him onto his back, and he stared up at Kate. A wild look crossed her dirt-covered face. Blood streamed down her right earlobe onto her cheek.

“You’re fine,” she said, peeling his hands off his stomach. “Thank God.”

“They’re coming!” yelled Ed.

Bullets punctured the wall connected to the kitchen, spraying them with chunks of drywall and passing overhead with the telltale snaps signifying a near miss. He managed to flip into the prone position, lying next to Kate, who had flattened herself in response to the automatic gunfire. Alex glanced at the window behind them. They had to get out of this room. Kate read his look and started to crawl toward the demolished sandbags. He grabbed her arm and mouthed “no,” surprised to hear faint words. Alex pulled her close and strained to speak.

“You have to stop them from getting in the mudroom,” he croaked. “Not from here. Go fast.”

She dragged him through the doorway into the kitchen, leaving him behind the safe box before disappearing into the mudroom amidst exploding drywall. His first instinct was to check on his dad. He didn’t see the familiar eight point woodland camouflage Marine Corps cap poking up behind the half wall separating the two rooms. He turned his attention to the backyard, just in time to see Ed push the kitchen table out of the way and throw himself behind the kitchen counter, the sandbags behind him finally collapsing from the concentrated stream of gunfire fired from the patio. Beyond Ed’s darting figure, he saw the screen porch door crash inward.

Forcing himself to react, Alex raised his rifle and fired at the first figure to enter the porch, knocking him back. A concentrated burst of fire struck the corner of the safe box, one round hitting the rifle’s side-mounted Surefire light and shattering it. Knocked off target, Alex pressed the rifle into the sandbags and pressed the trigger, firing two hasty rounds into the patio before expending his magazine.

A mass of camouflaged men barreled through the patio door firing, giving him a fraction of a second to make a decision that might decide their fate: Draw his pistol or reload the rifle. Habit brought his hand to one of his rifle magazine pouches, but survival instinct kept it moving to his drop holster. He didn’t have time to reload before they filled the room. Sticking the pistol past the obliterated sandbag corner, he tracked the first man entering the house and fired repeatedly, acknowledging the fact that he couldn’t win this gunfight. Two men breached the shattered sliding door before clouds of drywall dust and bullets rained down on the men still bottlenecked on the porch.

Ryan is still in the fight!

A distant, crunching explosion rattled the house, triggering a long-forgotten, frightening memory. A few more shots locked the pistol slide back, once again presenting Alex with a miserably lopsided decision. Not much of a decision, really. One way or the other, he was as good as dead.

Eli peeked around the corner and watched the remains of Hillebrand’s squad charge up the porch stairs, firing at the sandbag wall just inside the house. A figure darted across the kitchen, barely visible through the shower of dirt and debris, seeking refuge from the onslaught. Scanning the far right ground-floor windows over his rifle, he didn’t see the shooter using the M14. He was glad to see that gun out of commission. One pop from a .308—end of story. He turned in time to see men pile through the screen door, screaming and shooting like marauders. That should do it. Movement above the porch caught his attention, and the men inside the screened porch vanished in an explosive storm of gray drywall powder.

Frozen by the sudden, unexplained annihilation of Hillebrand’s squad, the sound of automatic gunfire pounded Eli’s ears and jarred him into action. He lifted his rifle barrel and sighted in on the man leaning out of the window. A booming explosion shook the ground and knocked the red dot off target as he pressed the trigger, sending a short burst of automatic fire high and to the right of the window. He didn’t bother readjusting his aim for another burst, instead opting to dive behind the barn and take cover behind the foundation. Bullets ripped through the barn, some passing inches over his back. When the incoming fire stopped, he crawled back to the corner of the barn and grabbed his radio. The not-so-distant explosion meant one thing—time to “get the fuck out of Dodge.”

Ed crawled around the kitchen island, ignoring the shards of glass and ceramics that dug into his hands. He prayed that the sandbags protecting his family hadn’t disintegrated under the intense gunfire. The floor shook from a boom, which he could barely differentiate from the rifle fire inside the house. Rounding the island on his hands and knees, he emerged in time to see Alex charge into the open and throw his pistol. Ed poked his head above the granite and witnessed one of the most bizarre moments of his life. The pistol bounced off the furthest man’s head, knocking him off balance as he climbed over the toppled sandbags and dropping him to the floor.

Alex collided with the second intruder, knocking him against the kitchen table. The two men grappled and slammed each other against the column at the edge of the hall wall, stumbling toward the safe box. Movement on the floor caught Ed’s eye; the man on the other side of the table kicked one of the chairs out of the way and grabbed the table. Having left his rifle behind, and carrying no other weapons, Ed felt helpless—until he saw the barrel of Samantha’s shotgun sticking up behind the sandbags. He sprinted forward and reached inside, trying not to expose his body to the gunfire still penetrating the walls.

“Sam, I need the shotgun!”

“It’s ready to fire!” screamed Samantha.

The warm barrel pressed into the palm of his hand, and he pulled it over the side. Without hesitating, he shouldered the 12-gauge shotgun and fired around the sandbags, knocking the man down. Ed racked the slide and fired under the table, shredding the table legs and splattering the half wall with bright red gore. Three additional 12-guage blasts stopped all movement and groaning on the porch.

One more.

He shifted the smoking barrel toward the desperate hand-to-hand battle on the floor fifteen feet away, but saw no way to shoot the insane-looking redhead without hitting Alex. Screw it. He’d put the gun right up against the dude’s head. Ed stood up and was immediately struck in the right hip by a bullet passing through the kitchen cabinets.

Alex grabbed both of the redheaded attacker’s wrists, trying to keep him from grabbing the pistol on his thigh or the loaded rifle hanging across his chest. One fact became obvious as soon as they tumbled to the floor in the kitchen. He couldn’t beat this guy in a straight grapple. Red was either too strong, or Alex was too tired. Either way, the result would be the same. Afraid to release either wrist, he held tight and tried to roll on top of his growling assailant. No good. Bullets continued to splinter the wooden trim and shatter plates in the kitchen as they lay on their sides kicking at each other.

His grip on the man’s right hand slipped, changing the melee’s dynamic in an instant. Red struck his face with the bottom of a closed fist and rolled on top of him, pinning him to the floor. Unable to effectively block the torrent of punches directed at his face, Alex pushed upward with his right hand and twisted his hips. The desperate attempt to turn the tables failed miserably, and Alex lost his grip on the man’s left hand. It was time to even the odds.

Alex jammed his right hand under the rifles pressed between their chests and dug between Red’s legs. Squeezing and twisting what he could grab through the camouflage trousers, Alex shot his head forward and caught Red’s nose with his forehead. Red screamed and pushed away, breaking Alex’s death grip on his crotch. Blood pouring from his nose, Red rose to one knee and fumbled for his pistol. Alex kicked his raised knee from the ground, knocking him backward against the basement door and scrambling after him.

Alex slammed him into the door, pinning both hands against the bullet-riddled wood. He was back where he started, holding both wrists in a struggle he couldn’t win. Except this time Red held a semiautomatic pistol in his right hand. A quick knee to Red’s already obliterated groin yielded nothing but a snarl and a return knee, which Alex deflected by turning his hip. Red’s strength surged, pulling him toward the foyer hallway. He couldn’t go to the floor again, not with a pistol in Red’s hand. A bullet penetrated the door a few inches from their heads, causing their eyes to dart to the hole.

That might work.

“Mom! Shoot the door! Shoot the door!” he screamed past Red’s left ear.

They shifted a few more inches toward the foyer opening.

“Shoot the fucking door, Mom!” he yelled and buried his head under Red’s chin.

Two rapid blasts scattered slivers of wood over their shoulders. A sharp sting bit into his right shin as Red’s body shuddered and weakened. Alex let go of Red’s left wrist and wrenched the pistol free with both hands, throwing himself behind the safe box as bullets continued to plow through the house. Red stumbled a few feet away from the ragged, bloodstained door and dropped to his knees, staring blankly at the mass of dead men in front of him. His right hand drifted slowly to his rifle while his gaze shifted to Alex’s outstretched, pistol-bearing hand.

Click.

The pistol dry-fired. Red’s fingers seized the rifle’s grip as Alex frantically racked the slide and checked the safety. A single hole appeared in Red’s chest, followed by the distinctive boom of a .308 caliber rifle. Tim Fletcher’s M14 rifle barrel protruded from the bullet-peppered half wall. Red stumbled into the foyer and crashed face first into the wall, leaving a thick red trail as he slid to the floor beyond Ed Walker. His neighbor lay flat on his back, bloody hands pressed into his right hip. Ed looked at Alex and winked. Seeing Ed reminded him of Charlie, whom he’d last glimpsed at the bottom of the stairs.

“You okay, Dad?”

“I’ve been better!” responded Tim, peeking out far enough for Alex to see the brim of his camouflage hat.

“Ryan! Send your status.”

“I can’t talk now,” Ryan responded, followed by a long burst of automatic fire.

“I want you out of sight. The backyard threat has been neutralized,” said Alex.

“Copy.”

“Kate, anything?’

The mudroom exploded in gunfire before she responded.

“We’re almost in,” Eli heard through the earpiece and scowled at the radio, like it was defective.

“Liberty Three, I don’t think you appreciate what I just said. McCulver reported two armored tactical vehicles headed your way. That’s too much firepower. Pull your men out and head to the secondary extract point.”

“They can’t get the vehicles into the compound, Eli, and it’ll take them at least five minutes to work their way through the trees. I have seven guys ready to breach. If the initial breach fails, I’ll pull them out. If it succeeds, we’ll sweep through the house and be on our way to the secondary extract before they reach the eastern tree line. We won’t get another chance like this,” said Brown.

Eli hesitated. Any chance to properly avenge his brother and nephew was worth losing a few more men. Regardless of the final outcome, he’d spin this in his favor, explaining the drastic loss of life as irrefutable evidence that the government had planted secret agents and platoon-sized kill teams among their own citizens. Of course, his militia had emerged victorious, and anyone that wanted proof could take a trip over to Gelder Pond to see for themselves, and be graciously shuttled over by one of his own members. Word about this attack would travel far and wide. The further, the better. He just needed to make sure he survived to spread the good word.

“Liberty Three, this is Liberty Actual. Proceed with the attack. Watch the second floor. You have one shooter armed with an automatic rifle in the northwest corner, out.”

Chapter 40

EVENT +75:31

^{Limerick, Maine}

Kate fidgeted, trying to find a comfortable position lying on the wet tile floor. Razor-sharp pieces of porcelain and glass dug into her knees and thighs, rendering the effort pointless. At least the fragments hadn’t spilled the entire length of the mudroom. Her elbows rested in a thick puddle spreading from the entryway into the mudroom. She braced her rifle against the doorframe, using the wooden trim to shield her left shoulder and part of her face from the mudroom door. This was the best she could do to protect herself, and judging by the holes in the trim above her head, it wasn’t much. Oh yes—sandbags protected her feet.

Wonderful.

All compounded by the fact that she had no idea what had happened in the kitchen. She heard a ton of shooting, then nothing. Her radio was somewhere in the sitting room, detached from the earpiece that still dangled from her ear.

It didn’t matter at this point. She had a job to do. A shadow slightly darkened the mudroom. Bullets penetrated the door, concentrated on the door handle and deadbolt, and slammed into the wooden shoe storage rack attached to the wall. A few bullets ricocheted in random directions, but most of them plowed into the same one-foot-by-one-foot section of the shoe rack, giving her a solid idea where the shooter was standing. She aimed at the wall to the left of the mudroom door and fired several projectiles through the drywall and siding, hearing a muffled scream from the porch outside.

A fusillade of bullets tore through the mudroom, forcing her to press into the doorframe as glass, drywall and wood showered the tile floor. A figure rushed in front of the obliterated door, rapidly firing his rifle at shoulder height into the mudroom. She placed the holographic sight’s reticle center mass and fired as he kicked the door loose of the locking mechanisms. A second man wasted no time following the door in, proficiently advancing and firing through the mudroom door and kitchen entryway. Kate’s rifle killed him before he realized his mistake.

A cylindrical gray object glanced off the door and bounced on the tile, rolling in her direction. She had no idea what it was and had no intention of finding out. All she knew was that when people threw things during a gunfight, they usually exploded. She scrambled to her feet and sprinted through the kitchen doorway, colliding with Alex.

Four bullet holes dimpled the right side of the refrigerator in a tight pattern facing the mudroom. Alex depressed the bolt release button, chambering a round from a fresh magazine, and switched hands in anticipation of firing onto the porch from a position on the right side of the kitchen doorway. Kate burst through the opening as he arrived, knocking him into the broken pantry door, which crashed to the floor.

“Grenade!” she yelled, yanking him toward the sandbags.

Alex stumbled for a few steps, gaining his balance in time to push Kate over the side of the safe box onto the Walkers. As soon as she disappeared, he dove behind the sandbags and waited for the explosion. A few seconds later, when the house didn’t shake, Alex clambered to the corner of the safe box and aimed at the mudroom. Thick, red smoke poured into the house, followed by several .223 bullets fired from men positioned around the doorframe. He fired back, but his hastily delivered bullets failed to find targets. Focused semiautomatic fire forced Alex to stick his rifle around the sandbag corner and fire Jihadi style for the first time in his life. He emptied the magazine and scurried around the other side of the box, reloading as he approached the far end of the kitchen island.

The mudroom fusillade continued as Alex checked the kitchen island corner and confirmed that he was screened from the mudroom doorway by the refrigerator. He edged along the stainless-steel appliance, plotting his next move. He could stick his rifle past the refrigerator and blast away, hoping that the shock of the unexpected, close-up blasts sparked a panicked retreat, but then what? Charge into the mudroom? He had no idea how many men waited for him. As the scarlet smoke intensified, he decided to wait for the marines—if the enormous detonation he’d heard a few minutes ago hadn’t taken them out of the picture. He just hoped Kate and the Walkers stayed in the safe box. A dark cylindrical object arced past the refrigerator, on a trajectory that flushed his decision down the proverbial toilet.

If the grenade landed in the safe box, Kate and Ed’s family would panic, jumping right into the sights of several militia guns. Alex lurched past the refrigerator, pressing the trigger twice before slamming into the pantry shelves. Dropping to the floor, he aimed up at the right side of the doorway and fired at a dark red mass behind a protruding barrel. A foot stepped into the kitchen, and Alex shifted his rifle left, firing again into the opaque cloud. Confused voices and jumbled commands quickly turned into return fire. Alex felt a bullet connect with his upper right chest, knocking him flat on his back. Another grazed his left thigh. He brought the mangled HK416 over his chest and fired the rest of his magazine into the smoke.

Chapter 41

EVENT +75:33

^{Limerick, Maine}

Jeffrey Brown crouched at the tree line, ready to sprint to the house, when his radio crackled.

“Brown, we can’t break through the mudroom. Request permission to withdraw,” said a coughing voice over heavy gunfire.

Thick plumes of red smoke billowed out of the mudroom door, hitting the porch ceiling and dispersing over the roof into the stark blue sky. The idiots weren’t supposed to pull the pin on the smoke grenade.

“I’m on my way. How many men do you have left that can fight?”

“Two, including myself.”

“Copy. Pull back. Head north for the secondary extraction point,” he said and pressed the alternate frequency button. “Liberty Actual, this is Liberty Three, the breach failed. Heading to secondary extract.”

“Liberty Actual copies. Get as many out as you can. Pick up the thirty-cal on your way out. It’s in the trees directly across from the leftmost, ground-floor window.”

“Copy. I’m moving.”

Two men stumbled down the porch stairs, coughing as they stopped to pick up their wounded squad mate. Brown stepped into the tall grass beyond the trees, but the sound of diesel engines stopped him. He dropped into the brush and crawled back to the trees as a dark blur crashed through the metallic gate fifty feet to his right. Two angular gray tactical vehicles burst into the clearing and raced toward the house. Brown crawled faster as the turret-mounted machine guns chattered in tandem, trading off deadly bursts that killed the last of his men.

Punching through the foliage, he risked a glance back at the house. Marines dismounted from both vehicles, firing single shots into the corpses lying on the gravel. One of the vehicles backed up and drove across the front of the house, heading toward the barn. He swung his scoped AR-10 toward the clearing, wanting desperately to take a shot, but there was no point. Killing one of them was a death sentence, even if he targeted the turret gunners.

The former ranger slowly eased his way deeper into the forest. He should be dead with his men, but his choice of rifles bizarrely kept him alive. With Daniel Boone and that crazy-looking bitch raining accurate fire down on his men, the .308 caliber AR-10 quickly became their golden ticket to cross open ground. He’d survived for a reason—which started to crystalize as he reached a safe distance from the clearing.

Chapter 42

EVENT +75:34

^{Limerick, Maine}

A low-pitched roar competed with the high, ringing tone in his ears, breaking the relative silence that had descended on the mudroom for several seconds. Alex flinched when long, tightly spaced bursts of automatic fire erupted in front of the house. He pulled a fresh magazine from one of the pouches on his vest and released the empty, which clattered on the hardwood floor. Hands trembling, he inserted the curved polymer magazine and released the bolt, ready for any militia that survived the Matvees M240s—however doubtful that might be. He lay on his back, pointing his rifle into the smoke, until he started to hear single rifle shots. It was over.

“Stay where you are! Let the marines clear the house. Ryan. Linda, acknowledge,” he rasped, crawling toward them.

Just one asshole with a trigger pull left in him could steal a life. The marines were making sure they didn’t, one bullet at a time.

“Copy. Marines clearing the house,” said Ryan.

“I need to check on Ryan!” Kate called, and he saw her head emerge from the sandbags.

“He’s fine! Stay where you are!”

Samantha Walker’s face appeared next, quickly finding Ed.

“Ed!” she screamed, climbing over the side and scrambling into the foyer.

“Everyone needs to stay—”

Kate jumped out next, running toward the stairs.

“Damn it, Kate!”

“I’m checking on Ryan!”

“I’m fine, Mom!” Ryan yelled from upstairs.

Two heads emerged from the safe box at the sound of Ryan’s voice.

“Heads down!” he barked at Chloe and Daniel Walker. “Where’s the grenade?”

“I threw it on the porch when it landed in the box,” said Samantha.

Alex leaned his head over the side of the sandbags. The Walker kids were shaking.

“Sorry about that, guys. I need you to stay in here until the house is cleared. Your dad’s hurt, but he’ll be fine. I promise.”

“I need the first aid kit!” yelled Kate.

“Throw us the first aid kit, Chloe!” screamed Samantha.

“Keep it down,” Alex hissed from the sandbag wall.

“Dad?” he whispered.

“Still ticking,” said Tim Fletcher from a hidden position in the great room.

He slid over to the basement door and put his head near one of the large holes.

“Nice shooting, Mom. Everyone all right down there?”

“We’re fine. How is my grandson?” Amy responded.

“He sounds fine. Stay put for now.”

A brown tactical-style backpack hit the floor next to him, billowing drywall powder in his face.

“Thanks.” He coughed, grabbing the pack and crawling next to Ed and Samantha.

“What are we looking at here?” he said, unzipping the bag and removing two flat, sealed packets.

“It doesn’t look good,” Samantha said, tears streaming down her cheeks.

“I’m fine, honey,” insisted Ed, squeezing her hand. “It just hurts like a motherf—”

“He sounds fine and looks fine.” Alex noticed a small pool of blood on the floor under Ed’s buttocks.

“And he’s not bleeding badly. That’s a good thing. How does your ass feel, buddy?”

“Like I sat on a nail.”

“We can definitely fix this,” Alex said.

He heaved the pack behind Samantha’s back toward Kate, who had turned Charlie onto his stomach and propped his left leg against the front door. She sat under the leg, pressing on his calf. The amount of blood on the floor in the foyer was unsettling, but not indicative of life-threatening arterial damage. Through sidelights next to the door, he saw one of the Matvees cruise past the house, headed west. The gray vehicle reappeared in the great room windows and stopped in the backyard between the barn and the house.

“Kate, use one of the QuikClot dressings and tape it up tight. The marines will take care of the rest. Ryan’s good?”

“I haven’t seen him, but he sounds good,” said Kate, digging through the medical bag. “Emily is fine with your mother?”

Alex smiled at Kate and nodded. “Mom has them locked down tight.”

“Let me see the wound here,” he said, gently moving Ed’s hand. “Definitely the entry, which means…”

He pushed Ed’s right thigh up a few inches and stuck his head against the floor.

“Through and through. Lucky guy,” said Alex, tearing open one of the packets and handing it to Samantha.

“I don’t feel very lucky,” grimaced Ed.

“Lucky it wasn’t your head. Sam, could you slide that trauma pad under his head, I mean ass? I get the two confused,” he said, winking at Ed.

“Was he like this in Boston?” asked Samantha.

“Worse,” replied Ed, wincing as Alex lowered his buttock against the hemostatic pad.

Samantha held out the second pad for Alex.

“Press this firmly into his thigh,” he said, moving out of the way. “It’ll stop the bleeding. I need to check on Linda.”

“What happened to her?”

“No idea. She stopped answering her radio,” he said, walking toward the stairs.

“Stop! Hands on your head!” bellowed a voice through the sitting room.

Alex complied, glancing through the shattered French doors. A rifle pointed at him from the lower right corner of the sitting room windowsill, locked tightly into a woodland MARPAT battle helmet.

“Captain Fletcher?”

“Affirmative.”

“Have all of your people stand fast while we clear the house. Hands visible and clear of any weapons until we positively identify all friendlies. Ooh rah?”

“Ooh rah,” said Alex.

“Dad?” called Ryan from their bedroom.

“Place your rifle on the bed and wait for the marines,” Alex said, leaning his head into the railing behind him. “Linda!”

“What?” she screamed.

Everyone made it.

Alex kept his hands in the air as the first marine appeared, aiming his rifle past the safe box toward the great room. He recognized Corporal Lianez immediately.

“Lianez, my dad’s by the wood-burning stove.”

Staff Sergeant Evans appeared on the other side of the kitchen island and aimed at the sandbags. “Hands up. Stand where I can see you.”

Chloe and Daniel Walker rose slowly, with their hands on their heads. The marine activated his rifle light and swept it through the safe box.

“These two are clear. Lianez, check the room across from the kitchen table.”

“On it,” said Lianez, winking at them as he moved forward to check the dining room.

“Captain Fletcher, what is your dad wearing?” said Evans, aiming his rifle past Lianez.

“Should be old-school woodland camouflage marine cover.”

“Check. Any tangos in that room with you, sir?”

“Negative,” said Tim Fletcher. “I didn’t let any by.”

Evans turned his point of aim to the covered porch. “That’s a no-shitter. Jesus.”

A third marine glided through the sitting room, examining the damage to the sandbags and nodding at Alex.

“Clear in the front room, Staff Sergeant!”

“Same here,” echoed Lianez.

“Clear on the first floor,” said Evans, activating his tactical radio. “Lianez, get these two stabilized for transport.”

“Copy that, Staff Sergeant,” Lianez said, dropping his MARPAT assault pack on the floor next to Ed.

Staff Sergeant Evans glanced up the stairs.

“Sir, is there any chance one of them slipped by you and made it upstairs?”

Alex shook his head. “We stopped them here.”