The Guardians (23 page)

She looked at Luke and just said, "Morphine...give him two hundred and fifty milligrams of morphine."

Luke just looked at her with confusion, as that high of a dosage would simply put him to sleep, with no chance of ever waking up.  He could see it in her eyes that there was no chance of saving him.

"Ease his pain," she said.  "Those are my orders."

He just nodded and grabbed the morphine out of the medical bag that one of the other soldiers that had been administering first aid had already brought to the scene.  He gave the dosage as ordered, and as the dying soldier slipped off to sleep for the very last time, Rachel broke down into an inconsolable cry.  She just looked up at the other soldiers and through the tears mouthed the words, "I'm sorry."  She had seen death and suffering before, but today had simply pushed her over the edge.  She was a new doctor, and had volunteered her services with the TSG in part because it was the patriotic thing to do for her state, but also for the experience.  This however, was much more than she had bargained for.

While they were tending to the dying soldier, Nate was directed to return to his quarters.  He did so reluctantly, and just
sat in the dark and waited for word from Luke.  After about an hour, the generator kicked back on and with it the lights.

Nate eventually fell asleep with his 9mm laying on his chest and fully dressed.  He awoke the next morning to a sad and somber scene.  The friendly smiles of the local volunteer nurses and medical assistants simply were not there.  The only people there were the surviving security staff from the previous day, who were just now getting relieved by the next watch rotation. 

At around nine in the morning, Luke finally arrived at Nate's room.  The two brothers exchanged their thoughts about the previous night's attack for a while, and out of nowhere, Luke changed the subject and said, "It's time we get going, and Rachel is coming with us."

"What?
Seriously, that's great...uh...I mean, I guess.  What caused her to decide to go?" said Nate pleased with the news but a bit confused.

"She said she can't handle the trauma," Luke said.  "She nearly had a nervous breakdown last night.  She's fresh out of medical school.  She would merely be an intern in any other reality, but because
of the limited resources they just threw her into this job and hoped for the best."

"But she did so well with my amputation," Nate said.

"Well, actually, you were out of it for most of that, so I guess you don't remember," Luke explained.  "Doctor Patel actually performed your operation, she merely assisted and did the in person follow ups with you."

"Who's Doctor Patel?" Nate asked.

"He stops by from time to check up on the place, luckily for you, he was in town when you were brought in.  He's been getting progress reports from Rachel over the radio.  He says you're ready to go," said Luke as he patted Nate on the shoulder.  "Good timing too I might add, you'd have to go anyway as they are shutting this place down. After last night's attack, the city leaders don't want to host us anymore, and since the Governor doesn't want us to seem like an occupying force, we've gotta go.  So, long story short, she's decided to go with us.  She doesn't want to simply be reassigned to another war torn town and not know if we will ever see each other again.  Besides, she figures they will probably need a doctor wherever we end up anyway."

"Well," Nate said.  "I'm sorry it's under these circumstances, but I'm glad.  I was really starting to feel like a jerk for dragging you away from her."

"So back to the plan," Nate said changing the subject.  "I asked the HAM operator here to send one more message to the Survivor's Locator Network for us.  I told them to tell Mom and Dad that their sons are leaving Texas and heading for Tennessee.  ETA unknown.  Please leave specific location information for the next contact."

"That should do it," replied Nate.  "But how do we make further contact if we are leaving our HAM setup here behind?"

"Oh, he also gave me a list of HAM operators who are friendly to TSG personnel that are located along our potential routes of travel," Luke added.  "And one more thing, I may have us safe passage into Mississippi, which could cut off a lot of time."

"How is that?" Nate asked.  "And from what I remember, safe passage is hard to come by around here."

"Texas, Louisiana, and Mississippi all have an unwritten defensive alliance," Luke explained.  "They loan and trade resources to one another and share intel.  The TSG has a C-130 heading to Tupelo, and I may have gotten us a ride."

"Wow little brother, and here I thought I was the one leading this reckless expedition into the unknown," joked Nate.

"Oh you are," Luke said.  "That's as far as I can get us on my connections, the rest is up to you."

****

Chapter 24: Resolve

Back in Tennessee on the Thomas farm, Daryl had proposed an idea to the rest of the group on how to deal with the member of the murderous group that has joined up with Frank Mu
ncie Jr. that they had been holding as a prisoner.  "So what exactly is our goal here he asked?  Is it simply to run the vermin off so that other people will be raped, robbed, or killed in their wake?  Is it merely revenge?  Or do we want to permanently fix this situation?  Like Evan said, we just don't have a way to deal with this guy, or their entire group, in a peaceful and legal manner.  I also truly believe that if we just run them off or let them go, we will be facilitating more of the horrendous crimes of which they are already guilty.  I would call them animals, but I have a deep respect for animals.  They are monsters.  They need to be dealt with as such."

"What do you propose?" asked Evan.

"Yea, are you suggesting we just kill them all?" responded Billy Skidmore with skepticism.  "Like we could even do that without taking casualties ourselves.  Just look at Ollie, and that's just from meeting them in the woods."

"True, if we met them in a head on battle or an assault
, chances are we would suffer casualties as well.  That's not something I'm suggesting.  In the area where we do have an advantage is freedom of movement and the element of surprise.  If we are all in on this together, we can move about freely, using each homestead as a look out.  As far as the element of surprise goes, we know who they are.  We know where they live.  We know how they think.  They on the other hand see us as individuals, and they assume we don't know much about them.  They probably also see themselves as the wolves and us the sheep.  I see it quite differently.  They are the wolves, but we are the bears."

"I like where you are going with this," said Jason.

"The one thing we do need in anonymity," added Daryl.  "We need them to believe that there is an organized group, not necessarily associated with any of the homesteads, that is keeping an eye on the area.  We don't want reprisals while we are dealing with them.  We want them to feel on the run and intimidated, not empowered to take revenge.  We need to basically seem like a group of secret guardians for the area." 

"I like that concept," said Evan.  "That could actually work for us in the future too.  It would give people some sort of feeling that there is a law around here, even if the law can't readily be identified.  People behave a lot better when they know there will be consequences
for their actions."

"So how do you propose we deal with these guys?" asked Charlie.

"Well," Daryl said.  "I think we can snipe at them for one.  Jason has that fancy rifle there that he seems to be pretty handy with at long ranges.  I've got a Savage Model 12 LRP in 6.5 Creedmoor that I can knock the tits off a fly with at one thousand yards.  What do you guys have in long range stuff?"

"Evan's got a fifty," added Jason.

"A .50 BMG?" asked Daryl.

"Yea, it's one of those single shot bolt action uppers made to mate up with an AR-15 lower," Evan replied.  "It came in pretty dang handy to Griff last year when the Homefront came under att
ack before Jason and I got here."

"I don't have anything as tacti-cool as a fifty, but I do have a 7mm Rem Mag with a good scope," said Jimmy.  "It may not bust down walls at one thousand yards, but it will drop thin skinned two legged game at that range."

"See guys, with those four rifles we could do some serious harassing fire to whittle them away, or just to soften them up," Daryl said.  "And to set the tone, I have a special gift I could make for them."

"What's that?" asked Robert.

"A flint bomb," said Daryl with a smile.

"A what?" several people asked.

"A flint bomb," he said.  "It's simple really.  It's no secret that I make my own black powder, and I have quite a bit of it.  I have plenty to spare for a special occasion such as today.  Black powder is very explosive compared to modern smokeless gunpowder.  If we mix a couple pounds of it with some nails and other debris, and put it in some sort of container, we would have an anti-personnel bomb."

"What would you use for the ignition source?" asked Jason with a very intrigued look on his face.

"Simple," he said.  "A lock from an old style flintlock rifle.  They are so simple to use for something like this.  When you pull the trigger on a cocked flintlock rifle, the hammer falls striking the frizzen.  The piece of flint held in place on the hammer creates a spark against the frizzen that ignites the powder in the flash pan.  In this case, it just sparks igniting the surrounding black powder.  All we have to do is to mount a flintlock mechanism into the powder container, cock it, then tie a line or string to the trigger.  Once the trigger is tripped, by whatever method we deem appropriate, it goes...BOOM!  Goodbye to anyone in the area."

"I'm glad you're on our side Daryl," Jason joked.  "That's genius."

"Not genius at all.  When you're single and into gun powder as a hobby, you have a lot of time on your hands to think things up," Daryl replied.

"So just how do we get them in position for your bomb?" asked Charlie.

"A backpack," replied Daryl  "You know, jihadist style."

"And just who is the jihadist?" once again asked Charlie.

"Your observer over there of course," said Daryl as he pointed to the man Evan and Jason had captured.

Everyone got silent for a moment at the thought of Daryl's suggestion.  They were serious when they were discussing it earlier, but all of a sudden when you put a human face on any destructive act, it puts the reality back into the situation.  The jovial mood was now e
xtinguished, but that did not change the fact that they intended to end this situation permanently.  They would not be sheep in their own homes.

"You guys, this just doe
sn't feel right," said Robert.

"Well
, what else do you propose?" asked Daryl.  "Look, like we have said several times, we can't deal with them, and we can't just turn them loose on the men, women, and children the next town over either.  Are you willing to let someone in your family die because you tried to be fair with these guys and they won?"

After a moment of silence Robert said, "No, you're right Daryl.  I just can't believe it has come to this."

Evan spoke up and said, "Robert, most of you folks around here are lucky, with the exception of Isaac Murphy and Ollie of course.  We on the other hand, have faced this sort of menace over and over.  Many of us at the Homefront were in the New York City area when everything went down.  We had a long and bumpy road to get back to Tennessee.  We lost some great people along the way, and we had to do things that in any other time or place simply would not have even been an option on the table.  But you know what?  If we didn't, none of us would be here.  As Jason here put it to us back then, you have to be aggressive enough, soon enough, to deal with the situation.  If you expect things to work themselves out any other way than to cause heartache for yourself or others you're sadly mistaken.  I for one believe that not one life of any member of our families is worth risking for idea that whatever it is we do to them may not be fair.  Well, nothing is fair right now, but I'm not going to sit on the sidelines and wait for one of those murdering, raping monsters to hurt one of my children or loved ones.  I vow right here, to be aggressive enough, right now, to end this.

"Me too," said Jason.

"And me," added Daryl.

"Count me in," said Charlie.

"Let's do it," said Jimmy.

"I'm in," said Billy.

"You're right, let's get it done," said Robert as he came to terms with their new reality.

"So let's get back to the anonymous nature of the task at hand," Daryl said getting back on track.  "I think it may add a little intimidation factor if we go by a group name like we were saying.  We need them to not know who it is or what our total force strength may be.  Personally, I like
The Guardians
.

"That does have a nice ring to it.  And it sums things up a little better than if we were a militia or the like, as we are not intending to be a formal unit, but rather a secret group of men who merely stand watch over our fellow neighbors," Evan said.

"Not to mention that fact that there has been so much anti-militia propaganda put out by the administration that using a name like that is like volunteering for the next drone strike," Jason added.