Cliff Ryder - Aim And Fire

Nate stared through the crack in the barn door. “I count at least four, all with automatic weapons. Running would be suicide—they’d take us out with the rifles. Only one thing to do, and that’s catch them by surprise. If we get them off balance, we can take them.”

“Are you nuts?” she hissed. “Shouldn’t we wait for backup?”

Tracy now saw one of the men set his rifle down, jump off the truck and walk toward the barn. Her suddenly slick fingers gripped her pistol as she watched the man come closer. This was something she’d never thought she’d be in the middle of, and now she was only a few yards away from smugglers armed with automatic weapons. If I get out of this alive, I’ll be glad to go back home and tell Paul he was right, she told herself.

“We wait any longer, and they’re only gonna find two dead agents out here. We go now! Follow my lead.” With that, Nate shoved the door back and leaped outside, aiming at the approaching man and shouting, “United States Border Patrol, nobody move!” He spoke first in Spanish, then in English.

Tracy followed, aiming her pistol at the men in the truck. She smelled harsh exhaust from the vehicle, and the thrum of its revving engine vibrated through her head, setting her teeth on edge. She called out, “Raise your hands, and no one move!”

For a moment the men and illegals packed into the truck stared in total surprise. Then everything went straight to hell. The man walking toward the door charged at Nate, covering the distance to him faster than Tracy thought possible. Nate fired, but his aim was off, and the zeta barreled into him, knocking him to the ground, his hands scrabbling for the pistol. The shot made the other men and women in the cargo bed scramble out any which way they could, leaping over the side walls and out the back of the vehicle.

The second man in the back leveled his assault rifle.

Tracy swallowed around a golf-ball-size lump in her throat, but aimed at him, knowing if she didn’t shoot first, they were both dead. “Freeze!” she shouted.

Instead, he sighted in, and she squeezed the trigger, the gun bucking in her hand. The man lurched back just as the truck’s engine revved, and it zoomed forward, heading for Tracy.

Aiming at the windshield, she got one shot off, spiderwebbing it, but the truck still kept coming, and her instincts took over. She dived out of the way, scraping her hands and knees on the sandy ground as the pickup roared past, smashing through the barn door in a crash of wood and metal. The truck revved again, and Tracy rose to see a large off-road tire in front of her. She put two bullets into it, but then the vehicle reversed out of the barn in a shower of broken boards, and she saw the passenger holding a small submachine gun as he popped out of the open window.

A shadow fell over her, and Tracy jerked her pistol up, only to see it grabbed and levered up at the sky.

“Are you crazy, woman! Let’s get the hell out of here!”

Tracy looked up to see Nate, who grabbed her hand and yanked her to her feet as he fired several rounds at the truck, which had been coming around for another attempted ram. She ran with him around the corner of the barn just as someone opened fire behind them, chewing boards apart in a hail of bullets. Running to the back, they rounded the corner to see several men trying to get into the Bronco, with one smashing the driver’s-side window with a large rock.

Nate fired into the air, scattering the illegals, but not before the window shattered. Tracy felt keys pressed into her free hand. “Drive!”

Too shocked to argue, Tracy ran for the door, unlocked it and brushed glass chips off the seat before climbing in.

“What are you doing?” she shouted.

Nate had jerked open the SUV’s tailgate and slid in the back. Grabbing the shotgun out of its holster, he racked the pump action. “Just get us to the road. I’ll keep ’em from following us out!”

Tracy jammed the key into the ignition, twisted it, slammed the clutch down and shifted into Reverse. She stomped on the gas and the Bronco shot out from behind the barn, Tracy spinning the steering wheel as they shot toward the highway. Just as they cleared the front of the building, the other truck flew out from the other side and slammed into the Bronco. Tracy screamed and fought the wheel as the SUV slewed from side to side, but regained control and kept going.

“Jesus, watch it up there, will you!” In the back, she saw Nate get back onto his knees and rack the shotgun, then duck down again. “Get down!”

Tracy did her best to hunch down while trying to keep the wheel straight—she knew if they hit the ditch instead of the driveway, their miraculous escape would end quickly. The chatter of an AK-47 sounded right next to her, and the back window exploded in a shower of glass, followed by the roar of Nate’s shotgun.

The truck swerved away for a moment, and Tracy let up on the gas long enough to shove the gearshift into third.

The driveway seemed endless now, the distant road looking as if it were hundreds of yards away. And even if we reach it, there’s no guarantee they’ll stop—it’s not like we’ll be safe there, she thought.

“They’re coming back—make sure they don’t hit the engine!” Nate racked the shotgun again and shot at the truck’s cab, shattering the driver’s-side window.

“Hell, I’ll do better than that.” Tracy swung the wheel, feeling the Bronco lean as it lurched over and crunched into the side of the truck, making the driver fight for control of his vehicle. One of the riflemen triggered a long burst, but the bullets kicked up dirt to the left of the SUV. The pickup’s wheelman regained control, however, and nudged his heavier truck over against the Bronco, trying to send it off the driveway and into the ditch. They were only about thirty yards away, and closing on the narrow entrance fast. Tracy hauled on the wheel, but couldn’t force the truck over. In a straight power contest, the other vehicle had the edge. Metal shrieked as the two vehicles rubbed together in a fight for dominance.

“Goddammit, punch it and get ahead of them!” Nate shouted.

“No time!” The driveway was only a few yards away, and Tracy spun the wheel in the opposite direction and slammed on the brakes, wrenching the SUV into a shuddering bootleg turn. Taken by surprise, the pursuing pickup raced out the driveway, onto the road and into the ditch on the other side. Tracy gunned the engine, running on the desert hardpan parallel to the road, leaving the zetas behind.

Stray shots from the automatic rifles pinged around them, and then they were out of range.

“Thank God that’s over.” Tracy slumped in the driver’s seat, the hot desert wind parching her face. She slowed down automatically, aware that she was running over scrub brush and other things that wouldn’t be good for the Bronco’s undercarriage.

“Hey, hey, keep an eye on where you’re going, all right?

We blow a tire or break an axle out here, and it’s a long walk—oh, shit.”

“What?” Tracy’s eyes strayed to the rearview mirror again, and widened in disbelief.

The truck was growing larger in the mirror as it came after them, its front end caked in dirt and its fender crumpled, but otherwise no worse for wear.

“Guess they weren’t as stuck as we thought. We either need to head into the desert or get onto the road,” Nate said.

“Hold on!” Tracy had spotted a flatter stretch ahead, and gunned the engine to make sure she had the forward velocity to make the switch. She edged closer to the ditch, then tweaked the wheel again, aware that the slightest wrong move could send them rolling over.

“Where are you—Jesus, I thought you were gonna head into the desert!”