Ever Hayes - Emergency Exit

Afghan Nazis? Wooly? What the heck was this guy referring to? Was it possible to sound any dumber? And where was this person he was talking to on the phone? How did this idiot get reception? Wes was about to continue the pursuit when he noticed movement and saw two other men following the fat man. Wes was close to one of his hunting blinds and scampered into it. The other two men snuck by less than twenty feet from him, unaware he was there. They each carried military rifles, and he could tell for sure they were Americans now.

Wes waited until they were far enough away to crawl out of his hiding spot and make his retreat to the lodge. He heard approaching vehicles and, moments later, gunfire. No doubt his sons had picked it up too. He rapidly covered his tracks back to Sully Hill, entering the tunnel through the boulder pile. He filled Sam and Isaac in on what he’d seen, and they told him the others across the lake had heard the gunfire too and seemed to be waiting for something.

Wes tried to rehash the conversation he’d heard. The people across the water seemed innocent enough; they’d even saved that bumbling fool. Hopefully, the two men he’d seen following the fat man had escaped, but if they hadn’t, then the rest of the group across the water were going to die, too. “Any guess on how many people are over there?” he asked his boys.

“When the gunshots rang out, we saw six people get out for a minute or so, and then they all jumped back in,” Isaac replied. “Three of them were armed, one girl and two guys.” Wes began pacing, watching the screens. “And Dad…” Isaac said.

“Yeah?” Wes looked at him.

“We’re not one hundred percent certain, but we’re pretty sure we saw an American flag.” Isaac paused. “We don’t think they’re the enemy.”

“I know,” Wes agreed. “I don’t think so either.”

Wes had been pondering his next move, but now he knew what he had to do. He handed Sam a hunting rifle, grabbed his old-school M40A3 and night vision gear, and they headed out the boulder exit. They carried two-way radios in case Isaac needed to alert them. They hurried around the lake and approached the vehicles against the wind. Isaac’s voice spoke into Wes’s earpiece. “Dad, the other two are back. No sign of the fat man.”

Wes stopped and pulled Sam down to the ground with him. He whispered into the mouthpiece, “Does it look like they were followed?”

“No, Dad. But it looks like they’re getting ready to leave.” Wes contemplated his next move, and then Isaac spoke again. “Dad, there’s traffic on the bridge coming from Devil’s Lake. I count eleven sets of lights.”

Crap . Go back or go forward . “What do you think, Sam?” Wes asked.

His younger son shrugged. “We’re only a hundred yards from them now. I think we have to save them, Dad.”

Wes sighed. “Okay then. Let’s go.” They crept up on the three men standing outside the vehicles and, after looking around one last time for any more trouble, Wes cocked his gun. “Don’t move a single inch.”

The two muscular young men spun towards him, but didn’t reach for their guns. The other started to reach for his, but Sam raised his own gun. “Don’t,” Sam snapped.

“We’re not here to hurt you,” Wes spoke softly.

“That’s good,” the man without the boots on said. “Because then my sister would have to kill you both.”

Wes wasn’t about to be distracted, until he heard a female voice. “I’d put your guns down if I were you.”

“Appears we’re at an impasse, guys,” the bootless one said, hands still slightly raised. “Who are you and what do you want? In case you haven’t noticed, we’re about to be killed here, so make it quick. They’re setting up their tracking gear as we speak.”

“You guys are Americans?” Wes asked.

“For a few more minutes at least,” the other young man replied with a hint of hostility.

“Hey, we are too. And I think we can help you,” Wes said, lowering his gun and motioning for his son to do the same. He glanced at the girl behind them whose bow was still loaded and raised. “I’m Wes, and this is my son Sam. We live in a cabin right over there, and we saw your friend get gunned down and the troops coming. We have a place you can hide. But you have to trust us.”

The bootless one seemed to be considering his options.

“We don’t really have a better plan, Danny,” an older man said, stepping out of a vehicle and addressing the bootless one.

“Let’s go then,” Danny agreed. “Everyone grab what you can carry and follow those guys. Cameron and I will be right behind you.”

Danny shook Wes’s hand. “Thanks.”

“You got it,” Wes replied. “Hey, just in case, left of the bridge there…” He pointed through the darkness toward his cabin. “I’ve got a hunting blind cut into the hill that goes all the way under the road. We usually park our duck boat in there during the winter. If you need a place to hide between here and the cabin, that’s as good as you’ll get.”

Danny nodded and turned back towards the trucks. “Go guys,” he called over his shoulder.

The group managed to carry most of what they had in the trucks back to the cabin. Danny and Cameron stayed behind and covered the vehicles, imploding scent maskers inside the tarps to deter the dogs. They had to do what they could to keep those vehicles if possible. The two of them were about five minutes behind, almost to the bridge, when the first truck of soldiers pulled up.

Through their night vision goggles the boys watched four men jump out on each side of the road, just across the bridge from their position. The truck moved on a couple hundred more yards and dropped off more men. Cameron was about twenty yards ahead of Danny, and he found the camouflaged entry into the hunting blind under the road. He slipped the cover aside and ducked into it. Danny crawled towards Cameron as several of the soldiers began walking across the bridge in his direction. He wasn’t going to make it to the tunnel.

Two jeeps were approaching the bridge from Danny’s left. The soldiers had crossed it by this point and were standing ten not-quite-dark-enough yards from him. Fortunately, they were momentarily distracted by the approaching jeeps and were signaling the first one to stop. As they spoke to the driver, Danny could hear dogs barking in the back of the jeep. He scrambled the last few yards to the blind and Cameron pulled him in. The dogs’ barking got louder, and wilder, as the driver dropped two of them off with the soldiers. Danny and Cameron scrambled through the storage tunnel, under the road, to the exit on the opposite side. As they were about to continue out, a voice a few feet ahead froze them. A soldier stood by the stream beyond the exit, urinating under the bridge. Danny grabbed Cameron’s arm and whispered, “Wait.” But they couldn’t. A large crash came from behind them as at least one man and one dog fell through the netted covering of the lakeside entry of the tunnel, thirty yards away.

Cameron stepped out of the cabin-side exit to deal with the soldier by the stream and nearly walked right into yet another soldier. Equally startled, the other soldier wasn’t as prepared as Cameron, whose knife kept him silent. Knowing that brief distraction had cost him the element of surprise, Cameron spun back towards the soldier by the stream and watched in horror as he raised a whistle to his lips. Danny had emerged from the tunnel, but he was also too far away to stop the man with the whistle. It turned out they didn’t need to.

As Danny was about to lunge for him, the soldier suddenly clutched his throat and dropped to his knees, the whistle falling from his lips. Danny caught his body before he landed in the water. An arrow was sticking out the side of his neck. Danny was pulling it out as a dog exploded out of the blind entrance a few feet behind them. The dog was leaping towards Danny when another arrow whistled past his head and pierced the dog’s skull. It let out a subdued yelp, limply collided with Danny’s leg, and then fell silent. Danny grabbed that arrow too. Several voices were echoing in the tunnel, closing in on them. They had to keep going.