Ever Hayes - Emergency Exit

Intelligence was quite sure the Americans were trapped somewhere in between. Unless, of course, they’d gone somewhere other than Durango . Eddie was fully aware Central Command thought nothing of the intelligence of these Americans. Few other Americans had proved difficult in this entire endeavor. There’d been many gunfights but little strategy, and the Americans stood no chance in a weapons war. But an intelligence one…Eddie knew better than to underestimate his prey there. They had proven time and time again they were up to the battle of wits.

It would have been easy to call in forces from multiple bases, to corner and converge on the Americans—block all their possible routes—at so many different points in this journey. But that wasn’t how Eddie had wanted to play this. He’d wanted personal revenge for Markus’s death. Then these Americans had fooled him, and angered him—multiple times—so he continued the pursuit.

And then there was Cheyenne. When the Americans could have run away free, they’d come back and saved his life and Lazzo’s. He still didn’t understand that. They’d earned the one chance he’d given them, but he still wanted them dead. And he definitely didn’t want anyone else catching them first.

Eddie had been given the opportunity to out them when the vice president was killed, but he didn’t. He had gone into that meeting with The Seven commanders intent on sharing his knowledge if they pulled a gun on him. But when they didn’t, he kept it to himself. When he had visited the VP in the tent before taking him up to the alpine base, Eddie had noticed the mud on the floor leading to a cut across the back of the tent. It seemed to have been sealed from the outside, but that gap told Eddie someone had been there. He could have proved that to the commanders if he’d had to. But he didn’t. The demotion didn’t bother him because he still was in the game. This wasn’t a matter of rank or recognition for him. This was purely personal. These Americans had started this fight with him, and he intended to finish it himself.

Then he heard the words that changed everything.

We were on the road again at 9 p.m. As we pulled into the town of Ridgeway and up to the fork in the road leading to either Durango or Cortez, we happened upon a roadblock. Only this roadblock was different. The troops were armed with guns and spotlights. “Danny, this isn’t good,” Sam said right away. “Three guards. This is different.”

He was right, of course. Danny knew they were going to search every vehicle passing through now. He knew the chain reaction alert had been passed on from Estes Park. “Just roll my window down now, pull up to them slowly and then roll your window down. Say the word ‘now’ when I have a clear shot at more than one guy. Make sure you stay out of the way.”

Sam nodded. He pulled up to the blockade and stuck his hand out the window to wave. The closest man didn’t wave back though. He said, “Park. Get out of car.”

Sam put the car in park, leaned towards the middle of the jeep for a second, and then asked, “Now?”

The soldier right next to our jeep went down before either of the other two guards even saw the gun. Danny took the second guy out with another single shot. The third guy ran for the radio, but before he’d lifted it an inch Blake shot it out of his hand. Nice shot! Danny swung out of the car and ran to the man. He’d screamed once already when Blake’s shot hit his hand. Danny didn’t let him scream again. He swept the man off his feet and knelt on his chest with a knee to his throat and a Springfield to the man’s temple. He asked which way was the safe way to go. The anger in the man’s eyes when he pointed straight south told Danny all he needed to know. Fear always said one thing. Anger always said another. “We need to go west, guys,” Danny said to Sam and Isaac after he’d finished the last guy off. “They’re waiting for us south.”

According to the scale on our map, it was a little more than one hundred miles, half of it through the mountains, from Ridgeway to Cortez. It should take us about two and a half hours, with no problems. From Cortez we would continue south to Gallup, New Mexico, which would take another two or three hours. That would drop us halfway between the two likely base locations in Flagstaff and Albuquerque. There was plenty of forest south of Gallup, if we could just get there.

The first forty miles to Telluride were nerve-racking but went without incident. As we approached the small ski town, our road broke south. But before we could turn, we came upon another roadblock. There was something off with this one though. We could see jeeps parked beside the barricade, but there were no soldiers in sight. It was barely 10 p.m.; there was no way they were asleep. With four jeeps, there had to be more than three men at this one. What made things even more confounding was the gate being left up. We didn’t see anyone as we drove through. We continued south on Highway 145 towards Cortez, driving another hour without seeing any signs of life—beyond a million rabbits, that is. Man, how fast could those things repopulate?

Entering the small town of Dolores a dozen miles north of Cortez, we came upon another roadblock, this one with three jeeps. Once again, the gate was open with no soldiers around. What in the world was going on? We felt like we were driving into a trap, but we couldn’t stop. Right now we’d have done anything for a THIRST system, but we couldn’t afford the time to stop and check any of the jeeps. We had to keep going.

General Roja had arrived in Durango before any other area soldiers had, but when the other troops joined them from Grand Junction, he decided he should set up his base somewhere else. That way, if anyone came through Durango someone else would slow them down, and after their fight the general would swoop in and kill them. It would be much easier that way, and he could stay a step ahead of the game.

He knew the Americans would be traveling at night. This was nothing more than reverse immigration. Several of the general’s family members had been working in America, mostly in Arizona, before the attacks. The general had pulled them all out safely, but they’d originally had to sneak their way into America. They always did so at night. The general knew the Americans hadn’t already passed him. They were still coming.

In Grand Junction they had a high-tech THIRST system, similar to what the drones and new helicopters carried. The Seven commanders had ordered it brought to Durango. The general pulled rank on the colonel from Grand Junction and insisted the advanced system go south with him another thirty-seven miles to the town of Aztec. It wasn’t a mobile system, but once set up it provided a fifty-mile range, and with that the general would be able to observe all traffic coming into both Durango and Cortez. From Aztec, at the onset of any action, he could move north to Durango if necessary, hold tight if anyone broke through—highly unlikely against one hundred men with jeeps and rocket launchers—or he could cut straight west towards Shiprock, and arrive before anyone from Cortez could get there. General Roja had it all covered from Aztec.

Another radar station had been set up in the town of Mancos, essentially halfway between Durango and Cortez. It was equipped with an aerial THIRST system—twenty mile range—and mostly being used to monitor traffic approaching Cortez through Dolores, and as a backup for the west exit from Durango. A vehicle had passed through Dolores, heading towards Cortez, around 11 p.m. It had stopped at the roadblock in Dolores for about twenty minutes before continuing slowly down to Cortez. One of the general’s officers had radioed the roadblock in Dolores after the vehicle had left, but he had received an “all clear” from the guards there. The colonel from Grand Junction had apparently relocated one of his jeeps from Telluride to Cortez.