Steven Konkoly - The Perseid Collapse

“Or he was taken prisoner,” said Eli.

“Prisoner?”

“Look around you, Dave. This wasn’t the work of a rival militia group or band of locals. Only a military Special Forces unit could pull this off. They bottled up Jimmy’s people on one bridge somehow and hit them from both ends. Fucking shooting gallery. We’ll probably find the survivor gutted by the side of the road somewhere up the road, tortured to death for every last bit of information about our militia. Jimmy probably gave them a good fight, gave them some wounds to lick. I’d want to know everything about the Maine Liberty Militia too. We’re up against something sinister here, Dave, and the government is behind it. No question.”

“Shit. Should we even be here?” he asked, glancing around.

“They’re long gone. In my experience, they shoot and scoot. No way they’d stick around after a gunfight like this. Get your squad to work loading up the bodies in one of the pickup trucks. Not mine. Bring them back to Shapleigh, and take the back roads. We’ll do a proper burial with full honors when I get back. I have a few things—”

A blaring horn disrupted his sentence, snapping his head toward the bridge. A white sedan crept forward along the bridge, twenty feet from Dave Connolly’s squad of disheveled, pathetic miscreants. Buddy unenthusiastically waved the car off, turning his attention back to a lively conversation among his squad mates. The driver laid on the horn again, this time fully ignored by Connolly’s men. Eli’s right eye twitched once, and he walked calmly over to the mess of men Connolly called a squad.

Buddy never saw the butt stock that collided against his right cheekbone, shattering half of his face. Mercifully, the trauma caused by the impact switched him off like a light bulb, and he never felt any of the repeated strikes that crushed his head to a pulp between the pavement and the rifle’s composite plastic.

Eli heard the car shift gears and tear into reverse, squealing its tires. He raised his AR-15 and centered the ACOG scope’s reticle on the driver’s head. Blond hair, woman. He fired methodically, exploding the windshield as he walked across the bridge. The back of the car veered left and hit the guardrail, blocking the road. The engine revved desperately as Eli changed magazines and flipped the selector switch to fully automatic.

Voices screamed from the car, followed by frantic movement in the back seat. He drew even with the side of the car and fired an extended burst through the rear passenger window, momentarily intensifying the shrieks of panic. He switched back to semiautomatic and fired three rounds at the lowest exposed point along the driver’s right leg, putting an end to the wild engine acceleration. He noticed that the back driver’s-side door was open and listened for several seconds. A low sobbing sound competed with the idling engine. A little hide and seek? Oh, this could be fun.

“One, two, three. Here I come. She’ll be comin’ around the mountain when she comes,” he said, walking around the hood of the car. “She’ll be comin’ around the—”

A woman in white shorts and a purple blouse exploded into view, hurling herself over the side of the bridge before he could shoot. By the time he reached the guardrail, her body had been whisked thirty feet downriver by the rushing water. He fired rapidly, using the white geysers of water caused by each projectile to guide his aim, until one of them erupted red. She was done. He turned his attention to the car. The few intact windows were splattered red. Perfect. Eli wrenched open the driver’s door and pulled the woman out by her sticky, crimson-matted hair. She spilled onto the street. That should be enough to keep traffic off the bridge.

Eli Russell stood up and approached Dave Connolly’s squad. “Form them up in two ranks for a promotion ceremony.”

While Connolly’s men fell into place, Eli changed magazines and shouldered his rifle. He nodded at Connolly and turned to face the squad, noting the look of sheer dread on their faces. He kept searching until he found what he needed.

“Mr. Connolly. Third man from the right, back row. Who is he?”

“That’s Jeffrey Brown, sir. One of my best.”

“He’s just been promoted,” said Eli, drawing his pistol.

“To what position?” said Connolly.

“Squad leader,” said Eli, firing a bullet point blank into Connolly’s head. “Eyes forward. Nobody looks at that piece of trash again. You understand?”

“Yes, sir!” they yelled in unison.

“No more happy horseshit in this squad, Mr. Brown. Am I clear?”

“Clear, sir,” said Brown, staring straight forward at a point in the distance.

“Front and center, Mr. Brown. This is your squad. Get these bodies loaded up and back to Shapleigh.”

“Yes, sir. Permission to speak, sir?”

“Better be good,” growled Eli.

“Can I assume they go in the river?” said Brown, nodding at his dead squad mates.

Eli chuckled and patted the young man on the shoulder. “And anyone else that ain’t militia material,” he said. “Get it done, Brown. And get it done fast. The fewer people that see us here, the better.”

“Yes, sir. No witnesses,” said Brown.

Eli smiled. “Looks like I picked the right man for the job.”

Eli cocked his head and put a hand to his ear. A car approached from Foxes Ridge Road.

“Ambush positions, both sides of the road!” barked Brown.

When the men didn’t move, he physically pushed half of the remaining ten men to the shoulder of the road next to the shot-up sedan. “Cover and concealment. Lock it down!”

Eli led the rest of the men to the downslope beyond the opposite shoulder, taking the position closest to the three-way intersection connected to French Street.

“Wait for my command!” he yelled to Brown, who had his hands full positioning his men.

A silver SUV careened into view a hundred yards away, squealing its tires.

“Stand down! Stand down! It’s one of ours,” said Eli, jumping up onto the shoulder.

Brown followed his lead, waving his arms and rushing into the middle of the road. The right man indeed. By putting himself between the oncoming vehicle and his men, he took the extra step to prevent a blue-on-blue engagement. Eli joined the new squad leader and waited for the SUV to arrive.

“You have prior military experience, Brown?”

“Yes, sir. Five years in the army. Went in right after the pandemic. Left as a sergeant,” said Brown. “Heads up, sir.”

The SUV stopped inches from Eli Russell, but he didn’t flinch or betray any sense of apprehension.

“Sounds like a perfect match. Connolly never said a word about you being a sergeant. Now I know why. Get your men to work,” he said, returning Brown’s salute.

Kevin McCulver opened the door and slammed it shut.

“Something wrong with your fucking radio, son! We almost lit your asses up!”

“The church is wiped out,” he sputtered with a panicked look.

“Not here,” spat Eli, grabbing his sleeve and guiding him behind the SUV. “You out of your mind talking about that in front of them?”

“Sorry, Eli. I’m a little fucking spooked by this. No survivors,” he said, spotting the pile of corpses. “What the fuck? Same thing here?”

“Get a hold of yourself,” said Eli.

“Jimmy?”

Eli shook his head.

“I’m sorry, Eli. We all—”

“No time for that. We have one guy unaccounted for. Bet he was taken for interrogation.”

“What?” Kevin said, shaking his head. “Interrogation?”

“Someone took out Jimmy’s entire platoon simultaneously at both locations. This is hardcore Special Forces work, and the only reason we’d have a Special Forces group operating in the area is if this whole EMP thing was a false flag operation.”