Matthew Mark - Dark Days Rough Roads

“It’s a stalemate over here Roger, any suggestions?”

“Ya, when they get done here and return, ambush them. Make sure they don’t make it back into the compound. I gotta go. I gotta go.”

Roger heard an increase in the rate of fire. The west woods were heavy with militia. He called into the house. “You guys ready in there?”

Rich said, “Ya, just tell us when.”

“No, Mark has to do it. I’m in the woods and can’t see what’s happening well enough. Mark is going to make the call and everyone needs to move when he says go. You guys give it everything you have, you hear me?”

“Roger, we got it, we’re ready if it comes to that.”

Roger continued making his way toward the heavy fighting. He was now northwest of his property. He moved in as close as he could and checked out all the gear he would need. He took his mags and made sure they were all loaded. He took out all of his 37mm rounds and checked to see what he had. He placed the rounds he would use in his left cargo pocket of his pants and dumped the rest.

He laid his M24 down and covered it up with some leaves and branches. He piled everything else up by another tree and loosely covered it up. It was more obvious than the rifle, but that’s what he wanted. He would prefer this was found instead of his rifle. He had to lighten his load as much as he could. He would take only what was immediately needed for this part of the assault.

Over by the south side of the house, the militia was firing only randomly. The north side was pretty much the same. Mike had Dawn, Diana and Kevin lay down some cover fire and he jumped from position to position until he made it over to David. David was laying there looking south toward the area where the man who shot him had been.

“You ok, David?”

David said, “Not really. This thing hurts like hell. I think the bleeding has stopped though.”

“David, you stay down. I’ll stay here and help out.”

“Sounds good,” David said. The two of them waited.

Mark called on the radio. “Hang tight everyone. Conserve your ammo if you can. You’ll need it. Keep your heads low. This is going to get dicey.”

Haliday was thinking through the fight step by step. They had done a hell of a job fending off the militia. He knew they took some heavy fire, but his group was fairly well concealed and had great cover. A rush would end that though. They almost succeeded and David got hit, and Lisa almost got it too. They were almost overrun. One last chance to even this thing out.

Alan was up in the crow’s nest working like mad. He had everything he needed laid out and was fixing a little issue with the main component of their next defense for when the militia rush on the west side came. He grabbed the wires and twisted them together and then double checked them. It was ready to go now.

The militia on the north started first. They fired at the house, the crow’s nest and the previous positions where they knew Randy, Sarah and Blake were located. The shots came roughly one every two seconds. The south side started up next. These guys were doing the same thing. It was almost methodical, a slow rhythm of shots.

Diana stepped down from a sand bag she was using to adjust her height. She went to step back up and was near the rear of the hole when she did. As she did, she was struck in her right upper shoulder area, which she accidentally exposed. Diana dropped her rifle. She tried to pick it up and her right arm wasn’t strong enough. She grabbed it with her left and rested it in position. She would have to fire as best she could.

The west side started up, but far more rapidly and sporadically. The majority of the militia was located over in this area now. The militia moved a little closer and the rate of fire tripled from this side. In a matter of about 30 seconds the north and south tripled their rates of fire and the west increased yet again. It was a full on assault coming in on them now.

The entire compound was under heavy fire now. Mark saw movement very close and called everyone. “Now, now, now!” Alan grabbed a metal spoon and slowly dragged it across a wooden board with terminals on the top. The terminals were connected to a large 12 volt battery wired to Haliday’s favorite rocket engine igniters. Throughout the west side of the woods, the trees lit up brightly.

The flares were originally parachute flares and were stripped down, altered and set in the trees. Burn time was about 45-55 seconds. Haliday had installed two sets of them and these couldn’t be shot and extinguished. Ten locations spaced along the wood line. They would constantly burn bright white until they burned out. This was the last of the tricks Haliday had in his bag.

As soon as Haliday heard Mark tell Alan to ignite the flares he started launching his 37mm rounds. These were CS tear gas shells and would cause some serious discomfort to people running for cover and trying to save themselves. He had seven and he launched all seven of them in about 30 seconds. He took off toward the west wood area to see if he could now help repel the militia.

The militia stopped in their tracks. They were not only completely illuminated now, but they could not see the house or fighting positions very well. They had no sooner started to back off or take cover when the tear gas shells started to land around them. They started a hasty retreat to get out of the light and out of the tear gas.

Everyone in Haliday’s group on this side of the house lit them up. Alan up in the crow’s nest started to fire down into the woods. He kept his eyes on the first flare that went off. As soon as this one burned out he would ignite the second set. This was going to give them about a minute and a half or more of light to even out the odds.

Inside the house, Rich fired a 12 gauge shotgun full of double aught buck into the retreating militia line. He pumped seven rounds as fast as he could moving from left to right. He dropped down and started reloading the shotgun to fire again. Over by the other window Bev and Karen were firing 22lr’s but had plenty of magazines and kept the rounds flying. They started at opposite ends and worked toward the middle and then back again. The group on the ground could hear the shots flying over their heads and they were firing as well.

Lisa, Mark, Kayla and Linda all kept firing at the militia. If they saw someone dive to the ground or behind a tree they would concentrate their aim on that location. The first flare sputtered out and Alan dropped down and started the second set. Everyone else continued the heavy sustained fire.

When the militia had moved forward they didn’t expect the flares and barrage of gunfire. As they retreated from this they incurred the heaviest losses yet. They had eight members here that had been advancing. Out of the eight, only three had escaped unharmed. Two were injured and three3 were dead. This devastated their ranks.

One man had stopped to aim at a flare that he thought he could shoot and put out. A couple of shots and it didn’t go out, however Mark had put a couple of five rounds bursts in that direction and this was the first casualty. Another member had moved laterally not knowing more flares were being ignited and Rich had hit him with the shotgun twice.

Off toward the other side, Karen and Bev had gotten lucky with the 22lr’s and hit a woman in the back of her neck as she retreated. She laid there paralyzed, unable to do anything. One of the other members reached down to grab her and Alan had fired his bursts into him. The carnage in such a short period of time was horrific.

The rest of the injured suffered arm, leg and torso hits, but were able to continue out of the area. The tear gas had them coughing with tears and snot running down their faces. They either didn’t don masks or plainly didn’t have any. As the flares all died out so did the firing from the militia. The militia were now just trying to get the hell out of there and handle their injured and dead. During this, however, the south end of the property and north end had their own battles they had endured.