Bug Out! Part 3: Motorhome Madness (9 page)

Earl and Jackson walked over, with Jane and Lucy.

“What’s up?” asked Earl. Jane went over next to Frank.

“The Lieutenant is wounded,” Hilda said. “The doc is on his way over here.”

Just then the doctor’s car pulled in through the front gate, followed by the paramedic’s vehicle. Hilda went over to greet them, and pointed to the Humvee. They drove over there. The paramedics jumped out of their vehicle, and brought out a gurney. The doctor got out of his car and rushed over.

“Who’s injured?” he asked.

“Lieutenant James,” the Major said. “He’s in the back of the Humvee.”

The doctor nodded at the two paramedics, and they brought the gurney around behind the Humvee. The Private opened the doors, and the paramedics carefully put the Lieutenant on it.

“Take him inside the clubhouse and I’ll have a look,” the doctor said.

The paramedics pushed the gurney inside, and the doctor followed it. Jasmine and Rosie were still in the clubhouse, with Chester and a couple other people.

“Turn some more lights on in here, would you, Hilda?” the doctor said.

“Sure thing.” She hit the switch and the lights came on.

“What wrong with him?” asked Rosie.

“Shoulder wound,” the doctor said after he pulled back the bloody shirt. “Not life threatening, but he’s lost some blood. We’ll need to get him to a hospital. How long has he been unconscious?”

“Not that long,” the Major said. “Probably about half an hour.”

“Alright. We have a small hospital in town….the boys could have him there in about ten minutes.”

“Great,” the Major said. “I figured we’d need to do an airlift. Go ahead and take him there.”

The doctor nodded to the paramedics, and they rolled the gurney out to their vehicle and loaded him in. Then they took off.

The major wrote a phone number on a piece of paper and handed it to the doctor.

“Here’s my number, give me a call and let me know how he is after you’ve patched him up.”

“Will do,” the doctor said, and then he rushed back out to his car and jumped in. He followed the paramedic’s vehicle down the road to town. Hilda went out and got the gate closed up again. Then she came back into the clubhouse.

“You two hungry?” asked Hilda.

“Yes,” the Major said. The private nodded yes too.

“Alright, let me whip something up for you,” she said, as she walked towards the clubhouse kitchen.

“What’s been happening here?” asked the Major.

“Remember the murder we were investigating?” asked Frank.

“Yes, the old man with the short wave radio,” he said.

“We figured out who did that. It was the woman that was in his rig with him the night before. Cynthia.”

“Really? How did you figure that out?”

“She disappeared, and on the way out she broke into Jerry’s rig and stole that short wave radio,” Frank said. “Then we found out that she was the lover of the militia leader.

“Which militia leader?”

“Franklin J. Hornady,” Earl said.

“Franklin?” asked Chester. He laughed.

“Oh, that guy,” the Major said. “He’s been in custody for a couple days now. He lost control of the Williams Militia, and the new leader tried to kill him. He surrendered to us for his own protection.”

“No, really?” asked Jackson.

“Really,” the Major said. “He’s quite a blowhard, that guy.”

“I don’t think Franklin ever had control of that Militia in the first place,” Chester said.

“Who’s the leader now?” asked Jerry.

“We aren’t sure,” the Major said. “I don’t think the Williams Militia is the core of this group, though. It’s too big and sophisticated now, and they have an alliance with the Islamists. The little Williams Militia never could have put that together themselves. Very strange. We don’t know where these other folks are coming from.”

“So you aren’t sure who’s the leader is, but it sounds like you have an idea,” Jerry said. “Who do you think?”

“If I were a betting man, I’d say that weirdo they call Officer Simmons, and one of the Islamist leaders.”

Jane looked like she was going to faint. Frank steadied her. Jasmine came over and leaned against Jerry.

“You guys know who that is, I take it. Maybe we talked about him when I was here before?” asked the Major.

“Yeah, Frank here shot him on the way out of Williams,” Chester said.

“Maybe you told me about that, too,” the Major said. “Sorry, I’m still a little rattled.”

“What happened to you guys up the road?” asked Frank.

The Major looked down and collected his thoughts.

“We took off on that road heading north. It was almost completely deserted out there. We passed a couple of ranches, but that was about it. Real rugged terrain on both sides of the road. Then we see a Honda CRV off to the side of the road, with its hood open.”

“Uh Oh,” Charlie said. “What color?”

“Red,” he said. “Why?”

“Sounds like Cynthia’s car.”

“Oh no,” Hilda said.

“Anyway, I asked my men to get out to see if we could render any assistance. I stayed in the Humvee, trying to get the command post on the radio. The Lieutenant and the privates all got out and walked over. There was nobody around the car. Then we started taking small arms fire from the ridges. I looked around, and realized that we had driven right into a perfect spot for an ambush. Narrow road, with high ridges on either side. No place to hide.”

“Crap,” Jerry said.

“Three of the privates got killed right away. The Lieutenant jumped for cover, but got hit in the shoulder. Private Jones here got over to him, and we all started to return fire.”

“The Lieutenant was still in action then?” asked Frank.

“Yes. He didn’t seem that badly wounded at that point. We were able to nail two guys on the right ridge and one on the left. Then a person on the right ridge stood up and got ready to throw a grenade. The Private shot him before he could throw it, and it went off in his hand. He must have had others on his person or close by, because we heard a few others go off.”

“So they did have the grenades,” Jerry said. “We were wondering if those were from you or them.”

“Oh, we have some, but it’s hard to throw them up a cliff.”

“Where are the bodies of the three privates?” asked Charlie.

“Back on the road. We pulled them over to the side. We were getting ready to load them in the Humvee when the Lieutenant passed out. We loaded him in the back and hi-tailed it here.”

“Do you think you got all of the enemy back there?” asked Frank.

“No way to tell. Private Jones climbed up on the right ridge. It was a mess after the grenade went off. Everybody up there was dead, but there was no way to tell if others escaped.”

“You didn’t get up to the left ridge?”

“No, we were going to do that next, but then the Lieutenant passed out.”

“You say that you don’t think the Williams Militia is a big part of this group now?” asked Earl.

“That’s what we are hearing. In fact, that’s what Franklin J. Hornady told us. I tend to believe him on that, but not much else.”

“I was in that group, Major,” Earl said. “It’s bothered me that I didn’t recognize any of the militia men we killed. We’ve nailed seven of them so far, back by the blinds. I got a good look at all of the bodies, because we loaded them up into a pickup this morning and dumped them down a canyon. I didn’t know any of them, I’m sure of that. Didn’t recognize the vehicles either.”

“I was wondering why you didn’t mention that you recognized anybody,” Jerry said.

“Why did you dump the bodies?” asked the Major.

“They were going to stink up the back end of the park,” Charlie said.

“Oh,” said the Major. “Stupid question. Sorry. I assume you stripped the bodies of whatever they were carrying.”

“Of course,” Charlie said. “Remember that SUV back there?”

“Yeah,” the Major said.

“It was full of supplies in the back. We have it over behind the clubhouse if you want to take a look.”

“Later,” Hilda said, as she carried out two plates of food. She put one in front of the Major and one in front of the Private. “Want a beer with these?”

“Water would be better,” the Major said. “We need to keep a clear head. We weren’t that far back on the road when we were ambushed. I’d say no more than five miles. There are bad guys around here. We need to be sharp.”

“Any chance of getting more troops out here?” asked Charlie.

“Oh, yeah, we’ll get more out here to clean up this area,” the Major said. “My CO was reluctant when we thought it was just a two-bit local militia. Now that the Islamic fighters are involved too, they will focus on this area big time.”

“Good,” Charlie said.

“Do you think we should be staying here, Major?” asked Jane.

“Yes, at least until we find out where the bad guys are,” he said. “I’d hate to see you guys get hit out on the road like we did. A grenade on a motor home would cause one heck of a fireball. They would hit the first one in the caravan, which would block up the road, and then they would kill off all the rest that are stuck behind. Makes me shudder just thinking about it.”

Jane had a horrified look on her face as she processed that information.

“So we need to get the Army in here to take these bad guys out, and we need to fortify this park as much as we can,” Jane said.

“Yes, that’s pretty much where we’re at,” the Major said. He was just finishing the meal. “Thanks, Hilda. That was great. I’m going out to the Humvee to get my CO on the radio. Be back in a few minutes.” He got up to leave, and the private followed him out.

“Wow,” Jasmine said. “This is really getting scary.”

“You’re telling me,” Hilda said. She looked around the room. Everybody seemed to be deep in thought.

“Maybe I should go out to the site of the ambush and look around,” Jerry said.

“Why?” asked Jasmine. She didn’t look happy.

“Because I’m an expert tracker, and I’ll be able to tell if anybody escaped, more than likely.”

“That’s not a bad idea, actually,” Charlie said. “I could go too…..I’m not a bad tracker myself. Too bad Jeb is laid up, because he’s the best tracker I’ve ever seen.”

The Major walked back in with a smile on his face.

“Well, I got their attention. The CO is sending a platoon out here.”

“How many in platoon?” asked Rosie.

“About 36, plus equipment,” Jerry said. “That’s about right for this job, at least to find the enemy.”

“Yep,” the Major said.

“If you’d like, I’ll go out to the site of the ambush and check for tracks,” Jerry said. “I’m an expert tracker.”

“Appreciate it, but let’s wait until the men get here. That info isn’t important to us at this point….we know these guys are part of a much larger force. The CO said that there have been a couple of other incidents to the north of here also.”

“Oh, really,” Charlie said. “How much larger are they thinking?”

“The CO said they could be as large as five hundred men, but they appear to be poorly supplied. That’s probably why they keep trying to hit this place.”

“So that tells me they’ll make another attempt to get back here for that SUV,” Jerry said. “I didn’t count everything in there, but I’ll make a rough guess that there’s at least a few thousand rounds of ammo in there.”

“Is it ammo that you can use?” asked the Major.

“Well, it is now,” Jerry said. “It’s 7.62, and we’ve got nine AK-47s now. Took them off of the bodies back there in the forest. Now I’ll have something better than that M-1 Carbine to shoot, and I’m checked out on the AK.”

“Alright, my suggestion is that you keep them, and get more people checked out on them,” the Major said. “My CO made clear to me that the platoon will be here to hunt down the enemy, not to protect an RV Park, so you guys are going to be on your own to a degree.”

“I figured that would be the case,” Frank said. “But the added pressure you put on them might tend to keep them away from here.”

“True enough,” the Major said, “but I wouldn’t let your guard down. You might want to skip Happy Hour for a while.”

“Oh no!” Rosie said. Then she cracked a smile. “Just kid.”

Several of the people laughed.

“Jerry, you have any experience with networking and surveillance systems?” asked Frank.

“Not as much as you do, but yes, I have some. What did you have in mind?”

“If we can get the stuff we need, maybe we can rig up a good early warning system here. Eventually somebody is going to go around those deer blinds.”

“What do we need?” asked Jerry.

“Well, I suspect that we have plenty of cabling and network hubs, since this park has Wi-Fi,” Frank said. “Is there a store in town that might have things like security cameras and monitors?”

Hilda started to laugh.

“That’s two I owe Jer,” she said. “Follow me.”

She got up and headed for the back of the clubhouse. There was a door to the outside. She unlocked it and they went through. It lead to the maintenance area, where they had parked the SUV and the pickup truck.

“I fought Jer about that fence back there, and I fought him about this,” she said, as she unlocked the padlock on the maintenance building door. It was a corrugated metal building that looked about fifty years old. “Who knew that we’d end up needing both?” She turned on the lights.

“Is that what I think it is?” asked Frank, looking at the boxes up on the top shelf.

“Yep, a complete security camera system,” Hilda said. “Jer spent a few thousand on this. I was so mad at him. Then he got sick, and never could get it set up.”

“Is this stuff still good?” asked Jerry.

“Hmmmmm. A little old school, but it will work as long as it’s not damaged,” Frank said. “Give me a hand, and we’ll pull these boxes down onto the work bench.”

Jerry got up next to him, and they picked up the first box. It was heavy, and they struggled to get it down.

“Damn, what’s in this?” asked Jerry.

“I’m guessing it’s a DVR unit and some network stuff.”

They picked up the second box and put it down there. It was a bunch of cameras and wires, in white Styrofoam, with a cardboard and cellophane top over it. It wasn’t heavy.

“Wow, thirty six cameras,” Jerry said. “That ought to give us some decent coverage.”