Conflicted Home (The Survivalist Book 9) A American (fun to read .TXT) 📖

The man pulled Doc over to him, “Is that what it really means? You are going to help her, aren’t you?”

Doc patted his shoulder, “Yes we are. She’ll be fine. Might have a nasty scar, but that’s it.”

The man looked down at his wife, tears in his eyes. “See, baby. I told you it wasn’t that bad. You’re going to be fine.”

The worst part was the children. We found many of them dead. Others, we were forced to mark with BLACK. Their little bodies simply could not deal with the trauma caused by modern military-grade high explosives. I saw Thad carrying the body of a teenage girl. She was obviously dead. He gently placed her in a row of other bodies in the shade of the trees. He was covered in blood, but didn’t seem to notice. After laying her down, he immediately went to look for another. And, so it went for more than an hour.

The walking wounded made their way to the clinic. Those not mobile were aided by their friends, family or neighbors. The more severely wounded were carried on makeshift stretchers until proper ones arrived from the clinic. Once the wounded were removed from the park, we were able to survey the damage. Twenty-three people lay dead throughout the park.

In the distance, I heard a loud boom, followed by an explosion. I hoped Mike had found whoever did this. I hoped they would be brought back alive.

Dalton knelt on the side of Micha’s face as he bound his hands. He’d placed a stout oak limb into the crook of his elbows, behind his back, and bound his hands together in front of him. It was a very uncomfortable restraint. Having secured his prisoner, Dalton stood up and looked to where the small Jeep-like vehicle was sitting, its crew still lobbing rounds. Micha sat up and started to say something. Dalton looked down at him, drew his Glock and gripped it by the barrel. He grabbed Micha by the hair and pushed his head to the side. Using the Glock like a mallet, he struck hard, once behind the ear. Micha collapsed to the ground, unconscious.

With that taken care of, Dalton stepped into the small cinder block home where he’d caught Micha nearby. Going through the house, he came to a bedroom that faced the small field the mortar team was working from. The window was broken out, so he wouldn’t need to open it. He stepped back into the closet of the room to obscure himself and raised his carbine. It would be a fairly long shot, in excess of three hundred meters. He was glad that today he had the AR with the ACOG. While the AK could shoot that far, this was much better suited.

Resting the rifle against the doorframe of the closet, he steadied it and used the hashmark on the vertical reticle for three hundred meters and squeezed the trigger. The rifle thundered in the closet, it was a miss. The mortar crew instinctively ducked when the round cracked as it passed them. The intensity of the crack gives a good indication of the proximity of the passing bullet, and this one was damn close.

They all ducked behind the Jeep and looked for the source of the shot. But not knowing where it came from, they had no idea they were still in Dalton’s line of sight. The second round did not miss as one of the men crumpled to the ground. The remaining men moved to the far side of the Jeep and pulled their stricken comrade with them. They began firing wildly at any place they thought the shooter could be. But they still did not have a line on Dalton.

He took his time, waiting for one of them to poke his head out. Dalton could clearly see the mortar set up behind the truck. It was large and had a single axle to allow it to be towed. To fire, it had to be disconnected from the truck and allowed to pivot back. The mortar was then lifted from its cradle and the base and bipod planted firmly in the ground.

Dalton kept an eye on the men. His radio crackled, “You still in the same place?” Mike asked.

“Roger that.”

As he spoke, a second light duty Jeep came racing up and slid to a stop. The three men in this truck began shouting and gesturing to the others, who remained behind their cover. Bingo, Dalton muttered to himself as he settled the optic on the man in the passenger seat and squeezed the trigger. The man was mid-sentence, leaning half out of the vehicle when the bullet struck him and he fell out, landing facedown with one foot still in the truck. The others began to fire wildly again.

Dalton heard the Stryker before he saw it. It came racing up the street he was on. Leaving his cover, he went back out through the house to show them where their target was. Micha was awake now, struggling to get to his feet. As Dalton passed him, he delivered a butt-stroke with the carbine to the top of his head, sending him sprawling to the ground again. He wondered, for an instant, if poor Micha was going to have any brain damage from the repeated blows. He shrugged, soon it wouldn’t matter anyway.

Dalton jogged out to the street. He couldn’t see anyone topside, but the turret did turn towards him quickly as he came out. But the top hatch popped open and Ted’s head came out. Dalton shouted to him, pointing to where the now two trucks were sitting. Ted popped out of a hatch and gave him a thumbs-up before disappearing back inside. The Stryker jerked as it gained speed down the road, the turret rotating to have the gun in position as soon as the targets came into view.

The big fighting vehicle stopped abruptly once it passed the house Dalton had used for cover. It