Disgusted with herself, she dropped to the bottom of her hole and swapped the magazine for one of the stack of loaded thirty-round magazines from the .50 caliber ammo can dug into the side of the foxhole that served as a shelf.
“How could I have fired thirty rounds that fast?” she asked herself out loud.
When she popped up to try again, the other man was gone. Although he was not moving, she fired three more times at the now motionless man she had shot in the back, just to be sure. She then flattened both of the truck’s back tires, put a dozen rounds into the pickup’s camper shell, and used up the rest of the magazine puncturing the truck’s gas tank. Lisa again slithered down to the bottom of the foxhole, wondering what to do next. The answer came when she saw a Dymo label on the bottom of one of the magazines, as she reached up to the shelf to again reload her weapon. The label read, “Tracer.”
Hearing a steady popping from up the ridge, Mary stated, “Sounds like Lisa has them in sight from the LP/OP.” There was a long pause, then another two shots followed immediately by a loud explosion. A ball of fire welled up from behind the barn. To Mary, it looked like a miniature version of her imaginings of a nuclear ground burst.
It was relatively quiet for the next two minutes. No shots were fired, and the defenders sat anxiously at their positions, waiting for targets to present themselves. All that they could see were clouds of black smoke rising behind the barn. Then, as quickly as they came, the two remaining trucks roared out from behind the far side of the barn and back down the road to the gate. Todd, Mary, Dan, and Rose, all positioned at the front of the house, had the opportunity to fire several dozen rounds at the retreating pickups. They were disappointed to score only a few hits.
Lisa, still firing the magazine loaded with all tracers, got a few more hits as the two trucks sped away. To her surprise, the man who had used the bolt cutters, and who was now carrying only an automatic pistol, ran after the trucks waving his arms. Lisa took a steady aim with the bipod resting on the edge of the foxhole. It was eerie, almost seeming like slow motion, watching the red glow of the tracer arc out the two hundred and fifty yards to hit the man in the small of his back. He fell to the ground and began writhing violently. Lisa fired twice more. From the traces, she could see that both shots hit their mark. The man stopped moving.
Mike ordered everyone to reload their weapons and sit tight. A call to Lisa up at the LP/OP confirmed that she was all right. Mike asked, “Did you reload?”
She replied tersely, “Roger that.”
Next, Mike asked her if she saw any movement or anything unusual behind the barn. She replied, “No, just the pickup truck that they left behind. The tires are still burning like crazy.” Dan asked Mike, “Can I go out and check out the two trucks?”
Mike answered firmly, “No way! They could have left wounded or a ‘stay-behind’ out there. If there are any wounded, let’s give them time to hemorrhage. We’ve got allllll day.”
It was almost an hour later that Mike dispatched a squad to clear the area. By then the pickup truck at the corner of the barn had stopped burning. The squad moved in rushes as two separate fire teams, with one supporting the other on each bound. They didn’t find anyone living. In addition to the dead man down at the county road, they found one dead man in the truck that had crashed through the fence, and two bodies on the ground behind the barn.
The two men’s weapons were missing. There was also a body burned beyond recognition in the back of the pickup that Lisa had set on fire.
When they examined the pickup nearest the house, they found that the driver was very, very dead. He had been hit by at least ten bullets. In the cab of the pickup, they found a Smith and Wesson Model 66 .357 magnum revolver with a four-inch barrel. Luckily, it had not been hit in the fusillade, and it was still serviceable. In the glove compartment of the pickup, they found a variety of road maps. These were later closely examined because they bore a variety of marking and marginal notations.
In the bed of the pickup they found four empty five-gallon plastic hydraulic fluid containers, which had apparently been used to carry gasoline. All four containers had been punctured by bullets, but had been empty at the time they were hit. They also found a sleeping bag, several cans of beer (some punctured by bullets), a spare tire, three pornographic magazines, and half a case of canned tuna.
Not much was recognizable, and even less was usable, in the burned truck. It had mainly carried food, much of it in cans. The only salvageable item that was found was an eighteen-inch pipe wrench. Down at the county road, they found the abandoned pair of bolt cutters. Twenty yards down the road, next to the body of the man Lisa had shot in the back, they found a badly pitted Ruger P-85 nine-millimeter pistol. In the man’s pants pockets, they found a Case pocketknife, a set of lock picks in a leather case, and two loaded magazines for the pistol. On his belt, there was a crude handmade leather holster for the Ruger.
In case the group of looters turned out to be the vengeful type, Mike ordered that a second LP/OP be set up and manned continuously for the next twenty days. This put an extra burden on the group, but both he and Todd thought it prudent. The second LP/OP was set up on a low hill near the west property line. Because it was temporary, it was not dug in. It consisted of a diamond-shaped camouflage net supported in the center to a height of eighteen inches. This gave the observer just enough room to lie down comfortably. A length of WD-1 was run from the new LP/OP to the house. A TA-1 was set up at the LP/OP, and a second TA-1 was added to the C.Q.’s desk.
After setting up the new LP/OP, Todd called for another group meeting. There, he asked everyone to reorganize their backpacks as “bug out kits” to use in case the retreat was completely overrun. For this purpose, most of the group members’ packs carried a selection of contents similar to Doug Carlton’s pack when he first arrived at the retreat. At the same meeting the group discussed various options for additional security enhancements.
All of the usable items salvaged from the looters were locked up by Todd in the same locker that held the items seized from the pair of cannibal looters the previous year. The two wrecked pickups presented a problem. Neither of them could be easily towed because their tires no longer had integrity. Rather than fabricate a towing dolly, spare wheels from the group’s vehicles were temporarily mounted on the two trucks until they could be towed away. After they were towed to the grove of trees behind Kevin Lendel’s house, the trucks were put up on blocks so that the borrowed wheels could be taken back off.
Fixing the chain-link fence took four people an entire day. First, the sections of the fence that were damaged were cut away from the rest of the fence. Next, two fence poles were straightened, and another replaced entirely, with scrap pipe. Then, using two cable-ratchet hoist “come-alongs,” the mangled section of fence was straightened out. The bumper of the shot-up pickup and the bumper of Todd’s Power Wagon provided the anchoring points for the process.
Finally, this section of fence was put back into place and lashed back into the mesh, using three strands of baling wire that was twisted together to provide the necessary strength. The finished job was far from aesthetically pleasing, but it was functional. Jeff Trasel declared the repair, “Crude, but effective.”
Mike Nelson also replaced the cut lock at the gate on the county road with the last of Todd’s spare Master locks. Soon after, with two other Group members posted as security, Lon welded a special sleeve to the galvanized steel gatepost. It was made from a three-inch diameter pipe for the lock to fit into, so that it would be immune from attack by bolt cutters. The chain itself was a special rubber-coated type, normally used to secure motorcycles, which Todd had bought before the Crunch. It was guaranteed as virtually “un-cuttable” by its manufacturer. After they had done all this, Mike went to talk with Todd.