“So that confirms it,” she said. “They’re working with the ghouls.”
“It looks that way.”
Danny said, “Personally, I have a policy. Never collaborate with anyone or anything uglier than shit in the sun.”
“Oh, that’s lovely, Danny,” Lara said.
“I know, right? I use that line on the girls, and they just about melt.”
“I’m sure they do.”
“But enough about me,” Danny said. “What’s the plan? We just gonna sit here with our thumbs up our asses and wait for nightfall, or what?”
“I need you to take the one behind the pick-up truck,” Will said.
“I’m listening…”
“He’s focused on the back doors of the auditorium, the office window, and the two front doors. I’ll make sure he doesn’t bother with the auditorium doors. You get ready when you hear it.”
“I was born ready,” Danny said. “Then my mom changed my name to Danny.”
“Davies,” Will continued, ignoring Danny.
“Yeah,” Davies said.
“When I give the word, I want you to empty your magazine toward the trucks. Fire in bursts, and don’t poke your head out. Keep to the right of the doors, stick your rifle out, and make sure to get their attention. You don’t have to hit anything, understand? Don’t stop shooting until you’re empty. Then reload and do it again.”
“I only have one magazine left.”
“Don’t worry, that’ll be enough.”
“Okay,” Davies said, though Will thought he sounded unconvinced.
“Lara…”
“Yes,” she answered.
“When the shooting starts, run to the interior office window in the auditorium. Your job is to get the attention of the sniper in the truck.”
“How do I do that?”
“I’ll draw his attention first. When you see that happen, I want you to squeeze off a couple of shots in his direction. Use the Glock. It’s lighter, and you’ll be able to move more easily back and forth behind cover. You don’t have to hit him or the truck. You just have to get his attention long enough so he doesn’t catch Danny coming out of the back doors. Lara,” he added, “whatever you do, do not expose yourself. Understand?”
“Yes. I understand.”
Will went down into an almost crouching position, his left leg in front of him, his back ready to propel him up and forward. “Davies. You ready?”
“Yeah,” Davies said, his voice trembling slightly.
“On the count of three. One, two…three.”
Will counted down a full two seconds before he heard the first volley from the G36. He peeked out around the corner and saw the men in hazmat suits suddenly come out of their positions in response. Across the parking lot, the man in the truck swiveled his rifle toward the school doors, but from his angle, he would only be able to see the very end of the G36’s barrel, firing straight out at the trucks. The man behind the red sedan grabbed his gas mask and slipped it back on while scrambling for his AR-15, turning his body in the direction of the school’s front doors.
Exactly five seconds after Davies began firing, Will slipped out from behind the school and, keeping as low as possible, began moving toward the sedan. The man’s attention was fixed on the action across the parking lot.
Will counted the distance in front of him. He took the first ten meters in five seconds…
Fifteen meters…
The man behind the sedan didn’t hear him over the roar of the G36, and the three men behind the trucks were too busy staying hidden behind the vehicles to shoot back. They looked confused by what Davies was doing, and looked content to wait it out.
Twenty meters…
Will risked a quick look in the direction of the truck at the other end of the parking lot. He spotted the shooter behind the rifle, peering through the scope, entirely focused on the school doors. The only way he could see Will now was if he pulled his eye away from the scope. That was the problem with staying behind a scope for too long. Your vision became limited and the field became a small circular bottle instead of a massive football field. That was why snipers stayed far from the main action, in a position where they could pick out targets without worrying about incoming fire. And why they had spotters.
Twenty-five meters…
As soon as Will hit the thirty-meter mark, the man behind the sedan started to turn around in his direction. But Will was well within shotgun range, and as the man swiveled his AR-15, Will lifted the Remington and saw his own moving form reflected in the clear lens of the man’s gas mask. Will fired from five meters away and the man’s chest exploded in a red splash and the lower half of his gas mask evaporated under the onslaught of buckshot.
He was still running toward the sedan when he shifted his perspective to the men behind the trucks, more than fifty meters away across the parking lot, and fired three quick shots in their direction. His buckshot fell well short, as he had expected. Hitting them wasn’t the point anyway. He just needed to make sure Danny could hear the shotgun blasts over the roar of the G36. Three shots would just about do it.
Immediately, all three men turned around and began firing at him. He reached the sedan just in time and lunged for cover, making sure to slide up to one of the back tires for additional protection. Bullets slammed into the sedan and kicked up thick chunks of concrete around him. Will slung the shotgun and reached for the dead man’s fallen AR-15, a slightly heavier weapon than the more mobile M4A1.
Will felt the heft of the weapon in his hands while bullets peppered the car behind him. He ignored them. The distance was too great, and unless all three decided to swarm him at once, he was fine where he was. He didn’t think they would do a full-frontal attack, not with Davies firing away with his G36. Coming out from behind the trucks meant exposing themselves, and even amateurs knew better than to do that.
Then there was a loud clang! as a heavy round pierced the other side of the sedan and traveled all the way through the body of the vehicle and exited out the door to his right, three inches from his head.
Holy…
It had to be the guy behind the hunting rifle, in the back of the pick-up truck all the way across the parking lot. The guy was using armor-piercing rounds.
Will scrambled to the ground on his stomach and fired the AR-15 in the direction of the three men. They scrambled to get cover when Davies suddenly opened fire with the G36 again, sending the men running back to where they had just fled from. It was funny, and Will almost chuckled when another large-caliber rifle round punched through the tire he had been hiding behind seconds ago and embedded itself into the parking lot twenty meters away. Things stopped being funny after that.
He reached for his radio. “Whenever you’re ready, Danny! Now would be nice!”
On cue, two shots rang out from a Glock, then a split second later, a loud burst from an M4A1, the gunfire coming from the other side of the school.
As soon as the last of the M4A1 shots faded, he leaned out and fired across the parking lot at the trucks again. He took a moment to watch the three men scrambling around. They were clearly uncertain about where to go, with gunfire coming from all around them now. Davies was still firing blindly from the doors and a black figure was standing behind the pick-up truck where the sniper had been. The sniper was hanging off the side, his arms dangling lifelessly. The black figure took his place.
Danny.
Will was about to click his radio and tell Davies to cease fire when the G36 went silent. He had finally run out of bullets.
Will heard Danny’s M4A1 pinging off the dented sides of the Tacoma and Ram. He leaned out from behind the flat tire, and using the dead hazmat body as a prop, he sighted in on the three men in the middle of the parking lot.