Reaching the front, Robie threw himself forward in a prone position and opened fire right as the group of closely massed men erupted from the front entrance.
Because of the body armor they wore, he employed only head shots, and in short order had taken out all five who had burst into his range. Those not instantly dead moaned, cried, and cursed as Robie rose and sprinted toward his scooter.
He heard another sound that caused him to change direction and then dive down, right as the bullets zipped over him. He rolled right, took aim, and strafed the field in front of him with gunfire. This would give him a few precious seconds to assess the new threat.
It was coming from two directions, ninety and two-seventy on the compass.
Looked to be six men in each group, armed and armored.
Robie felt flattered they had sent basically a platoon to take him out.
He fired off the rest of his mag to keep his enemy at bay for another few seconds, and then slammed in his next-to-last sleeve of ammo.
His scooter was out of the question now. His adversaries owned that ground.
He couldn’t run for it. They would cut him down in a matter of seconds. No help was coming, he was outnumbered ten to one, and he had two thirty-round mags and seven additional shots in his pistol. They probably had thousands of rounds to expend on him. So it was just a war of attrition now with only one clear outcome.
He thought of pulling out his phone and calling Decker, if for no other reason than to tell him what was happening and to take charge of his body. But he decided against that. That was a defeatist attitude, and that was not really in Robie’s DNA.
He looked left and then right, searching for options as the group of men in front of him slowly moved forward. Just to show he wasn’t to be toyed with, he focused on one man, leading the pack on the right. He watched the guy through the scope on his pistol and gauged his diversionary movements for about ten seconds. He discerned the pattern and took aim with his pistol, and when the man stepped to his right, it was the last step of his life.
As the man fell dead, Robie immediately rolled to his left and kept going as rounds poured into the location he had just occupied, his shot having given it away.
Then the others ceased firing and hunkered down. Robie could imagine them using their comm packs to assess the situation and arrive at a solution to the little problem represented by him.
Robie didn’t wait to confront the result of this discussion. He rolled to his left and kept rolling until he reached a planting bed that was full of dying flowers and small bushes. Tac lights were flying all over the ground as they searched for him from a safe distance, because there were limits to the accurate range of the sub gun. It was designed to be devastating in close-quarter battle, but it was for shit at long range.
He debated whether to use the tac beams as a convenient target to take out one or two of them. But doing so would only lead to overwhelming firepower directed at him. And he couldn’t keep rolling out of danger. They would figure that out and send fields of fire in every direction he could possibly take. Then it became a numbers game, and one round would eventually find him.
He assessed the situation again. It was a shitshow, to be sure. But Robie had some more cards to play.
He opened the duffel and took out two metal fist-sized canisters and a pair of headphones with a built-in battery. He put on the headphones and powered them up. He punched an engagement switch on each of the metal canisters, tossed one and then the other.
They hit the dirt about two feet from his adversaries.
The blinding flash of light was followed by an avalanche of sound, and, far more lethally, sheets of packed shrapnel traveling at speeds no person could dodge.
Two seconds later, Robie got up and fired through the smoke, emptying his mag. Then he ran to his left toward the road using an evasive zigzag movement.
He heard shots fired in his direction, but none hit their target.
When he looked back, the smoke had cleared, and he was dismayed to see that six men were barreling toward him. They must have anticipated his tactic and had kept low enough to let the shrapnel sail harmlessly over them. He turned and fired his last mag at them. Two went down, but the other four returned fire and kept charging.
Okay, the shitshow was turning into maybe his last stand.
He dropped the empty sub gun, pulled his pistol, knelt down, and took aim. He might very well get two of them before the other two got him. At this precise moment in time that might be as near to perfection as was possible.
He sighted through the scope on his Picatinny rail, as they were no doubt doing with him. He prepared himself mentally for the impact of the rounds that would end his life.
Okay, Robie, it’s been a good run, but all good runs have to come to an end.
The next instant one man dropped, then a second.
Then a third. They were all head shots, and bits of skull, flesh, and eruptions of blood covered the ground around the men as they went down.
The shots were so rapid and so precise that they almost seemed to blend together into one round fired.
The thing was, Robie had not pulled the trigger on his weapon.
As the last man stopped and gazed around, wondering where the hell the shots were coming from, the next round pierced his skull and blew out the back of his head.
He fell to the North Dakota soil without any last words.
Robie rose from the ground and looked around, his pistol at the ready. Just because someone had taken out his enemies didn’t mean they were necessarily his ally.
He whirled when he heard the sounds of methodical footsteps coming across the road. He pointed his gun at the interloper.
When the person came close enough for him to see, Robie was stunned for one of the very few times in his life. He lowered his weapon.
“What the hell are you doing here?”
Dressed all in black, Jessica Reel lowered her customized sniper rifle with her favorite scope attached. She looked him up and down, then surveyed the field of carnage behind them.
Gazing back at him she said, “What else? Saving your ass.”
“I WANT TO KNOW what the hell is going on,” exclaimed Joe Kelly.
It was the next day, and he was standing next to Decker and Jamison, as they surveyed the grounds in front of the abandoned apartment building. It was strewn with dead bodies with sheets over them. Hundreds of yellow markers, denoting found shell casings and bullets, covered the ground.
“Looks like quite a gun battle went on,” observed Decker slowly.
“That I can see,” barked Kelly. “What I want to know is why.”
“How should we know?” replied Decker calmly.
“Nothing like this ever happened before you guys showed up,” replied Kelly testily.
“Doesn’t mean it’s cause and effect,” pointed out Decker.
“Have you identified any of the bodies?” asked Jamison.
“None have ID or any other traceable items. And they don’t look American to me, at least most of them don’t.”
Decker glanced at Jamison and said to Kelly, “Do you have photos of the dead?”
“Yeah, why?”
“I’d like to see them. Something might pop.”
Kelly looked at him warily and then said, “I’ll get them. Don’t go away.”
As soon as he moved off, Jamison said, “This is the building where Robie brought us to meet his boss.”