100 miles southeast

A small helicopter flew between hills. It was a Bell 429 GlobalRanger with some aftermarket weapon configurations. Unlike some support gunships, the crew-chief operated gun was not a machine gun or a rotary cannon of any kind but instead was a Barret M107. The rack behind the gunner held an M240B, the pylons held their own rotary GAU-9 .50 BMG cannons and rocket pods.

The pilot kept the chopper close to the ground while the co-pilot kept an eye out for power lines and obstacles. They had one radio receiver tuned to the police network in their target area, with an encrypted line keeping them connected to Tom’s control room.

Meanwhile

One more helicopter flew in, it was a two seater ultralight helicopter with a pilot and a guy with a machine gun mounted to a pintle. This chopper was only four miles away.

There was also an F350 with metal panels bolted to it, as well as window slats over the windshield. It came down the road toward the wrecked Suburban, loaded with armed men in the cab as well as the bed. The bed had inward facing seats with ten men waiting to jump out and start shooting. Inside the crew cab of the truck were three men in the back seat with M249’s and thick body armor. This truck was only one mile away, and closing the distance quickly.

Michael looked down the road and saw the metal covered truck on its way toward them. “Lani,” he said with concern in his voice, “need the sixty out here.” He took a knee behind the engine compartment of the sedan and swapped magazines. He kept his head down and waited for the truck to get closer.

Lani grabbed the M60 from the back of the suburban. They still had plenty of armor piercing ammo in belts. She flipped the cover up and lay the belt on the feed tray. She slammed the lid and yanked back on the charging handle. She ran over and set the machine gun on the hood of the car and ran back to grab more ammo.

Michael held his rifle as he kept watching the truck. When Lani got back to the gun with the two belts of ammo, he turned and pointed to the M60. “Get on this,” he said sternly, “you remember what to hit?”

“Driver,” she said softly, “gunner, engine, and replacement driver.”

Michael smiled, “good.” He moved to the feeding side of the gun and set his rifle down. He removed the belt from its carrying box and yanked the feed end of the second belt and attached it to the end of the first. “We might be in this as a last stand if I can’t get the truck started.”

“No last stands,” Lani said back at him with noticeable anger, “we’ll kill every motherfucker and walk home!” She turned her eyes back on the sights and opened fire on the truck. She let out a fifteen shot burst as she lay a slow stitch from the drivers side of the window all the way across the covered glass to the mirror of the opposite side. She paused for only a couple seconds as she adjusted her aim for the engine block and let out another long burst. Some of the rounds went through the plates, though they didn’t have enough energy to damage the radiator or impede the operation of the engine.

Michael turned the key and watched as nothing happened. “Trucks dead,” he said softly as he went to the back and grabbed more pistol magazines and shoved them in pouches hastily before running back to Lani’s position. He began firing high, aiming for the people in the back of the truck.

Two of the men in the bed of the truck had gone down, catching rounds from Michael and Lani and then slumping over dead. The driver caught two in his chest but still kept his foot on the accelerator and his hands firmly on the steering wheel. After a brief moment of taking more and more machine gun fire as they continued toward the crashed vehicles, the truck collided violently into the sedan. The front of the sedan was crushed between the weight of two armored trucks, though it still retained some shape. The team in the back were slammed forward into the headache rack of the truck, the weight of the team killing another man by crushing his chest. The seven remaining men started clumsily piling out of the back as the men in the back seat of the cab started kicking their doors. The force had warped the doorframe and trapped the team inside.

Lani had grabbed her gun and moved back, grabbing the foregrip handle and levelling off toward the back of the truck. Michael had his weapon raised to cover the opposite side of the truck. As men started fumbling around and trying to get back into the fight, they started getting cut down by rounds flying through them. They tried to rush Michael since they had just enough sense to realize that the machine gun was not going to be as forgiving. This logic would prove faulty.

Michael sent rounds through their chests, collarbones, necks, faces. He grabbed his next magazine and grabbed the bottom of his current one as he fired, knowing damn well he’d have little or no time to deal with reloading. As the bolt locked open, he ripped the spent magazine out and shoved the next one in and ran his hand against the bolt release. In barely a second, he had returned to firing at the group of dismounts who had piled out of the truck.

There were two men left behind the truck who had decided to climb back up and go over the top of the cab to get to Michael. As one of them peeked his head up, Michael saw it and raised his weapon, firing three shots. They landed perfectly in his face and had killed him before he could hit the ground. The last man tried to go under the truck and fire toward Michael’s feet. This didn’t work as he had missed twice. Michael reflexively jumped over the car and aimed his weapon at the windshield and fired into the slots. The glass was not ballistic rated, which let the rounds fly right through. As Michael dumped his magazine, two of the back seat passengers slumped over. Lani aimed into the windshield and finished off the last man who sat in the middle. Only the man under the truck remained.

As he stood up and tried to figure out where he was going next, Michael had moved over the car and advanced on him. He pressed his muzzle against his neck while grabbing the muzzle of his victims rifle and held it away from himself. He let out two shots, killing him.

Lani had stopped firing since the occupants of the truck were dead and Michael was forward of her firing direction. “I told you,” she yelled out to him, “This isn’t the end!” As she said this, a burst of rounds landed near Lani from behind her. Reacting quickly, she ran to the other side of the F350 and got her head down. “Okay fuck those guys!” she screamed out.

The ultralight had found them. They took a hovering pattern as the gunner shot in short bursts at them.

Michael moved to the back door of the cab and ripped the door open, retrieving one of the machine guns from the dead passengers. He disconnected the sling and racked the charging handle back. Once he had done this, he pressed the safety selector button to FIRE and began looking for the shooter.

Meanwhile, Lani had moved to the back of the truck and began firing bursts back at the helicopter. Her shots fell short, prompting her to aim a little higher. By the time the second volley of fire reached the choppers position, they had tilted sideways and gotten out of the way. This motherfucker, Lani thought to herself as she kept firing at the fast dodging chopper.

Michael fired as well, watching a traver fly toward the chopper every five shots. This fucker’s got ball ammo, he realized as he watched the flight of his shots.

After a moment of exchanging fire with the moving target, a missile flew into the side of the little helicopter. Michael and Lani knew that this meant help had arrived. The friendly Bell chopper flew directly to their position and did a hard braking bank, turning sideways to kill their momentum and bring themselves to a hover.

Michael used this time to run to the suburban and throw a flare to signal a good landing spot. Once the flare landed on the ground, the chopper set itself down. The gunner quickly stepped out and walked over to Michael. “You Mike?” he asked kinda loudly to project his voice over the helicopter.

Michael nodded, holding his thumb up to answer his question.

“I’ve been sent here to cover your escape outta here,” the gunner said. “But it looks like you need an actual extraction, which I’m not equipped for.”

“We need three seats and space for about fifteen or twenty guns,” Michael explained to the gunner, “And they ain’t small.”

The gunner started laughing. “We can get a nearby recovery asset here,” he said with a smile, “nearest best we got is a box truck.”

“That’ll do,” he said as he nodded. As the gunner ran back to his helicopter and called in the extra support, Michael walked over to Lani who stood by the driver's seat of the suburban. “We’re gonna get ground transport out of here,” he said calmly to her, “once it arrives we gotta load guns and gear into it and ride out of here.”

Lani looked at him and nodded softly. “What happened?”

“We talked about getting all our shit outta here,” Michael responded, “he’s only able to escort us, not move us.”

“No,” Lani said firmly, “on the other end of where she took you.”

Michael hesitated. He saw no reason to bullshit her, but he was worried about how bad it would all sound. He decided to explain it anyway. “It was a chamber in hell,” he said softly, “it took form from my past, and forced me to confront things I wanted to leave behind long ago.”

“And you bring her back?” Lani asked with confusion.

“Remember that convenience killing Bernard set up?” he asked as he observed Lani nod. “That’s a dead woman's daughter, raised in hell. She’s no longer what we met at the hospital.”

“Wait,” Lani said, “you mean someone left a kid behind?”

Michael shook his head. “She wasn’t born yet when her mom was murdered.”

Lani looked at her as she sat there sitting upright, saying nothing. “She’s awake.”

Michael looked into the suburban. “How ya feelin?”

The girl's lips twitched before she screamed loudly, tears rolling down her face. She began screaming words but they were incoherent and indiscernible.

“So much for that unfeeling tough bitch,” Lani said as she giggled. “I wanna see if I can hit her now.”

“No,” Michael said with a scowl, “we are not doing that.”

“She had no problem choking me,” Lani growled, “I have to hit this bitch!” Lani ran to her side of the suburban and grabbed her by the shirt. “Hi bitch!” she yelled in her face.

The girl pulled away helplessly and screamed, hyperventilating and shaking. Michael grabbed Lani and pulled her away. “This is not how we are,” he said as he carried her to the back of the suburban.

Before Lani could respond, the girl started screaming out words that formed sentences of understandable meaning. “I feel things!” “Help me!” “This hurts so much!” “Why did I do all this?” she finally broke down crying loudly.

“You gotta be fucking kidding me,” Lani said a flat and unimpressed tone, “did you knock the power outta this bitch?” She began laughing loudly, leaning against the bumper of the suburban.

Meanwhile, the chopper lifted off the ground and started flying a patrolling pattern around the area. “What the fuck is going on with those people?” the co-pilot asked as he watched the commotion.

“They’re a special case,” the gunner said with a chuckle, “He’s the contractor, she’s officially a personal assistant.”

“Whatever,” the pilot said as he checked gauges, “probably fuckin on the job.”