She connected herself to the zip line and noted no vibrationing through the line, so themandos must have disengaged. As she rode the wire down, her trolley wasn’t silent like theirs had been, so she was attracting attention. A few wild shots screamed past where she’d been, answered by a soft cough from a silenced gun from below.
With the attackers looking up, themandos could pop out of the snow to take them out. If they had the opportunity to take them out silently without killing, they did. Otherwise, it was a silenced round to the forehead or a knife in the throat.
Evelyn released her harness before she reached the tree, and the moment her feet touched the ground, she rushed forward to catch the stragglers at the back of the group. The invaders weren’t giving up without a fight, and they knew they weren’t alone in the woods now. She could hear single shots and the buzz of an automatic firing off a burst as the attackers fought back.
Her silenced gun made quick work of anyone who pointed a weapon in her direction. Otherwise, she used her short club to knock them out and quickly zip-tied them forter collection.
She was finishing up on her fourth when there was a loud rip sound, and something kicked her in the stomach, knocking her back into the snow. Her return shot from her position sprawled on her back punched its way free from the snow and took her attacker in the throat. He spun gracefully and dropped to the ground, choking out hisst breath.
Amando suddenly appeared next to Evelyn, and she saw it was Stim. While he had a ssh of blood on his upper arm, he gave her a thumbs up, and she returned it even though her stomach ached from the kick. She picked herself up and followed him back toward the fence. They checked the men they hadn’t killed and confirmed they were secure. They stripped them of weapons and moved on.
They met Fisher, and the man shed some hand signals to Stim, who responded.
When all themandos gathered, Fisher spoke. “Twenty-four terrorists. Ten dead. Fourteen captured.” He looked at the man who’d questioned him about Ben’s body armor. He was a bear of a man with a ck beard and arge hole in the center of his camo jacket. “How’d that new armor work out for you, Killjoy?”
“Felt like a mule kicked me in the chest, but I’m still breathing,” the man said.
Evelyn frowned as that sounded like how she’d felt on her stomach. She ran her fingers over her abdomen and discovered her coat was shredded. She gingerly opened her jacket and found her new fouryer te had slipped down to cover her gut. She carefully pulled it out and saw three closely spaced impacts.
“Why were you wearing it over your stomach?” Fisher asked in surprise.
“I wasn’t. It must have slipped down when I dropped off the zip-line and hit the ground. It wasn’t fastened down properly,” she exined.
“Lucky for you,” Stim said with a grin. He gestured to his shoulder and looked at Fisher. “If I’d had that curved te I was talking about earlier….” The CO snorted.
They heard a helicopter approaching, then a second joined it, and they flew by overhead.
“Heree our reinforcements,” Evelyn said. She turned on her radio and spoke quietly into her mic.
She listened, then looked at Fisher. “Troops are still twenty minutes out, but we have a dozen reinforcements for now. The Spa reports the group that attacked them only had five men. All are dead.”
“Wasn’t there supposed to be thirty? Does that mean one is still unounted for?” Fisher asked.
“Possibly. Let’s collect the live ones and bring them into the court where they can be ced under guard by our reinforcements. The dead will remain here until they can be carried out on the other side of the park. I don’t want the neighbors to see the corpses. I made that mistake once before,” she admitted, and Fisher chuckled with a nod.
They moved off into the forest once more, and soon the woods were filled with the sound of cursing and cries of pain.
They pulled the prisoners through the path between Ben’s and Gabrie’s homes into the court, where they could see the two helos resting in the center of the circr park with troopsing toward their position. Evelyn stopped on the road and released the man she was dragging. She saluted the captain who stopped before her.
Themandos dropped their prisoners and went back for the others.
“We have fourteen prisoners and ten dead terrorists. ording to the squad in One Ashburn Court, there are five dead terrorists in the field across the road. We were told thirty terrorists were sent here, but only twenty-nine are ounted for. Either one didn’t arrive, or they’re still out there. We’ll keep looking.” The captain nodded.
Evelyn continued her report. “General Davis will want these men taken in for questioning. We haven’t been able to reach him since he gave us a warning shortly before the attack.”
The captain nodded. “There was a major telmunication failure on the eastern coast. Potentially a cyberattack. We expect to get the channels back shortly. We’ll guard the prisoners until transport arrives to take them back to the base.”
Evelyn nodded and turned back to the path into the forest, where themandos continued dragging out the surviving attackers.
“Hey! One got past you!”
Heads turned to see a redhead with a bruised cheek and a bloody nose dragging a man’s body through the snow by his cor.
“Fucker had a sniper rifle!” she snapped as she strained to tug the big man forward. “It’s still back behind my house.”
Several soldiers ran forward to take the unconscious man from Trish. She pointed to her house, and a third soldier went to collect the weapon.
“Are you okay, Trish?” Evelyn said as she joined the woman.
Trish smiled wearily. “This fucker knew how to fight. He got more than a few hits in. I need to soak in a hot tub. Maybe with Ben,” she said with a smirk.
“Thanks for having our back,” Evelyn said.
“You’re a civilian?” the captain asked in surprise.
Evelyn grinned. “Trish is one hundred percent badass suburban mom!”
Trishughed and bumped Evelyn’s shoulder with hers.
“We should inform the neighbors they cane up now,” Evelyn said.Material ? N?velDrama.Org.
“Dibs on Ben!” Trish said with a grin, pulling her cell out of her pocket. Her smile was quickly reced by a look of shock and rage as the screen was destroyed.
“MOTHERFUCKER!” Her head whipped up to see the awakening sniper look in her direction groggily. She ran over to him as his eyes widened and kicked him solidly in the face, snapping his head back. Evelyn grabbed her arms and pulled her back.
“That’s gonna leave a mark,” Evelyn said as she stared at the unconscious, bleeding man.
She dialed Ben on her cell, put it on speaker, and handed it to Trish, whose anger eased as she saw the name on the screen.
“Evelyn? Is everything all right?” Ben asked quickly.
“Hi Ben, this is Trish. You cane out now. Everything is good. Well, I need a new cell phone as a fucking sniper broke mine as I fought with him,” Trish grumbled.
Evelyn grinned as she heard Ben’s exmation of surprise and worry. “She’s okay, Ben. Just bruises and a bloody nose. The prisoners are being collected in the court to be taken away for questioning. The dead will be collected from the other side of the park and the field across the road.”
“Thanks, Evelyn. We’reing out.” Ben hung up.
-=-
By the time everyone had been called and assured everything was under control and safe once more, only a few came out to see the conclusion of the excitement. The cold, the snow, and thete hour kept most inside. They’d get an update in the morning.
Ben was one of the hardy souls who braved the weather to join Evelyn, Trish, Liliya (Rose was in the care of Lily), Fisher with his team, and Captain Vanier with his.
Four trucks from the air force base finally arrived, and the two teams loaded the survivors into the back. Most of them were silent, but others had some interesting things to say. ording to them, Ben was a traitor to the United States for inventing superior weapons and armor for the Ruskies. They also had choice words for Liliya.
Fishers and a few members of his team with minor injuries rejoined Evelyn once the prisoners were on their way to the air base. The rest of themandos assisted the remaining soldiers with collecting the dead for the remaining trucks.
“Do those men know they were working for the FSB?” Liliya asked.
Ben looked at her curiously.
“Does it not seem a strange coincidence that this group suddenly targeted you after Sergey Zhdankov sent team after team at you?”
“The cyberattack on the Washington tel systems?” Evelyn asked.
Liliya nodded. “Support for the attack. They hire hacker teams to knock out the criticalmunication channels for a period of time to iste the target from their support systems.” She pointed to the smoking hole in the Spa’s top floor. “Someone with inside information told them where to hit them center. That was from an RPG. I’m surprised it didn’t take the top level off.”
“I added armor ting under the stone siding. Twoyers,” Ben said as he looked toward the damage. Maybe a thirdyer would have been a good idea.
“I don’t know how they activated the terrorist cell, but I have no doubt it was them,” Liliya said. She looked over at Ben. “I’m d you listened to Tina and Lucy and stayed inside.” She pointed to Evelyn’s torn-up coat. “That might have been you, and you’ve had far too many injuries in your life. Good night.”
She turned and headed back to Trish’s ce to collect her daughter.
Trish stretched up, got a kiss from Ben, and followed Liliya back to her house.
Ben watched them go, looked at Evelyn, and finally saw the shredded fabric over her stomach. He immediately moved closer to look into her eyes. “I’m sorry for not noticing earlier. What happened? Are you hurt?”
Her face heated up as his concern overwhelmed her. “I-I was shot in the stomach-but it’s okay!” she quickly finished at his look of rm. “I was wearing one of your fouryer tes, and it slid down while I was running around. It caught all three rounds. I had a vest underneath, but it might not have stopped them at that range. Yours did.”
“You were wearing untested armor ting?” Ben asked sharply, his worry spiking.
Fisher stepped forward to catch Ben’s attention. “All of my men wore the prototype tes over their regr armor. They got one hell of a live fire test. Killjoy took a point-nk shotgun st to the chest. Your te stopped it.”
“I want curved tes!” Stim said, gesturing to his injured shoulder.
Ben blinked at them and saw themandos smiling at him.
“Aside from Stim, was anyone hurt?” Ben asked.