pass.
Colonel Rollins met him just outside the door, where strewn bodies lay untouched and blood appeared black on the concrete. “I told you we monitor everything,” he said, answering Jonathan’s unasked question.
Actually, it answered only one; but the others could wait until the PCs were secure.
The Little Bird sat on the ground, its rotors cutting a windy disk in the frigid night. Jonathan counted eight black-clad operators surrounding the chopper, their weapons directed at every compass point. Rollins led the way to the tiny door in the chopper’s side. He pulled it open and gestured for the PCs to enter.
Christyne looked stunned. Hesitant.
“It’s all right,” Rollins shouted over the roar of the engine. “With Boomer’s compliments.”
Ryan perked up at the name. “Dad’s here?”
Rollins shook his head. “No, but you’ll see him soon.”
“Where?”
Rollins shot a look to Gail. “Soon,” he said. “Time to climb aboard.”
Gail understood the hesitation to mean that she wasn’t cleared to know their final destination.
As Ryan scrambled aboard, Christyne looked first at Boxers, and then to the rest of the team. “Thank you,” she said. She reached out for Big Guy, offering him a hug.
Entering rare territory for him, he allowed it to happen.
“You’re very strong, you know,” Christyne said.
Jonathan realized that he’d never seen Boxers blush before. At least not like that.
As she pushed away, Rollins put a hand at her back to urge her into the Little Bird. No one was safe until they were airborne.
Christyne braced herself against the door and turned one last time. “God bless you all,” she said.
The instant she was clear of the door, Rollins slammed it closed, and the chopper was airborne, leaving them all to look away and close their eyes against the rotor wash.
Rollins said something into his radio that Jonathan couldn’t hear, but soon the infil choppers were returning for exfil.
“What’s next?” Jonathan asked the colonel as the birds got louder.
“I guess we all go home,” Rollins said. “Mission accomplished.”
Jonathan made a broad gesture with both arms. “What about all this?”
“All what?” Rollins said. “I don’t see a thing. I couldn’t. We’ve been on a training mission a hundred miles from here.”
“We could use your help,” Jonathan said. “These assholes dispatched execution teams across the country. We need to find out who and where.”
Rollins shook his head. “Negative. We had one mission, and we accomplished it. You’re welcome, by the way.”
Jonathan felt a pang of embarrassment. “Appreciate the help.”
The colonel shrugged as if it was nothing. The night started churning again as two more choppers dropped from the sky and flared to land. Rollins offered his hand, and Jonathan took it. “And we appreciate the loyalty. Sorry I can’t offer you a ride. We’re loaded to the max. I’ll have a hell of a time explaining the hours and the fuel consumption as it is.”
Translation: Roleplay Rollins had stuck out his neck as far as it would go.
“No problem,” Jonathan said. “I’ve got a ride.”
Rollins looked relieved. “Good luck, Digger.”
The Little Birds were airborne again within seconds of landing. Then Jonathan and his team were alone again with the dead and the wounded.
“One-way asshole,” Boxers growled. He shouldered his weapon and started scanning for targets. “This is a bad place to be, Boss. There’s still a lot of people and weapons unaccounted for. I vote we start hiking.”
“What about these people?” Gail asked. “They’re wounded. Suffering. We can’t just leave them.”
“Watch me,” Boxers said. He started moving away, ever vigilant.
Jonathan shouldered his weapon and followed.
“No!” Gail said. Her voice was firm, insistent. In different circumstances, petulant. “Look at what we’ve done. We can’t just leave it this way.”
Something snapped in Jonathan. He let his weapon fall against its sling, and he turned on her. “We cannot stay,” he said. He felt blood pounding in his ears. “We didn’t start this fight, we finished it. Everything that flows afterward is someone else’s problem. We’ve got a long hike out of here, and I’m not endangering the team.” Without NVGs to mask them, her eyes showed hurt and anger. “This is not negotiable,” he said. “Now move.”
“What about the ongoing threat?” Gail countered. “What about all the innocents who will die? Don’t we owe the whole friggin’ world a little intel gathering?”
“The whole friggin’ world is pursuing their own leads. They chose not to pursue these. I’ll make a call to Wolverine when we’re back in the world. She can do with the information what she wants.”
“You’re going to tell her about this carnage?”
“Of course not. I won’t have to. If I tell her to take a peek up here, I believe she’ll put two and two together.”
“And meanwhile, terrorist teams are free to roam, spreading random violence.”
Jonathan took a step closer and lowered his voice. “Dammit, Gail, our mission was to save one family. It’s done. Successful beyond any imagined outcome. Let’s call it a day and leave saving the world to Batman and the Justice League.”
“But we-”
“ Now, Gail.” He waited until she settled her hand on her weapon and moved to join Boxers.
The final look that she flashed at him before moving was one he hoped he’d never see again.
They moved through the night with combat stealth, staying in the cover of the woods. Weapons ever at the ready, they spread out, keeping twenty paces between them, with Boxers in the lead and Gail in the middle, due to the lack of night vision. They moved with agonizing slowness as they lifted their feet and brought them down in silence.
Five times in the first hour, Boxers signaled for the tiny column to stop and take a knee as movement in the trees raised an alarm. Twice it was a woodland creature of some sort, and once it was just nothing at all, but twice, Jonathan was pretty sure that it was Army of God Klansmen continuing their flight.
Without ever actually discussing it, Jonathan’s team had tacitly agreed not to engage anyone who didn’t engage them first. Jonathan found it counterinstinctive and a wide departure from any reasonable order of battle; but this opfor was so disorganized and traumatized that to do further damage just seemed cruel.
Jonathan considered walking back to Michael Copley’s mansion and stealing a car to drive back to their command post, but the net gain didn’t seem worth the net risk. All of those people who scattered into the night would be looking to regroup somewhere, and the leader’s mansion would be as good a rallying point as any. It made no sense to unnecessarily engage anyone at this point.
So, they kept walking.
By five-thirty in the morning, they were on the edge of a familiar clearing. The sun was just turning the eastern sky orange when Sam Shockley’s farm came into view.
Boxers stopped at the edge of the clearing and motioned for the others to join him. “I think we should move around this,” Big Guy said. “I don’t like wide open spaces.”
“What, you think they’ve set up an ambush?” Jonathan asked. Hearing the words stated aloud made them sound ridiculous.
“Can you think of a better place?”
“That assumes a lot of advance notice,” Jonathan said. “Even we didn’t know we were coming here until forty minutes ago.”
“It’s on the straight line between where we were and where we’re going.”
Gail asked, “How would they know where we’re going?”
Boxers made that growling sound that signified frustration. “I’m just sayin’,” he said. “It’s not a big leap if they track the truck we left back there.”
Jonathan thought it through. He was as much about managing risk as the next guy, but it would add an hour to
