It wasn’t long before they entered a neighborhood, and John began directing people into front yards and out of the street. They used abandoned vehicles, bushes, and trees to mask their movement. Thirty minutes of sneaking along, John called for a halt and pointed to a house, then himself and Jared before making a sweeping circular motion indicating he and Jared were going to the rear of the house. He held up his hand to the rest of the group, telling them to remain in place.
John moved down the side of the little house without so much as a glance back at Jared. When John reached the back side of the structure, Jared was right on his tail. The men found the back door had already been forcibly opened, making their entry all the easier. Both men moved quickly into the house, searching the common area and kitchen for a phone book. The two men found no phone book and were back out front with the other five in less than four minutes.
Jared and John repeated this exercise twelve more times before hitting pay dirt inside what held all the indications the home was owned by the elderly. Both men came to the front of the modest house and motioned the other five members of their party to them.
“Devon, you and the ladies go to the back with Jared,” John said. “Dwight, you take the one-four corner and, Barry, post up on the one-two corner. Make sure no one sneaks up on us.” John was about to turn and sprint back to Jared when he saw the confusion on each man’s face.
“You, there,” John said to Dwight, pointing to the left side of the residence. He looked at Barry and jerked his head to the right side before running to the backyard.
Devon was with Jared, leafing through the phone book, looking for the company he’d visited. A few moments later, Devon located the address, which John glanced at briefly before turning to study his map of the city. Another two minutes and Jared, John, Devon and the two women were moving up the side of the house towards the street. Barry glanced over his shoulder as John came alongside him.
“Let’s roll,” John said tersely. He wasn’t angry, just focused now. They had a mission, and for a while that had been in limbo while they searched, but now they could focus on a single objective.
John pushed the party hard for two hours, stopping only to allow for water and a small snack intake before pushing on at what amounted to carelessly fast by nowadays standards. Their route took them through a residential neighborhood and then out onto a main road. When John peered around the corner and onto the main road, he slunk back, dropping to the ground. Jared knew immediately John had seen something he hadn’t particularly cared for. Jared had been last in line when John dropped, and now he moved up, making sure everyone stayed put until he and John sorted out what was happening up around the corner.
John had out his binoculars and was slowly making his way up to a small row of hedges that surrounded the corner house. Jared tapped on John’s foot, halting the man. John looked perturbed, but shimmied back to Jared.
“At least three guys with rifles up the street about seventy-five yards, maybe a hundred. I only got a quick look before I ducked out,” John informed him in a muffled whisper, his eyes riveted to the front.
Jared acknowledged John by pursing his lips and scrambling back to brief the rest of the frightened party. John moved forward, carefully parting the hedges in order to obtain a clear view of the men ahead. There were four men up the street, all of whom were armed. The men had positioned two vehicles on either side of the road. Two men sat in each vehicle; both sets of men in each vehicle sat in the front seat, lazily looking up and down the street.
John kicked himself for moving the group so fast and knew if he’d been moving in a straight line, these guys might have got the drop on them. Only because they were transitioning onto a new and unfamiliar road did John take the time to recon it before blasting around the corner straight into the men’s line of sight and fire. John studied both sets of men for a few moments, then trained his binoculars on the area around the vehicles. His breath caught at the sight of what filled the lenses of his optics.
There were bicycles, backpacks, clothes and other items thrown haphazardly about the men’s ambush location. Others had not been as fortunate as John and Jared’s party and likely paid with their lives along with all their belongings. The men located a well-traveled choke point and were victimizing people who passed through. John saw the men were armed with a shotgun and three deer rifles. John couldn’t tell a make or model, but knew a long-range battle with four guys, three of whom were sporting high-powered scoped rifles, was a bad idea.
As John was about to crawl back to Jared and the rest of their party, the hair on the back of his neck stood up as a shrill whistle sounded from somewhere behind John. Making matters worse, the four men in the vehicles immediately whistled in response and began concealing themselves outside the vehicles, where they were more mobile. John suddenly felt very behind the curve as he scrambled back to the very worried group of six.
“Move!” John barked as he got to his feet and ran past them.
John didn’t wait to see if his order was being followed; there was no time for that now. They were being maneuvered on by a force of unknown numbers. There could be five or there could be twenty-five. In John’s opinion, it didn’t really matter since he and Jared were
