CHAPTER 9: AMBUSH
Crested Butte, Gunnison County, Colorado. October 14th, 2004.
The door to the pawn shop was securely locked with a padlock and chain. Dallas pried up a lug wrench he'd gotten from the SUV's toolbox. He pushed up with all his might and grunted. Sheriff Morales walked up to his side, revolver in hand.
-"I can't believe I let you do this," he commented as Dallas struggled against the lock.
Ironic, Dallas thought. Three years ago he had gone to prison for robbery and burglary of precisely that same place. Although the security cameras did not show his face and the owner of the store had not identified him, Dallas turned himself in to the then county sheriff and accepted a five-year sentence, with the possibility of getting out in three for good behavior. The truth is that Ricky had been the culprit, but Dallas didn't want his brother to follow in his footsteps, to go to college and have a better life.
Now, in an ironic twist of fate, Dallas was committing the same crime for the same reasons, to protect his brother and the people around him.
-"This plan is stupid!" Dale came up yelling, "Let's get out of town!"
Dallas looked up at the teen. "We won't make it without weapons, idiot," he said as he pulled the lever again. "You're too stupid to talk Dale, shut up."
The lock gave way with a click, and Dallas turned the knob. The door opened and Morales stepped forward, aiming the revolver at the darkness and whatever might be in it. Once he secured the place, he gestured for the rest to come inside. Dallas and the others slipped into the store quickly and quietly.
-"Where's the weapons?" Ricky asked, looking at the tempered glass shelves, where the objects of change were displayed: Antiques, tools, electronics, camping equipment and toys, but no weapons of any kind.
-"Follow me," Jesse replied. She grabbed a camping lantern from the counter, switched it on, and led the group. Dallas picked up another flashlight and watched the rear. "Here!" the girl pointed to a shelf that covered one of the walls. On it hung hunting rifles, 12-gauge shotguns, pistols and revolvers of various calibers.
-"Come on, Dale. Grab some bags," Dallas ordered as Ricky grabbed a shotgun and threw it at him. He slung it over his shoulder by the strap. "Jesse, put some weapons in there."
Eddie walked over to a shelf and removed an old battered VHF radio center and placed it on the counter. He checked the battery slot but it was empty.
-"That thing works?" Dallas asked.
Eddie reached into the drawer and found a new battery pack. He quickly opened it and put the batteries in the device. It lit up with a click. "Yeah, I just need a little light," he told Dallas, who held the flashlight closer.
Eddie turned the dial to channel 9. The 27,065 kHz frequency of the civilian band radio was used exclusively for emergencies. With phone lines and cell phones down, it was his only chance to contact the National Guard.
-"Sheriff Morales calling the National Guard, go ahead," Morales took the microphone. Dallas and Ricky were putting ammunition inside some canvas bags. "I repeat, this is Sheriff Morales calling the National Guard."
A shriek of static came from the speaker, Eddie adjusted the frequency by turning the dial, the answer came clearer.
-"This is Lieutenant Wood in charge of the eighty-ninth Troop of the Colorado National Guard," a man's voice responded, "go ahead, sheriff."
-"What's your position, over?" Morales asked.
-"Main street," the Lieutenant replied, "Bellevue intersection. Near the exit to the medical center. Over."
Main street? Dallas looked at Eddie strangely. Morales had said that they would take hours to arrive, and that was assuming that the deputy officer managed to contact them before. That hadn't been more than thirty minutes. How had they arrived so quickly?
-"Listen, Lieutenant," Eddie called back, "I don't know what your men are going to find, but the situation is getting worse."
- o -
Highway 135 near Flat top mountain, Gunnison County.
The convoy of the Colorado 89th troop command approached the vicinity of Crested Butte. The National Guard team had been waiting for orders on Highway 135 near Three Pines, about one mile south of the city, near Flat Top mountain. Two Hummvees in olive green camouflage led the way for an IAV Stryker armored personnel carrier. An additional Hummvee covered the rear of the eight-wheeler.
Lieutenant Dalias Wood had been monitoring the insistent emergency calls and radio chatter, but for the past hour these had gone silent. Something unusual was happening in the resort destination, but his superior in Cheyenne Mountain, General Stevens, was very cryptic, and had ordered him not to take action until he received a direct order from him or the CIA guy, Agent Garber.
Wood glanced sideways at the men sitting in the cargo section of the Stryker. Although they wore National Guard uniforms, they had a discrete triangular patch with a circle inside and the letters OWLF on their shoulders. The Other Worldly Life Form taskforce was there to locate and secure extraterrestrial technology that top brass said -He was far below pay grade to know who they were -had fallen into the Grand Mesa National Forest. Wood's mission was once the presence of a hunter was confirmed, lure it out and if possible eliminate it while another team secured the ship.
A few minutes ago, the general ordered the squad to move into the city. During the mile and a half between their position and the town's access, Wood didn't see a single vehicle coming in the opposite direction. Crested Butte was empty and silent, not a soul in the street. Odd , Wood thought.
-"Sheriff Morales calling the National Guard, go ahead," A man's voice crackled on the radio. "I repeat, this is Sheriff Morales calling the National Guard."
-"This is Lieutenant Wood in charge of the Eighty-ninth Troop of the Colorado National Guard," he responded, taking the mic and pressing the transmit button. "Go ahead, sheriff."
-"What's your position, over?" Morales continued. Wood used the tank's periscope to get their position. He spotted a traffic sign that read Main St. and a sign that read: Crested Butte Medical Center with an arrow pointing the way.
-"Main street," Wood replied, "Bellevue intersection. Near the exit to the medical center. Over."
-"Listen, Lieutenant," Sheriff Morales called back after a short pause, "I don't know what your men are going to find, but the situation is getting worse."
The Stryker slammed to a stop. Wood went back to the periscope and saw the reason: a car crash of at least ten vehicles, effectively blocking all access. A sedan had collided with a red pickup truck and was on fire. The cars behind crashed in a chain with the damaged vehicles. Further behind, a bus swerved and overturned. The rest of the cars were abandoned there in the rain, with the doors open and the engines and lights on.
-"Oh right," He addressed squad leader two, "we'll continue on foot from here,"
The man nodded first to Wood and then to his subordinates. The members of Squad Two prepared their equipment.
-"Go, Go, Go!" Lieutenant Wood barked when the rear ramp of the Stryker opened. The men in the cargo bay descended into the wet pavement. "Squad one, secure the area and cover squad two!" He instructed them over the rain.
-"Understood! Zero Six out!" The Squad one leader, Corporal Strause started giving orders, "Move!"
-"Report your situation!" Staff Sergeant Salerno ordered the soldiers, while they scattered in the street, forming a wide circle.
-"Squad two, Perimeter is secured." Strause reported.
The members of squad two scattered in the rain, always trying to stay within the perimeter of squad one. Then, as one, the soldiers began to advance down the street, searching among the vehicles.
-"Use your night vision and IR," Strause ordered. He lowered the ATN-PVS7 visor on his helmet and the street turned bright varve hues.
Where is everybody? Wood wondered. The emergency services had not arrived at the scene of the accident and in the distance he could see the glow of the fire. People just didn't disappear.
As a member of the OWLF, Wood was informed about his goal. The yautja, as that CIA spook called them, were expert hunters and ferocious warriors, capable of taking out a team of special forces without batting an eyelid. But they also knew that they never attacked civilian targets before.
One of the men from squad one walked past the overturned bus and inspected the rear. Something grabbed him by the shoulders and pulled him into the darkness. Sergeant Strause turned towards it, attracted by the metallic noise of something hitting the hood of a car.
-"Lieutenant, go ahead," Morales called again.
-"We lost a man," Strause reported. Wood checked the screens. The Stryker had a small command and control center, screens showing real-time footage from the cameras in the men's helmets. Strause's camera showed the image of an M4A1 carbine lying in a puddle next to the overturned bus. Private First Class Hopkins's view showed static.
-"One moment, Sheriff." Wood went back to the periscope, looking away from the screens. Between the cars, he watched as a few men from Squad One joined Strause, while Squad Two looked up nervously, pointing their guns at the rooftops.
Private First Class Hawke approached an abandoned Honda Civic. Behind him, a strange looking shape rose, slipping out between two neighboring cars. Hawkes turned and before he could react, he was lying on the ground. A splatter of arterial blood stained the civic's window, only to be immediately washed away by the falling water.
-"We have contact!" Squad two leader cried over the rain, turning in time to see private Hawke being dragged between two buildings. Immediately, the silence of the street was replaced by a cacophony of shouts, shots and screams. "They're attacking us!" yelled one of the Squad Two members, "It's a damn ambush!"
-"What the hell is going on?!" Wood alternately looked at the screens. Several showed static, one showing the view from the ground where the helmet had fallen off and the rest showing blurry images of his men firing left and right. The Humvee gunners fired the Browning machine guns mounted on top of the vehicles. A bone-chilling shriek was heard as Wood guessed the .50-caliber ammunition found its mark.
-"They're surrounding us!" leader two yelled, "retreat! I repeat, retreat!"
They? So there was more than one? Wood frowned. OWLF files indicated that the hunters acted alone. Although in the Los Angeles incident reports reported one craft, more than one hunter was never seen active at a time. The situation was getting out of control.
-"Lieutenant?" Morales repeated on the radio. But Wood had gotten up from his place and headed for Striker's top hatch. He reached for the handle and opened the heavy circular metal plate.
The machine gun fire had stopped. Wood readied his own weapon, an M249 SAW light machine gun, and climbed outside. His men had disappeared, there was not a single body in the street and the rain had erased all traces of blood. Nor did he see the bodies of the fallen attackers.
How is it possible? He wondered, the enemy had wiped out two squads in less than two minutes without leaving a trace.
Wood turned back at the sound of scratching metal. A black-as-night creature was crawling up the Stryker's roof, straight at him. It was huge, with an elongated, eyeless head like a torpedo. It has a mouth with metallic-looking teeth and a long, bony tail trailing behind its body. Finding itself discovered, the monster hissed, showing a second inner mouth no less terrifying. Wood raised his gun to fire but with lightning speed, the infernal beast lunged at him and the second mouth shot out like a piston, piercing Wood's forehead.
- o -
-"Lieutenant, are you there?" Eddie Morales repeated, after the comms had suddenly gone silent. "Lieutenant, tell me if you're there?" The radio crackled without response. Dallas watched silently. Morales sighed and leaned back against the counter, leaning on his elbows and putting his hands behind his neck.
-"We won't make it right?" Jesse said, unable to move and a look of terror on his face.
Who could blame her? Dallas thought. If a troop of heavily armed soldiers had been annihilated, What could they expect? A creak in the backstore immediately put them on alert, Dallas and Eddie turning, pointing their newly acquired weapons at the source of the noise.
-"Don't shoot!" yelled two young men, raising their hands and going completely still. "We won't risk life for six twenty-five an hour," one of them said.
Dallas and Morales lowered their weapons. It was a young man with a stubble beard and a light brown jacket. His partner was an African-American man dressed in a dark blue sweatshirt.
-"We're under attack," Eddie told them.
-"Terrorists?" The bearded man asked, turning to his friend, "I told you they would."
Terrorists? Dallas didn't know what those things were, but they sure as hell weren't terrorists. Based on what Ricky and his friends managed to see, they were large, with a matte black body and a long tail. Darcy was too traumatized to even describe what she saw. Some kind of wild animal? But Dallas had never heard of such a thing.
-"Are you two stoned?" Dallas asked, looking at both alternately. The bearded boy tried to hide the blunt in his hand, shaking his head negatively.
-"Hello?" a woman's voice called from the doorway. Dallas took the shotgun and headed for the door. "Hello, is anyone there?" the woman repeated. "Hello?"
The woman was startled to see the barrel of the gun pointing at her. Dallas relaxed, in front of him he recognized Kelly O'Brien, and behind her, clinging to her waist, was her daughter.
-"You're hurt?" Dallas asked. She didn't answer, she was agitated, as if she had just run a marathon. It didn't take a genius to guess that she was running away. "Come in, you'll be safe in here." He told her as he glanced outside through the blinds.
The plan had been to take up weapons from the Pawn shop and use the SUV to escape town on Highway 135 to Gunnison, but after what happened to the National Guard, they would have to take another route. Maybe west on Route 12 to the Anthracite Range or the mountain road to Capitol Peak.
"T-that was w-where Sam and Buddy…" Darcy objected, her voice cracking. "T-that's where t-they disappeared to." The rest looked at her in silence, letting the woman vent her pain. "I'm sure those things had something to do with it." Dallas and Eddie exchanged glances, they hadn't told anyone about Ray yet.
-"The 317 only goes as far as Marble," Morales said, "and the vehicle won't be able to get through the snow, we'll be trapped."
-"Then we just have to go south," Dallas said, "To Gunnison, if those things follow us…" No one wanted to think about the possibilities.
- o -
Kelly O'Brien took a cloth and wiped Molly's dirty face. They were both soaked. "Hi," Dallas approached her, handing her a towel, "you both look tired."
-"It's been a rough night for her," Kelly replied, not meeting her eyes. Once she was done with the mud on her daughter's face, she proceeded to dry her hair.
-"How about you?" Dallas asked. He'd correctly deduced from their expressions that something had happened to her husband, the man he had seen with her briefly upon arriving in town.
-"I'll live," Kelly replied. She was a tough woman, years of service had hardened her to keep her cool in combat, she had to be strong for Molly's sake. No training in the world had prepared her for what was happening. Not only were the infernal beasts roamed around, killing indiscriminately, something else lurked in the darkness.
-"We're leaving, in five minutes," Dallas informed her, and walked back to the store, where the others were gathered, ready to go.
-"Thank you," Kelly nodded. She finished cleaning up Molly and scooped her daughter up, putting her to her feet.
A dull thud came from the hallway and an object slid across the floor. It was the shotgun Dallas was carrying. "Where is he?" Molly asked, clinging to her mother's waist. She bent down and picked up the shotgun.
-"Hmmm," She heard a moan and fearfully looked up. Dallas was there, hanging upside down, tied from his feet to the ceiling beam by a metal cable.
- o -
A/N: Another chapter done. I expanded a little in the National Guardsmen's point of view. I know that ambush scene was intented to show the soldiers in fact didn't know what was happening. But the screens of their commanding officer shown the words OWLF. That was an easter egg to Predator 2 and the team chasing the predator. In this novelization, the OWLF is in fact aware of the predator's presence but not the aliens. So, althought they know what to expect, they were taken by surprise by the xenomorphs.
I also gave Darcy a little more dialog. Because in the movie she was just there and in the original script by Salerno, she plays a more active part, shooting and killing alines. She did not deserve being just an extra.
Don't forget the comments and see you on the next chapter.