Running Towards The Abyss Read online

  Then all of the attackers’ guns were firing towards Clayton and his two patrol members. Robert moved to his right, peeking around the rear of the big pickup. He sighted in on the muzzle flash of someone shooting towards Maria and Danny. Robert fired four shots around where he supposed the shooter to be and was rewarded with a cry of pain.

  A loud metal thunk signaled the impact of a round next to Clayton’s head on the rear fender of the Ram. He crouch-walked back to the driver’s side of the vehicle and peered around the front fender, looking for another target.

  One of Maria’s shots had struck Kevin Anderson in the abdomen. He had collapsed onto the grass and was slowly bleeding to death. Robert was sure that he had hit two of the gunmen but he was far from comfortable. He guessed there were twelve to fifteen intruders in the group that he had illuminated and had no idea if this was all or if there were other attackers moving towards them, as well.

  Gunfire from the strangers slowed down again. “Everybody into the dorm,” a loud voice boomed from near the entrance. The gunmen continued firing towards the security team but backed quickly towards the residence hall.

  “Cease fire!” Robert yelled over at Maria and Danny. They didn’t want to shoot wildly towards the dorm for fear of striking a resident. He ran over to where his two team members were, making sure they were OK, but knowing they needed to get into the building before these criminals had a chance to hurt anyone inside. Robert quickly came up with a plan for them to defend the dorm.

  The Northeast Georgia Technical College, Lavonia, Georgia, Monday, 0055 hours

  It was almost a thousand yards from Jake’s room to the roadblock. Nicholson was halfway there when gunfire exploded from the direction of the dormitory. The Marine cursed, quickly reversing direction, running back towards the residence hall. There were several shots, a lull for a couple of seconds, and then another long exchange of fire.

  McCain woke up at the sound of people running down the sidewalk. His window was slightly open to let in some fresh air and the footsteps were amplified right outside of his room. He sat up in the bed, trying to get his bearings.

  Someone yelled, “Stop! Drop your weapons!” A second later gunfire erupted, shattering the silence.

  Chuck threw himself to the floor, grabbing his blue jeans as the firefight raged just outside of the dorm. He got the pants on and grabbed his rifle from where it stood, leaning against the wall for easy access.

  A voice McCain did not recognize yelled, “Everybody into the dorm!”

  Maybe it was one of the security team leaders ordering their people inside. Or maybe it was people with an evil intent. He rushed towards his door, tripping over his boots in the process and falling to the floor. He didn’t land hard but it slowed him down. I need to put my boots on but there’s no time, he thought. I’m going to be fighting barefoot.

  Alicia’s room was on the second floor of the dorm but the gunfire and yelling woke her up. She slipped into the hallway and crept down the stairs, holding her flashlight, wanting to get to Elizabeth’s room. Alicia was wearing a black hoodie with the school’s logo and sweatpants. She heard dorm room doors open on the far end of her floor as she started down the stairs. Probably some of the other sentries going to see what’s happening. What did Mr. Nicholson call them? A quick reaction force? Hopefully, they would be quick tonight.

  In the midst of gunfire and yelling, Alicia’s first reaction was that she needed to get to Miss Benton. She always knows what to do and will know what’s going on. Alicia had heard about the possibility of an attack on the school. She knew that Mr. McCain had spoken to Officer Miles about how the people who had kidnapped Miss Benton and killed their friends had very likely found their IDs linking them back to the college.

  Miss Benton is probably OK, she thought. I didn’t even think about the fact that she and Mr. McCain are probably together, since it’s their last night with the big man leaving in the morning. That would be embarrassing if I knocked on the door and they were in bed together. But something bad is happening outside and I’d rather be with those two than anyone else right now, she told herself.

  As Alicia reached the first floor, several more gunshots just outside the front entrance, directly across the lobby from the staircase caused her to jump. A loud voice carried over the gunfire. Suddenly, the door burst open and armed men, strangers, rushed in, talking all at once.

  Flashlight beams lit up the young African-American woman, and she froze wide-eyed at the intruders pointing their weapons at her. She quickly turned and tried to run back up the steps. Alicia heard footsteps running down the stairs and others coming up behind her. Hands grabbed her and the overwhelming smells of bad breath and body odor filled her nostrils.

  Alicia started screaming as a hand clamped over her mouth. Her teeth bit down hard, drawing blood. Bo Harris yelled and punched her on the side of the head with his other hand, dragging the now-dazed girl back over to the others.

  “Look what I found, guys,” Bo announced. He wiped the blood from his hand across Alicia’s hoodie, grabbing at her breasts. “She’s going home with me. I’ve always liked these little dark hotties.”

  Don Lester had heard the other sets of footsteps rushing down the stairs. As Bo was manhandling the black girl, the hefty young man raised his Benelli M4 Tactical shotgun. Two armed students, members of the QRF, came into view on the stairwell and Don blasted them with double 00 buckshot from a distance of ten feet, knocking both of them down. Lester fed two more shells into his gun, keeping watch on the staircase.

  “Who’d we lose outside?” Neil asked calmly.

  “Where’s Wesley?” Joey wondered, the concern evident in his voice.

  “Kevin’s not here, either,” Mark Anderson announced quietly. “Joey, I’m pretty sure I saw Wesley go down right after the shooting started.”

  “Little Tommy Taylor is missing, too,” another voice said.

  “So we’re down three,” Dodd observed, slinging his AK and drawing the Desert Eagle pistol. “Give me that girl, Bo.”

  “Don’t hurt her, Neil,” Bo pleaded. “I want keep her.”

  Even in the dim light, Harris saw the flash of anger in the enforcer’s eyes and he handed Alicia over to him. She had recovered from the strike to her head and realized that, for the moment, she needed to stay calm. The muscular thug wrapped his left arm around her neck and put the barrel of a huge pistol against the side of her head.

  “What’s your name?” the gunman asked the trembling young woman.

  “Alicia,” she said, her voice shaking.

  Neil yelled, his voice projecting through the dorm and to the security team in front of the building. “You people outside and everybody inside, we’ve got Alicia with us. Stay back and we won’t hurt her. If you college pukes try anything, I’m going to splatter her brains all over this building.”

  Dodd looked back at his hostage and spoke in a lower, but still menacing voice, “Alicia, we’re here for Chuck. What’s his last name?”

  She didn’t answer. Why Chuck? How did they even know who he was? The gun jammed viciously into her temple.

  Alicia grunted with pain. “McCain,” she answered, angry tears streaming down her face. “Chuck McCain.”

  McCain eased the dorm room door open. He heard voices talking excitedly, a woman scream, and then a man yell near the front entrance. A few seconds later, two loud blasts echoed down the hallway. Chuck didn’t want to just rush out into the corridor, guns blazing. He needed to assess the situation first and figure out what he was dealing with. He peered around the doorway, only exposing his left eye.

  Flashlights flickered and danced down the hallway near the middle of the dorm. A group of armed attackers were standing in a line, near a large man who was holding someone. That has to be who screamed, Chuck thought. What I’d give to have some night vision. McCain guessed at least ten intruders, but there could be twenty or more hidden in the shadows for all he knew. Chuck considered trying to climb out one of his windows and sli
pping up behind the thugs. The windows, however, opened outwards with a crank, and he knew there was no way that he’d fit through the small opening.

  The dorm door across the hallway opened and Beth’s face peered out, the fear evident in her eyes. He saw that she held her Glock in a low ready stance, standing back from the opening. Good girl, he thought.

  Chuck whispered from inside his own doorway, “Get back inside, now!” He waved her back from across the corridor.

  “What’s happening?” she mouthed, her face a mask of terror.

  A loud voice yelled for everyone to stay back and announcing that Alicia was a hostage.

  “Chuck McCain!” the same deep voice bellowed a moment later from up the corridor. “Our business is with you. Come out with your hands up and walk down here.”

  “I don’t think we’ve met,” Chuck called out. “You seem to know me but I don’t know you.”

  “You met some friends of mine and killed them. And you stole a bunch of our stuff. We’ve come to collect. Bring that girl with you. We want to have a talk with her, too.”

  There was a smattering of laughter from the other gunmen.

  “The only one of ‘em I got a name for was some piece-of-crap, dirty cop named Mike Carter,” Chuck yelled up the hallway. “Is that who you’re talking about?”

  An angry buzz of voices came from the intruders. “He’s the one, him and his men. I also heard you gunned down a girl named Tonya and stole her baby. She was a friend of ours, too.”

  “You’re half right. I did kill Tonya when she and her low-life doper boyfriend tried to rob me. But the baby? I left that little boy with meth-head Greg.”

  McCain could hear more murmuring from the group of armed men.

  “Enough talking!” the loud voice yelled. “Come out right now or I’m gonna kill this cute little black girl. I might even let a couple of the boys have some fun with her first while you cower down there like a scared dog. You can listen if you want.”

  “I’ll come out, “ McCain answered. “Just let me put my gun down.”

  Chuck pulled the thirty round mag out of his rifle, sliding it across the floor and under the bed. He pulled the charging handle to the rear, ejecting the chambered round to the floor. At least this way, they’d have to take a couple of action steps to use the gun. He tossed the M-4 onto the bed and grabbed the Glock off the night table, slipping it into the waistband of his jeans at the small of his back, pulling the Northeast Georgia Technical School sweatshirt down over it.

  “I’m coming out now.”

  Beth’s watched in horror from her doorway. She was mouthing, “No!” and shaking her head. He winked at her, smiling as he exited, walking down the corridor, his hands up.

  The Northeast Georgia Technical College, Lavonia, Georgia, Monday, 0105 hours

  Jake met the second security patrol converging on the dorm after hearing the gunfire. Tina had instructed them to check the roadblock when their team leader, Gina, had checked in. When the shooting started, however, they all turned and ran toward the dormitory. The four cautiously approached the long building, still not knowing what was happening. A soft whistle came from the parking area, adjacent to the front entrance of the residence hall. Danny and Maria were crouched behind a Nissan Sentra.

  “Mr. Nicholson, we’re glad to see you,” Maria said.

  She and Danny quickly recounted what they had seen and their part in the gunfight. Mr. Clayton had sent them to the parking lot to wait for backup. Robert had crawled up to the large front windows of the dorm and was concealed in some bushes next to the door so he could monitor what was happening inside.

  “It looked like maybe ten or fifteen people with guns,” Danny said. “A lot. We think we hit three of them so there’s still a big group. The ones we shot are lying right over there,” he pointed to a small grassy area near the front of the dormitory, “but we haven’t checked to see if they’re dead or wounded because we didn’t want to give away our positions with our flashlights.”

  Jake gave some quick orders and they all prepared to move out. Everyone trusted the Marine’s leadership and having a plan gave them something to focus on. They knew that their job was to eliminate or capture the intruders and try to minimize casualties in the dorm, a difficult task in a building packed with so many residents.

  Nicholson had cautioned them on fire discipline but also told them that they were going to be the ones to end this crisis. Their rules of engagement were not to shoot into the building until he started shooting and not to let anyone escape. Nicholson told them to fire through the glass windows. They weren’t that thick and the bullets would easily penetrate the glass.

  A loud voice yelled for everyone to stay back and said that Alicia was their hostage. A minute later the same person inside the dormitory called for Chuck and told him to come out. They could only hear part of the conversation from the parking lot but they understood that things were about to come to a head.

  Jake sent Danny, Maria, and the other three sentries to join Robert near the front entrance of the dorm. It was a crawl of about forty yards, mostly in the open, but the darkness would conceal them as they moved. Nicholson wanted all six of the security patrol stationed at the front door. If and when shooting erupted, he would rather have the inexperienced sentries firing into the area of the building where they had the least chance for collateral damage. He assigned Tyrone, a member of the second team to cover the downed intruders in front of the building. Jake hoped they were dead or completely incapacitated but he sure didn’t want bad guys sneaking up behind his people.

  Nicholson reached the end of the dorm from where he had exited earlier. He withdrew a key from his pocket, quietly opening the door.

  “I’m coming out now.” Jake recognized Chuck’s voice from the far end of the building.

  Nicholson slipped inside, moving stealthily down the corridor, coming up behind the attackers. From the little bit of illumination their flashlights gave off, the attackers all seemed to be focused on the big man walking towards them with his arms raised.

  As Jake moved down the hall, several dorm room doors opened partially, scared faces peering out. The Marine held a forefinger to his lips and kept walking.

  McCain had his hands at shoulder level as he approached the lobby of the dorm. Rifles and shotguns were pointed at him and he expected the bullets to rip through him at any moment. He walked slowly, watching the men in the faint light, trying to learn as much as he could about them. Chuck knew that Jake, Tina, and the security teams would be here soon.

  Chuck also realized that he was a dead man. His only hope was to save Alicia and to delay their escape until Nicholson got his people into place. And, if I’m lucky, maybe I can kill a few on my way out, he thought.

  It had sounded like one of the patrols had stumbled upon the invaders and a gunfight had ensued. He hoped Jake’s people were OK. It had been brief but intense, just like some of the firefights he’d been in in Afghanistan. What would the Green Berets do in a situation like this? he wondered.

  A tall, powerful-looking man held Alicia, a large Desert Eagle pointed at her head. Nice gun, McCain thought. On either side of him were two monsters. They both looked big enough to play offensive line for a Division I school. Why can’t I ever get some little guys to tangle with?

  A short, wiry, angry-looking young man stepped in front of the brute holding Alicia. Well, there’s my little guy, Chuck almost laughed to himself. The small man raised a full-sized AR-15 and leveled it at Chuck’s head.

  “You killed my daddy,” he hissed. “Now I’m gonna kill you.”

  “Bo, get behind me until I tell you,” Mr. Muscles snapped.

  “You told me I could kill him, Neil,” Bo whined, lowering the rifle.

  “Bo, do what I tell you,” Neil said, the menace clear in his voice.

  “Mike Carter was your daddy?” Chuck taunted. “Are you sure? A scrawny little turd like you coming from that big man?”

  The rifle came back up and M
cCain thought he might have overplayed his hand. The offensive lineman to the right of Muscles clamped a meaty hand on Bo’s shoulder.

  “Listen to Neil. You can kill him later.”

  “Larry Harris was my daddy,” Bo said, through clenched teeth. “He was in that house, too, and you gunned him down.”

  McCain nodded. “I probably did. I killed several scumbags that night and I’m sure your daddy was one of them.”

  Chuck thought that Bo might actually start crying, he was so angry. He started to raise the rifle again but the offensive lineman put his hand on the barrel and kept it from coming up. Bo glared at Chuck with hatred and unbridled hostility in his eyes.

  “Bo, I just want to talk to him for a minute and then you can have him, OK?” Neil asked. It was obviously a command but he needed to keep the angry young man dialed in.

  “Sure, Neil, but now I want to kill this bastard nice and slow. I think I’m gonna use my knife.”

  Bo stepped out of the way, to the side of the bigger men.

  “Where’s the girl?” Dodd asked McCain, the Desert Eagle still pressed against his hostage’s temple.

  “You seem more like the type who’d like little boys, Neil.” Chuck replied, looking into Dodd’s eyes.

  The offensive lineman on Neil’s left was surprisingly quick, closing the distance, and slamming a vicious right uppercut into Chuck’s midsection. The man was powerful but McCain had been hit harder in sparring. He acted the part, though, and doubled over, giving the appearance that he’d really been hurt.