Chapter 14

Day 13 Wednesday 25 April 2007 - Impact plus 9 days

We were not letting any grass grow under our feet as we blew through Monterey at 12:20 AM.

"You're awfully quiet tonight," Betsy commented.

"I guess I'm worried about Sarah," I said.

"Is she a good friend of yours?" Mark asked.

"She is a "work friend", you know someone you work with for several years and get to know pretty good but you don't do anything together outside of work," I said.

"Yeah, I know what you mean," Mark replied.

"And she has that typical petite girl attitude, like a stick of dynamite, she will fight you on the drop of a hat and she is spunky as hell and I just loved pushing her buttons," I said laughing.

"You do that well with a lot of people," Betsy said.

"I do don't I," I said cracking up. "I just wonder why she didn't come home when they heard about the asteroid, or at least before the EMP hit."

"Yeah, that gets me thinking to, I guess we will find out shortly," Betsy said.

An hour later we were cruising through Bridgewater, but instead of going up and hitting interstate 81; we instead made a left on route 11.

We drove on for several miles, we even passed the truck stop we cleaned out this morning, then made a left on Pleasant hill road and drove for about a half mile then made a right on Central Avenue then made a left on Middlebrook Street. We came up to another intersection and the convoy stopped.

The lead cougar stopped and the crew started to get out of the vehicle so I pulled the knob to set the air brakes and got out of the truck and headed up to the lead vehicle to find out what was going on.

I walked up and asked, "What's up?"

"The house is down the street to the left about 100 yards or so, but it's a dead end and I don't want to get all the vehicles boxed up down there," Sergeant Dunstan said.

"What do you think, leave most of the people here to guard the trucks and the rest of us head down to check out the house?" I asked.

"That is what I would suggest," Sergeant Dunstan replied.

"Cool. How about six of your guys and me, Mark and Betsy," I suggested.

Sergeant Dunstan just nodded, and then started to gather the people he wanted to walk down to the house with and I went back to the truck to talk with Mark and Betsy.

"Are we here?" asked Betsy.

"No it's down the street to the left a ways, but the Sergeant thinks we should leave the trucks here and walk the rest of the way down, and I agree with him," I said. "We will leave most of the people here with the trucks and six of his troopers plus Mark, Betsy and I will head down there."

Betsy and Mark nodded and grabbed their gear, as I keyed my microphone.

"Everyone be on the lookout, stay here and watch the trucks while we check out the house," I spoke.

I got replies of affirmation over my headset as we started heading for Sarah's house.

Our group slipped on their night vision goggles and spread out with the soldiers taking the lead we headed to the left down Sharon Street.

We just reached the cul-de-sac where Sarah lived when we first heard the scream. To say it put us all on alert was an understatement.

We sped up our pace and headed for Sarah's house, and as we approached the screams got louder.

We got to the house and I checked the address on the house just to be sure and it was the same address Lisa gave me for Sarah's house, I just shut my eyes for a second, "FUCK" I said under my breath.

I whispered "Mark and you three around back, the rest will head in through the front, let us know when you're set."

Mark grabbed my shoulder and squeezed then followed the rest of the people around the house while the rest of us slowly headed for the front door.

After a long minute I hear over my headset, "The only light we see is from an upstairs bedroom, and that is also where the screams are coming from."

"Wait for our entry then hit the backdoor and make yours," I said over the microphone.

We got up to the door and I placed the barrel of my AA-12 right where the door's lock was, I looked at everyone to see if they were ready and was about to pull the trigger when I stopped myself. I keyed my microphone, "Hold one."

I reached up and slowly turned the doorknob and to my surprise the door opened to my gentle push. I slowly opened the door as quietly as I could and I heard over my headset, "The front door is open we are headed in. If you hear any commotion hit the back door otherwise wait for us to open it."

I slowly eased into the house and into the living room with the stairs going up right in front of me. I watched the stairs while my group entered into the house.

Sergeant Dunstan headed through the living room towards the back of the house and stopped and pointed to Betsy who nodded and pointed her M-4 at the couch.

I barely heard the back door open and 20 seconds later I heard, "The ground floor is clear," over my headset.

I hadn't moved my eyes off the stairs when I felt a hand on my shoulder and I started up the stairs towards the screams.

About halfway up the stairs I saw dim light coming from a room to the right of the landing above and as I continued up the stairs I saw that the door is open.

I flip up my goggles and slowly continue up the stairs, then a couple of stairs from the top I lean forward and look into the room. Right across the room was Laura, her hands were behind her back and she had duct tape wrapped around her ankles. Her eyes looked blank and she stared off into space and was rocking back and forth as she sat on the floor.

The door blocked a lot of my view of the room but I saw a king-sized bed to the left inside of the room and I could just make out the head of the bed and saw three guy's, two were holding the screaming girl down as the other forcibly raping her.

I moved back from the door, turned and held up one finger and pointed to the other side of the room and gave the hand signal for hostage. I then held up three fingers then signaled bad guy and their position in the room.

I then pointed to the two guy's right behind me and signaled for them to follow me then I signaled for the others to cover us and to head to the other rooms on the floor.

I took a deep breath and then slowly let it out, then climbed the last two steps to the landing.

I stepped into the room with the barrel of my AA-12 leading the way. The screams of the girl they were raping prevented them from hearing us enter the room. The guy holding the girls right arm brought his beer up to have a drink and as he took his first swallow he saw me and the barrel of the AA-12 pointed at his head.

He didn't have a chance to give any warning as I pulled the trigger on the shotgun and made his head into a bag of mush and spraying the wall behind him with his blood.

I then heard an M-4 fire and the guy holding the girls left arm was shot several times in the chest.

The guy doing the deed rose up onto his knees and turned his head to face me. I lowered myself a little to get a better angle on him, just to make sure I would not hit the girl, and as soon as he saw my shotgun I pulled the trigger.

The girl had stopped screaming when the first shotgun blast went off but she started screaming again when her rapist fell on top of her dead.

I walked up the left side of the bed and dragged the now dead rapist onto the floor and off the girl and got my first good look at her, it wasn't Sarah. I didn't know the girls name, she must have been one of Sarah's friends from college.

The girl didn't say a word; she just reached down and tried to cover herself with one of the blankets on the bed.

Then over my headset I heard, "We need a medic here ASAP," followed by a quick affirmative.

I turned and said quietly to the guy behind me, "Take care of her, will you."

He looked at me a second, then popped me on the shoulder, "I got her."

I nodded then headed for the door, I noticed on my way out another soldier was helping Laura. It didn't seem to be helping though; she was still in her own world.

I made it out into the hallway and Mark was standing there he got a serious look on his face then asked, "How are you doing?"

"It hasn't had time to hit yet," I smirked. Then took a deep breath and asked, "So how is it going out here?"

"We have five girls naked and tied up in the second bedroom and one beat all to hell in the third bedroom."

"How bad is she?"

"Really bad, we called for a medic but Sergeant Dunstan is seeing what he can do till they get here."

"Sounds good, I'm going to go check it out."

I start heading to the second bedroom when I heard the noise of a couple of diesel engines coming from outside.

I walked into the room looking to see who was in there. I recognized two of the girls, Lauren and Denise. I then turned and headed for the third bedroom. I walked in and couldn't see the girl but as I got closer I saw that it was Sarah.

"Damn," I said under my breath. "How is she?"

"What I've found so far is a broken jaw, her left eye is swollen shut, broken ribs on both sides, broken left arm and right wrist, and probably internal injuries," Sergeant Dunstan stated.

I knelt down beside Sarah, "They messed her up pretty badly didn't they."

I reached down and brushed her hair and saw her right eye open and looked at me, I reached up and took my helmet off and set it to the side. I looked back down at her and saw on her face she recognized me.

"Hey, there you are. You're going to be alright, your mom sent us to find out what happened to you," I said as the medic came into the room with his bag.

I looked at the medics uniform, Sussman, Corporal Sussman went right to work then started asking questions, "What have you found so far sir?"

"Broken ribs, broken arm and wrist, broken jaw, eye, internal injuries," the Sergeant replied.

The Corporal was working while he was listening; he started two IV's and handed the bags to me to hold. He then put Sarah into a neck brace, "I'm going to need a backboard."

I keyed my microphone, "We need a back brace in the third upstairs bedroom."

"Roger," Came the reply over the radio.

I looked back down at Sarah and I saw a tear roll down her cheek, I brushed her hair again trying to dispel her fears, "It's going to be alright, you're going to be fine. Trust me," as I smiled at her.

Less than a minute later the backboard showed up and was set beside Sarah. Corporal Sussman looked at everyone, "Ready?" he then slowly rolled Sarah onto her right side and the backboard was slipped under her and then they rolled her back and started to strap her down to the board.

As they were rolling Sarah over I heard her grunt in pain several times, I would hate to have to go through what she is.

"Ok guys, easy does it," the Corporal said, as we got ready to move her. They lifted her up and I followed making sure the plastic lines didn't get pulled out. We eased her down the stairs then right out the front door and right into the cougar that was backed up to the door. I handed off the bags to another soldier then headed back to the house.

I keyed my microphone, "Ok, let's get the girls dressed and ready to move."

"Already done they are headed down now," Mark replied.

I stopped at the door, "Sergeant!" I yelled.

The Sergeant popped out of the cougar and came trotting up to me, "Sup?"

"What do you think, load all the girls into two of the cougars and send them back to the house? Sarah needs to get back to the docs ASAP."

He thought for a second then replied, "Yeah, they can pretty much fend for themselves, anything short of a tank and they will be alright."

The girls started coming out of the house then and the Sergeant started leading them into the cougars, while I turned and went back into the house.

When I got inside, "Ok, let's pack their stuff up, clothes, personal items, leave the rest."

Everyone started working except Betsy, who had her gun pointed at the guy who had his hands tied behind his back and was lying face down on the couch.