Quaranteam - North West Ch. 06

The sun was getting low when I finally hiked out of the bush and back into view of our little compound. Erica was waiting for me with a smile and a plate of stir fry. "What's the word, Harri?"

"They're still down there," I said. "There are some workers keeping an eye on the driveway. Could you throw on a big pot of coffee for me and dig one of the thermoses out of storage?"

"Harri, if they've got some of their workers down there, it's not your job to supervise. I'm sure Vanessa and her Dad left someone in charge."

"They did," I said. "And I'm not going down there. I'm staying up here."

I shovelled the stirfry down, relishing in the spicy kick Erica liked to cook with. Inside our little compound I gave Ivy a kiss, apologizing that I wouldn't be seeing her in bed for the night. Then I went to the storage container closest to my RV. The one with my gun safe.

"What's the word?" Leo asked me when he found me. I had a lantern flashlight on and was loading rounds into my father's Model 700. "Jesus, Harri. What the fuck?"

I doubted he was commenting on me loading the Remington hunting rifle. We'd used it plenty when we were hunting during deer season - it was a solid, reliable tool. No, I knew he was reacting to the other firearms I had out. My M9 was already holstered on my hip, a copy of my service sidearm that had served me so well through my tour and as an MP, and my DDM4V1 was laid out, waiting for me to do a quick check it was still in good order.

"Just taking precautions," I said. I was already trying to get into the right mindset.

"What does that even mean? What are you doing?"

"There's about a hundred protesters down there, last I counted. More keep arriving," I told Leo, loading the last round into the 700 and checking the safety before setting it down. I fished a handful more.308's out of the ammo box in the safe and fed them into the bandolier shoulder strap for the hunting rifle. "Problem is, they're pissed off. Not just about the construction, but at all the other shit going on right now. And pissed-off people do dumb shit."

"So what, you're going to go all Alamo on us?" Leo asked. "For real, Harri. Nothing's going to happen. They're down there, we're up here."

"Leo," I said. "I'm not asking you to do anything you don't want to. The Bear shotgun is in my RV. Do me a favour and keep it handy tonight. If I miss something, I'd rather you have it than not."

"Harri-"

"Dude, just stop," I said. I'd finished with the.308s and started taking apart the DDM4V1 and giving it a quick clean. It was a budget purchase that I'd made prioritizing reliability over flashy shit, and the 'scary one' in my collection when it came to civilians. Erica hadn't even liked the idea of me owning it when we gave her the tour of my firearms and taught her the safety protocols for them. Leo had only ever fired it once. Both of the siblings had said the same thing; 'If you have the rifles and shotguns and the handgun, why do you need a machine gun?'

This sort of thing was why I needed it. And it wasn't a 'machine gun.'

"I'm not planning, or hoping, to kill someone tonight. If I have to use the DDM4 or my sidearm, something has gotten really fucked," I said. "But I'm also not taking any chances. Sometime tonight, there's going to be people sneaking up into the construction yard to cause mischief, and they aren't going to know the difference between the construction yard and where we're living. Maybe they hear us and they stay clear, or maybe they don't. I'm not taking that chance."

Leo watched me cleaning my rifle, and glanced out at the darkening sky, and then back to me. "What should I do?" he asked.

A wave of relief washed over me - it had been years since I'd served, and every instinct I had was telling me to do what I was doing, but that civilian part of my brain was second-guessing everything. Leo agreeing told me I was being logical, even if he didn't like it or I turned out to be wrong.

"Just be with the girls tonight," I said. "I can handle the yard, you stay with them. Think of it like a shitty tower defence game. If I do my job, you'll never have to do anything."

He nodded and left me to my work.

Surprisingly, it was Danielle who came to see me next. "What can I do to help?" she asked. Her Australian accent was sounding stronger, the California valley girl part of it dropping with her serious demeanour.

"Nothing, I've got it," I said. She'd caught me as I was strapping on my ghillie suit - another item that Leo and Erica had found silly to own considering we didn't need it for hunting deer. It had honestly been more of a gag item in my collection than anything until tonight.

"Harrison, I'll remind you that my Dad was military, yeah?" she said. "I grew up outside the city. I know how to work a firearm."

I took a breath and looked at her. Even at night, by the light of a lantern, she looked like an elven beauty despite the cutoff denim shorts and zippered knit sweater. "Can you handle a handgun?" I asked.

"I've shot the head of an Eastern Brown from ten paces away when it was threatening to bite my dog," she said.

"I assume that's a snake?"

"A fucking poisonous one," Danielle said.

"Alright," I nodded. "Under the passenger seat of my truck is a gun case with my pop's old 1911 and a couple of magazines. Hang on to it for tonight. Try not to freak out Erica or Ivy, and if you hear shots tonight don't let Leo come looking for me, let alone Erica and Ivy. If they leave the RVs it'll just make things worse."

"OK," she said with a serious nod, then stepped towards me, hugged me and gave me a kiss on the cheek. "Thanks."

"For what?" I asked as she stepped back.

"For being the man I figured you were," she said. "Leo's all mine and I'm happy with that, but like I told you - you remind me of all the good parts of my Dad. I'm glad I have Leoand you around."

She left to fetch the pistol, and I finished strapping on the ghillie suit and slung my two rifles over my shoulders and closed the gun safe. When I was finished slamming the storage container closed, I turned around to find Ivy and Erica both looking at me with their arms crossed.

"Both of you, huh?" I asked.

"Yes, both of us," Erica said.

"United front," Ivy said.

"Look-"

"Shut up, Harrison," Erica said, and then they were both hugging me while being careful around the firearms. "Just be careful."

"Extra careful," Ivy said, burying her face into the strings of the ghillie suit in my chest and then immediately pulling back with a wince. "Ugh, this smells terrible."

"Yeah, well it's not exactly the sort of thing you clean very often," I shrugged.

"Whatever," Erica said and kissed me. Ivy kissed me as well, looking at me with those big eyes of hers with concern.

"So you're not going to try and convince me this isn't necessary?" I asked.

"Wouldn't do anything except lead to a fight we couldn't win," Erica said. "You're too stubborn not to do it."

"And too brave," Ivy added.

"That too," Erica smiled sadly. Then she handed me the big thermos of coffee. "Come back to us in one piece."

"I will," I said. "Don't worry. But if you two hear anything tonight, if there's any gunfire, don't come looking for me. Just stay in the RVs and hunker down from the windows. If you come looking for me, you'll add more danger and not take it away, alright?"

They both agreed, though I could tell Erica didn't like it. I could only imagine her sprinting across the construction yard, bullets flying everywhere, screaming my name as she worried I'd been shot. Hell, she'd probably pick me up and carry me to safety if it were true, but she'd also likely never get to me in the first place if things were that bad.

I kissed them both again, then stalked off into the night.

I ended up settling into a nook on the side of the hill to the south of the construction yard, with a clear view of about two-thirds of the yard and most importantly the RV compound. I unslung my rifles and carefully positioned myself in a comfortable prone position I was going to be able to manage for a long time. I'd never gone through Sniper training, but I'd picked up enough from my Bootcamp, talking with other soldiers and from movies to know a thing or two - not to mention years of hunting. So I cracked the thermos and took a sip of the hot, strong coffee, and started my watch.

I saw them moving through the trees at around 02:30 in the morning down on the east side of the yard near the driveway. They must have skirted around the construction worker picket line and followed the driveway up, but they were still in the shadows so I couldn't tell how many there were, or what they were carrying. The only reason I spotted them early at all was because someone was flicking a flashlight up occasionally.

I had the 700 cradled in my arms, and I slowly rolled into position but didn't sight down the scope yet. I didn't have any night vision gear, and while the simple Leupold scope easily gave me the range to tag anything moving down there, I wouldn't know what I was hitting.

They stopped at the edge of the treeline, and I could only imagine the nerves they were feeling looking out over the open area. There were seven portables set up holding various offices now, and half a dozen big crew vans that had been left behind for the night along with some of the company pickup trucks. The pilings and supplies to erect the bigger barracks were also looming in the big, open space.

"Just take a look and leave," I muttered quietly to myself, willing whoever was down there to not make this worse than it could be.

Five minutes went by before a figure began to creep out of the tree line, crossing the rise of the hill and slipping towards the yard. From the distance I was at, I couldn't see them clearly enough other than to tell they were probably wearing a backpack - not a big deal in and of itself, but my training was screaming at me. 'Anything' meant anything. That backpack could hold weapons, or communications equipment, or even an IED.

I sighted in on the figure. It was a man, military age but young. I couldn't see much of his face between the black bandana over his nose and mouth and a ball cap backwards on his head.

My finger tightened just a fraction on the trigger when I saw the flash of metal in his hand, but my hesitation saved his life - he was carrying a can of spray paint.

He reached what he thought was the shelter of the first building - and itwas shelter if he thought a guard was patrolling inside the yard. But I wasn't inside the yard, and instead I was looking at him dead on along the length of the building as he took off his backpack and then turned, motioning back towards the treeline. A half dozen more figures began quickly creeping across the hillside.

I had a choice - if that backpack was full of spraypaint and that was all they were there to do, it would be annoying vandalism at worst as long as they didn't approach the compound. If any of them were carrying other tools of vandalism or had darker thoughts about them, it was going to be a lot harder to deal with them a minute from now.

And then there was the history of the thing.

My family had defended this land for six generations, including from small raiding parties of the Band during the worst and darkest parts of our history. Men had died on both sides, but so had women. Badly.

History is a powerful motivator, especially with so many If's rolling around in my head.

I sighted in and pulled the trigger. The boom of the rifle was especially loud in the still of the night air, and I heard it echo back to me three times off of the surrounding hills.

The bullet hit the cannister the man had set down on the ground, and the spray can immediately erupted in a spray of bright blue paint as it spun from the impact and the release of aerosol, coating the ground, the man and some of the wall of the building. The man recoiled with a scream, and later on I would see that there was a beautiful, cartoon-like outline of him with his arms up in a panic on the wall. The others split their decision-making - three immediately turned and began sprinting back to the tree line, while the other three dove into the dirt trying to take cover.

I could have killed them. Just pop, pop, pop. It would have been easy.

But as the blue-painted man stumbled around trying to clear his eyes, calling for help, I watched as his friends tried to beckon him back over to them without standing up. Finally, one of them - the one I probably respected the most, though I would never know who he or she was, got up and ran to him, grabbing him and hauling him back towards the trees. The other two followed, and then they were gone. I waited five minutes, watching the treelines for lights or movement, before I thumbed open my phone with the brightness turned all the way down and texted the group chat. 'All good. Warning shot only.'

I immediately got two hearts from Erica and Ivy, and Danielle started typing, but my phone started buzzing in my hand with a phone call from Vanessa.

"Hey," I answered with a whisper.

"Harrison, why the fuck is my Dad waking me up asking me to call you about a gunshot?"

"Because I shot at some people sneaking onto the site," I said.

"You shot someone on the site!?!"

"No, I- listen to me. I fired a warning shot and they ran off. No one is injured... I think."

"What does 'I think' mean?"

"Well, one guy might have damaged vision from getting spray paint in his eyes," I said.

"..... Harrison, what the fuck?"

"Just tell your Dad I've got it handled. I'll see you in the morning."

"Alright. You better not fuck me here," she grumbled.

I smirked. "Not unless you ask very nicely," I said.

"Oh my god, this is why I don't wake up at three in the fucking morning 'cause I say dumb phrasing like that. Good night. Again."

She hung up as I chuckled softly.

I abandoned my post at 06:30 when the sun was peeking well over the horizon. Usually, the first groups of workers would already be arriving on site, but obviously today was going to be different. When I trudged into the compound I found Erica awake, sitting in one of the Adirondack chairs and she gave me a tired smile. Ivy was sitting beside her in another chair, curled up with a blanket over her.

"Welcome home," Erica said, sitting up and yawning.

"Good morning," I said. "How late did she stay up?"

"About five am," Erica said. "Kids these days don't know how to party all night."

I snorted. "Let me get this shit put away, and I'll move her to the bed."

And I would have done just that, but as I was unloading my firearms I heard the telltale staccatothwumpthwumpthwump of an incoming helicopter. As I stepped back outside, rings of cold and clammy sweat on the shirt I'd worn under the ghillie suit, Erica, Leo, Ivy and Danielle all came out of the compound to join me as we watched an HH60 Pave Hawk coming in for a landing. As the helicopter engine began to whine loudly while it powered down, I led the others as we approached.

Several soldiers immediately hopped out of the Air Force-branded helicopter, each one in proper fatigues with all the correct identification patches - it almost made me proud to see an actual military uniform after the shady fatigues the OGAs had been wearing. Then the officers climbed out of the helicopter.

They were both in service dress uniform rather than fatigues, and both women looked around shrewdly with narrowed eyes as they took in the rough construction site, our compound tucked away in the back corner, and our ragtag group of strippers, artists and one carpenter.

I sucked in a breath, assuming my most military stance despite my likely dishevelled appearance, and marched up to the two officers as they approached us. One was carrying a briefcase in one hand and a leatherbound clipboard in the other - she had Captain bars on her shoulder, and if I had to guess at a glance she was an established attache for the other woman. My march brought me right up to within five feet of the two, and I snapped to attention in front of the Lieutenant Colonel. She was a woman with broad shoulders and a powerful, confident stance that almost hid her hourglass figure. She had thick brunette hair pulled back into a tight bun, and she had a somewhat dusky complexion as if she'd gotten too much sun. But I knew that was just her natural colouring.

Lt. Col Miriam Abarbanel slowly, cleanly, returned my salute and we lowered our arms. Then she took off the medical mask that was hiding her face and broke into a smile that reached up into her hazel eyes. She stepped forward and wrapped me up in a hug, kissing me on the cheek. "It's good to see you, Harri," she said as I squeezed her back.

"You too, Miriam," I said. "Congratulations on your promotion."

She leaned back from the hug, still smiling. "More rank, more problems. You know how it is."

"I don't, thankfully," I grinned. "What are you doing here?"

She took in a long breath and looked around us again. "I'm here to threaten a bunch of US civilians to back the fuck off, or they'll all be arrested and held on charges of treason," she said, her smile slipping. "How's your morning going?"

"I shot at someone last night," I said. "So I think you're up on me, but not by much."

"I'm going to need you to explain that in more detail," the other woman said, stepping forward.

"Harrison Black," Miriam said, stepping back and releasing my arms. "This is Captain Laura Bloomberg, a Judges' advocate with the Air Force. Captain, I've already debriefed you on Mr Black's record, but I should let you know - Harrison saved my life and dignity once upon a time. So go easy on him, if you don't mind."

"I don't go easy on anyone, ma'am," Captain Bloomberg said. "That's why I'm here."

"Too true," Miriam nodded. "Alright, let's say hello to everyone, then you can get me a briefing on the ground here. And please, dear God, tell me you have some coffee brewing. It's about to be one hell of a long morning."

====================================

Thanks for reading! Votes are appreciated, and comments are even better.

Quaranteam: North West is an ongoing series that will continue to see updates moving forward. If you have enjoyed the series so far, definitely make sure to check out CorruptingPowers main series and other spinoffs. For similar Harem-y themes, you might want to check out my other series currently releasing.

Cheers!

~Break.

====================================