It was all the encouragement I needed.

There were less than twenty-one feet between us, maybe twelve at the most. I covered the distance in three long strides. By the time Travis recovered and began to reach for his weapon, it was too late.

One hand grabbed his wrist and pushed it away from his sidearm while the other covered his face, blinding him, wrenching his head backward and pushing him off balance. After forcing him back two steps, I reared back with my right leg and brought a knee into his solar plexus with all the strength I could muster. The strike hit with enormous force, driving the air from his lungs in an agonized whoosh. He doubled over, gun forgotten, a high-pitched gasp peeling from his throat as he tried to pull air into his chest cavity.

The key to victory, once you have your opponent hurt, is to be relentless, to never let up, to hit them again, and again, and again, until they go down and do not get back up. The principle of continuous attack.

The next blow was an elbow strike to the temple. It turned his legs to rubber and made his eyes roll around independent of one another like a goggle-eyed lizard. I followed the elbow up with a spinning back fist to the jaw that spun him around, but amazingly, he kept his feet.

Tough son of a bitch.

When his back was turned to me, I stomped the crease of his knee, forcing him to the ground. He immediately tried to stand up, but again, I was on him too quickly. With the fingers of my left hand curled into a half fist, I slammed the edge of my palm into his brachial nerve once, twice, three times. On the fourth, he went down limply and did not move.

Not wasting any time, I yanked his gun from its holster and brought it up to the low ready position. The sights tracked first to the left, then right, following my line of vision. I kept my finger tight on the trigger, taking in some of the slack. I expected to see a crowd of people staring at me, maybe a mixture of shock and anger, some of them standing open-mouthed, some of them going for weapons. Instead, all of them, including Jerry, who clutched a bleeding left forearm, gaped southward at a rising plume of dust stretching skyward and approaching rapidly.

“What the hell?”

I lowered the weapon and looked around again. No one was paying me any attention. I took a few deep breaths and cleared my thoughts, focusing on my senses. The first thing that came to me was the rumble of vehicles, lots of them, diesel engines, the hum of tires, and a rapid, metallic clattering.

Treads.

Which meant … what? Tanks? Bulldozers?

Shit.

I looked up again and saw dozens of black plumes, exhaust stacks. As the noise of them closed the distance to the compound, I heard the engines begin to ratchet down, the grinding and grunting of big transmissions downshifting as they slowly came to a halt.

Calmly, so as not to draw attention to myself, I walked toward my carbine and pistol. They lay on the ground near Jerry where I last saw them. I was a few feet away before he noticed me. When he saw me coming, he tried to step in my way.

“Hey,” he said.

I raised the pistol. “Jerry, you do not want to fuck with me right now.”

He paled. “Okay.”

“Step away, Jerry.”

He did, four steps. I motioned with my free hand for him to keep going. When he had gone far enough, I stooped to pick up my rifle, still pointing Travis’ gun at him, then retrieved my Beretta. Once I had my gear sorted out, I lowered the pistol and motioned Jerry over. He complied, warily coming to a halt a few feet in front of me. I dropped the mag from Travis’s gun, cleared the chamber, and thumbed out the remaining six rounds. They made little puffs in the dust as they fell to the ground. That done, I tossed the whole works at Jerry’s feet. He was not bleeding too badly, telling me Mike must have shot his weapon out of his hand. The cuts were undoubtedly from shrapnel.

“I’m sorry about all this,” I said. “But Travis had no right to search my things. He may have been a cop once, but he isn’t any more. He has no jurisdiction here, or anywhere else for that matter. If he had just let me go on my way, none of this,” I pointed first to Jerry’s wounded arm, then to Travis’ still prone form, “would have happened.”

“I’ll tell him that when he comes around,” Jerry said drily. “Don’t think it’ll make much difference, though.”

“What about you, Jerry? Are you all right?”

“My fucking arm hurts.”

“You’ll forgive me if I’m not terribly sympathetic. You were pointing a rifle at my chest, after all. And besides, it could have been worse. A lot worse.”

Jerry cast a nervous eye in the direction the shot had come from. “Who the hell was that, anyway?”

“A friend of mine.”

“What is he, a sniper or something?”

“Something like that.”

Jerry looked back at me, eyes wide around the edges. “He could have killed me.”

“Is that a realization, or a question?”

“He still out there?”

“I imagine so.”

He held up his hands and backed away. “Tell me something, kid. Why do you need a sniper watching this place if all you wanted was some water?”

I leapt up on the Cadillac at the gate and casually strode across its hood. “Insurance, Jerry. It’s a dangerous world we live in.”

*****

There were thirty vehicles in the convoy.

Most of them were the wheeled variety, but there was one Abrams tank, a couple of mobile Howitzers, and four Bradley fighting vehicles. I also counted eight Humvees, six M35 deuce-and-a-halfs, five armored personnel carriers, and four HEMTT cargo trucks. The line of vehicles came to a halt in front of the settlement’s main gate as I turned southward and began walking down Highway 281.

The plan was to stroll casually by and turn left at the southeast corner of the wall. I saw no reason why the Army, or Marines, or whoever it was would be interested in a lone traveler, even a well-armed one. This was Texas, after all, where firearms were as common as cowboy hats.

So when a Humvee’s passenger door opened a few feet away and a soldier spilled out, carbine trained in my direction, shouting at me to get my fucking hands in the air now, I froze in genuine shock.

“I said get your goddamn hands up!” he yelled when I didn’t move. Slowly, I did as ordered.

“Turn away from me.” The soldier said. I tried to read his nametag, but his arms covered it.

“What’s this about?” I asked. “Why are you-”

“SHUT THE FUCK UP!” he screamed, going red in the face. “Turn around now!”

“Johansen,” a sharp voice said to my right. I turned to see who had spoken and saw a man in fatigues approaching. He had a captain’s insignia on his uniform. “Lower that weapon right now.”

“He’s armed, sir.” The soldier, Johansen, said.

“Yes, and if I were in his place, I would be too. Now lower your weapon, Sergeant.”

Johansen complied, glaring daggers at me. The captain stepped closer and reached out a hand. “Sorry about that. The sergeant here is a little overzealous at times.”

I shook the offered hand, not taking my eyes off Johansen. “You don’t say.”

Johansen’s already red face darkened. Beside me, the captain said, “Name’s Morgan. Insert joke here.”

It was inappropriate, but I chuckled, finally looking away from Johansen. “Captain Morgan?”

The officer smiled. “Yep. I’m a real hit at parties.”

“You a deserter?” Johansen growled.

I looked back at him. “What?”

“How’d you know he’s a captain? He never identified his rank.”

I pointed. “It’s right there on his uniform.”

“How do you know what a captain’s bars look like?”

“My old man was in the Army.”

“Mmm-hmm. And where did you get that M-4?”

I looked down. “It was a gift.”

“Mind if I take a look?” Morgan asked.

I handed it to him. He glanced at the manufacturer’s stamp, then handed it back. “Rock River Arms. I hear they make good stuff.” He shot a pointed glance at Johansen, who looked crestfallen. If the gun had been made by Colt, it would have looked bad for me. I was in Army surplus tactical gear, after all, and was old enough to have enlisted in the Armed Services. But Rock River Arms did not make M-4s for the military, that was Colt’s job, thus invalidating Johansen’s suspicions.