The Uvalde Raider by Ben English (great books for teens TXT) 📕

experience Micah knew that good accuracy was not the AK’s forte, he was relatively safe from their aimed fire at this distance. After sizing up the two AK carriers briefly, the former Marine returned his attention to Blue Shirt and the Lebanese with the SVD. Both were still moving slowly along the confines of the caliche roadway.

Micah understood that now was the point of no return. The armed group was still some 300 yards away from the building and he was right at 200 yards to their rear. Taking a deep breath, he sat up and took a modified kneeling position, running his left arm through the Marlin’s sling. As he did so, his right thumb eased the rifle’s hammer back to full cock.

He let out half a breath and mentally forced his body to relax at the prospect of shooting another human being. The .30/30 was set for a 200 yard zero and there was no real crosswind, so Micah placed the front sight square on the marksman’s back and centered the post in the Williams rear aperture. The tip of his right index finger pressed against the trigger, taking up the slack. He paused for a moment, double checked his sight picture and began pressing again.

The doomed terrorist had stopped and was glassing the area once more when the Marlin boomed. The 150-grain soft tip bullet took him slightly off center as he turned, slamming into his upper right back and driving deep into his vitals. The scoped rifle fell from his hands and he dropped to both knees, then toppled over flat on his face against the surface of the dirt road. The man uttered no sound as he fell, there was only the puff of dust on either side of his upper body as he hit the ground.

The Hezbollah rifleman was still falling as Micah hurriedly worked the Marlin’s lever, chambering another round while shifting the front sight in search of their leader in the blue t-shirt. In his peripheral vision, he could see the other two scattering like quail, both seeking some sort of cover. He ignored them and picked up the flash of blue heading away from the road, fleeing into a line of scrub and brush.

As the Muslim terrorist scrambled madly for safe haven, a disparate part of Micah was oddly fascinated at how fast a man can move when consumed with fear. There was no time to fire another aimed round as if he were on a target range, so he tracked the fleeing blue shirt with his rifle’s front sight and gave it a bit of a lead as it entered the brush. This time he gently popped the trigger and rode the recoil back down just in time to see the Hezbollah leader knocked spinning, and then disappear into the scrub.

Now it was his turn to move quickly. Micah slung the Marlin over his left shoulder and scrambled on his hands and knees back to the finger of the draw he had come out of. As he did so, the stabbing sensations in his right rib cage flared up once more. Yet the angry buzz of projectiles in his general direction hurried him along.

The other two terrorists with the AKs were returning fire blindly, shooting into the area where he had fired from. Both of their assault weapons were set on full auto, and the gunmen were spraying rounds wildly. He dropped down into the finger and out of the line of direct fire, coming up to his feet while topping off the Marlin’s tube magazine. The firing lessened, and then stopped as Micah eased the rifle’s hammer forward to half cock.

Remaining still for a moment, he strained his ears and listened intently. Off and away where he had engaged the Hezbollah terrorists, he heard words in Arabic drift in and out. Micah did not know what they meant, however they sounded like some sort of heartfelt cursing muttered on his behalf. The Texas lawman found himself smiling thinly at the prospect. Then there was nothing but the sound of silence.

Moving as quickly as he dared, Micah began a recon shuffle down the finger and toward the main draw from where he had first come. He knew he had a few moments of respite as the remaining terrorists regrouped, recalculated on their present status and came up with some sort of plan of action.

The trooper was going to make the most out of that little window of time, and change his location to come at them from a different direction. The Hezbollah terrorists would be very hesitant in attempting to make their way back to the Suburban. Beyond the fact they had been fired upon from the rear, the Lebanese had no real way of knowing exactly where his rounds had come from or how many shooters there were.

These unknowns in their tactical situation, along with not knowing the terrain around them, would play to his advantage. Most likely they would circle wide and try to continue on to the cinder block building. He would be waiting for them when they did.

Micah Templar slowed down to a walk, breathing hard while trying to step as lightly as possible. His broken ribs had been protesting in agony each time his right foot touched ground when jogging along, and he was concerned that he might be making enough noise to catch an attentive ear. He turned his thoughts to the two armed and still ambulatory Hezbollah Lebanese out there, and what might be going through their minds. Most likely they would separate now while still keeping each other in sight, probing hesitantly in a circling motion in the direction of the operations shack.

The former Marine also began to consider the condition of their leader in the blue shirt. Micah did not feel confident that his rushed second shot had anchored Blue Shirt for good. The Texan had seen the