Ow. Fuck.

Rebecca's head hurt. Now she knew what Sam meant about "a faceful of airbag". The front and left ones had deployed, and she coughed on the slowly dissipating gases from the explosive charges. She looked for Sam and her mother through her blurry vision, but their doors were open and she didn't see them. The new case of tinnitus she hoped wasn't permanent was fading enough she heard shouting outside, Epstein's voice on the radio and— gunfire? Shit. Cracks of multiple small caliber rifle rounds and a boom from Chrissie's 12-gauge.

She bent her arm a little farther than it probably wanted to go so she could haul her Tavor up over the center console and ready it. When she tried to do a quick scan of the surroundings, but her vision was still giving her fits -- she rubbed one eye and realized the two were not agreeing on the same focal length. She closed her non-dominant left eye, tried again, and saw several armed people rising out of cover ahead on the left side of the road.

Well fuck that.

Ronnie had told her that the key to surviving an ambush was immediate and overwhelming return fire. Two clicks as she moved her thumb confirmed the Tavor was ready to party, and she slapped her earmuffs down. She had to ram her shoulder against the door as she struggled to unlatch it — something must have distorted the frame.

A quick glance as she shoved the left airbags out of her way confirmed where her targets were, and she braced her foot in the door's storage pocket. That got her the leverage she wanted to push it open several inches. She leaned, keeping her leg up in cover, slotted the Tavor through the angled gap above the hinge, and cursed when she still had trouble focusing.

Fine. I don't need depth perception.

She let her right eye and the Tavor's holosight function as one, and held back the trigger as she swept her aim across four of the closest targets. The flurry of hot brass pelted the steering wheel airbag, and one casing caught in the crook of her elbow, causing her to flinch and end her volley to shake it away.

She cringed as two cracking sounds announced incoming bullets impacting the armored window she was using as a shield, and more thunked into the door panel below it. Hopefully Sam had the right side covered, Rebecca had to take care of the left herself.

Sure, keep shooting at me, as long as you keep your heads up.

She gave each visible silhouette an emphatic seven to ten rounds, figuring volume would compensate for her reduced precision and make a distinct impression on their opponents. When she paused to reacquire, raindrops sizzled on the exposed end of her barrel.

It looked like she'd dropped seven incoming attackers in their front left sector. There was no upright movement — thrash and wiggle all you want, you're not getting up with that many holes in you — so she put three or four suppressive rounds into a prone log that looked like good cover.

Sounds of more firing reached her from behind, so she pivoted in her seat, left knee under her and right leg crooked back into the footwell, and aimed through the door's rear gap. A curve in the road let her see that Chrissie and Patrick had bailed out to the right side of their SUV. Epstein must have been working around the back, as an M4 muzzle protruding from behind the left rear corner flashed repeatedly while Patrick fired over the hood. Rebecca took all this in just as a someone sprinted out in a mad dash and made it to the left side of their vehicle.

She still squeezed her left eye tightly shut as she drew a bead on the rusher, but Christine's shotgun boomed, the close-in attacker toppled, and their body jerked when the shotgun blasted again.

Must be firing under the car— good girl.

None of the remaining aggressors attacking the rear vehicle were looking her way — in fact, two were exposed to her as they sought shelter from Patrick and Epstein's bracketing fire, so she sent four or five rounds into each of them from behind, crumpling them with a satisfied snarl.

There were probably a bunch of rounds left in the big magazine, but she hadn't been counting precisely. The brief lull was a good opportunity to yank the loaded mag out and slap a replacement home — the partial empty going in the pouch the full one had come from just like Ronnie taught her. She re-readied her gun and swept around the rear of the vehicle, aiming towards the right side. Epstein must have checked their right flank before circling rear and left, so she only spared the area past Patrick a brief glance as she moved, checked their direct side and brought her aim around the far corner to check their right front quadrant.

And froze. A woman with a camouflage cap and her hair in a tight ponytail had a firm grip on the shoulder of Laura's jacket and a gun to the back of her head. Sam was a few yards away with her hands raised while a scruffy-faced man disarmed her, and there were two more men behind all that. One of them spotted Rebecca, aimed an assault rifle at her, and gestured sharply upwards with a jerk of its tip.

**

Rebecca tested the zip ties cinched around her wrists. They felt like normal cable wraps, in a simple tight loop, not the thick B-shaped ones Jaime'd told her about. Still, they were perturbingly effective. Her entire group sat in a row at the side of the road, except for Sue, who apparently had burrowed under the seat and was hissing enough the ambushers were giving him a wide berth while they ransacked the contents of each SUV.

The half-dozen or so — no, get your head clear, girl. Five. One woman four men. Two assault rifles, one hunting rifle, one shotgun, one submachine gun. The five surviving attackers were picking through their tactical gear and food supplies first, having tossed their clothing and personal goods back into the trunk areas.

Rebecca kept track of each of their approximate positions as she turned her head to look at the row next to her. Chrissie was to her right, then Patrick and Epstein. Laura and Sam to her left. Nobody looked hurt. Well, she might, given the way her head felt.

The rain was still a constant annoying drizzle, and it was soaking through Rebecca's t-shirt and hair. When she took a closer look at Sam, Rebecca noticed she was starting to shiver.

The apparent highwaymen periodically stalked past, or sat on the log the cable impact had pulled flying into the side of the SUV, looking over their new prisoners. The next time the woman came around, Rebecca made supplicative eye contact.

"Hey... can we get her a jacket?" She nodded towards Sam, who was glaring at the ground with her jaw set, probably trying to keep her teeth from chattering. "Please?"

The woman simply gave her a stony-eyed sneer, scoffed to herself, and resumed walking. When she was out of hearing range, Rebecca heard Sam growl something through her clenched teeth.

"Aww, I probably killed some of the bitch's friends."

Rebecca watched, waiting, since that was all she could do at the moment. Epstein was testing his bonds too, looking around, correlating and calculating. Christine was glaring at various captors when they weren't looking, but that looked more like a simple desire to kill them all. Patrick kept looking at Chris, and around, not just at their attackers but also the surrounding terrain. Laura kept glancing back and forth worriedly between Rebecca and Sam.

Chrissie let out a sigh that was close to a snarl. "Do you think it was all a trap? Like, with the radio."

Rebecca fought a shiver. "Maybe, but weird to do it all the way at this end." She tilted her head to keep a raindrop on her forehead out of her eyes, and fell silent again as someone moved closer.

The man with a submachine gun — maybe an MP5? — started digging around in the back of the lead SUV. Rebecca saw him drag one of their duffel bags towards him and root around inside.

He set aside a few of their lights, and poked around more for a minute or so before making an amused sound. For a moment Rebecca worried he'd found Sam's pearls or something, but instead she saw him lift out a pair of underwear. Her vision wasn't clear enough to be able to identify it as hers or Sam's, but it didn't really matter, as he turned and swept a skeezy gaze along the entire row, probably trying to guess whose it was.

Patrick caught on quickly. "Hey man, you got me. It's mine."

Christine wrestled back a derisive laugh under her breath, but Rebecca still heard the remnants of it along with Epstein muttering, "No, I'm Spartacus."

The man stroked his pathetically sparse chin beard and snickered as he took a few steps towards them and kicked Patrick onto his back. Not particularly hard, just enough to feel like the bigger man. Chrissie and Epstein both yelled at him in protest while Rebecca glanced at Patrick to make sure he was okay. She felt the first inklings of an idea stirring.

Shitface the Thinbearded gloated, clearly quite satisfied with himself, and strolled down the line past Rebecca. MP5, Single/full auto trigger group, flashlight, small optic on top. Likely police issue. No sidearm. Knife in right boot. Heavy swagger like he's compensating - probably no training. She snapped her eyes up when he stopped in front of Sam.

Sam was in her preferred heavy cargo pants, but after their armor was taken she was left in just a tank top on her upper half  — she didn't bother with the neoprene base layer when just driving around. Between her soaked shirt darkened by the rain, light skin tone, and bright hair plastered to her face, there was a lot of contrast to draw an eye — certainly Rebecca's on a better day.

Before this creepster could say anything or leer more than single second, Rebecca shifted up onto her knees, raising her hips off her heels. "Hey, asshole."

He with the extremely sketchy vibe and twisted frail ego looked over. "You got something to say to me?" Rebecca didn't reply, but maintained challenging eye contact; he took the bait, striding back over to loom in front of her.

When he started to repeat himself, she dragged her teeth over her tongue to try to gather some extra saliva and spat as forcefully as she could in his face.

"You bitch!" He swung his hand to slap her, and Rebecca wondered if he saw her eyes glint dangerously before he connected.

He telegraphed the strike well in advance, and she rocked backwards to move her head away. Just like she expected, he extended to follow. Her rearward momentum softened the glancing blow, and the sting in her cheek just fed a spreading grin as she landed on her back. Toppling brought her knees skyward, and she lashed out with three stomping kicks to his groin.

The first two connected quite satisfyingly. The third only clipped his thigh, but knocked him further away as he stumbled back. Rebecca used the opening to tuck her knees to her chest and bring her wrists down past her hips — once her hands were in front of her again, she rocked forward to her feet and lunged.

Epstein was already replicating the wrist-freeing contortion, followed by Patrick, but Christine's bindings must have been higher, because she struggled in Rebecca's peripheral vision. Laura hadn't been in a real fight in her life, and Sam was probably going hypothermic.

Rebecca charged at her foe, grabbing his jacket at the neckline and driving him farther towards the side of the SUV. When he slammed into it, she let go, sliding clenched fists to either side of his neck and pushing forward. The zip tie bit into her as she pushed it against his throat, but the pain only fueled her bloodthirsty intent.

The damp pavement made her shoes slip and she repositioned, throwing her weight forward again. Her legs threatened to cramp from her all-out strain as she drove the plastic strap deeper into both her wrists and his neck.

His eyes were wide and he seemed short of breath, but he recovered enough to get his left hand around Rebecca's throat and punch her in the shoulder and ribs. She started to worry they were too evenly matched, but then a new weight landed against her back and a lock of curly blonde hair fell into view over her shoulder.

There was a sickening pop from in front of her, not unlike wrenching the leg from a turkey, and she felt his trachea give. His eyes bugged more and he started making terrible choking noises — she wasn't sure if she'd been hoping for the zip ties or his throat to give first, but was good with this outcome.

Rebecca felt Chrissie fall away behind her and regained her balance. Unfortunately, recent experience had educated her on just how much more this next part was going to suck.

She grit her teeth to prepare herself as she balled her fists and wedged her right knee between her forearms. Tightening her arms around her leg as much as she could... she relaxed her left leg and dropped all of her weight onto her clenched hands.

Her gasping cry of pain as her knee wedged her arms apart was wordless, but there was plenty of profanity running through her mind as she shook her freed hands once and snatched up the choking man's gun. Epstein must have seen the knife in the guy's boot too, because he'd already pinned that thrashing leg down to retrieve the blade and started cutting his own bindings.

One down. Three men, one woman.

She racked the bolt on the SMG and one unspent round went flying from the ejection port — that was worth confirming the next was chambered and ready before she went around the back of the SUV. The commotion had finally drawn the attention of their remaining captors, but she caught one of them in the open and unloaded on him. Rebecca hadn't trained with this model of weapon, but putting the sights center mass and squeezing the trigger was straightforward enough at this range, and at least some of her burst hit.

She switched targets towards the next source of motion and fired, but didn't catch it in time — shit, someone got around the front of the SUV. She fired one more burst towards a man diving behind a tree and whipped around to check the other side.

Once again, she found herself aiming at some of these fuckers while they had the drop on people she held dear. The bitch with the ponytail and guy with the shotgun had Sam and Laura at gunpoint again, with Epstein crouching a few yards closer to Rebecca and Patrick near Christine where he'd seemingly just cut her bonds. Looks like her wrists were bound palms-out, that's why she couldn't wiggle them past her feet.

Shotgun - most immediate threat. Her assault rifle is still bad, though. Rebecca steadied her aim and tried to figure out what to do next.

Things got more complicated as the man she'd been shooting at by the tree stepped into view with his rifle up, and their four opponents started to spread out, guns raised. She'd never take all of them, she'd already revealed to the woman that Sam was somehow important... maybe she could draw their fire to herself, get behind the SUV in time?

Panic started to climb in her chest — not the senseless kind from before, but rational fear, not knowing what to do — especially when she thought her vision was getting worse. She opened her mouth to try negotiating, but doing that seemed to cause an odd ringing sound in her ears.

The shotgun wielder's head disappeared with the sound of a wet melon hitting pavement, followed by a deep boom a half-second later. Epstein was already in motion when she heard the weird metallic sound echoing again, and her brain finally put the pieces together — big, fast rounds - long distance.

Epstein flung a handful of mud into the ponytail woman's face as the distant rifle's thundering report reached them, and charged her moments before Sam. Rebecca had an angle on the guy with the hunting rifle that was clear of them, so she shot him several times.

She doubted these assholes had the same fancy 9mm hollow points she still hoarded from her initial purchase so long ago, but she could come back around and make sure he was down for good later. The literal last man standing dove behind a tree on the left side of the road and she fired after him, frustrated to see her shots simply chip the bark away.

Rebecca looked back to the melee in front of her — ponytail woman was grappling with Epstein for the gun. Sam drove her shoulder into the woman's gut and slammed her against the SUV, knocking the side view mirror askew and loosening both her and Epstein's grip on the gun.

Laura got ahold of the barrel, yanked it free, and swung it at the woman's head like a bat. Rebecca heard her mother grunt with the effort, and then snarl — not something Laura usually did — as she staggered back.

"Should have given her a jacket, bitch."

Rebecca would have to compliment her mother's use of combat one-liners later.

She started to worry how many rounds were left in the unfamiliar MP5, so she clicked its pictogram-illustrated safety to single fire — the multilingual-friendly single red bullet, instead of five or the white X). started popping single rounds at the guy behind the tree. Everyone flinched at his burst of return blind fire and she started firing faster, trying to suppress so the others could get into cover, maybe find their own weapons again.

Two more high-caliber rounds zinged across the road. Splinters half the size of her forearm exploded from the tree trunk, and she saw gouts of viscera fountain laterally from behind it as the same distant thunder echoed.

She didn't feel the need to confirm that particular kill.

Rebecca lowered the captured SMG and checked on her family. Laura had the gun shouldered, leveled at the woman where she lay propped up on the ground. Epstein helped Sam up and away, ushering her towards Rebecca and then turning back to Laura.

Sam slumped against her, panting, and Rebecca embraced her with one arm, steering her towards the shelter of the raised tailgate. Chrissie and Patrick came to their side and started digging in back for dry clothing for Sam, so Rebecca kissed her on the forehead and eyed their surroundings. She spotted everyone's body armor in a stack across the road and retrieved hers. She had to set down the nearly spent MP5 to lift the armor over her head, but didn't bother picking it up again; she simply drew her familiar pistol from where it was still holstered on her gear.

She kept it aimed at the guy who had been wielding the hunting rifle as she circled the front of the SUV and checked him — by kicking him in the head. It just lolled open-eyed and slack-jawed, so she kept moving back to her mother, Epstein, and Ponytail.

Epstein was still a few feet cautious feet to Laura's side with his hand outstretched for the gun, but she kept it aimed at the woman on the ground as they glared at each other, her finger on the trigger. Rebecca knew her mother's face well enough to know she was as dangerously livid as she'd ever seen and carefully rested her hand on the top of the rifle.

This is familiar. Protective fear aggression runs in the family?

"Mom, it's okay. We're okay." She gently pushed the muzzle down and away. "This isn't who you are, you're not a killer."

Laura blinked, clenched her jaw tighter for a moment, and then relaxed it. "Fine. How's... where's Sam?"

"She's around back, Mom. Why don't you go check on her? She likes you, she'd probably appreciate it."

Laura nodded. "Okay." She sighed out some of the tension filling her body and loosened her grip on the rifle, which Rebecca lifted out of her grasp and passed to Epstein.

It was a Soviet-styled AK, not the M4/M16 platforms he was used to carrying, but he still settled it into a professional low carry right away. Rebecca nodded towards her mother, and then pointedly looked away from him to the back of the vehicle, and he nodded, extending his left hand to help guide Laura away.

Rebecca stood so she could see both them and the woman on the ground. Once Epstein and Laura were obstructed from view by the SUV, she looked at Ponytail, who gave her the same trademark sneer, with the addition of bloodied lip.

Rebecca didn't dignify her with an emotional response. She merely said, "I am," and lifted her arm.

The woman's arrogant expression cracked in sudden understanding just as Rebecca shot her twice in the chest and once in the head.

**

The others had given her a collection of different looks right afterwards. Epstein immediately popped back around the corner with the AK raised to check on her, glanced at the body with a slightly raised eyebrow, and nodded.

She nodded back, and heard the radio crackle inside the cabin. When she opened the door and leaned in for it, Patrick and her mother were clearly shocked, but Christine and Sam's expression were laden with grim satisfaction. She saw Epstein dig their pair of bolt cutters out from the back and head for the cables across the road.

The voice on the radio hailed again. "Echo, this is Rivenoak. Please respond."

Rebecca got her left hand on the mic, safetied her pistol, and set it on the driver's seat. "Rivenoak, Echo."

"It looks like you're all okay. Do you require further assistance?"

She looked around. As long as they got into dried out and warm inside the vehicles again, it looked like everyone would be fine. "Negative, Rivenoak."

"I want to apologize. That trap was probably meant for us, and it took a while to get repositioned to support you."

She noticed a hole in the far window, and then glanced around and spotted a mangled but surprisingly large copper-colored projectile lodged in the "bulletproof" windshield. Drawing a mental path between the two, she realized its continued trajectory was in-line with where Ponytail had been standing earlier.

Rebecca lifted the earmuffs off her head so she could hear the radio better over the lingering ringing in her ears. "Your timing worked out. Good aim, sorry about the armored windows ruining your second shot. Thanks again for the assist."

"Like you said, it worked out. You probably fared better than our folks would have. Looks like a negative on anyone left to interrogate?"

She rubbed what she could reach of her temple under the helmet with her free hand. "I didn't see them picking up any survivors we dropped during the first round, so I'm thinking that's a hard no. Sorry."

"Don't be. Worst case, it sends a message. Call us if you need anything else, otherwise, safer travels."

"Thanks. Echo out." Rebecca tossed the mic back towards the passenger seat and sighed, shaking her head. She smiled at Sam, and then suddenly winced and reached for her head as everything went white.