There were ten of them.
Group by group, they left their cars.
They approached in waves.
Traveller leaned Slater’s arm around his shoulders and led him towards the stairs. He shifted the old man’s weight onto the rails of the stairs.
Slater grunted as he struggled to lift himself up, step by step.
Traveller stayed on the first floor. He could see the first distant group of three approaching the door now.
Before they could think to shoot him, he darted to his left—into the living room, out of their sight—and pressed his back against the home’s south-east corner. If the window between him and the door hadn’t been opaque, he would have had a perfect view of the porch from this angle.
Traveller aimed his rifle towards the foggy window and waited.
Slater reached the top of the steps and lay on his stomach, swapping out his shotgun for a hunting rifle that had been preemptively placed there for this exact purpose. Although the angle would be too high to see anything above an entering enemy’s waist, it still provided him with a view of their feet as they approached the door.
Slater used this brief moment of calm to roll his shoulder, although the stretch did little to loosen the tense, pained muscle.
He watched through the reticle of the rifle as the first set of feet emerged.
“Now!” Slater yelled.
Traveller blindly fired the shotgun twice through the window. He could see now through the space where the window once was that he was successful in shooting two of them; the third remained standing, only hit in non-vital locations by the raining glass.
Traveller did not have the confidence or the cover to attempt a head-on firefight. Knowing it would put himself back into view from the door, he ran through the front hallway. “Cover!” he yelled.
The enemy took aim at Traveller, but before he could pull the trigger, a bullet penetrated his toe. He writhed in pain and hopped back around the cover of the outer wall as Traveller disappeared into the kitchen.
Slater rolled his shoulder again, feeling the pressure of the gunshot bounce inside his injury.
Another group of three had been not far behind, which gave the toeless mercenary the false confidence necessary to move out from behind the cover and charge inside blindly, accidentally activating the tripwire, which swiftly and emotionlessly erased his head. He joined Gene’s headless corpse on the ground.
The second group had learned from the mistakes of the first and approached with more caution. Two of them took cover to the left of the door, and one to the right.
The one in the center of the three looked between his two comrades. “On three.” He mouthed “one,” then “two,” then finally…
He jumped in front of the doorway, remaining outside, and crouched down to a level where he and Slater would be able to aim at each other, but before either of the men could fire, a hammer fell through the hatch-door of the attic above him and landed on his head.
Rose watched through the small opening in the door with morbid curiosity as the hammer she dropped cracked open the man’s skull. The mercenary taking cover to the right of the door—a mature looking woman with sharp eyes and a tailor-fit black suit—noticed Rose and took aim. Rose slid back, behind the cover of the closed door soon enough for the thick wood to block most of the bullets; thankfully, those that managed to penetrate the door hadn’t hit her.
Rose kept low, deciding it was too soon to look outside again. Her decision had been the smart one: the woman kept her cool aim focused at the hatch door, even as her partner stepped out of cover.
Following in hammer-head’s footsteps, the third of the group got down on his haunches in front of the door and aimed. He and Slater both fired at the same time, but the pain in Slater’s shoulder caused his aim to shift to the right. Thankfully, the cover of the stairs blocked the bullets, but the shots sent wooden splinters of dust flying into the air. Slater tried to aim through his squinted eyes, but still couldn’t see clearly. “Kid!” he yelled.
Traveller’s hands popped up around the cover of the kitchen door and fired completely blindly towards the front door. Slater used this moment to slide back—still on his stomach—away from the steps. He wouldn’t be able to shoot the enemy from here, but the enemy wouldn’t be able to shoot him either.
Traveller’s hands now being the only visible target, the enemy entered the home, guns blazing, careful to step over the tripwire. Traveller’s hands receded behind the door’s cover.
The enemy took this as an opportunity to stop shooting and focus on running towards the kitchen as quickly as possible.
Entering the kitchen, gun aimed ahead, Traveller seemed to have disappeared. He walked slowly, alert for any surprise attacks.
What he hadn’t expected was for the carpet to drop under his feet.
He fell face-first, hitting his forehead against the corner of the opening in the floorboards, and landed in the kitchen’s hidden bunker.
Traveller had been down there, waiting with a gun already aimed and ready. Without emotion, he pulled the trigger.
Slater’s voice echoed throughout the house. “Stage two!”
As Traveller ascended out of the hidden bunker, Rose descended from the attic.
Rose ran into the workshop. Alberto watched, arms still tied behind his chair with a rope, as Rose grabbed at the metal bucket that had been waiting for her there.
The bucket swayed more than she expected in her panicked grasp, causing a small wave of nails to spill over the rim, rolling onto the ground. Deciding this mess was not a priority during a firefight, she ignored this and ran back out to the hallway.
Alberto looked down.
His toes gripped the head of a sharp nail.
The two mercenaries at the back of the group looked ahead. There had only been two more running ahead. Including themselves and the woman aiming at the attic, there had only been five of them left now.
“Screw this…” the older of the two mused. “There has to be another way in.”
“Perimeter?” the younger suggested.
The older nodded.
The older ran around the garage to the east; the younger towards the garden to the west.
As they passed, they saw the other group of two enter.
Just before Traveller turned his back on the front door to start climbing the steps, he saw them enter. “Cover!”
He sprinted up the steps, legs burning with adrenaline.
BANG! BANG!
Although Slater had shot both of the men behind Traveller, one continued to run through the pain.
Rose tipped over the bucket as soon as Traveller reached the top. The nails rained down the steps like harsh hail on a windshield.
By the time the remaining enemy realized what Rose had just done, it was already too late. Stepping onto the first nail caused him to trip forward, directly onto the many others that awaited on the steps.
He didn’t flail around in pain for long before Slater finished the job with a shot. “That’ll make it harder for ‘em to come up,” Slater said flatly.
Rose backed away, starting to finally feel the sickening toll of all the violence. She covered her mouth tight and turned away from the stairs, which allowed her to notice Alberto standing at the door of the workshop.
Instead of running directly towards the three of them, Alberto went the exact opposite direction, running towards the attic.
“We’ll cover the stairs!” Slater yelled out to Traveller, still on his stomach, aimed towards the front door. “Go get him.”
Traveller nodded. “Good luck.” He ran off, following Alberto.
Slater’ muscles loosened and he calmly watched through the gun’s reticle.
The young and old mercenaries had both circled the house, and were now standing by Traveller’s white Cadillac.
“Nothing?” the young asked.
“Nope. Just the front door, and I’m not a fan of letting them funnel us in.”
The young man thought back to the garden he just walked through. The generator. “Let’s make ‘em come to us then.”
Alberto crouched down, looking through the triangular attic’s hatch door. A bullet hit the door and he fell back. “It’s me!” he yelled out to the woman below. “Don’t shoot!”
He opened the door a crack and peered through. There was a smirk on the woman’s face behind the gun. Another shot flew towards him and he shut the door again.
Alberto muttered to himself, searching around the attic. A hunting rifle, identical to the one Slater was currently using, had been waiting upright by the hatch door.
He grabbed the rifle and, without aiming, pushed the door open using the barrel of the gun. He pointed it where he remembered the woman standing and fired. After a moment of silence to insure no bullets were sent back to him in response, he put the rifle back where he found it.
Alberto loosened his still-tightened top button and crouched down to the hatch door again.
Traveller finally reached the top of the steps. He aimed his gun towards Alberto, but to his surprise, Alberto ran directly towards him this time.
Traveller fired a shot, but Alberto had dashed to his right before he could even pull the trigger. Then to the left—again, just before Traveller pulled the trigger. Before a third shot could even be fired, Alberto was directly in front of Traveller. He gripped the hot barrel of the gun in one hand and the stock in the other; in one swift motion he had forced the gun to rotate counter-clockwise, removing Traveller’s hold on the trigger.
Then, in an equally swift motion, he kneed the gun up, hitting the hot barrel of the gun into Traveller’s face with a shocking force.
Stunned, Traveller’s grasp of the gun released.
He formed a loose fist and swung at Alberto, but it had been at such a slow, dazed pace that Alberto managed to spin out of the way, returning to that three-hundred-sixtieth degree with a foot extended at the height of Traveller’s face.
The kick pushed Traveller onto the ground.
Alberto stood over him. Traveller was helpless.
Alberto reached out to Traveller’s head, but before he could grip him, the entire house shook at the sound of an explosion.
Using this momentary distraction, Traveller kicked Alberto in the gut, which made him step back.
Traveller picked up his gun. He fired ahead without hesitation.
Blood shot out the side of Alberto’s head and he fell.
Traveller dropped his gun, sighing with relief.
“Help!” Slater’s voice echoed through the house behind him. “Someone shot the generator! Fire!”
Traveller looked down the stairs. Although he couldn’t see anything, he had already felt the room getting warmer.
Looking back ahead, he was shocked to find Alberto back on his feet, running towards the hatch door with his hand covering his bloody left eye.
Traveller lifted the rifle again, but before he could aim, Alberto had already jumped out the hatch door.
Traveller ran to the other end of the room and aimed out the door.
The bodies below had cushioned Alberto’s fall enough that he had already put distance between him and the house. He was about halfway to the fleet of now-abandoned vehicles now.
Traveller aimed the rifle through the hatch door, prepared to finally put his aim to the final test…
“My house!” Slater’s desperate voice echoed from beneath. “Please!”
Alberto ran.
Traveller yielded his aim and climbed down the stairs to help.
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