This may be a work of fiction but it was penned by a person who believed in this country and the basic integrity of its citizens. He also believed that we have certain rights granted to us under law and an obligation to protect and preserve our Constitutional Republic. To some of you this may sound corny and that’s ok – you have a right to your opinion. To some others…well. Enjoy your Independence Day!
…”I have to,” he said to them. “I have to do this – show the KGB why they lost, why they’d lose again or anyone else would lose if it happened all over again.”…
…Rourke bent down, flicking on the flashlight, shining it up inside. Rungs were anchored to the living granite, three feet apart, the tunnel inside angling steeply upward.
He turned back to the shelves. From a box he took an American flag. He returned to the escape tunnel….
…Rourke crouched beside the opening at the top of the mountain, electricity arcing through the scrub brush. In the distance, he could see one of the Soviet helicopters crashing down, struck by the lightening, burning. Only one remained. Rourke stated to his feet, running, crouched, toward the center of the mountaintop. His radio aerial, camouflaged in a bracken of scrub pine.
Small patches of cloth were visible protruding partially from the inside of his shirt – red and white – as he touched at the flag.
Rourke reached for the antenna mast, electricity sparking from it. Rourke drawing back his hand.
Below him, far beneath the mountain, massive ball lightning rolled across the ground, the ground itself burning, the remaining Russian soldiers running, clothes burning, electricity arcing from their bodies, their heads, bodies exploding with it.
Rourke reached for the mast again, the leather magazine pouch protecting his hand. He started to tug at the cloth, pulling it from inside his shirt. Red. White. Red and white stripes. A blue field with white stars. A strong wind whipped across the mountaintop as Rourke secured the grommets on the flag to the antenna mast, the flag catching in the stiff wind, unfurling, blowing across the top of the mountain.
Rourke stepped back, staring out across the valley. The thunder seemed to be in waves, lightning bolts ripping the sky around him.
Out of the black sky, the last Soviet helicopter came. Rourke started toward the escape tunnel entrance. The helicopter was firing its machineguns, the rocks around Rourke’s feet chipping up, seeming to explode.
A missile launched from the gunship, a smoking trail. It exploded less than a dozen yards from the blowing flag. Rourke fell to the ground, the concussion stunning him. He started to push up to his feet. The flag was ripped, tattered – but still there. The Soviet helicopter was making a run, coming low, its coaxially mounted machineguns blazing, slugs impacting around the flag.
“No-o-o!” Rourke screamed the word, his hands flashing up to the twin stainless Detonics .45s, ripping them from the leather. On the horizon, the sky was burning, like a wave, the fire licking across the air, toward him, engulfing the ground.
Rourke could see inside the cockpit of the helicopter now, past the open cockpit door. “Rozhdestvenskiy,” Rourke snarled. The rock beneath Rourke chewed up under the impact of the machinegun slugs, a small wound opening on Rourke’s left forearm as a rock chip impacted against it. Rourke stood unflinching, the pistols in his hands as the helicopter closed.
Rozhdestvenskiy was leaning out the cockpit door, a submachinegun in his hands, firing.
Rourke shoved both gleaming Detonics .45s ahead of him at arm’s length, then started to fire, first the right pistol, then the left, then the right, then the left.
The helicopter was still coming. The slide locked back on the pistol in Rourke’s right hand – empty.
Rourke, his lips drawn back over his teeth, shouted, “God Bless America!” The pistol in his left hand discharged, Rozhdestvenskiy’s body lurching, twisting, the submachinegun in the KGB colonel’s hands firing still, but into the helicopter.
The fire in the sky was rumbling toward Rourke as he started running toward the open hatch of the escape tunnel. He dove for the tunnel; the fire welled up and consumed the mountain, as it had the sky and the earth below….
SURVIVALIST #9 Earth Fire 1984
Sharon