Dog Days of Summer (Damned of the 2/19th Book Four) - Finished

Resistance

McDaurn Family Farm

Lewis County, WA, USA

10 August, 1986

0938 Hours

They'd loaded us into separate cars after putting leather gags in our mouths and hoods over our heads, like we wouldn't know where we were going. The leather was old, folded mouth pieces with holes punched in the sides to allow the thongs that went around our heads and tied at the nape of our necks. Bindings on our feet, not allowing us to take full steps, and black bags to keep us from seeing anything, even though they had blindfolded us.

I knew the route, counted the minutes between each turn, kept my sense of direction about me the whole time. I knew where we were going, knew we were going to stop at the gate I'd blown through even before we did so.

"That didn't quite go like they said it would, did it, Niall?" Someone asked from the front seat as we pulled out of the hospital parking lot. I was chewing on the leather pad, grinding it between my teeth.

"No shit?" Niall was one of my cousins and was sitting next to me.

He went to say something else but I threw my body against him. Once, twice, the third time someone punched me in the back of the head, then grabbed my neck and pulled me tight.

"Goddamn it." Niall cursed. "These two assholes act like goddamn animals." He coughed. "I think he cracked one of my ribs against the door handle."

"You'll be fine." A deeper voice. One of the older uncles.

"Easy for you to say, Glendan, you aren't back here with a psychopath." Niall complained.

Uncle Glendan. Great. Former Marine Recon, four tours of Vietnam, Silver Star winner. A big man, tough as nails. I was surprised he was with everyone else, I would have figured he would side with my Father over the whole thing. He had always been kind to me, telling me often that eventually I would be a grown man and my childhood would not matter. It made me feel betrayed that he was in the car.

"It's his duty to attempt to escape our custody as well as make things as difficult as possible for us." Uncle Glendan answered. "If you give him the slightest option to enable the escape of the Texan or himself he will take it." Uncle Glendan chuckled, a harsh, merciless sound. "I've always said that everyone is underestimating that boy, and from what he did to you idiots should be proof enough."

Niall elbowed me in the gut, but whoever was holding me by my neck didn't loosen their grip. "We took both of them down anyway." The pad in my mouth was shredding and I swallowed a chunk of the leather that was juicy with my saliva, the dyes, and taste of leather.

Uncle Glendan laughed at that, a big booming laugh. "Almost thirty of you, and over half of you had to be carried to your vehicles. You got no idea what you're dealing with, do you?"

There was quiet for a moment. "What do you mean, Glendan?" Someone I didn't recognize asked.

"The tattoos on both them boys, they say a lot." Glendan answered.

...shit...

"They're just unit patches, so what?" The same person asked. I was tearing the pad up, chewing on it. The dye and what they used to tan the leather was making the broken teeth burn and ache.

"It's a Third CosCom patch, along with their Special Weapons graduating class number and their unit name: 2/19th Special Weapons Group." Glendan said. "Special Weapons training is intense as fuck, over half don't graduate."

Someone made a scoffing noise. "So he's Special Forces? Didn't seem like that from what his girl had been saying. His girl said he was just an ammo-rat, now you're trying to tell us he's some Special Forces heavy weapons guy or some shit?"