Chapter 4 - The Sunrise ArmyBy six in the morning, the blizzard had vanished completely, leaving behind a sky of crisp, ruthless ice-blue.
The sun crested the frozen peaks of Pine Lake, casting a blinding glare across the blanket of white snow.
Surrounding Mara Ellis’s small cedar cabin was an terrifying display of private military force.
Eight heavy armored BearCat tactical vehicles formed a semi-circle around the clearing. Over thirty mercenaries dressed in winter urban camouflage stood behind snow barricades, their assault rifles mounted on bipods. On the frozen surface of the lake, two sleek black Eurocopter helicopters hovered like giant, predatory insects, their searchlights pinning the cabin in bright white beams.
In the center of the armored line stood Arthur Vance.
He was fifty years old, impeccably groomed despite the freezing cold, dressed in a tailored charcoal cashmere coat over a bulletproof vest. He held a high-powered tactical megaphone in his gloved hand, a cold, arrogant smirk playing on his lips.
“Mara Ellis!” Arthur’s voice boomed across the snow, amplified by speakers that shattered the wilderness silence. “I know you are inside! I know you are a decorated trauma nurse with no criminal record! You have ten seconds to step onto that porch with your hands above your head!”
Inside the cabin, Mara stood beside the boarded window, looking through a narrow seam in the wood.
Gabriel pulled himself to his feet, leaning heavily against the wall as he clamped a tactical belt around his waist. He picked up a secondary assault rifle recovered from the dead scout in the hallway.
“He won’t let you live even if you surrender, Mara,” Gabriel said quietly. “He can’t leave witnesses.”
“I know,” Mara said softly.
She looked down at her attire. She had replaced her blood-stained sweater with her heavy canvas winter coat. Over her shoulder hung a medical pack, and in her hands, she held her twelve-gauge shotgun.
“Stay here with Luca,” Mara told Gabriel. “I’m going to give him my answer.”
“Mara, no!” Gabriel reached for her, but she stepped back gracefully.
“Trust me, Gabriel,” she said, her eyes burning with terrifying focus. “I spent four years running from these monsters. I’m done running.”
Mara walked to the battered front door, unlatched the heavy wooden beam, and pushed it open.
She stepped out onto the snowy porch.
The morning sun caught her face. Her dark hair blew softly in the freezing wind. She stood alone against thirty rifle barrels, two helicopters, and an army of mercenaries.
Arthur Vance lowered his megaphone, chuckling softly as he took a step forward onto the snow.
“Wise decision, Miss Ellis,” Arthur shouted, his voice filled with arrogant condescension. “Send my brother and his bastard boy out, hand over the hard drive, and I might just let you live out your days in a federal witness protection program.”
Mara walked slowly down the three porch steps, stopping in the middle of the blood-stained snow where Gabriel had fallen the night before.
She looked Arthur directly in his cold, gray eyes.
“Four years ago, a seventeen-year-old boy named David Miller died in room 4B at Detroit Memorial,” Mara’s voice carried through the clear morning air, razor-sharp and unwavering. “He bled to death because your administrators blocked his surgery.”
Arthur frowned slightly, his smirk fading into annoyance. “What on earth are you talking about, woman? Hand over my brother!”
“You thought you bought everyone in this state, Arthur,” Mara continued, taking another slow step toward the armored line. “You thought power meant you could crush people, steal their children, murder their wives, and bleed cities dry without anyone ever standing up to you.”
Arthur’s eyes turned murderous. He raised his right hand, signaling his snipers on the ridge.
“I’m giving you one last chance, nurse,” Arthur sneered. “Where is my brother’s answer?!”
Mara raised her head, pulled a small black remote control from her pocket—a signal detonator pulled from the gear of the dead tactical scout in her hallway—and held it high in the air.
“This is my answer,” Mara shouted.
She pressed the red button.
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!
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A series of devastating smoke and explosive charges—set by Mara and Gabriel during the night using the dead scouts' breaching supplies—exploded simultaneously along the treeline and beneath the snow drifts surrounding the armored vehicles.
A massive wall of blinding white snow, black smoke, and deafening flash-bang shockwaves erupted across the clearing, plunging Arthur’s army into absolute chaos!
