[JMars71]

Entry #8

It's been two days since my last entry. We decided to stay another night at the bolthole ... to stretch our limbs, relax the muscles and just chill.

Flynn wasn't unable to "hijack" the M.P. satellite he'd linked up with, but did manage to take over a bit of it's memory ... from what he called "email". He says it will immediately register to anyone linking up with the satellite, so if anyone does they'll see it, get the message he left, and we'll be able to communicate. Good boy!

We're at that gas station plaza on Forbidden Plateau Road as I write this. You remember, the one we were attacked at on our first day. Well, we were just ambushed again. And by the same gang of "Road Warrior" rejects as before. Except this time there wasn't just 4 of them. As we neared the old gas station, rounding the bend in the path, we noticed what appeared to have once been an old school bus, stripped down to the bare bones and tarped over, parked across the path up ahead some 100 meters.

We knew it was a trap, Percy and I, but ... we didn't know what to do exactly. I had Deena pull my Scout out from the rear and up alongside Percy's, and then we both got out while Deena and Mark manned the MAGs. Percy was going to scan the area with his binoculars and then the two of us we're going to move in, but no sooner had he spotted someone laying on their belly behind the bus then gunfire erupted from out of the trees on either side of the road! Small calibre and nothing our armour couldn't handle, but getting shot at is getting shot at! We returned fire ... BIG time ... and Percy lobbed a couple of grenades. Man, I nearly crapped my pants when he had just pulled the pin on one only to suddenly collapse when a round hit him in the ankle! To his credit though he managed to hold onto the thing and get it gone.

There were at least 8 attackers when all hell broke loose, but there was a lot of movement in the bush, and in the end 4 more were making their way, brazenly, up the road towards us as they fired their small calibre bolt-action rifles. Mind you, it seemed like we were getting the worst of it. I took a shot to the ankel as well. And both Mark and Deena went down hard. I figured they were dead for sure anyway, but as it turned out, Deena just took a graze that knocked her out. As for Mark, he got off "easy" too with only a cracked cheekbone and his ear shot off.

It was actually Houdin that ... I guess he saved us. Spurred on by Alison, and her desire to get to Mark and Deena, he climbed out of the V150, laid down some smoke, and it just seemed like from there the tide began to turn. There was some pretty hideous screeching, ie. in pain, coming from inside the treeline, the movement began to die down, and before long ... things went quiet entirely.

But just before that ... man, I tell you, they almost got the V150. A couple of them had managed to circle in behind us and would've taken it if Flynn hadn't have put two slugs in the face of the first one to look in the entry hatch. Good thing Jack had given him that handgun. Anyway, Flynn took a round to the chest from the second -- yes the kid had standard MP body armour too, fortunately -- but Grace took him down with her SMG. Not a nice tight cluster either. She said she just stuck the gun out of the hatch and let'er rip when she saw Flynn get hit.

A couple of them managed to get away. We heard the bus start up (sounded like crap) and drive away behind the cloud of smoke Houdin had laid down. At a glance I count about 9 or 10 visible on or along the road. And I'd say there are up to as many more dead, or soon to be, hidden in the bush. I know I shot at least 3 in there.

Wow ...

Oh! Looks like we're ready to roll! Later.