Life after Death: A Story of Survival 12/20/2011 UPDATE

[m249saw]

where is the moar

[walterde]

Thanks for the recent update. Its now Christmas in the story and it will be Christmas for real in a few short weeks. Maybe, just maybe Santa Shoedaddy can bring us an update if we are good.

[.357]

okay i've read all 26 pages, awesome work can't wait for another update!

[Shoe Daddy]

Merry Christmas everyone. Santa came earlier this year and brought with him a temporary end to my writer's block and I was able to produce MOAR. This is just part 1 of several so that I can break up the action into more manageable sections for what will be easily the largest battle scene I have attempted to write. I hope you enjoy the update and I will be writing more over my Christmas shutdown. As always feedback is welcome.



I couldn’t see. Too much blood covered my face. I couldn’t hear. My ears felt like they were plugged with wet cotton. I was freezing and soaked. The river wasn’t frozen due to the current. I was being pulled down by unseen hands into darkness, spots filled my unseeing eyes, I couldn’t breathe; I felt like I had been stabbed in the chest. My mind was racing with unanswered questions as consciousness slipped from my grasp. I am going to die.

Four Days Earlier

As I sat at the main table, I leaned back in my chair and watched everyone work intently on their own tasks. Karen caught my eye from the kitchen, flashed me a smile and went back to work canning the sauce from the previous nights’ meal. She had come a long way in our ranks, from enemy combatant to ally, I wasn’t ready to draw her into the friend zone just yet, but I was slowly beginning to trust her. I still needed to have a more formal debriefing with her about the Dragons, but after that ass-whipping they took from the Militia I gathered they were more focused on licking their wounds. As I sat fidgeting in the hard-backed oak chair, I chuckled to myself since I just realized I actually fit in the chair for the first time in my adult life (being fat was a bitch at times). Turning my attention back to the bridge, I called in assistance from Edd hoping that he could point out a few possible weak points for us to attach charges to. Honestly I did not want this bridge to come down, but with the Militia dug in on the other side of the road and a small town’s worth of housing and equipment available, I just couldn’t find a way to keep them off our ass. The occasional HMMWV might get through, but anything heavier would be impossible since the one-land bridges and low water crossings just couldn’t handle the weight.

Weak points were guessed on since none of us had a structural engineering background so to speak, settling on the east side supports on the riverbank and as far out in the middle of the bridge as we could reach. This would be the tricky part, since the water was low and the river hadn’t frozen over yet. Sarah came up the brilliant idea of using a weighted section of paracord thrown over the rebar under the bridge to pull up a ratty old backpack packed with fertilizer and one of the ten bricks of C4 we recovered and using one of the three electric detonators/primers we had. If it didn’t punch a hole in the bridge, it would make a massive weak point in the center and hopefully provide a breaking point if the river side supports could be taken out. Doing all of this unnoticed was also going to be tricky until Brian came up with the idea of a distraction: using a makeshift three-person slingshot to launch our last grenade into the trees on the outside of town from a boat on their side of the shore and slip back across the river to the vehicles and provide cover fire for the demo team. The charges were simple, but heavy and highly destructive: fertilizer (plus some extra chemicals I won’t mention online) molded into large bricks and packed into backpacks, suitcases, and duffel bags with a C4 kicker charge. This yielded us eight packs, with the largest two going to the underside of the bridge. The riverside charges would be set to electric primers, while the center charges would be attached to the only remote detonator we had, courtesy of the Militia. Our plan was to take three vehicles, one truck and two cars, to within a 1/8 mile of the bridge, via back road and running dark. The interior lights were taped over or removed as well as the brake and reverse lights, leaving us with only headlights since getting pulled over was no longer a concern. The main road was elevated over the surrounding area for flood control and would hide our vehicles from sight for the most part from any guards posted on our side of the river.

Edd would be our overwatch sniper, using my bolt action .308 to take out any guards on our side of the river, Brian was currently working on fitting it with a makeshift suppressor while Art worked on pulling the projectiles from 20 rounds and reducing the powder charge to make a subsonic round with plenty of knockdown power. Alex and Amy were elected to stay back and watch the house since his leg was still bothering him and Amy was unwilling or unable to pick up a weapon. Sarah, Emily, Karen, Art, Sam and myself would be on the demo team, placing charges and running like hell back to the safe point where the antique detonator was located and the wired blasting caps. We had wire aplenty and just enough blasting caps to set off the six riverbed charges, while I would carry the remote detonator for the center charges in my chest pocket. Brian would use a small rowboat to paddle across the river, launch the grenade, and paddle like hell to get back before the Militia got a clue and bring up the pickup to haul us back to the cars so we could turn tail and run.

We had the materials, we had the motivation, and we had a plan. Funny how it just never works out that way.

[Vinny76]

Just read the entire story and really enjoyed it. I'm from S IL and live in Marion now so it was very cool being able to relate to the places in the story.

I'm not sure if the board isn't working properly or what, because for me it ends on page 26, which was Dec 20th 2011.

[Tperkins]

Just read the entire story and really enjoyed it. I'm from S IL and live in Marion now so it was very cool being able to relate to the places in the story.

I'm not sure if the board isn't working properly or what, because for me it ends on page 26, which was Dec 20th 2011.

Nah, you got it right, there just hasn't been an update to this story yet.

Bump for an awesome story as always. Shoe Daddy, we really need moar.

[Shellyann36]

No MOAR story?

[salem85]

this is really great i love it pease update!!

[Shoe Daddy]

Holy crap. I forgot about this completely. No promises will be made, but I will try and get motivated and write more