The Winter Tyrant-Chapter 32: Winter Warfare Part I

Dean didn’t go to sleep that night. After having a few drinks with Katherine, he sent her to bed. She didn’t question his orders, she was after all being treated far better than she expected to be, especially after fully learning of the circumstances she had forced her way into.

Instead, Dean took a shower, sobered up, and then went back to his room where he equipped his gear.

He swapped out the 30-round mags in his pouches and replaced them with 45-rounders, and reached for the RPK instead of his AK-74m.

After switching his loadout, he got on the radio and sent out a call to all of his forces.

"This is Archon-actual, I need Phalanx Alpha and Beta to report to No-man’s-land ASAP. If you’re in the middle of a patrol, get Phalanx-Gamma to cover. This is an all hands on deck situation tonight. Oh, and bring your e-tools, over and out."

After saying this, Dean locked up his home and walked out the front door.

He met up at the rendezvous point internally designated as No-man’s-land. It was the area where the raiders had been surveying Paradise Falls the fiercest over the last few days.

And it was there that Dean met with two of his fireteams. The boys were equipped like soldiers, and stood there awaiting orders all the same. Which Dean was all too happy to give.

"Alright, listen up, because I’m only going to say this once. It is highly possible that tomorrow morning the enemy will be making its first assault. As you can see, the bodies are gone, which means they took them back. They know that we know they are here, and they are likely going to over-commit to a full frontal assault, relying on speed and numbers to take the town. So... We’re going to make them pay gravely for that impatience."

Daniel nodded in understanding, letting his rifle rest slung against his chest. He pulled his E-tool out of his bag and unfolded it.

"I take it we’re digging...."

Dean nodded and silently pulled supplies from his pack. Including, but not limited to compost briquettes, a campfire pot, a makeshift stove fashioned from a tin can, a fire starter, a bushcraft knife, and an e-tool.

In life he had always found that demonstration was better than simple description when it came to instruction.

He started by digging up the snow with his e-tool and packing it tight. In doing so, Dean quickly sculpted sharp and spike-like molds.

He then placed loose snow around him into a campfire pot that he placed upon a makeshift stove he had fashioned from a tin can, burning the compost briquettes he had made from his own toilet as its fuel source.

Only after the snow had effectively melted into water did Dean pour it into the molds he created moments before. After mere seconds of exposure to the sub-zero temperatures, the water hardened into ice. Where Dean then retrieved it and forcefully sharpened the ice with his knife.

Once the sharpened spike was in his hands, Dean handed it over to Daniel, who carefully held it with slight reverence in his eyes.

"We’re going to be making a lot of these tonight, and then burying them in pitfalls leading around the perimeter. Who needs landmines or bear traps when the winter itself has given us everything we need to defend ourselves?"

The boys stared at Dean in utter silence, dumbfounded by the ingenious nature of his design. Throughout the night they would build traps in strategic locations and conceal them from an unguarded eye.

The traps had been lain and now all that was required was to wait for the prey to walk into them.

---

The dawn rose the same it did every morning, but its light could barely be felt by the earth below.

Nevertheless, on the hour, the raiders began to move. Under normal circumstances, they would leverage the speed and mobility of their snowmobiles to rapidly assault the neighborhood.

Leveraging their firepower and makeshift incendiaries to force a surrender outright. And then plunder the area for its worth.

However, the enemy had proven that they knew of the enemy’s plans in advance. And because of this, the boss of the raiders ordered a rather unconventional assault.

He had given the order for his men to charge the neighborhood on foot. The men naturally didn’t make their presence known until they had actually spotted their enemy. Stalking through the snow, they wore a blend of conventional civilian cold-weather clothing and hunting camouflage patterns.

Some had hunting rifles others had more tactical carbines. Iron sights and optics were equally dispersed among the men.

But it wasn’t their loadouts that gave them the tactical advantage it was their numbers and disregard for civility that caused them to press forward with the belief that victory was certain.

They never noticed the drone overhead, lingering between the trees as it mapped their every movement.

There Dean watched the first of the raiders to fall a prey to his preparations. He stepped towards a larger pile of snow, hoping to conceal his presence beneath its boundary only to plunge three feet below into ice spikes coated in human feces.

His bloodcurdling screams filled the air, terrorizing those who could hear them, especially since shortly thereafter more and more joined suit.

"God help me! Oh, fuck... help! Please!"

The cries for aid were drowned out by the sudden concussive blasts of gunfire echoing in the vicinity.

Men dropped left and right as intersecting lines of fire cut them down. Dean himself lowered reached forward away from the drone controller attached to his plate carrier, and instead grabbed the automatic rifle resting on its bipod, aiming down its optic he began to spray controlled bursts of fire in support of his boys who were hidden throughout the battlefield.

The first wave of raiders was wiped out within the first fifteen minutes of the morning. Before, their boss and his inner circle had even finished brewing their coffee.