Freedom TM

approaching engines took center stage now, echoing off the outer face of the estate wall. Suddenly a booming wall of sound hit their eardrums—followed by a shower of sparks and flame. Quickly followed by several more sharp explosions and the screeching of metal.
    There were hoots in the ranks. “Yeah!”
    A flaming, twisted piece of wreckage slammed into the wrought-iron gates, knocking one gate off its hinges and filling the grillwork with fire. Another flaming wreck slammed into the first, toppling the gates completely. They crashed down onto the highway dividers, sounding like a xylophone tumbling down a staircase.
    “So much for our gates.” Through the flames Hollings could see that the claymores had taken out another dozen AutoM8s, which were burning in the ditches alongside the road.
    But there was now a veritable roar of racing car engines. The flames revealed dozens more cars coming in from the night.
    Just then a staccato
boom
echoed and tracer fire flicked out of the guardhouse—tracer rounds bounced off the distant prairie and metal wreckage. The M60 near Hollings opened up, too, as another sedan plowed through, smashing into the burning wreckage filling the arch and sending the whole pile over the highway dividers. The deafening crash washed over them, flaring into a brilliant fireball as the wreckage cartwheeled into the corner of theguardhouse. Another car blasted through. And another—which tumbled into the ditch alongside the road—partially blocking their field of fire to the gate.
    “Jesus H. R. Pufnstuf Christ!”
    “Priestly, put some arty on that road!”
    “All I’ve got is static, Captain. Comm just went down!”
    “Goddamnit, get on the landline in the guardhouse. And bring some fire down!”
    Priestly saluted and took off at a run toward the guardhouse. Flames and tracer fire silhouetted him against the surrounding blackness.
    Soldiers around Hollings were flipping up their night vision goggles. It was getting bright in the kill zone with all the flames.
    A rocket streaked out of the guardhouse window and disappeared through the gate opening. A flash and
boom
echoed out there. Another rocket raced in from the foxholes and detonated against the stone wall. Rock splinters blasted back, dinging against the Humvee fenders as Hollings ducked down. “Damnit!” He stood back up and had a much better view of the road now. Good thinking. They could build a new fucking wall….
    A whole row of SAWs on his right opened up through the new opening—tracers screaming toward the sound of a NASCAR race approaching them out of the darkness to the north. Ricocheting off of unseen targets. Another rocket raced out of the guardhouse. An explosion. The burning wreckage of a car knocked down a section of wall to the left of the gate.
    Machine-gun fire rattled from the extreme right and left flanks— out by the ends of the wall.
    “Keep on them! Keep firing!”
    Several more cars raced into the meat grinder, crashing into the barriers and pitching up. But by now the barriers were partially pushed aside or smashed in two.
    He could see Priestly racing through the guardhouse door. The guardhouse was starting to catch fire now. Soldiers raced up, pulling pieces of burning wreckage away from the wall. A Humvee with the .50 caliber on top roared past Hollings and slowed near the wreckage—nudging it from the building.
    “Good job, Lopez!”
    Lopez waved and opened up with the .50 into the maw of the gate. The deep, slow booming of the .50 was a kettledrum section to the crackling of small arms fire.
    Another rocket streaked out of the guardhouse and nailed a car on the approach road.
    Hollings looked around at the carnage. Good lord … Flaming wreckage littered the prairie. It looked like something from Revelation.
    The gunfire was crackling less intently now. Soldiers were changing drum clips. Barrels were smoking hot. Their field of vision was now the radius of light around the flames. Their night vision and FLIR scopes were useless so close to this light and heat.
    But the sound of approaching engines only got louder—and there was a deeper one among them. Hollings stood up and shouted. “Truck! Incoming truck!”
    Just then another two sedans smashed through the opening, and tracer fire ripped through them. One caught fire and tumbled over the foxhole nearest the road. Shouts and screaming. Nearby soldiers ran to help their trapped comrades.
    “Goddamnit!” Hollings could see Priestly