Chapter 6 - The Chaos in the Snow
Tomas screamed in agony, stumbling backward and dropping his weapon in the snow.
Blood poured instantly from his shattered nose.
Sophia did not freeze in fear.
She sprinted toward the porch with incredible speed.
"Fire!" Tomas roared to his men, clutching his ruined face.
Santiago raised his assault rifle and unleashed a massive wave of suppressive fire.
He aimed precisely, dropping two of the advancing mercenaries before they could pull their triggers.
Sophia dove behind the thick wooden railing of the porch just as bullets shredded the wood above her head.
Santiago grabbed her by the collar of her pajamas and dragged her inside the cabin.
He slammed the heavy door shut and locked the steel deadbolts.
Bullets began tearing through the walls, shattering the windows into thousands of deadly fragments.
"Get to the cellar!" Santiago yelled over the deafening noise.
Sophia crawled rapidly across the floor toward the kitchen.
Ruby threw open the hidden trapdoor from below and reached her hands out.
She pulled the terrified girl down into the dark, damp earth.
Santiago continued to fire out the windows, holding the attackers back.
He knew he was hopelessly outgunned.
He had two magazines left, and there were at least ten heavily armed men outside.
He retreated toward the kitchen, covering his tracks with relentless gunfire.
He threw himself down the trapdoor just as the front door of the cabin was blown off its hinges by a breaching charge.
He slammed the heavy wooden grate shut and locked it from the inside.
The root cellar was pitch black and smelled of dirt and old potatoes.
Ruby was holding Sophia tightly, whispering soft, comforting words to her.
Santiago turned on a small tactical flashlight, casting a dim beam across the small space.
"They are going to burn the cabin down to flush us out," Santiago warned them.
He walked over to a seemingly solid brick wall at the back of the cellar.
He pushed hard on a specific brick, triggering a hidden mechanical latch.
A section of the wall swung open, revealing a dark, narrow tunnel.
"This leads to an old mining cave half a mile away," Santiago explained.
They hurried into the tunnel, leaving the sounds of the men tearing the cabin apart above them.
They walked for nearly an hour in the cold, claustrophobic darkness.
They finally emerged into the freezing morning air, completely exhausted but alive.
Sophia tugged frantically on Ruby's sleeve.
Ruby shined the flashlight on the girl's hands.
Sophia signed a rapid, terrifying message.
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Ruby looked up at Santiago, her face completely pale.
"She says Tomas wasn't the only one in the room when your father died."
