Page 16 of Knocked Up in Alaska

Chapter Five

“All right men. Stay loose. Stay focused. Mind on the mission.”

Ford pushed his goggles to his forehead, squinted at the bright morning sun, and ignored Mad’s pep talk. His teammates, geared up similarly by chance rather than by plan in camo pants and dark-colored T-shirts, did the same. The temperature hovered at a civilized fifty-nine degrees. Winds remained low. Visibility excellent. Optimal conditions for this morning’s battle, but none of it mattered. The “mission” had gone FUBAR the moment Izzy had picked their team. Wing, Mad, and Trace just didn’t know it yet. Archer? He glanced at the man who looked like what might happen if David Beckham and Brad Pitt somehow produced a son and then dropped him full grown into a war zone. Yeah, Archer knew they were fucked.

Wing emerged from a hedgerow, jogged over, and dropped a dark-blue duffel bag at his feet. Inside, CO2 cartridges clinked together. “The girls are armed. Men, choose your weapons.”

Trace knelt and unzipped the bag. “Flag’s in place?”

Wing nodded. “Flag’s planted at the agreed-upon location.” He made air-quotes around “agreed upon,” because he’d voted to put the flag at the top of the highest totem pole in the Captivity sculpture garden, which would have effectively made Bridget their only target since the other two members of Team XX had never climbed the thing. Trace, Archer, and he had vetoed the idea on the grounds that they didn’t want to win by forfeit or broken neck.

“Okay. I’m on my way there.” Mad lowered his mirrored aviators, then lifted the airhorn he held and aimed the red funnel end north, in the direction of the pole. “Gentlemen, your start points are equal distance from the flag. When you hear the horn, it’s go-time. Make me proud.”

Unlikely, but Ford held his tongue. Trace, still kneeling by the gun bag, let out a disgusted grunt.

“Problem?” Archer asked.

“Two problems, actually. My sister’s evil, and you”—Trace glared at Wing—“are a dumbass.”

“Me?” Wing’s mouth dropped open. “Why?”

“They took all the good guns. Do you see this shit? Left us with one Tippman A-5 semi-automatic, Sniper Edition—”

“That’d be mine,” Ford said and held out his hand. Trace slapped the long, black, rifle-style paintball marker into it and tossed him a CO2 cannister. He screwed the cannister into place and then, out of habit, commenced a weapon check.

“And two of these,” Trace continued, holding a bright orange Splatmaster, pump-action marker in each fist.

“It’ll work,” Archer said and took one.

“It’s a fucking kid’s toy.” It looked all the more so in Trace’s huge hand. The big man stood, opened the hopper on his Splatmaster, and started pouring ammo in. “No cartridge. Low impact. Low accuracy.”

“Shoots up to a hundred feet,” Archer offered and filled his hopper from the ammo tube Wing handed him. “Accuracy depends on the shooter.”

“Bridget’s accurate,” her brother warned.

Fully loaded, Archer pumped the chamber of his gun. “I’m aware.”

“And she’s probably chosen something SA, with real range.”

“Well, that just cements our strategy,” Archer noted. “You take left flank, I take center, Ford takes right flank and heads directly for the high ground and the bird’s eye view of the flag. Bridget’s our primary target, because she’s probably their sniper, and if she gets into position, we’re fucked.”

They were fucked, regardless, but just to figure out how badly, he loaded his hopper and asked, “Can city girl hit the side of a barn?”

“That’s a known unknown,” Trace replied and lowered his goggles over his eyes. “I can tell you she’s never owned a gun, but they’ve had a week to practice, and they’ve used it. She refused to divulge her marksmanship.”

“Amateur.” Archer smirked as he lowered his goggles and pulled on a ballcap, turned it backward to protect his neck. “You should have popped a cork on her favorite wine, loosened her tongue, and charmed the intel out of her.”

“Hey, I popped, loosened, and charmed her with something a hell of a lot more powerful than wine, and I’m telling you, she’s a vault when she wants to be.”

Ford shrugged. “I’m sure she appreciated your efforts—”

“I guarantee she did,” Trace interjected.

“—no matter how ineffective they proved to be.”

The burn earned impressed, “Ooohs,” from Wing and Archer. Even Trace grinned. “Hey, it’s not my fault she loses the power of speech when I—”

The blast of the air horn cut the conversation short. Ford fitted his goggles into place, flipped the gun’s selector switch from safe to semi, and took off in a crouched jog along a line of hedges to his sniper spot at the crest of a hill with a strategic view of the flag. Even with his mind focused on that goal, he stayed alert. If their strategy held, he was the most likely to encounter Bridget because she’d be running for the same spot.

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