Mercy (The Last Army Book 1) (27 page)

“This map you’ve found… it sounds too good to be true,” one of the militia commanders said through the radio. “I’m pretty sure the enemy wanted you to find it.”

Edward, Claire—the radio operator—and I crowded on the back of a small grey van at the rear of the assault. I leaned close to the radio, several poisonous words making their way up from my gut, but Edward pushed me away.

“Yes, I know it seems convenient, but they’ve got the whole attack mapped out,” Edward said, looking at the map. “I think we should take this seriously.”

“There’s no time left for caution,” the commander said. “We’ve got less than six hours of sunlight left. Carry on with the attack. Good luck.”

I shoved Edward out of the way.

“Fifty thousand raiders are waiting for us at the stadium, you idiot! We’re all gonna die because of—”

Claire flipped a switch on the console. “That’s enough.” She bit her lip.

I leapt out of the van and kicked one of its tires. Tears rolled down my cheeks. Arjun and the others had died for nothing. The people at the barricades had died for nothing. Soon thousands more would die for nothing, as well. Edward climbed down the van and walked toward me. I turned away.

“The commander’s right, Rebecca. It might’ve been a trap.”

I wiped my tears away before facing him. “I guess we’ll find out.”

***

I rode to the stadium in the radio van, sitting next to the back windows. Only brief firefights broke out along our route, the rattle of gunshots and the odd blast of explosives reaching us from a few blocks ahead. By the time we got to the scene of the attacks, only the dead and wounded remained, lined up on the sidewalk. Sometimes they were only a handful, other times a couple dozen. The raiders were thinning down our militia force before delivering the knockout blow at Citi Field.

I didn’t help repel the raider’s ambushes. Instead, I combined all the ammo in my half-empty magazines, almost topping off two of them. Counting those in my rifle, I had fifty-six rounds left, plus thirty 9mm rounds for my handgun. In theory, I could kill at least eighty-six raiders—not counting those I might slay with my sword. I chuckled at my wishful thinking.

Claire looked at me from her radio, pursing her lips and frowning.

I waved her away. “Sorry, I was just thinking of something silly.”

She turned back to her equipment and twisted a few dials—probably just acting busy to ignore me.

Eighty-six raiders.

A quick estimate of the odds against us turned my stomach. Less than twenty thousand people from the non-Christian camps entered the city. Being rather optimistic, maybe fifteen thousand fighters were left after taking the barricades. At least five thousand of those would have to head north, away from the stadium, in order to secure the bridges leading to Manhattan. So… ten thousand militia fighters against fifty thousand raiders. We’d each have to kill five enemies to break even.

I licked my dry, cracked lips and admired the view as we bounced along the fractured road. The city looked the way I felt. Gutted buildings, piles of debris, and entire city blocks consumed by the fires that had broken out after the earthquake—leaving only the charred skeletons of buildings—adorned the landscape. The smoke columns to the west indicated that the military had reached Manhattan right on schedule. Of course, the raiders at the stadium would hit them from the flank after taking care of us, so they’d probably end up dying for nothing, as well.

The van veered off the road and ground to a stop on the eastern bank of Flushing Creek, a little over half a mile east of the stadium.

“This is as far as we go.” Claire folded the raiders' map. “You probably want this. I’m… I’m sorry command didn’t believe you.” Her smooth hand trembled as she offered me the map. The bulges under her eyes were at least a couple of nights in the making.

“It’s all right—keep it.” I climbed out of the van. “If I’m right, and things go sour here, it might be of use to you. Take care.”

“Wait!” The radio operator chased after me. “You don’t have to go if you don’t want to.” She pointed to the van. “I’ve been on the radio all morning, and it’s a mess out there. Trust me, no one would know if you just walked away. If you’re sure it’s a trap, then… don’t go.”

I slung my rifle back and tried to give her a hug. She took a step away. I smiled, looking down at my bloodstained, stinking clothes.

This is what I want. This is who I am. I can’t run away from this.

“Maybe you’re right; maybe I should just leave, but… I don’t know, I guess I still believe.” I dangled the cross on my necklace.

It wasn’t a complete lie. Though I couldn’t stop thinking of how we’d all die for nothing—and kill for nothing—deep down I still wanted to believe that in the end everything would be all right… that a benevolent God up there in the sky would make all the spilt blood mean something.

The young woman sighed and looked from my cross to the smoke pillars rising from Manhattan.

“I used to believe, but after all that’s happened, I just can’t anymore.” She looked back to me with tears in her eyes. “That’s why I’m here. I got kicked out of the place where I was staying a week ago for suggesting that maybe God is evil. What about you? If you still believe, why aren’t you with the pastor’s people?”

“That’s a long story,” I said, scratching my grimy head. “I’m not sure that God is evil, though.” My throat tightened as I remembered the dead children, lying on the street. “I think it’s us. All of us—we’re the evil ones. Maybe we’re the bad guys in this story.”

Three thousand militia fighters assembled in front of the Van Wyck Expressway, ready to attack Citi Field from the east. I and around seven thousand others gathered at the train station just a thousand feet south of the stadium’s main entrance.

I’d been to the stadium a few times before, whenever my dad was in the mood for some father-daughter bonding that didn’t involve a violent movie. Although the façade’s tall brick arches—which I always thought were cute, like a modern version of the Coliseum— had survived, the stadium seemed sad and empty with its light towers, billboards, and signs knocked down by the earthquake. Every single window had been shattered.

A short wall of rubble—about three feet high—ran around the parking lot, no more than five hundred feet in front of us. Instead of cars lined up in the parking lot, small shacks stood next to each to each other in rows, made out of multi-colored pieces of cars’ sheet metal and other scavenged materials, welded or riveted together—perhaps some sort of makeshift housing.

Raiders popped up from behind the rubble barrier every now and then, taking a glimpse of our troops massed behind the busted remains of the train station’s buildings. There couldn’t have been many more than two thousand raiders. My chest lightened with cautious optimism. I gave the cross on my necklace a quick kiss, inspired by the hum of prayer around me, but directed a feeling rather than a prayer to God.

Please, please, please.

Whistles rang out to spur the charge, but I stood my ground. I didn’t run forward until the screaming wave of militia was halfway to the enemy.

The crack of gunfire lasted less than a minute. Brick and dirt shot into the air from the blast of homemade explosives. The battle cries redoubled, and the militia spilled over the barricade and into the parking lot. They rushed toward the stadium in packed columns, charging between the rows of metallic shacks. I leapt over the bloodstained debris. The corpses of the defenders were slumped against it on the other side.

I smiled.
Maybe I was wrong…

The crest of the assault wave was two hundred feet away from the stadium’s main entrance when raiders emerged from the top and between the arches, raining automatic fire and dozens of Molotov cocktails down on us. I froze in place, gasping, my legs weighed down by fear and shock. The front of the charge tumbled down, torn apart by the raiders' bullets. Pillars of fire and smoke rose from within our ranks as the Molotov cocktails burst on the ground. Hundreds flailed around, covered in flames and squealing in agony, spreading chaos in our vanguard.

The raiders perched up high shifted their fire to the rear of our assault, pouring bullets down the corridors between the makeshift structures. I dove behind one of the shacks to avoid the gunfire and pressed my trembling body against the warm sheet metal—bathed by the afternoon sun.

A length of rusty chain and a heavy padlock lay on the ground beside the shack’s narrow entrance. I ventured a peek inside and found only a few pieces of cardboard on the ground, as well as the potent stench of urine, sweat, and excrement. Anger and sorrow swelled inside me as I remembered the cages the raider captured by Martin and me had spoken of. Could my parents have been in one of those cages? Could they be nearby?

I peeked around the cage, aiming my rifle at the raiders firing down on us. My hands shook from the gunshots and shouting around me, but four raiders had plummeted to the fractured concrete around the stadium by the time I’d emptied my magazine. The rest of the militia fighters hiding behind the cages gathered their nerve and popped from behind their flimsy cover to shoot at the raiders, as well. The redbrick arches on the stadium’s façade were soon pocked with bullet holes, the limbs of enemy fighters swinging lifelessly from their elevated platforms.

A distorted battle cry rang out from inside the stadium, drowning even the sound of gunshots. A torrent of raiders poured out of the entrances like thick, squirming snakes, thousands upon thousands, gunning down and trampling over the militia forces in the parking lot. I quickly climbed on top of the cage, cutting my hands on the jagged sheet metal, and lay flat on the roof to fire off another magazine at the incoming horde. It was like scooping water out of the ocean.

The battered militia broke ranks and fled. Many tossed their weapons aside as they ran, weeping and screaming. The few brave—or shocked—enough to stand their ground were steamrolled beneath the advancing raiders. The metallic cage I lay on clattered as if struck by hail as raiders fired on me. I rolled off the roof and ran along with the rest of the militia.

The raiders pursued like a tempest sweeping in behind us in a storm of pounding boots, barking rifles, screams, cries… and cheering. I cleared the barrier around the parking lot in two strides, crouched behind it, rammed the last magazine into my rifle, and peeked at the approaching enemy. Raiders kept pouring out of the stadium. Those in the front of their counter attack shot the militia in the back and slugged or stabbed the ones left agonizing on the ground. Maybe five thousand of us were left alive, fleeing to stay that way.

It can’t end like this. Not like this.

Tears welled in my eyes. I gritted my teeth until blood poured from my wounded gums and climbed onto the barrier, facing the raiders.

“Fight! Fight! Fight, you cowards!” I screamed, spraying blood with every word, and fired my rifle at the tide of enemies only two hundred feet away.

The recoil of sixteen shots hammered my tender shoulder in a few seconds. The raiders had advanced a hundred feet. I dropped the rifle and drew my pistol. Militia fighters gathered at my feet, firing from behind the barrier. By the time I raised my handgun, our forces were firing at the enemy charge all along the three-foot-high mound of dirt and chunks of building material, leaving only a few gaps for the rest our troops to escape the parking lot.

The raiders' attack was blunted by the torrent of gunfire, with many rushing for cover like cockroaches in the light, knocking each other down. But the raiders at the back pressed on.

I emptied my handgun down on the frenzied horde and drew my sword with a cold, stiff hand. I screamed to spread the fire raging in my gut. “Let’s kill them all!”

The militia charged over the mound and threw themselves upon the enemy assault wave. Before I could slash my sword downward, the raiders crashed onto us like a tsunami. I grabbed the stock of a rifle, burying my nails into the wood as a raider tried to thrust it into my stomach. I twirled my sword in my right hand, aiming the blade downward, and stabbed the raider’s shoulder over and over as if with an icepick, holding back each blow so the blade wouldn’t get stuck in his body.

The raider fell, and another took his place. Our battle line, less than fifty feet deep, faced a mass of enemies that stretched all the way to the stadium’s entrance, almost three hundred feet away. Still, in the clutches of the melee battle we had a chance of killing the raider in front of us if nothing else.

Cries and shrieks surrounded me. Sweaty skin and bloody clothes pressed against me. I stabbed down with my sword, holding back kitchen knives, fists, and even baseball bats with my left hand, clawing at an enemy’s eyes whenever I could. Stab, stab, stab. My sword gleamed red with blood under the sun. I advanced one foot and was pushed back two. The militia fighters behind me pushed me forward. I gained back the lost foot, stepping over a carpet of butchered people in front of the rubble barrier. Some of them moaned, still alive.

Hands grabbed at me—at my arms, at my collar, at my face. I opened my mouth, screaming, and bit down on exposed skin. The metallic taste of a raider’s blood flooded my wounded mouth.

For a fraction of a second, what I’d learned in school about HIV and AIDS flashed into my mind. I bit harder until the raider yanked away his hand, wailing, and I rammed my sword through his throat. Unprotected murder.

Pain flared up from my broken nose as a raider grabbed my face. I tried to raise my sword to stab her, but hands tugged on my sleeve. Bony fingers clutched my left hand. I swung my head away, which heightened the pain but released the raider’s hold on my face. With tears clouding my eyes, I smashed my forehead against her face. Both of us screamed. She staggered backward. A deafening shot rang out to my left, next to my ear. Blood splashed on my clothes. I gasped for air, feeling the burn of exhaustion in my chest and arms, and buried my jagged nails into the hands grasping my right sleeve. Upon freeing my sleeve, I unleashed a flurry of stabs. My heavy, blood-drenched shirt slapped against my skin. Black dots popped up in my sight. My legs wobbled.

“They’re surrounding us!”

“Run!”

I turned my face to the right, toward the shouts. A column of raiders charged our right flank. What little remained of the three thousand militia fighters attacking from the east scattered in the distance. The mass of raiders in front of us roared and pushed against us, gritting their teeth in one final effort to kill us all.

I staggered back and crashed onto the rubble. Two raiders held down my arms and legs. A third loomed over me with a hunting knife in his hand.