Push Back: A Post Apocalyptic Thriller (The Disruption Series Book 2) (26 page)

Beside Hunnicutt, Luke watched the mob flow down the fence line. “I’m not liking this. This looks way too coordinated for a rioting mob.”

“Agreed, but we’ll handle whatever they throw at us. Hopefully without a wholesale slaughter,” Hunnicutt said.

Luke looked due west at the sun nearing the horizon. “I’m not sure the intimidation factor is going to work, sir. The sun’s directly in their eyes now. They probably can’t see the machine guns that well. Should we fire a burst over their heads to give them a clue?”

Hunnicutt looked west then glanced at his watch. “Let’s not waste the show. We’ll wait till they all have a ringside seat and light ’em up. How many are loaded with tracer?”

“Every other gun,” Luke said, and Hunnicutt nodded.

They stood in silence and watched the mass of humanity flow against the chain-link fence, screaming and shaking fists and improvised weapons.

Louisiana Street

2 Blocks from the Perimeter Fence

Same Day, 6:50 p.m.

Banks stood in the street next to the technical, listening to the radio squawk and reduced to observer status as Reaper directed the operation. The technicals were spread evenly along the perimeter fence, one to two blocks back and out of sight from the fort walls. His own men, weapons concealed, were spread evenly at the back of the mob along the fence. They were anonymous faces in the crowd, with the bulk of the milling mass of screaming refugees between them and the guns of Fort Box.

All except for the baby gangstas. Fifty preteens were spread across the front of the mob near the fence, all volunteers eager to prove their worth to the UBN. The single qualification for their current task was sufficient strength to operate the bolt cutters they kept concealed in plastic garbage bags. They would strike at the first gunfire either from Fort Box, or if that was not forthcoming, from their brothers at the back of the mob. Their task was simple: cut the fence to ribbons along its entire length.

Banks glanced over at Reaper. “I don’t like this. We shoulda made the signal something else. Them soldiers can shoot any time; what if we ain’t ready?”

“What’s important is that the fence gets cut. Exactly when makes no difference. If we made the signal something else, half those little morons would miss it. This way, all they have to remember is ‘hear guns, cut the fence.’ Even they can remember that,” Reaper said. He narrowed his eyes. “And you let me worry about things like that. You’re starting to get on my nerves again.”

Banks fell silent, and Reaper looked down the street and grinned. A pickup approached, and Banks saw people in the bed. They were all women and children, refugees in ragged clothes with haggard faces. Their wrists were zip-tied, and terrified eyes showed over duct-taped mouths.

“Put them in the bed of the technical,” Reaper yelled to the driver of the arriving pickup. “Zip-tie ’em to the rack, standing up, and make sure they can be seen.”

Banks stared. “What the hell you doin’, Reaper?”

Reaper grinned. “That’s an unauthorized question, fool. But I’ll give you a pass, seein’ as how I’m in a good mood. That’s ‘enhanced armor.’ When it hits the fan, the technicals are gonna be priority targets, so I’m givin’ our heroes over there in Fort Box a little extra to think about before they pull the trigger.”

Reaper’s smile faded. “Now you ridin’ with me. So get your ass up in the bed of that truck before I put you in a dress and mount you as a hood ornament.”

Fort Box

Wilmington Container Terminal

“GIVE US OUR FOOD! GIVE US OUR FOOD!” the mob chanted in unison, those nearest the fence shaking the chain link in time to the chant. Luke looked on with growing concern as Hunnicutt swept the fence with his binoculars, then dropped them to hang on his chest by the strap.

Hunnicutt sighed. “I guess it’s time to offer a bit of discouragement, Major.”

“Yes, sir,” Luke said, raising the radio mic. “All tracer-loaded guns, repeat, all tracer-loaded guns, fire a short burst over the heads of the hostiles on my signal. Confirm. Over.”

He listened as each gun confirmed promptly; then he gave the order. “All tracer-loaded guns, execute. Repeat, execute.”

All along the wall, the guns barked, and fiery tracers shot out hot and straight, well over the heads of the screaming refugees. The chanting stopped at once, silenced by the fifty-caliber snarl. When the guns stopped scant seconds later, a deathly quiet fell over the fort and mob alike.

Like a hysterical person slapped back to sanity, the mob was shocked, and on the wall, soldiers held their breath, hoping this would end it. Hunnicutt raised the glasses again, scanning the faces pressed up against the fence, encouraged by what he saw. Maybe it would be this easy after all.

And then he saw an African-American boy perhaps twelve years old, perhaps younger, resolutely cutting through the chain-link fence with a pair of bolt cutters almost as big as he was. The cut was already two feet from the bottom of the fence and growing. Oh God, please not this, he thought, a lump in his throat. It took three tries to get the next order past his lips.

“Corporal Miles,” he said to the rifleman kneeling to his right, “there is a perimeter breach directly in front of us. Take him out. Now.”

Miles raised his M4, searching, then looked up at the colonel. “Sir, it’s … it’s a kid. I … I can’t shoot a kid.”

Hunnicutt’s voice was shaking, “That’s an order, Miles.”

“But, sir—”

“PERIMETER BREACH!” came a scream from down the wall, followed by a second, then a third.

Things seem to go in slow motion for Hunnicutt, and he felt a steely calm run through him. He put a hand down on Miles’ shoulder. “Take the shot, son,” he said softly. “This is on me, not you.”

The young soldier looked up with glistening eyes, bobbed his head once, and raised his rifle. The sound of the shot seemed to tear through Hunnicutt’s own heart. He shook it off and turned to Luke.

“Pass the order, Major. Weapons free. Repeat, weapons free. Anyone inside the fence is a legitimate target.”

The fence was fully breached in two dozen places before they got the situation neutralized. The mob reacted like a living thing, recoiling from the fence in panic, none even attempting to enter the newly opened breaks now blocked by dead children’s bodies. Hunnicutt ordered a cease-fire and crossed his fingers.

But it was not to be. He heard sustained gunfire behind the mob, and like a blind and wounded beast, the massed humanity surged back toward the fence and Fort Box beyond, charging without thought, reacting to the immediate pain. It crashed into the fence with a horrific scream, those refugees nearest the fence unable to prevent themselves from being pinned against it. Some, the lucky ones, were forced through the multiple breaches. Free from the crush of the mob, they looked fearfully towards the fort walls, raised their hands in surrender, and huddled near the groaning fence, unable to retreat and terrified of going forward. Hunnicutt ordered his men to hold their fire.

But it was only a matter of time. Gunfire continued to come from the back of the mob, though the exact source was impossible to ascertain. The fence was leaning along its entire length with the press of thirty thousand refugees. Blood dripped from the chain link as faces and hands and arms and legs were mashed into the wire, far beyond the limits mere flesh could endure.

And then it happened. At places the mesh separated from the poles, and in others the poles themselves toppled over, concrete foundations breaking free of the ground like uprooted trees in a windstorm. Whatever their pattern, the failures occurred in quick succession, and in seconds the perimeter fence ceased to exist. The mob flowed toward the defenders like a fast-rising tide.

And on the tide came sharks. The shooters drove the mob forward at gunpoint, more visible now, but always careful to stay close enough to use the mob as cover. As they cleared the battered remnants of the fence, the shooters ran forward, mixing in the terrified and milling crowd to turn their fire toward Fort Box.

What they lacked in accuracy, they made up in volume. Hunnicutt heard a grunt, and he looked down to see Miles down, blood flowing from a shoulder wound.

“IT’S BANGERS. THERE MUST BE A THOUSAND OF THEM!” Luke shouted.

“TARGET THE SHOOTERS,” Hunnicutt yelled.

Along the wall the defenders fired sporadically, coping with the near impossible task of differentiating between armed bangers and their human shields. The horrific roar of the battle increased, augmented by the sound of roaring engines and stuttering machine guns as the technicals burst from hiding and roared forward.

It was all about survival now, and every defender knew it without the need for orders or commands. The fire increased without regard to collateral damage as defenders began to fall. A machine gun fell silent, victim of sustained fire from two of the technicals. Another ceased to exist, hit by an RPG. The attackers’ strategy was obvious, and by unspoken agreement, the defenders turned their fire on the technicals.

And paused. There was a perceptible lull in defensive fire as the defenders saw the technicals’ ghastly human armor. But in the end, it could make no difference. Tracers streaked toward the technicals from the M2s and drew fire and RPGs in return. Riflemen pulled triggers again and again, tears rolling down their cheeks as their rounds tore through innocents to impact the monsters behind them. Each defender became an emotional island, the revulsion and shame at their own action fusing into a white-hot hatred of the bastards who forced them to it.

It lasted fifteen minutes—and forever. Here and there, a banger reached the wall with a grappling hook on a rope, but such penetrations were few and easily dealt with. In the end, the human shield strategy proved to be the attackers’ undoing. The mass of refugees was packed so tightly against the walls, the bangers behind them couldn’t reach the wall in any significant numbers. They found themselves a readily identifiable fringe at the back edge of the packed mob, and easy targets for the defenders. They fell in increasing numbers, and the more intelligent among them hid or dropped their weapons and burrowed into the safety and anonymity of the crowd.

When the attack stalled, the technicals changed tactics. Oblivious to the huddled refugees, they targeted their remaining RPGs at one small area at the base of the wall, hoping to force a breach. A half dozen explosions rocked the sidewall of a single container and opened a gaping hole. But the inside wall of the container held, and the surviving technicals fled the field. By dusk, it was over.

And the worst was just beginning.

Chapter Fourteen

Fort Box

Wilmington Container Terminal

Wilmington, North Carolina

Same Day, 10:30 p.m.

The guns fell silent in the gloaming, replaced by the heartrending cries of the dying and wounded. Hunnicutt forced himself to ignore it and concentrate on the tasks at hand. He ordered all available night-vision equipment spread along the wall and posted an overwatch. Anyone approaching the wall was labeled a threat and terminated. Anyone fleeing the huddled mass of refugees along the wall was allowed to leave unmolested unless they were armed, in which case they were to be terminated.

Those defenders without night-vision glasses worked by flashlight, assisting wounded comrades and carrying down the dead. They moved silently, on wooden limbs, and spoke in quiet monosyllables when they spoke at all, barely audible above the piteous cries outside the walls. More than one defender broke down and sobbed, and Hunnicutt had cotton balls brought up from the dispensary. They stuffed their ears and kept working.

***

Hunnicutt heard approaching footsteps and turned to see a flashlight bobbing toward him along the top of the wall. “That you, Luke?”

“Yes, sir,” came Luke’s voice.

“How bad?”

“Twenty-three, sir. Seventeen wounded and … and six KIA.”

Hunnicutt didn’t speak for a long moment. When he did, his voice had a detached, almost philosophical tone. “It sounds better somehow, doesn’t it? KIA, I mean. Somehow less final than dead. Noble somehow.”

Luke didn’t respond, and Hunnicutt shook himself out of his funk. “Sorry, Major. How about the wounded? Are any of them …”

“Three are critical, sir. Dr. Jennings doesn’t think one will survive the night, but she’s optimistic about the other two.”

Hunnicutt nodded, then realized Luke couldn’t see him in the dark. “Very well. Continue to rotate personnel on the night-vision glasses every two hours. Everyone not on watch should get some sleep. I have a feeling we’re going to need all the rest we can get.”

“Yes sir,” Luke said, but he didn’t move away. “What about … out there?”

The moans and cries of the wounded outside the walls had subsided into background noise, punctuated by sporadic shrieks of pain and the crack of M4s as armed bangers attempted to leave the scene.

Hunnicutt shook his head. “We can’t send anyone out there to help them until morning when we can reestablish a perimeter. We don’t know how many hostiles are still in the mob, and there are at least a half dozen technicals still out there somewhere. Anyone outside the walls would be sitting ducks. You know that.”

Luke sighed. “Agreed, sir. But with respect, I don’t think you should be standing here dwelling on it either. You need rest too.”

“I’ll be down directly, Major, but thank you for your concern.”

***

Despite his promise, Hunnicutt paced the wall all night, listening as the moans outside the fort faded. As if by agreement, his subordinates left him with his own demons. As the sky lightened in the east, Hunnicutt confronted the sight he’d been dreading. The carnage was even worse than he remembered. He sank down cross-legged on the hard steel of the container, buried his face in his hands, and wept.