Radio Hope (Toxic World Book 1) (18 page)

“Fight! Fight!” the scavengers shouted.

The Doctor made a gesture to the guards at the armory.

“Give them their weapons!” he called to them.

Another cheer. Marcus saw The Doctor waver and positioned himself behind him, putting a supporting hand on his back.

“That was none too soon,” Clyde said. “They’
re getting prepared to attack already.”

Marcus and The Doctor looked back out. Some of the bundles the slaves had been carrying were unpacked and they could see they contained
more belt ammunition for the machine gun and a series of metal plates. A group of men bolted these together and added wheels. The metal plating was pierced by a small square hole near the top and another wide rectangular one at the center.

“What’s that thing?” Marcus asked.

“A mantlet,” Clyde said grimly. “A portable bulletproof wall for that Gau-18/E.”

“Can our machine guns punch through that?” Marcus asked.

“Probably not. I bet their machine gun and the riflemen are going to lay down covering fire while the skinnies bring up the ladders and swarm us.”

“We’
ll give them some warm hospitality,” Roy said as he ascended the stairs. Several men and women followed him with lacrosse sticks in their hands. Each was supplied with a Molotov cocktail and more people carrying more Molotovs brought up the rear.

“OK
, everyone stay low behind the crenellations. Only fire out of the loopholes. We don’t want to lose anyone,” Clyde called out.

Oh, we’re going to lose people all right
,
Marcus thought.

They could see the white-robed man by the banner giving orders with wild gesticulations. His thin, high voice carried over to them in the dawn air. Marcus couldn’t make out what he was saying
.

“Doc, you better get inside,” Marcus said.

“I think not,” The Doctor said. He reached over to Clyde’s belt and pulled an automatic from his holster.

“You taking my sidearm?” Clyde said with a hint of anger.

The Doctor cocked an eyebrow. “You mind?”

Clyde grinned. “Kill a few cultists and I’ll forgive you.”

The men with the ladders and hand weapons arranged themselves in a mass at the front, just at the edge of the Burbs. Right behind came a line of riflemen. Marcus noted that many of the rifles were leveled at the crowd in front, not at the defenders on the wall. The machine gun crew wheeled the mantlet into position almost a kilometer away at the center of the empty marketplace, with the gun itself just behind and out of sight.

“We kill enough attackers and that machine gun won’t matter,” The Doctor called out. “They can’t take the wall with that. They can only take the wall with men. Aim well and wait for a good shot.”

Clyde was already hunched behind one of the raised portions of the wall, his assault rifle resting in the gun port, a tight grin on his face.

He’s actually enjoying this
,
Marcus thought.

Marcus peeked over the wall. He could see the high
priest, the one who sported a Jesus look, extolling his men. Other than his bodyguards few seemed to be paying him much attention, and with a flash Marcus realized that it wasn’t faith driving these people on, but a mixture of fear, desperation, and opportunism. The religion was just a veneer. He’d be surprised if one person in ten out there actually believed in it.

But damn that gu
y had created something rare. Marcus hadn’t seen a crowd this big under one command since the City-State Wars, and that was forty years ago. How did he do it? Marcus found himself wanting to sit down with this fellow for a few minutes, find out what made him tick. That sort of knowledge could be useful, especially trying to run this zoo.

Mr. Fake Jesus over there wouldn’t abide Abe and his cronies hiding away and slacking on their duty to defend the wall.

Clyde called over to the DShK-4 crew. “Give that machine gun a couple of bursts. See if you can punch through that mantlet.”

The crew of the tripod-mounted heavy machine gun took careful aim and fired. Marcus saw dirt kicked up in a line a little to the right of the enemy’s gun. The crew stopped, made an adjustment, and fired again. This time they hit. One of the enemy crew fell and Marcus saw sparks fly off the mantlet.

“Cease firing! Cease firing!” Clyde shouted. “It’s not getting through. You got first blood, though! Punched right through that guy’s Kevlar.”

A cheer broke out on the wall. The crew grinned and gave each other high fives.

“Don’t fire again until I give the word,” Clyde told them. “Your ammo is too precious to waste except on something important.” He turned to the crew of the M60. “As soon as they get into range, give them all you got.”

The crowd outside pumped their weapons overhead three times.

“Purity! Purity! Purity!”

The cult’s
machine gun roared to life. For a moment the air reverberated with the sound like a buzzsaw.

Then the gunners found their range. A terrific clanging no
ise battered at Marcus’ ears as countless rounds ricocheted off the metal wall. Not far from him a woman peering through a gun port got shot in the face and fell flat on her back. Another bullet punched through a weak spot in the wall and right through the thigh of a man who was crouching out of sight, thinking he was safe.

Everyone hit the deck.

The machine gun paused, then made another sweep of the wall. Marcus flinched as the clanging of bullets on the metal surface passed right by him. He opened his eyes, not realizing he had shut them, and saw another man a little further down pitch over. Once again the bullets had found a weak point.

They’ll find more
,
Marcus thought
.
Hell, they’ll
make
more.

Clyde must have had the same thought because he was screaming at a couple of men beside him to go fetch sandbags from the base of the wall and bring
them up.

The machine gun paused again, although Marcus knew by now that it was only because the gunners would take a moment to adjust their aim before making another pass. In that brief lull he heard another sound. For an instant he dismissed it as the ringing of his ears, but it sounded different.

It was the roar of a crowd.

Marcus dared to peek through a gun loop.

A mass of men was charging at the wall, bearing their spears and machetes high. Others carried ladders over their heads.

“Here they come!” Marcus shouted.

An instant later he had to dive back down as the machine gun spat out another deadly fusillade. A spot on the wall just inches from his face sprouted open, a finger-wide hole appearing in what he had always assumed was a bulletproof barrier.

There are bullets and then there are bullets
,
Marcus thought.

Clyde waved his hand at Roy, shouting something no one could hear. Roy nodded and signaled to the team he had assembled. Th
ey were divided into pairs, one with a lacrosse stick and another with a lighter or matches ready to light the Molotov cocktails. Roy himself gripped a lacrosse stick while his bouncer Frank stood by him as a loader.

Frank lit the end of the alcohol-soaked rag sticking out of the bottle in Roy’s lacrosse stick and Roy flicked the stick, launching the Molotov cocktail in an arc over the wall.
The others followed suit.

Marcus peeked out of the gun loop, ignoring The Doctor as he tried to claw him back out of danger.

A dozen Molotov cocktails smashed into the rocky ground in front of the wall, right in the midst of the swarm. Men fell in twisting flames. Others jumped back or veered to the side, knocking over those next to them.

The M60 got into the action, cutting a line through the tightly packed attackers.
The crowd convulsed like a living thing. It paused, wavered, then surged forward again. . .

. . .only to be hit b
y the next volley if Molotov cocktails. Flames flared all up and down along the line. The cult’s machinegun still hammered away, shooting forth so many bullets one actually caught a Molotov cocktail in mid air. It burst and lit. A sheet of flame settled on those below.

Marcus stared in wonder, forgetting the danger from the machinegun as he saw dozens of men screeching and rolling on the ground, trying to douse the flames. A few others, panicked, ran through the crowd trailing fire.

This time the crowd didn’t waver, but moved resolutely on. The machinegun stopped firing as a score of ladders clanked against the wall. The M60 stopped firing too. Its crew cursed and wrestled with it, trying to eject a jammed round.

“Rifles!” Clyde shouted.

The Head of the Watch led by example. Giving up the safety of his gun loop to another man, he stood between the crenellations of the wall and poured auto fire from his M16 into the thickest part of the crowd.

All up and down the wall other men and women opened up with their guns.
Marcus kept his own gun loop. He admired Clyde’s gung-ho attitude but lacked his Kevlar. He aimed into the surging mass of humanity beneath him and squeezed the trigger.

The gun didn’t fire.

He stared at his weapon. Something was wrong. He had stripped and cleaned it the night before. Clyde had inspected it.

Then he saw the safety was still on.

Cursing his stupidity, his snapped off the safety and aimed again.

The crowd was pressing against the wall to avoid the fire. Heaps of their comrades lay bleeding on the ground behind them. Marcus couldn’t angle down enough to get a good shot. Instead he aimed at the line of riflemen fifty yards away and fired.

As if that had been a signal those riflemen began firing back. A man right next to Marcus cried out and clapped a hand to his shoulder. He caught a glimpse of Ahmed dragging him away. Once again the defenders hid behind their protection to avoid getting hit. Those with gun loops fired at the riflemen, picking off several, but Marcus knew the real threat was coming up those ladders.

“Have some balls, dammit!” The Doctor shouted and stood up.

“No!” Marcus tried to stop him.

The Doctor, his sallow face twisted in rage, leaned over the parapet and emptied
his clip into the people below.

“Die, you throwbac
k motherfuckers, die!” He screeched down at them.

Marcus only managed to drag him back when he ran out of bullets.

“That was a damn stupid thing to do!” Marcus shouted at him.

“Was it?” The Doctor replied.

Marcus could barely hear him for the cheering. The scavengers had gotten a good view of his bravery and were roaring their approval. Most had retrieved their weapons from the armory and clamored to join them up on the wall. Several started coming up the stairs.

“Stop
! No strangers on the wall!” Clyde shouted. He pushed past the riflemen and Roy’s assistants, who were lobbing Molotov cocktails over the wall as fast as they could light them, and got to the top of the stairs. Two other citizens joined him. Marcus trailed behind.

“Why c
an’t we fight? This is our war too!” a scavenger said.

“No strangers on the wall!” Clyde repeated, almost panicking now.

“There will be fighting enough for everybody before this is all through,” Marcus added.

Another citizen got picked off and tumbled off the back of the catwalk.

“Who’s going to replace your losses?” the scavenger in front shouted over the gunfire.

Clyde hesitated for a second, then called out “Associates! Get some associates up here. You, what
syourname, you’re an associate, get on up here. And you, Lashonda, get up here too. Everybody, let them through!”

There was a scuffle on the stairs as people tried to get up, down, or simply out of the way.
One man tipped over the edge and landed hard on the ground below. Marcus pointed out a couple more associates and motioned for them to get up the stairs if they could. Scanning the crowd for more familiar faces, his gaze settled on a stranger.

Something about his look caught Marcus’ attention.
Maybe it was the wild eyes, maybe it was the tight grin.

Maybe it was the fact that he was looking right at The Doctor.

Marcus went cold.

With gripping clarity he saw the man raise a pistol.

“No!” Marcus shouted. He ran for The Doctor.

The pistol flashed. The Doctor clutched his stomach. Marcus got to him just as the scavenger let off another shot, this time grazing Marcus’ ear.

Then everything fell apart.

Clyde roare
d and opened up on the stranger with his M16, taking out him and several of the people around him. Scavengers started firing at the civilians on the wall. Men and women pirouetted and fell, or turned and poured fire on the scavengers.

And the
scavengers fired at each other too, blasting away at point blank range. Marcus spotted a group of scavengers move as a body toward the gate, mowing down the citizens guarding it. Clyde turned and concentrated his fire on them, only to get knocked off his feet a second later.