State of Rebellion (Collapse Series) (18 page)

“If you’re right,” he says, “then we need to pull back and reassess. We were prepared for five thousand, not ten thousand or anything more.”

Another mortar round. Another blast of artillery fire.

“That thermo graphic camera they’re looking at in Jeff’s platoon isn’t showing us everything,” I say. “Omega’s not stupid. They can find ways to cloak their numbers.”

Chris sets his jaw.

“We’ll hold our position here a little bit longer. If things go-”

His words are drowned out. A ball of flames streaks right into the ditch. It happens in slow motion. I see what’s going to happen before it even does. A group of men dive for cover as Chris throws his arm around my waist, pushing me behind him. We drop to the ground. All I feel from that point on is a wall of pressure. Like getting sacked by a three hundred pound linebacker. I can’t breathe, I feel heat and thousands of tiny fingers tear at my skin.

Chris is shielding my body with his. I squeeze my eyes shut, nothing but the harsh ripping sound of the explosion turning to a high pitched ringing – and then silence. After a few beats – minutes, perhaps seconds – I barely manage to lift my head off the ground. Dust and smoke permeate the ditch, turning me almost blind. I can’t hear anything. I am deaf to the
world around me. Something hot and wet slicks down the sides of my neck. Blood. My eardrums have burst. Chris rolls into a crouch, looking far more balanced than I feel. His neck is covered in blood, too.

“Pull back!” he mouths.

I rise to my feet and fall back down, my legs shaky. My heart is pumping way too fast. I’m dizzy, and as I stumble to the side of the ditch, I fall over the dead body of one of our own. His body is twisted at an unnatural angle, the side of his face burned, skin sliding off bone. I have never seen anything so horrifying. I gag and fight the urge to vomit.

“Pull back!” I yell. I can’t hear my own voice, and that is somehow the most disturbing thing about this situation. “Pull back!”

Dear God. How did they get so close?

They must have sent mercenaries ahead of the troops in small enough forces to go undetected and unnoticed, slip behind our lines and cause insane chaos. Disrupt our organization.

Stop thinking, just move!
I tell myself.

I can feel the detonations of other mortar rounds. Our men are slowly pulling back, but in my opinion, leaving the ditch could be more deadly than staying. The ditch is what’s keeping us from being fried as mortars explode around the hillside.

Even as these thoughts pass through my head, I look up and catch glimpses of movement in the grassy hillside to the sides of the ditch. Air support is already streaking through the air, our Blackhawks moving like hulking, airborne ships,
keeping the enemy ground forces from getting too close.

“They’re ambushing us!” I yell, as if anyone can actually
hear
me.

Or maybe ambush isn’t the correct term. Maybe
guerilla warfare
are the words I’m searching for. Because that’s what’s happening, isn’t it? These small Omega mercenary forces are using our own tactics against us.

I hadn’t counted on this.

I’m sure other people did, but honestly, this wasn’t supposed to happen. Just like we weren’t supposed to get ambushed in Sanger during our last attack.

The influx of the mercenary forces makes it impossible for us to stay here. Our soldiers start pulling back, scrambling up the side of the ditch, ducking into the undergrowth, running
back towards the platoons ensconced in the safety of the vehicle convoys. I climb up the ditch, too, stopping at the top to see where Chris is. In true leadership form, he’s waiting until the last soldier is out of the hole until he climbs up. My heart seizes in my chest as he makes his way towards me. I pray that he’ll make it to the top.

Please, please, please…

He does.

“Cassidy, keep
moving
,” he yells, breathless.

I move out of my crouch and run with him, away from the ditch. The telltale sound of bullets whizzing through the air make thwacking noises against the dirt and shrubbery.

This is all too familiar. Here we are again. On the run.

It seems to take an eternity to reach Jeff’s vehicles. They are huddled into a tight circle, reminiscent of the rings pioneers would form with their wagon trains to withstand Indian attacks. Chris and I slip inside the ring, literally sliding into the open end of a Humvee. Bullets ping off the armor.

Chris and I are both covered in blood. We must look horrible.

“Rivera, we need backup,” he yells into the radio.

I hear a strange sound, like pressure rising in a glass bottle. A loud pop hits the inside of my brain and I can suddenly hear again. “Whoa,” I mutter. “Weird.”

“Rivera, do you copy? Over.”

“Alpha One this is Rivera, over,” the radio crackles. “I can’t send backup in there, get yourself out. You’re in a hole.”

“We need backup
now
,” Chris growls. “My men are
dying
.”

“I’m sorry, but that’s a negative.”

My heart drops to my stomach. Why wouldn’t Rivera back up the militia? Getting out of here is going to be a lot harder without…I grab the radio on my belt.

“Sundog, this is Yankee, over,” I say.

The vehicle suddenly lurches forward and the convoy starts moving, retreating from the area. The mortars and gunfire are going wild outside. I clutch at the door handle for support as the Humvee crashes over a bump, heading downhill.

“Yankee, this is Sundog,” Manny replies. “What seems to be the problem?”

“We’re boxed in. We need your help.”

“Of course you need my help. Rivera’s not good for anything, now is he?”

“Just
do
something!”

Two minutes pass. Two
long
, painful minutes. It’s impossible to hear anything over the roar of engines and the constant smattering of detonations, but I know the exact instant when Manny arrives. The peppering of bullets on the left hand side of the Humvee suddenly drops off. I press my face against the window and tilt my head up, straining at the sky. Manny’s biplane is ridiculously low, sweeping over the hillside, too close and too fast for anybody to really react. His little biplane is outfitted with modern weaponry and I can almost see Manny’s flight
cap blowing back in the wind as he takes another dive.

He’s brave.

Or crazy. One of the two.

Probably just crazy.

“He’s just in time,” I say.

“He’s insane,” Chris replies. “Thank God.”

No kidding.

What the hell is Rivera’s problem?
Denying
us backup? Whose side is he on?

As the convoy continues to move, my body is still buzzing with adrenaline and shock. It’s keeping my senses sharp, keeping any pain from seeping into my body. Something has gouged out a bloody gash in my shoulder. Shrapnel, maybe? Whatever it is, I can’t feel it yet. But I will. Later. If I’m still alive.

“Hey, what the hell happened?”

Jeff swings his head around from his spot on the front seat. I hadn’t even realized that he was inside the vehicle until now.

“Omega sent guerrilla mercenary forces out ahead of their ground troops,” Chris replies. “
That’s
what happened. How come none of our scouts or our cameras picked this up?”

“Maybe somebody hacked our system,” Jeff suggests. “Maybe-”

Bam
.

Something explodes right in front of our Humvee. I scream as the vehicle jerks upward and flips sideways, slamming down on its roof. My head smacks against metal as flames ignite around the car. I am unable to move for a few beats, dazed and shocked from the brunt of the impact. I move slowly to orient myself, crawling
on hands and knees as my head spins. The scene around me melts like hot wax, fading, fading…

Stay conscious!
I scream at myself.
Don’t do that!

I force myself to remain awake, a physical effort that my body fights. I look up, head throbbing. Gasoline, oil…something must be leaking. We have to get out of this vehicle. Now.

“Cassie, come on, do what I do,” Chris instructs, flipping himself over. The driver is kicking frantically at his door while Jeff’s head lolls to the side. He’s out cold. Great.

“You get Jeff!” I yell. “I’ll get the door open!”

Chris moves towards his unconscious brother while I pull on the door handle. No dice. It’s jammed into the dirt, stuck. I kick and kick at
the glass, but the windows are too small to climb through, anyway.

“Chris…” I say. “There’s no way out!”

Chris drags Jeff’s body from the front seat, resting his boots against the side door. He crawls into the rear of the vehicle, pulling a crowbar out of the equipment area. He uses it to pry the door open, his strong arms doing the work that I couldn’t.

“You first,” he says. “Get out and find cover. Do
not
stop moving.”

I don’t hesitate. I crawl on my hands and knees across the upside down cab, pulling myself through the door, slicing my hands on the shards of glass. I stay low to the ground and turn around, taking Jeff’s shoes, helping yank him through the opening. Chris bears the brunt of his brother’s weight as we drag him outside. The
driver follows us out the window, and for the first time today I realize that I know this man. Uriah. He was the sentry guard at Camp Freedom.

“Uriah?” I say, dazed.

He doesn’t respond. I follow his line of sight. The Humvee in front of us has been totaled, a twisted mass of metal and flames. To the right is a slope covered in thick brush and trees. We slide down the dirt embankment, taking Jeff with us. We stay on our stomachs beneath the foliage as I frantically attempt to wake Jeff up. He’s slowing us down.
Wake up, wake up!

I feel the panic begin to creep in.

Keep it together. Stay calm. Come on, panic is what gets people killed.

Rivulets of sweat slide down my forehead, slipping behind the collar of my jacket. I’m soaked in the stuff, sticky with blood, dizzy with fear. As I raise my head just enough to see over the bushes, I can only watch in horrified fascination as white streaks of smoke cut through the air. RPGs and mortar rain down on the mountainside, plastering the hills in flames and dramatic sprays of dirt. It all seems to happen in slow motion, like a camera hovering over a scene in a movie.

And then I see them. Four tiny black dots in the air, coming steadily closer. Silently. Like hawks. Manny’s biplane takes a twist and turns in front of us, diving down the side of the biggest hill, heading towards base with a rumbling screech.

“Smoke!” Chris yells. Uriah flips onto his back and grabs an air support marker off his belt. It looks like a grenade and works the same way. Pop the key ring, throw the canister and look out. Uriah does exactly that and bright yellow smoke begins spewing from the marker. At that moment Jeff stirs, jerking out of unconsciousness with a start.

“Easy, easy,” I soothe. “We’re out of the vehicle. Are you injured anywhere I can’t see?”

“No, I’m okay…” he mumbles. “I just hit my head.”

“I noticed that. Stay down.”

The black dots head in our direction, no doubt locking onto the yellow smoke. Chris slaps his hand on the back of my neck and shoves my head down, my cheek pressing against the earth.
The black dots are no longer dots, but full-on fighter jets. Allies. Hello, Air Force.

Did Colonel Rivera order them out here? I thought he had denied us backup.

The jets streak past so quickly that I can barely track their progress through the air, their engines screaming loud enough to rupture my eardrums all over again. Chris keeps his hand on my head, making it impossible for me to lift myself up and see everything that’s happening – a good thing; otherwise I’d probably end up getting fried by a stray piece of shrapnel.

The jets let their weaponry loose on the mercenary forces. Their missiles explode behind us with brilliant accuracy, precision and timing. A rush of pride fills my heart. That’s the United States Air Force coming to our aide. How cool is this?

Well. It
would
be cool if everything didn’t suck.

It doesn’t take more than a few seconds for the jets to blast the enemy and blow everything to kingdom come. I close my eyes, concentrating on Chris’s hand on my head, on Jeff’s breathing beside me. After what seems like forever, the noise subsides and Chris eases his grip, slowly rising from his position. I roll to my side, dripping in sweat and mud, caked from head to toe in ashes.

Jeff’s face is deathly pale, but he has no exterior wounds. I’m guessing he has a concussion. I’m guessing we
all
have one.

“Move,” Chris commands, crouching. “Do
not
break cover.”

I nod, licking the blood off my lips, staying low in the shrubbery, slinking into the trees. The
interstate dips here into a small canyon. There’s a large green water tank, along with a single acre of dead grapevines.
Who
opted to grow grapes right in the middle of a freeway I have no idea, but whatever. People are weird, right?

Chris stays in communication with the rest of the surviving members of the convoy using his radio, but my radio is dead. The top of the device is smashed, crushed when the Humvee flipped over.

I stop and take a breather on the other side of the water tank. Pieces of paint are peeling off the rusty rungs of the ladder that leads to the top.

“We’ve got a few miles back to base,” Uriah pants. His hair falls in dark waves across his face, but the dirt and grime make it
impossible to identify any other distinguishing features. “We won’t make it back in one piece.”

“We won’t even have to try,” Chris replies, keeping a firm grip on Jeff’s arm. His brother looks like he’s about to barf. “I’ve got someone coming to pick us up. We just have to get to a safe place to get inside the vehicle.”

“I don’t want to get blown up again,” I mutter.

“The Air Force just eliminated the mercenary forces,” Uriah says. “We’ve got nothing to worry about at the moment.”

“Right, right. There’s only a five thousand man army coming around the corner.” I shrug. “No big deal.”