Boondocks

Chapter 46: The Jump

CROC

The Officials moved like a school of fish, so tightly packed it was hard to tell where one shield ended and the next began. The men opened fire, their bullets pinging off the glass. Pointless. Wasted. Their unfazed targets spread out like links in a chain, circling the main building. We were at a standoff. One step forward, and they were easy prey. We had them trapped, but for how long?

"Won't we run out of bullets?" I roared above the chaos.

"Can't get shit past you!" Reggie kept his finger on the trigger, his eyes wild, and his arm vibrating beneath the force of each shot. "Tex is taking his damn sweet time!"

As if Tex heard him, he kicked the door back open and tossed a lit bundle of dynamite. It skidded across the ground, rolled beneath the shields, then boom.

Screams erupted. Dust, fire, and bodies blew into the air. It rocked my bones and nearly tossed me from the tower. I gripped the rail. A hunk of debris collided with Reggie's head, knocking him backwards.

I ducked for cover and crawled over to him. "You alright!"

He clutched the spot, blood seeping through his fingers. "What hit me?" He looked to his left. A booted foot lay on its side. "That's got to be the goddamn nastiest shit to ever happen to me."

Another explosion shook the tower, and I scrambled over and grabbed the light. Smoke rolled, allowing me brief glimpses of the carnage below, but I couldn't see enough to pick a target. The wall of Officials had dissolved. Any order at all was gone. As the clouds cleared, bile rose into my throat. A few of the men were beating open the locks to the other buildings, and stampedes of ghostly-pale corpses burst from within. They tore over one another, pushing and shoving with wild, glassy, unblinking eyes.

They'd been locked in the dark, starved, diseased. It was so much worse than death. It was. . .cruel. Senseless. Why?

I froze, watching them and the men still raging against one another. Bodies lay scattered wherever they'd landed, both whole and in pieces. Ours and theirs. So much blood. So much death. So little purpose. This was humanity. This was what Willow had tried to explain. This was what she feared, and why Pappy had insisted I hide.

Reggie hobbled to his feet and slumped over the gun. Blood spilled from his hairline, dripping down his face. He pulled the trigger, firing off a few rounds before swaying on his feet. I caught him just before he tipped over and lowered him back to the floor. He clutched his head.

"Just stay down," I said. I stood and began throwing knives, taking down an Official with each one. An injured Tex hobbled toward the main building, Merle and Cecil supporting his weight on either side. I reached for a blade and found my belt empty.

I turned. Reggie lay unconscious—slow, shallow breaths the only thing separating him from the dead below. I eyed the gun. I'd watched the men enough times, I knew how it worked, but I'd sworn to never use one. But if they didn't make it inside, then this was all for nothing. I grabbed it, testing the weight and feel in my hands. Slowly, I pulled the trigger, and it kicked back as if it were alive. I jolted, then tightened my grip and aimed again, focusing on the Officials closest to them and working my way outwards.

They disappeared inside, and I turned my aim elsewhere, everywhere. The Earth was colorless no longer; black charr and deep red painted the ground in splotches. I kept shooting, adding more details to the gruesome picture we'd created.

Until a group of shielded Officials caught my attention. I fired on them, my bullets ricocheting backward, doing nothing to stop them as they marched closer, headed straight for us. The man in their center had a strange pack on his back, and a gun unlike any I'd seen before. One of them motioned to us, shouting a command. Then the man pointed, and a stream of flames shot forward, drenching the beams of our tower. A burst of heat wafted around us, and I jumped back, feeling like a fish just dropped into the frying pan.