Anthem's Fall

Chapter Seventy-Nine

Chapter Forty

Kristen

Tears of despondency and dread welled in Kristen's eyes as she sprinted up the quaking avenue beside Madison. Entering the migrating riot was an immersion into a world with no rules, a scene entirely distant and alien to the life with which Kristen was so familiar. Man's carefully sewn and timeworn fabric of compassion, kindness, and morality was ablaze and scorching to nothingness before her eyes, leaving only caustic despair in its wake.

In fleeting sidelong glances Kristen beheld unspeakable atrocities. Curled on the pavement, a trampled and broken body of a young teenager, her sneakers twitching from the kicks and stomps of the mob. Marching out of an electronics store, a man balancing a stack of brand new laptops in his arms. Parents desperately holding infants and toddlers into the air to keep them from being swallowed up, while futilely begging for someone to help them.

A drear of chalky dust obscured the afternoon sunlight as the dreamlike conflict between Vengelis and his nameless foe pervaded straight through the towering buildings on all sides, sending wreckage plunging down into the crowds.

Ahead of Kristen and Madison, the disfigured skyscraper leaned diagonally over the intersection at a treacherous angle. Kristen stared agape into the dusty sky at the countless teetering windows overhead. The building blocked the warm autumn sunlight that splashed upon the rest of the city, and cast an ominous dark shadow across the block. The air felt suddenly colder in the chill of the building's shadow. Deadly debris fell from the lofty heights into the narrow chasm of the avenue. Kristen had never felt as small and frail as she did under the eclipse of the vast skyscraper. It was a sensory overload, and all the while the same word repeated over and over in her mind: war.

As they ran, Madison gripped Kristen's arm tight. They were in this together, and Kristen was glad not to be alone. Madison was strong and fast, and Kristen could barely keep up.

In the middle of the swarming intersection, a hulking black-and-green camouflaged army tank was stationed in the shadows below a set of drooping unpowered traffic lights. The austere tank contrasted starkly with the rest of the posh storefronts. Around the tank, a ring of indomitable Marines was stationed at attention, all shouldering enormous black assault rifles. The guns were pointed outward at the stampede. The men looked ready to fire upon the pressing riot at the slightest provocation. Standing on the hood of the armored vehicle, a soldier with black boots was shouting into a megaphone. You could see the panic in his eyes: he had prepared himself to serve in distant lands, not in the beating heart of America.

"The bridges on the east side of the city have been demolished! Don't try to evacuate east! I repeat, do not try to evacuate over the East River."

Kristen and Madison slowed to a jog to listen to the man. The magnified voice barely carried over the uproar around them. He waved his arm to his right, Kristen's left.

"Make your way to the west side of Manhattan. The Holland and Lincoln tunnels are still operational! There is an evacuation effort underway across the Hudson! Shelters are being erected along the New Jersey side of the river. Please remain calm! But get to the Hudson and out of the city as quickly as possible!"

"Let's go!" Madison shouted and made to turn west up the clogged street.

"Wait!" Kristen called, and she forced her way through a few shoulders to get closer to the Marines. She waved to them vigorously as she shoved people out of the way.

"I need to talk with you!" Kristen screamed, her voice scarcely audible amid the riot.

The soldier standing mere feet in front of her made no acknowledgement of her presence. He stared coldly past her, the barrel of his gun pointing directly at the chest level of the mob, at Kristen.