The immediate enemy turned away from Lake Shore Drive and back to the fighting on Michigan Avenue. With the road and beachfront now clear, Jacob could hear the frantic battle and screaming of the air assault teams. The sky soldiers had done their job pulling the Others off the beaches and luring them to their positions further inland. Now the air assault troops were cut off from the beachfront, overwhelmed, and surrounded on Michigan Avenue. Gunships flew in making strafing runs, trying to provide desperate cover.
“The Apaches only have enough fuel and ammo for a couple passes,” Cass said to no one in particular. “They’ll have to drop back soon.”
Jacob sat at the wall, staring into the smoky mist and listening to the battle. Distant screams mixed with the rapid firing of rifles and machine guns. He knew that when the Others finished with the air assault troops, they would move back to their front. Explosions ripped across Michigan Avenue and clouds of dark smoke billowed across the grasses of the park, obscuring the view ahead. Bright flashes of light shone through like orange glows of fire as nearby buildings ignited.
Far to the south, Jacob could see the transport helicopters returning. They hovered then dropped to the roof of the stone-walled “castle”. Too far to see individual people, he still knew the assault was working; the aggressors were being pulled off the museum, allowing the helicopters to get in close enough to make extractions. The gunfire to the front gradually picked up, and then slowly declined as the air assault troops were taken out of the fight.
“Get ready, they’ll be coming for us now!” someone yelled.
Men to his left and right lay pressed against the wall. Veteran soldiers undid snaps on their vests and readied magazines for quick access; grenades were placed on the tops of the walls. An engineer team bravely ran to the center of the road and placed a hasty line of claymores before bailing back.
A man’s hoarse scream came out of the smoke. “Don’t shoot, don’t shoot!” he yelled as he emerged from the smoke and haze. He leapt over the far wall and tumbled to the street then crawled forward before clawing back to his feet.
“Go! Get out of here… they’re coming… there’s too many of them!” he yelled as he ran across Lake Shore Drive, breaking through the near wall just feet from Jacob.
The man pulled himself over the wall and scrambled for the boats. A sergeant tackled him and pulled him down behind cover, trying to calm him. Jacob could hear the man screaming, yet not able to make out the words. The mob in the smoke drowned out all other sounds. As they drew closer and the yelling become frenzied, the state trooper to Jacob’s left backed away from the wall.
“Fuck it, I didn’t sign up for this!” the trooper said, turning away. Cass was behind him and shoved him back into position.
“There is no place to run!” he yelled up and down the line. “Get ready!”
Jacob had flashbacks of watching old movies about forces armed with axes, charging an opposing army who stood behind a shield wall and waited for a tidal wave of death to push against them. British soldiers on line, facing down waves of charging Zulu warriors; every man on the wall had a purpose and together, they were strong. If one man failed and allowed a breach in the shield wall, they all would fall.
The swarm grew louder, their feet beating against the sod and pavement. The smoke hanging over the park appeared to boil from the turbulence of thousands of attackers charging under the haze. The first of them rammed the far wall; the rest were moving so fast they collided and tumbled over it as rapid salvos from the soldiers’ rifles cut them down. Another wave was close behind and moved the mass forward like a bulldozer shoving them to their deaths at the hands of the soldiers’ rifles. The next wave slowed; calculated now, they dropped into cover. While looking for holes and running at angles, they hurdled over the barriers.
Tactics changed again, and they massed farther to Jacob’s right. Wave after wave launched at the wall before the attacks moved to the middle, and then more to the left. Probing for a weakness, they hit every section. Bodies stacked up on the roadway, hanging lifeless on the far wall, and Jacob continued firing into their rushing bodies and faces. When his weapon would empty, he’d quickly reload. He dropped a magazine in the grass at his feet and when he went to retrieve it, he saw the piles of scattered brass.
“How many more can there be?” a man yelled.
“More than we have ammo for,” another answered back.
Jacob’s hand slapped his vest at empty ammo pouches. They were right, he’d already expended half his rounds, and the things were still coming. A sniper’s bullet caught the man to Jacob’s left, his head snapping back as more shots knocked out men to the left and right.
“Sniper!” a sergeant screamed.
Jacob prepared to duck just as another mass hit the walls. In coordination with the sniper’s fire, the mass was able to break the wall and move to the center of the road. The claymores exploded, cracking like a bolt of lightning shooting down the length of the roadway, covering the pavement in concrete dust and thick smoke. Jacob’s ears rang from the overwhelming noise. A hand grabbed him, pulling him off the wall, and then turned him south. He stumbled to his feet but upon seeing others move, he stepped off and jogged with the group.
“We’re falling back to the Castle,” men yelled as they turned to fall back to the trail and run south to the museum.
His view to the right as he ran to the Castle was obscured in smoke. Ahead, though, he could still see the beacons of the helicopters orbiting
