Slutty Rivets looked at him, a quirk of a smile on hisface, partly hidden by his red beard. He held out his hand and said,"Looking for one of these."
Ace looked down and saw a spherical shape, topped with aring and a handle, a hand grenade. This will make beautiful music, hethought. Ace hopped out of the vehicle, the cold metal of the grenade in hishand. He took a few steps towards the helicopter, unsure of how far he couldthrow the thing. It weighed as much as a medium-sized rock. He hefted it in hishand again.
A little closer, he thought. Ace jogged forward,his eyes on the helicopter. From inside the cockpit, he could see movement,whether it was a living person or a dead person trying to escape, he didn'tknow, and he didn't particularly care. A blood-smeared hand bashed against thespider-webbed glass of the cockpit.
"Throw it, pussy!" Spider yelled at him. Acelaughed, pulled the pin, and threw the grenade as far as he could. His throwwas short, but it took a fortuitous bounce and rolled a few feet, lodging underthe middle of the helicopter wreckage. The anticipation was intense, and thenit exploded. The wreckage lifted off the ground, shards of metal flying intothe air. It erupted in a bloom of flame that rocked the buildings next to thewreck, shattering windows and making Ace's ears ring once more.
Ace fell back on the ground when the grenade exploded. Hewatched the second explosion, the smoke and flames curing upwards to the sky. Glorious.
Chapter 15: Digging In
This was a war that they would lose. The only realquestion was how long they would continue to fight it. Sergeant Tejada haddelivered his latest report. In the last ten hours, they had lost close to1,000 troops and made hardly a dent in the population of the reanimated.
The reanimated, that was the official term thatWashington had settled on. The men had logically taken to calling them Annies.At first, he had wanted to snap at the first man he had heard use the term, butit was typical army behavior. It was better to give them a cutesy nickname thanto call them what they were. Calling them the reanimated reminded the men ofthe fact that their enemies used to be the people that they were sworn toprotect and fight for. Calling them the reanimated reminded the men that theirown families might be out there, walking, searching for someone to eat. If theywanted to call them Annies to feel better about it, then that was fine byMcCutcheon. If calling them Annies prevented them from freezing up when theyhad to pull the trigger, then that was also fine by him.
Bad news just kept rolling in. An entire squad had gonemissing, dead or deserted, McCutcheon didn't know, but he knew things weregoing to get worse before they got better. They had lost two Apaches in thelast 10 hours, in addition to the five-hundred men. One had been inexplicablyshot down in the city, and the other had just disappeared. The men werereplaceable, the choppers were not. The entire United States Army was spreadacross the country so thin that it was only a matter of time before thePresident unleashed the final protocol, and they would neat to make a hastyretreat when the orders came down the pipeline.
They were on borrowed time here. The best they could dowas gather survivors, thin the numbers, and keep a sizeable fleet of movablevehicles for when the order came down. The reports out of New York led him tobelieve that the order would come sooner than later. In New York, ahundred-thousand troops had been whittled down to nothing in the span of a day.
Philly and Boston were much the same, but there was stilldamn little news about Denver. He had tried his wife and daughter's cell phonesa dozen times in the last ten hours, but they hadn't even rung. He pushedthoughts of his family to the side. He had a job to do, and he was going to doit.
He sent a runner to find Sergeant Tejada. Tejada was agood man, capable, but he was the type of soldier that never wanted to get toohigh in the army. He was comfortable leading men and following orders. Makingdecisions was not his forte. As Lieutenant General McCutcheon's right hand, hewas indispensible.
Sergeant Tejada entered the warehouse, saluted and stoodat attention. "At ease," McCutcheon said dismissively. "SergeantTejada, what is the report from the refugee camps?"
"Sir, the entire Coliseum is secure. However, MajorMiller reports that the fences aren't secure enough. He estimates the crowd ofAnnies to be somewhere at ten thousand."
"Jesus," McCutcheon said, unable to control hisreaction. He wiped his hand across his face as if there were something hangingoff of it. "'Ten thousand did you say?"
"Yes, sir."
"Continue with the report, Sergeant,"McCutcheon prompted, his mind still trying to grasp the concept of ten thousandof those things held back by chain-link fences topped with razor wire.
"They have plenty of food, but he requests moreammunition. All road traffic to the refugee center should be suspended untilthe perimeter is cleared. They have lost several squads who were trying to dropoff refugees. The squads were overrun in the process."
"Alright. This is what I want. Pull the choppersfrom search and rescue. I want them shuttling survivors and ammunition back andforth between the Coliseum and here. How many men are at the Coliseumcamp?"
"Three thousand, sir, less some casualties."
"Right. Well, give them the ammo that they need. Allsearch and rescue operations are to bring any survivors here. We'll transportthem to the refugee center from here by helicopter. Anything else?"
"Sir, the reports from the soccer stadium aresomewhat..." the Sergeant swallowed before he finished..."worse."
McCutcheon didn't like two things, the fact that SergeantTejada had held back intel and the fact that Tejada actually seemed hesitant togive him some news. "Well, don't keep me in suspense, Sergeant. Spit itout."
"Sir, the soldiers at the soccer stadium report thatit is an indefensible position. They have
