* * *
The bloodbath filled until the brink of dawn.
Just as the sky became two blending masses of steel blue and rose-red, the last bodies fell in the streets of District 5. In the rest of Nova Crimea, the sounds of battle were fading. North Street (“Poretsky Decent” according to the broken signs over block corners) was transformed into the Styx, a meandering red river of dilapidation and mutilation. Most of the buildings still stood. The ground was uprooted and the fog of dust left in the wake of the blitz settled.
Saul stood, gazing out over the scene from beneath the arch of a broken wall. The clouds rolled in and a light snow coated the corpses white. Soon, the corpses would be dragged away, loaded into piles and shipped back to the martial world for strip-down.
In the calm after the storm, scenes from the previous hours repeated in his mind, and he kept coming back to the martial woman with the sapphire eyes. Her blood still caked his hands and face. He could still smell her breath as the blade tore in and feel the snap of her neck through the shaft of the blade. Now that the heat of battle had dissipated, the thoughts flooded in: the image of the blood shooting out, and the writhing eyes. He was certain that he had killed many times before. The blood of the dead coursed through his veins like anemia. So, why did this woman linger? What fresh hell was it he saw as the life left her eyes? “Proximity heightens the empathy” the neuralists always said. But, what he felt at that moment was no amplified sensation of the same small grumble in his soul which naturally follows the kill – at least without the neurals. And he remembered, at that moment, Malachi’s warning, something about nightmares spilling over…
The cigarette reached its last draw and he flicked the butt away. A single file of East Grid soldiers were marched out of the wrecked ingress of a nearby building, fingers laced behind their heads, gun muzzles prodding them onward like cattle for the slaughter with the other POWs being herded in streets. A faint stir in the air caused his head to jerk around. He took up his gun and descended, following the noise to the door of a small apartment block.
The locks were shot and the doors hung on a single hinge. He nudged the door gently with the muzzle and, three inches into its swing, the door broke off from its seams and fell.
He sidestepped into the entrance before the sound of the clatter pierced the silence, lining the sights down a long, dark and empty corridor. The strobe light on the end of the rifle flashed over thin walls, shredded by crossfire. Three civilian bodies lay dead amid shards of broken glass, dust and dirt. There were bloody trails left in the wake of the escape. He stepped over the doorsill and into the dark, and glass cracked and splintered underfoot. The floor was covered with bloody footmarks. As he approached the first apartment, something stirred. The rifle jolted in his hands.
A thick trail of smeared blood led from the corridor and stopped at the threshold of the apartment door. The blood still looked fresh. He followed the blood trail with the tip of the rifle barrel, approaching the threshold and nudging the door open. The sound of wheezing, moaning breaths became distinct.
The door opened.
Settled with his back against a bullet-torn wall, lay a man, legs twisted, mangled and spread before him, a round, red stain forming on the carpet. He was an East Grider and he was alive, though barely so. Both of his legs were shot through the knees, bleeding, and the wound below his collarbone was fresh too. The breaths squeezed into his chest and his head lolled to the side. The face was pale behind the streaks of blood. When the drooping eyes saw the vague figure reach out, a quivering hand rose.
“Stay calm,” said Saul. “I will help you.”
“Net…” The East Grider feebly tried to wrestle him away.
“Ya pomogu” he insisted, waving the hand aside. “Rasslab…”
“Net!” the East Grider coughed. Blood sputtered from his lips and a crimson drool seeped out the sides of his mouth.
He felt the hand clench tightly around his wrist, shaking with fear. He looked up and saw the eyes shimmer, as though sobered for the very first time by the imminence of death. The hand slowly released and tried to reach for something. The East Grider gasped the syllables of a Russian word which vaguely sounded like “painkillers.”
“Khorosho…” he nodded.
He took out two vials of sedative from the utility belt in his gear and plunged the first vial into the neck, above the wound. At once, he felt the man’s relief as his body stopped trembling. He threw the vial aside, took the cap off the second vial and pressed down on the same place. The East Girder’s head hung, his chest settled and the hands wilted at his sides. He was gone.
A long, almost memorial, silence endured, after which he put his hand over the man’s forehead and drew down the eyelids. As he looked upon the departed visage, he wondered why the aspect of sleep should bequeath such strange nobility to the image of death.
Suddenly, to his left; a stir. He jerked round, gun raised, finger pressed on the trigger and the light flashed over the figure standing at the entrance.
“Easy there, commander…”
His trigger finger eased.
A pair of gemstone eyes shone through the gloom.
He lowered his weapon, glaring back at Celyn with the look of someone who had been caught in the middle of some disgraceful act. He came to his feet and stood still and silent, staring at the floor.
For a long time, neither of them spoke. After a while, Celyn sighed and reached behind her back, took out a bottle of clear liquid, unscrewed the top, drank and screwed the top back on again. “Here,” she said, and tossed him the bottle. “It’s water. I got it from a vending machine.”
He studied the contents of the unlabeled bottle nonetheless, returning a sceptical glower. He took off the top, cupped his hand, poured and splashed his face. Celyn, meanwhile, let down the long, frayed braids of her hair and rolled out her neck. “We actually pulled that one off,” she groaned and chuckled with relief. “Talk about cutting it close.”
The water ran wine-red in his hands as he scooped handful after handful up to his face with increasing vehemence until it ran clear, whereupon he exhaled and dried his face in a dirty, frayed vest lying on the floor. He then held out the garment and examined it briefly for size as a fresh thought occurred to him: He would need civilian clothes.
He came into the only bedroom in the apartment; flicked the switch four times. No light. Apart from the ruffled sheets on the bed, everything else in the apartment was still in place. Celyn waited on the threshold and observed without a word as he propped the rifle against the wall and stepped up to the bureau. A sharp pain shot through his arm as soon as he tried to pull open the top drawer. He winced and clutched his shoulder, feeling the sting of his touch against the exposed pulp of a wound beneath the rip in his gear.
“You’re hit?” Celyn came toward him.
Now that the rush of battle had passed, his mind was being awakened to all kinds of sensations. The pain oozed into his flesh.
“Come here,” she said, beckoning him onto the edge of the bed. “Can you raise your arm?”
He attempted to do so and managed, subduing a grimace with a clenched jaw, but not the shaking of his outstretched arm.
“Looks like the round tore through the deltoid,” said Celyn, with a careful eye on the laceration. She emptied out all the contents of an iatric pack and opened up a vial. “This may sting a little,” she said, holding the vial over his shoulder.
He subdued another grimace as the pale fluid poured out and seared his flesh like a brand. The burn lingered until the painkillers kicked in, and the gear was gently peeled back over the wound. He watched her from the corner of his eye. Her touch was tender through the dead flesh. The sounds of the faraway battles had all but disappeared, and an uncanny peace settled upon them, in the solace of that dark room.
“So…” Celyn murmured, “now you’ll just …disappear into the night?”
He sensed the hints of longing in her voice. “Not yet,” he answered, qui
etly, “but… soon.” He flinched again. The suturing gel filled the gap of the wound and the raw flesh tingled.
“This whole region is one big warzone. Where will you go?”
“South, toward Mamayev. Then east, to the Kazakh border.”
“That’s East Grid territory.”
“There is no choice,” he said. “I cannot remain in the West.”
He felt the wound contract and the binding gently but firmly layered over the wound.
“That is one hell of a march,” said Celyn. “Better stock up on supplies. You may run into a few skirmishes on the way.”
“I can take care of myself.” He brusquely came to his feet once the last strip of gauze was layered and a loud explosion sounded from nearby.
They rushed out of the building just in time to see the last fragments of a severely battered building tumbling into the street. Celyn came up by his side.
“Be vigilant,” he said, lowering his weapon. “There is still conflict in the other districts.”
They descended the stairs and begun ambling up the street, surveying goings-on.
“Any updates?” asked Celyn.
“They are doing the final sweeps of the buildings,” he said.
“Casualties?”
“Duguay is dead,” he said, after a slightly less than solemn pause.
“…He had a good run.”
“I suppose it is just you and Malachi from now on,” said Saul.
“Well, I don’t know what Eli has planned, but I’ll probably be taking some time off after this.”
“That makes two of us, then.”
Another group of POWs was led onto the main street. They stopped and allowed a drove of POWs to pass and he pursued them with a pensive stare.
“Don’t worry,” said Celyn. “We won’t kill them … They’re worth more alive anyway.”
“What will they do with them?”
“Wipe them clean. Reprogram. Rehabilitate.”
“Conversion?”
Celyn nodded. “Today’s enemy, tomorrow’s ally,” she said. “Loyalty doesn’t count for much in this war. For all we know, we could have been fighting on their side once – maybe even more than once. No way to know for sure…”
“Vartanian.” An unexpected transmission cut the conversation short. “Vartanian, come in!”
“Malachi.”
“Where are you?”
“East end of North Street,” said Saul.
“Get to an elevated position with a full view of the bridges on the city limits. Bring all the heavy firepower we have.”
“What is wrong?” asked Saul.
“No time to explain. You’ll see when you get there. Move!”
The line cut.
“What the hell was that about?” said Celyn.
“It did not sound good.”
“AS-13, IS-12,” Celyn called out over the transmission, “rendezvous at the high-rise on North Street, east side, side entrance, double-time. Bring the big guns.”
“Roger that.”
The new wave of adrenaline quelled the pains once more as they made swift way to the high-rise at the end of the road. When they arrived, two squads were already there.
“Fifth-floor corridor, east side,” Saul instructed.
The glass walls were shot open and boots trampled over the shattered glass. The platoon divided and rushed up the stairwells. When they came to the fifth floor, more than a third of the corridor had been blown out. The outer wall of the high-rise and whole sections of the floor and roof were blown out so that the fifth floor merged with the fourth, sixth and seventh. He came out on the edge of the jagged outcrops of floor and the snowflakes flayed in the cold draft. Daybreak was nearer now, but it was still dark.
Despite the poor visibility, Poretsky Bridge was within view, a long bowshot toward the northeast. The dense crowds of fleeing civilians were making their way across the north bridge, over the wide, sheer gorge bordering the city. Farther off to the south was the second bridge, and more civilians in flight.
“Malachi.”
“Talk to me.”
“I have the bridges in sight… All I see are civilians.”
“Look dead east,” said Malachi, “across the gorge.”
He did as instructed, turning his sights eastward. A small, neighbouring borough of ruined buildings came into view. There did not seem to be anything of significance, until he raised his sights toward the distance beyond the ruined borough. Strange shifts in the land just below the horizon caught his attention. He increased the zoom on the scopes and when the image focused, he saw with harrowing clarity what he had previously mistaken for a trick of the fog and wind:
Tanks. A platoon of the metal behemoths rolled toward the city, with a battalion of foot soldiers bringing up the rear. When the zoom scopes decreased, the platoon became a company and the battalion became an entire division, and the wave of war steadily trundled toward them on the turn of the tide. His hands slowly lowered and the dread broke through the austerity in his eyes.
“Oh hell,” cursed Celyn
“Do you see them?”
“Eli, where the hell are you?”
“The office block on the corner of South Street. The one with the red sign.
They spied out the tower block to the south.
“Listen to me,” said Malachi. “We have to take them out together. If they access the district there will be nothing we can do to stop them.”
“There are too many,” said Saul. “The ATGs will not be enough…”
“I’m not telling you to fire on the tanks…”
He paused a moment on Malachi’s words and turned his sights back toward Poretsky Bridge, and the mass of civilians, crossing over the steep canyon.
The bridges…
“If we fire on the pylons at the same time, the bridges will fall.”
“No!”
“There’s no other way”
He focused in on the families marching across the bridge, battling against the swelling snowfall, men and women shielding their children from the frigid wind. The images of the dying woman and the resounding echoes of his nightmares recurred.
“There are over a thousand civilians on those bridges.”
“If we don’t do this now, we will lose everything we just fought for.”
“An army that size could plough its way through the whole damn city,” said Celyn.
He set his sights out to the east once again. The oncoming division reached the ruined borough and divided into two – one brigade going north and the other south. He lowered the scopes and raised his hand to his temple. “AS-5, AS-6, come in,” he called.
“Commander.”
“Get to the city limits. Stop people from crossing the bridges. I repeat: Stop people from crossing those bridges, now.” The line cut before the reply could come. “Ready the ATGs.”
At once, the heavy arms came out and were quickly assembled for firing. Two martials propped up each of the big launchers on either shoulder and a third loaded the projectiles. In less than a minute, five ATGs were set in place, locks set on to the large pylons supporting the bridges.
“We will wait until the last civilians have passed.”
“We can’t wait that long.”
“There is too much congestion on the bridge. The tanks will not be able to cross until the traffic clears.”
“Have you lost your mind? They’re not going to stop!”
The army was closing in fast, now less than half a kilometer away. When they came within sight of the civilians crossing Poretsky Bridge, a panic erupted. Some of the fleeing civilians raced forward, others turned around and started to retreat. Scenes on the south bridge had taken a similar turn.
“Take the shot”
“Wait for my mark.”
“We have to take the shot now,” said Celyn.
“Hold.”
A flash from the south blazed in the corner of his eyes. Light and smoke streaked through the air to the
south and he looked on in horror as the missiles shot across the dawn sky and slammed into the pylons of the south bridge, exploding in white bursts.
“No!”
The thick cables snapped and lashed out like titan bullwhips and the tall columns of steel and stone toppled and crashed. The bridge split, and the howls and screeches carried in the wind as he watched them fall into the gorge.
He had just enough presence of mind to hear the three sharp, distinct bleeps in his right ear.
He turned. “No…”
The ATGs were engaged.
“NO!”
He hurled himself forward and a short, sharp blast sounded before everything went white and the blast became a long, high-pitched ringing.
When he came to, he was on his side clean across the corridor. Dismembered pieces of corpses hung from the wreckage all around him. Fresh portions of debris fell from the floors above, where an even larger hole was blown into the side of the building. He tried to rise but his right arm gave way under him and he howled in agony. Through the blurred vision, he saw Celyn rising from the ashes, covered in blood, coughing and hauling herself out from under the debris.
“Eli… El—i … Eli!”
He turned agonisingly onto his side just in time to see the long canons of the prodigious firing line rotate and incline. The wide muzzles of the tank-guns flared. A split second later, the tower block to the south exploded in a succession of loud, pulverising explosions.
“ELIII!” Celyn’s voice bayed through the wind.
The tower crumbled and fell in the distance. His wavering head lolled over just in time for him to glimpse, through fading vision, the tanks ploughing their way across Poretsky Bridge, trampling and crushing everything and everyone in their path.
C. 5: Day 378