26. Storm of Eternity
Jon surveyed the battlefield.
To his right looking north along Front Street he saw eight vehicles burning and the scattered remains of three more across both the paved road and the grass of Bicentennial Park. The columns of black, oily smoke stretched into the sky and mingled with the thunderheads spawned by Voggoth’s army. The greasy smell of ignited fuel, the burning odor of expended ammunition, and the putrid stench of death swirled together and hung across the scene so heavy Jon thought he might suffocate.
Several squads remained intact across the waterfront and a pair of Vietnam-era APCs rumbled into position along the railroad tracks where they disembarked about 15 newcomers-most in Internal Security police uniforms-who searched for cover in the shadow of the toppled cable-stayed bridge.
A field adjacent to the basement of the destroyed building where Jon’s bunker lay had been filled with foxholes, trenches, and armored vehicles at the start of the battle. Now he saw bodies, blasted sandbags, and an overturned LAV. Smoke from the fires and explosions settled over the lot like a fog. Through that fog he saw signs of movement: a gun barrel here, a helmet there, but he could not accurately gauge how many men remained in those positions.
To his left-to the south-a similar sight. The heart of the truss-style Memorial Bridge lay in the Mississippi, leaving a raised highway and on-ramp leading to nothing. Beneath that a substantial number of soldiers still fought from inside the remains of an industrial building as well as from trenches dug in the riverbank. A badly-scarred but still-functional Abrams tank stood defiantly in the open on Main Street and a pair of matching Humvees held their ground within the shell of a destroyed cistern along the river.
Still holding, Jon thought, but the real battle hasn’t even started yet.
The Order’s weapons for that ‘real’ battle assembled on the far bank with a massive cloud of smoke from the destroyed Chrysaor floating behind like the back curtain of a stage.
They resembled frogs. Big mechanical frogs; each the size of a house with spiked treads instead of feet. Armored plating, cameras for eyes, and mist-spitting tubes along their back ensured they would not be mistaken for Earthly creatures, but the frog analogy held in Jon Brewer’s mind.
They lined up among the flattened woodlands of the western side of the Mississippi; about two dozen of them. White mist attempted to hide their activities but humanity’s defenders saw the intent: the time had come for Voggoth’s army to cross the river.
In addition to the frog-things, the twin whirlwinds that had spent most of the battle dancing on The Order’s flank swept in to the river bank. As the swirling clouds of white and gray approached, the winds slowed and collapsed in toward a central point like a fog machine in reverse. From those dying winds materialized a host of demonic creatures.
Jon recognized their gray cloaks and skeletal faces with empty black eyes and elongated jaws: the Wraiths. Each of the two fading windstorms spawned hundreds of the foot soldiers as well as a pair of giants, each one eight-stories tall with skinny bodies and slack-jawed maniac faces. Their extremely long arms dragged on the ground and ended with big fists attached to rubbery wrists.
The Order’s assault did not go unchallenged.
Jon radioed, “Mortar teams open up, damn it! We need anti-armor up here!” Then on another frequency, “Shep, get ready.”
“Roger that, Jon, we’re ready to roll,” came the radioed reply.
The remaining mortar teams in the field to the north opened fire. Explosions tore across the western river bank. One of the frog-things blew into two pieces; a squad of Wraiths flew into the air and broke apart into grains of dust.
“Cassy, what’s your status?”
She radioed back, “I’ve left a few units at the school and am moving into position with the rest of my riders. Just give us the go and we’re there.”
He admired her enthusiasm.
Tendrils of white mist spread across the western dike in an attempt to cover the approach. The giants-all four of them-strode in big steps to the riverbank and added their unique form of artillery to the fight.
Their arms raised high above their savage heads.
A Javelin anti-tank missile hit one of the creatures in the chest, eliciting a roar of anguish and knocking it backwards before it could complete its strike.
The other three, however, were not stopped. Their fists hit the ground. Three focused earthquakes sped from the opposite bank and caused the water of the Mississippi to boil; a huge whirlpool sprung to life in the center of the river sucking down the overturned barges.
The tremor reached the east shore. What remained of the pavement of Front Street cracked and shook. Three huge sink holes opened to a hiss of steam and a geyser of water.
Soldiers-both career professionals and post-Armageddon civilian recruits-along the river retreated in panic; a few fell into the holes, most found new places to hide among the bombed-out, burned houses and shops of Quincy.
Two machine gun teams and a squad of irregulars joined the general in his foundation-bunker. Jon could not blame his men for retreating but Voggoth’s first intent-to clear a bridgehead-proved successful.
The protective shield of mist hung like a thin veil over the far side of the Mississippi, yet Jon could still see the creatures busy at work. The frog-things reached the water’s edge. Their mouths-if that is what they could be called-opened as if the things needed to vomit. A flap-what Jon’s eyes saw as a tongue-stretched overtop the water all the way to the east bank where it dug into the ground and root-like protrusions cemented the seal. An instant latter that tongue-the bridge-solidified into a material resembling hardened rubber.
“Shep! Cassy! Better get up here!”
More than 20 of the insta-bridges spanned the Mississippi from the warehouses and docks a quarter mile south of Jon’s position to Riverfront Park opposite Quisippi Island north of the now-destroyed Memorial bridge. The Wraiths came first across the bridges and the giants waded the waters taking pains to avoid the spinning whirlpool. Jon suspected the rest of Voggoth’s army lined up to follow the vanguard across.
“Get those guns going, boys,” he told the men around him who in turn used the edge of the concrete slab as leverage for their M249 machine guns. The rest of the soldiers-some in army-reg BDUs others in street clothes-added to the fight with carbines and hunting rifles.
Jon thought he might go deaf from the roar of the guns but they sounded sweet music nonetheless. The first pack of Wraiths to set foot on Bicentennial Park were ground into dust instantly. More followed.
A runner jumped into the open foundation carrying cartridges of ammo for the heavy guns. As the soldiers accepted the fresh bullets, Jon patted one of the heavy gunners on the shoulder and motioned down the destroyed block.
“Get your ass a hundred yards south,” the soldier saw where one of the bridgeheads faced only small arms fire. “We got more than just one bridge here!”
A hauntingly familiar sound came to Jon’s ears, forcing him to pause his instructions. The sound made him shiver, not so much from fear but from memories of frigid winds and frozen snow drifts.
He heard the sound of a Wraith screaming its deadly voice: “wwwwwhhhhhaaaaaaaaaaaaa.”
The screams came in a chorus. The jaws of the skeletal beasts opened to unfathomable width. The atmosphere between their black mouths and the targets of their fury shimmied as if the air molecules vibrated to the point of shaking apart.
Their voice acted as their only weapon, but proved lethal enough. While others could hear the sound, the weapon killed more precisely: Jon witnessed a foot soldier wearing a St. Louis Rams T-shirt and a blue baseball cap firing a shotgun from behind a toppled tree explode from the chest up. He saw a mortar team situated between a pair of crumbling concrete walls break apart as if unseen chains pulled their bodies in ten directions; the explosive shells around their feet detonated as a side effect.