I pulled my phone out of my jeans and cursed silently at it when it refused to flicker to life after I pressed the Unlock button. The useless plastic brick shook in my hand as I stared at my reflection on the touchscreen. I looked like a ghost under the fine dust still plastered on my face, but apart from some small scratches, I was fine.
“Is your phone working?” I asked Karla, turning toward her, my voice dry and weak.
She fished her phone out and cradled it in her hands. Her finger hovered over the Unlock button for a few seconds, and she stared at the device, on the verge of a fresh wave of tears. Those tears spilled out once she finally pressed it.
“Oh God, what’s going on?” She desperately tapped the button a dozen times more. I took her phone and hugged her. Karla’s tears soaked through my shirt.
The crimson solar eclipse hung menacingly above us.
Chapter 6
Two hours later, no aid had reached us yet. No firefighters, no police, no ambulances, no one. Not even their sirens could be heard. The school nurse and teachers had assisted the injured students in the parking lot—at least fifty of them—as well as they could, but it was clear that they needed to get to a hospital, and soon.
The girl with the mangled fingers moaned for something for the pain as she hugged her hand against her chest. Tom passed out sometime after the school collapsed. His head, all wrapped up in bloodied bandages, rested on our history teacher’s lap. She stroked his blood-matted hair as she stared into the distance with passive, reddened eyes. Her trembling lower lip betrayed her anxiety.
The students' anguish soon turned to anger. They demanded answers from their distraught teachers, waving their bricked phones and swearing loudly, unable to keep their emotions in check. Along the street, groups of people shambled toward the nearby hospital. A small group of men wearing ties carried a young woman, her arms flopping at her sides with every step they took. The crackling of nearby fires and the rumbling of weakened buildings reached us from all sides, as well as the screams and cries of survivors. An acrid smell of smoke made my nose itch. The wailing sirens of ambulances and fire trucks remained conspicuously absent.
A handful of parents—those who worked within walking distance of the school— showed up and took their children with them. Karla and I weren’t so lucky. Her dad, who worked at the hospital just a few blocks away, must’ve been swamped with injured survivors. Her mom had left a few years ago, and it was anyone’s guess whether she was even in the country when the disaster struck.
I caressed the silver cross hanging around my neck every time someone ran down the street screaming his or her child’s name. I clung to the slim chance that the next parents to show up would be mine, even though I knew I’d be disappointed. Whatever had disabled the phones had also taken out the cars, which were now abandoned by their owners along the road, and the trains probably couldn’t run after the earthquake even if they hadn’t been affected by the blackout. Trekking from the office to my school through the city’s devastated streets would take my parents hours.
If they’re still alive…
I tried to push away the grim thoughts that popped into my head as the minutes kept slipping by. The couple of hundred surviving students sat in their classes on the parking lot’s busted concrete while their teachers carried out a head count. Mr. Jenkins—a short, lean man with thinning black hair—wrote down our names. Ms. Greenlee was still missing—still buried under the pile of rubble that had been our school.
“Are we staying here much longer, Mr. Jenkins?” I asked as he wrote down my name.
“You can only leave with your parents or legal guardian,” he answered, without looking up from his notepad, in a way that made me think I wasn’t the first one to raise the question.
“One of our classmates is hurt really badly. I think he’s gonna need more than a bit of gauze.” I looked back at Tom.
Mr. Jenkins choked up a little and finally looked up from his scribbling. His dark-blue eyes showed no anger at my little outburst.
“I know, but you’re going to have to be patient just a little longer. Everything’s going to be fine.” He smiled without enthusiasm before resuming his name taking.
“Do you know what’s wrong with the phones? I really have to call my parents,” Amy said when Mr. Jenkins approached her clique. She gripped her cellphone like it was the soap at a prison shower.
“Well, I’m not a science teacher, but I guess it must be some sort of solar EMP.” Mr. Jenkins gazed at the solar eclipse.
I nodded in silent agreement. If a nuclear bomb could trigger an EMP, then the sun—basically an enormous nuclear reactor—could trigger one as well, only on a much larger scale.
Principal Wong had organized some of the staff into a search team, but they returned to the parking lot with nothing but scrapes on their hands from stirring the unyielding wreckage. A ring of students formed around them asking for their missing friends. The improvised rescuers shook their heads and sent them away with nothing but empty promises before gathering with the rest of the staff to decide on their next step.
Amy and her friends swapped the batteries on their brand-new iPhones with each other in a futile attempt to make one of them work again. Only the girl I’d rescued from under the bookshelf didn’t participate in the experiment but instead hugged herself and whimpered. Occasionally she’d gaze at Amy—her savior—and thank her once more for saving her life.
“Don’t worry about it. I’m just glad you’re okay.” Amy patted her friend’s hand like a queen showing favor upon one of her subjects. Her gesture brought a wide smile on her friend’s face, reflecting a devotion bordering on religious.
Amy noticed me staring at their little scene and frowned ever so slightly before looking away.
Bitch.
The school staff finally ended their meeting, and the principal climbed on top of a white delivery van parked near the center of the lot to address the few hundred students assembled there. He struggled a little during the climb, but his height and relative youth allowed him to pull the stunt without losing too much face. After straightening his striped blue tie and brushing off his white shirt, Mr. Wong waved his hands to get everyone’s attention.
I turned toward Karla, who was hugging her legs with her face buried between her knees. Looking around, I found most of the students in a similar state of despair, completely oblivious to the world. Only a handful of them caught sight of Mr. Wong and slowly made their way to the white van without bothering to alert their distraught classmates.
“I have an announcement to make, so I’ll need you to gather round!” the principal yelled, but most of the students were too immersed in praying and anxious chatter to notice. Our teachers had to go to each cluster of distressed high schoolers and shepherd them toward the principal’s improvised stage.
“Hey, snap out of it, Lala. I think we’re finally getting out of here,” I said as I shook Karla’s shoulders.
She lifted her face. When I caught sight of her puffy, bloodshot eyes, I felt a slight sting of guilt for being so rough with her. Still, she wiped her face with steady hands and managed to get up from the floor by herself. Her hand felt cold as I pulled her through the crowd gathered by the principal, though.
“I need you to be silent for just a moment and listen. Please,” Mr. Wong said. “I know you’re all scared, but we’ve got to do our best to stay calm. Many of you have voiced your desire to leave, but it’s just not safe for all us to move from here yet. The emergency services are having trouble reaching us, but I assure you that help is on the way.”
I squeezed my fists as he climbed down from the van. I realized proper emergency procedure in case of apocalypse probably wasn’t part of the teacher’s manual, but their shoulder shrug of a plan seemed like having us bury our heads in the sand. The principal must’ve been more afraid of potential lawsuits than of his students bleeding to death in the parking lot, or even of the orange glow of the not-so-distant fires crawling toward us. Evid
ently, I wasn’t alone in my thinking—the tone of the agitated discussions that followed his announcement wasn’t one of relief.
“What the hell do you mean by, 'Wait for evacuation'?” a stocky boy yelled and pointed at the blood-red solar eclipse above us. “Can’t you see the world’s ending? The city’s burning down; we have to get out of here!”
Mr. Wong raised his hands to quiet the students down. “All of us have to stay at the rally point, so that when the authorities—”
“No one’s coming!” a short-haired girl screamed from the edge of the crowd, squeezing the useless phone in her hands like a magic charm.
“You don’t know that, okay, so shut up, you…” The girl who snapped at her short-haired classmate couldn’t finish her sentence and broke down in hysterical sobs.
A shouting match erupted between those who agreed to wait for help and those who wanted to leave. Although the teachers tried to defuse the situation, sensible arguments soon gave way to streams of insults from both sides. Karla winced as her schoolmates cursed openly in front of the staff, showering each other with four-letter words and questioning each other’s bravery.
“Don’t you care if your friends die? These people need to get to a hospital!” I yelled in the general direction of those too scared to leave the parking lot.
Whatever reply they gave me was drowned out by at least three times as many voices in agreement. Obviously, the vast majority of us wanted to get out of there. Emboldened by the outcome of the shouting match, large groups of students even threatened to walk away without their teachers' consent, although none of them elaborated on where they would actually be walking away to.
“Everyone shut up!” Principal Wong was back on top of the white van. A tense silence descended upon the startled students. He took several gasps as he straightened his tie and wiped the sweat that drenched his furrowed brow.
“I apologize for that, but we can’t allow ourselves to descend into chaos. Now, it’s true that the fires that have broken out make this place risky. I’ve also spoken to Mrs. Simpson, our school nurse, and she agrees that several members of the student body require urgent medical attention. As such, we have decided to transport them ourselves to our alternate assembly point, St. Anne’s Hospital, just a few blocks east of here.” The crowd threatened to start screaming at each other again after the principal’s speech. Mr. Wong gestured for them to calm down. “No more shouting, please. Remain in your groups while we map out the safest route there.” He climbed off the van.
After a few seconds of murmuring, even those who’d been against the plan quieted down and embraced it, giving in to the wishes of the majority. I was afraid I’d have to pump up Karla's spirits for the coming ordeal, but that was not the case. She had a beaming smile on her face and nodded as she wiped away her tears. I copied her smile, understanding the motive behind her enthusiasm. Her dad was a surgeon at St. Anne’s.
Lucky girl.
Father and daughter would soon be reunited.
Chapter 7
Staying put might not have been such a terrible idea after all.
The extent of the tragedy that had taken place hit me with every block we left behind. The few buildings left standing seemed like battered dollhouses, their tasteful brick facades or floor-to-ceiling windows shattered and lying in heaps along the sidewalk, exposing crumbling interiors. Some of the buildings slanted at impossible angles, defying gravity… at least for the time being. We tiptoed under their shadows. I feared the stomping of our feet would be all it would take to bring them down.
Dozens of people with blood streaming down their faces emerged from the dust cloud which covered the streets, holding injured body parts and screaming for help. Every so often, vaguely human sounds could be heard from within the wrecked buildings.
I felt the urge to ask Mr. Jenkins—who’d taken over our class—for permission to check for survivors. None of my classmates seemed to be aware of the faint moaning coming from the wreckage, though. Either I was the only one who heard the noises, or they were very good at hiding their concern. Maybe it really was all in my head, since even with my nostrils clogged with dust I thought I could smell the stench of spilled guts and pooling blood nearby.
“Hey, Lala, can you hear that?” I asked Karla, leaning toward her as we walked by the wrecked buildings.
“What?” she asked, staring at the fractured pavement.
“I don’t know. Sounds like someone’s hurt.”
“Maybe it’s one of the guys up ahead.” She nodded in the direction in which our injured schoolmates were being carried. “I’m sure they’ll be fine once we reach St. Anne’s.” She rubbed her shivering hands as she walked. “I just… God, I just hope Tom pulls through. I know my dad can get him looked at straight away… when we get there.” She closed her eyes and failed to stifle a sobbing spell.
My mind raced for something to say that would cheer her up, but I kept stumbling over thoughts of my own parents. Sometimes it might’ve felt as though we went for days without crossing paths, with them treating our apartment more like a hotel room than a home, but during the few hours we spent together, they always tried their best to make me feel loved. I remembered trading beauty tips with Mom, watching movies with Dad… just talking about whatever I felt like talking about.
There was no time for self-reflection, though, as we had to be on the lookout for cars and clumps of debris strewn along the road, hindering our journey to the hospital. Again and again, we ran into streets in which the rubble was heaped up to ten feet or higher, and the shambling procession of students and teachers had to skirt around it, only to find the next street blocked as well. At every intersection, it wasn’t ruined buildings that barred our way but heaps of twisted steel and broken glass where cars—sometimes more than a dozen—piled up in burning wrecks.
I watched with morbid interest the outcome of an especially gruesome crash when I spotted a blue minivan with one of those “Baby on Board” stickers on its cracked rear window. Concern overtook me, and as we marched by the pileup, I scurried over to the smashed vehicle and wiped the dirty passenger window to take a look inside. I instantly regretted my decision.
A young woman sat behind the wheel, her beige slip dress and light-blond hair spotted with blood… and her brains scattered across the dashboard. Splotches of bright-red blood and gore gelled on the busted windshield, the same color as the solar eclipse that was still lingering in the sky almost three hours after the earthquake had ended.
I breathed in short gasps as my throat tightened and my heart fluttered in my chest. The woman’s gruesome remains didn’t bother me as much as I would’ve thought, but the empty baby seat in the back was a different story. I frantically swiped the rear-side window and pressed my face against the murky glass until I could make out a baby-shaped figure lying on the carpet. I covered my mouth with my filthy hands to muffle the piercing shriek escaping my lips.
“Hey, wait a second!” I screamed to my oblivious classmates already several feet away as I yanked on the van’s door handle. Locked. I desperately searched for something to break the glass with and found a chunk of concrete the size of my head. I slammed it at the window by the passenger’s side. My wrists stung from the impact, but the glass burst and spilled onto the empty passenger seat, far away from the baby. I unlocked the sliding door, pushed it away, and crawled inside the minivan.
“Come on, Becca! What are you—”
Finally noticing my absence, Karla had come to fetch me but froze in place a few feet away as I emerged from the minivan with a baby cradled in my arms.
The little guy couldn’t have been more than a few months old, his tiny light-blue polo shirt and khaki shorts baggy on his small, pale body. I barely felt his weight as I held him in my shivering arms. Thin lines of blood trailed from his mouth and nose.
Tears rolled down my cheeks as I staggered toward Karla. Her feet remained planted firmly on the ground, but her body leaned away from me, as if she wanted to run away.
“Do you think he might still…?” I tried to ignore the limpness of the baby’s stubby arms and feet, the coldness of his skin… all that blood.
“Oh, Jesus…” Karla covered her mouth with both hands and whimpered, but soon regained enough composure to stretch out a hand toward the baby’s neck. She jerked it back right away.
“Put him back, Becca.” She turned her face away, sobbing into her hands.
I walked back to the minivan, crying, taking care not to stumble on the scattered rubble as I dragged my unsteady feet. I laid the baby in his car seat and reached for the plushy white blanket sprawled on the van’s floor to cover his pale, blood-streaked face. As I lifted the blanket I found a small stuffed monkey beneath it. The dumb smile sewn on its face seemed to mock me, and I felt the urge to toss it away, but instead I placed it in his owner’s arms and covered them both with the blanket.
I stepped outside the minivan and wiped the tears off my cheeks before shutting the door. Steadying my breathing, I hurried to Karla, who stood where I'd left her. She wept and clasped her hands as if praying. I’d barely reached her when the sound of rapid stomping approached us. One of our classmates materialized out of the dust cloud.
“Hey, what the hell—are you guys coming or not?” He tried to catch his breath. “What, you found a cute handbag in there or something?”
I strode up to him without saying a word, my face flushing as my grief turned to anger. Somehow, I managed to contain my burning desire to sock him straight in his stupid mouth and settled instead for shoving him to the ground.
Mercy (The Last Army Book 1) Page 3