The Cup

CHAPTER 55

The back wall of the building was still intact and would protect them from behind. They retreated part of the way into the church and formed a line facing the doorway where the rebels had to enter. Broken masonry gave them some cover from rifle fire. It wouldn't protect them from grenades or from an RPG. They crouched behind the fallen stones, waiting.

Nick lay next to Selena. "Don't shoot until most of them have made it through the door. You see someone with anything more than a rifle, take him down first."

Selena's mouth was dry. She waited, breathing to slow down the adrenaline pumping through her.

A man with a cloth sweatband wrapped around his head came through the doorway, crouching low and swiveling his head from side to side. He had an AK. He said something over his shoulder and three more men followed him in. They moved toward the open entrance to the stairs and stopped. Selena aimed at the one nearest the opening. She felt Nick's hand on her arm and looked over at him. He shook his head.

Not yet.

Five more men came through the door. The first four stood in a group arguing about something. Nick waited but no one else came in.

"Now," he said.

Selena opened fire. She was aware of the others shooting. The night lit with flashes from the guns.

The hail of fire took down all four men by the trap door. The others dove for cover. In seconds, the sound of AK's mixed with the coughing of the MP7s. One of the rebels lifted his rifle over the rock he was hiding behind and fired blindly, spraying bullets in their direction. Selena shot off his hand. She could hear him screaming over the sound of the guns.

She'd never been in a firefight like this. Hundreds of rounds struck the rubble around her, sending chips of rock and masonry flying everywhere. Her gun locked open. She ducked down, ejected and jammed in another magazine, cocked the gun and waited for a lull in the shooting before she looked again.

She was looking at the wrong end of an RPG launcher.

"RPG!" she yelled.

The grenade screamed over her head and impacted against the back of the church, blowing a large opening in the wall. Selena raised up and shot the man with the launcher. It was a temporary reprieve. Someone else would pick it up.

It was only a question of time before more rebels came or they ran out of ammo. Either way they were cooked if they stayed where they were.

Ronnie crawled over to him.

"This is not good, Kemo Sabe."

"Yeah. We'll go out through that back wall. Once we're in the street, we can keep them busy until our ride gets here. Ronnie, Selena, you go first. Lamont and I will cover you. Once you're through, keep them off our six."

The volume of fire coming at them increased and then fell away.

Reloading, Selena thought.

"Go," Nick said. He and Lamont raised up and began laying down fire.

Selena jumped up with Ronnie and ran in a crouch toward the opening blasted out of the back wall. She tripped and went down hard, rolled and came up again several steps behind Ronnie. He reached the opening, went through and then began firing over her head. She made it to the wall and through and moved to the other side.

She looked around the edge of the opening and began shooting at the piles of debris shielding the rebels. Nick and Lamont broke cover and ran toward them. She fired over their heads and prayed they'd make it. Rounds from the rebel guns were whistling through the opening and chipping stone from around it. Nick had almost reached her when he was hit and went down. He stumbled to his feet and made it the rest of the way.

"I'm all right. Glanced off the armor."

He took out his radio.

"Spooky One, this is Bird Boy. The LZ is hot, say again, LZ is hot."

"Copy, Bird Boy. ETA two minutes."

"Moving now. Out."

Behind the church was a street lined with the shattered trunks of trees. They were in a neighborhood of shops and cafés. Across the way was the remains of a two-story high shopping mall. The concrete façade was pockmarked and chipped, the big display windows long gone, but the building was still intact.

"In there," Nick said. "The roof's flat, it's perfect."

They ran across the street. Bullets kicked up pieces of pavement around their feet. They made it through into the building. Behind them, men were shouting.

Ahead of them an escalator led upward. They ran up the silent steps. The second floor was strewn with the remains of displays from the shops lining the sides of the mall. Several broken mannequins leaned in grotesque angles through the shattered windows of a clothing store. Glass crunched under their feet. The night sky showed through gaping holes in the roof.

Below, everything had gone silent.

"They'll be here any minute," Ronnie said. "How do we get to the roof?"

Selena pointed. "There's an exit door. There have to be stairs."

They ran to the door. It was locked.

Nick aimed his rifle at the lock and fired. He kicked the door open. Shots came from behind. They went through the door and slammed it shut. Bullets pounded into it on the other side. Stairs led down and up. They climbed up, forced open another door and found themselves on the roof.

Men were converging on the mall from either end of the street below.

"I'm low on ammo," Ronnie said.

Lamont pulled out two magazines and gave one to him.

"We need more than that, we're in what my grandma used to call a heap of trouble."

The voice of the chopper pilot came over the headset.

"Bird Boy, that you on that roof?"

"Where the hell is he?" Lamont said. "I can't hear him."

"Spooky One, yeah that's us. Hostiles on the ground. They have RPG's. Watch your ass."

"Uh, copy that. Standby."

"I hear something," Ronnie said.

"There he is." Selena pointed.

Coming toward them out of the night was a black shape that looked like nothing they'd ever seen before. The helicopter was all angles and odd surfaces that were hard to grasp, as though the machine was fluid in shape. As it drew closer they heard the sound of the engine for the first time, a soft, ominous rumble mixed with the muffled whir of rotors. The aircraft bristled with weapons.

The chopper angled to the left and unleashed a barrage from a chain gun at the rebel troops in the street. The surface of the street disintegrated. Cannon fire and heavy machine gun rounds shredded the men below.

The pilot brought the chopper close to the roof, hovering inches above the surface. They ran for the open compartment door. A crewman helped Selena in, then Ronnie, then Lamont. Nick came last. As they lifted away, the door to the roof flew open. A streak of fire shot out of the chopper and through the door. A ball of flame rose into the night sky. The roof of the mall fell in on itself, burying anyone below.

"Hell of a machine," Ronnie said. "You see what it did to those poor bastards?"

As they lifted away, Lamont looked out through the open door of the chopper at the ruins of the mall.

"They probably should've waited for a sale," he said.