Mercy (The Last Army Book 1) by John Freeter Read Free Book Online

boy right behind me asked.
    Without stopping, I turned my head back to see the reason for his surprise. He held a broken piece of smooth white plastic. At first I thought it was some kind of toy, since it had a small panel with an assortment of buttons, but pretty soon I figured out it was part of a bed railing... a hospital bed.
    Karla had her eyes fixed on the road, still oblivious to our classmate’s discovery. I kept my mouth shut and quickened my pace, driven by the awful realization weighing down my gut, swallowing mouthfuls of dust as my tense breathing turned into gasping. I feared what I’d find at the end of the block, but the hope that I was mistaken pushed me toward the hospital.
    “Slow down, Becca. I can barely see,” Karla said, her feet drumming on the pavement as she struggled to keep up. I almost lost my grip on her hand as thick beads of cold perspiration drenched my skin, but I managed to hang onto her as I dragged her along the street.
    “Miss Stirling, come back here right now!” Mr. Jenkins yelled when I rushed past him. “I thought I made it clear we have to stick together!”
    I ignored him, my desire to put my fears to rest much stronger than his furious commands. The teacher cursed at the dust storm and hurried after me. He wouldn’t chase after me for long, though, as a solid ring of students and teachers blocked the end of the street.
    The students held onto each other, weeping and cursing. Some sat down on the broken road, staring into nothing as tears streamed down their faces. The teachers tried to calm them down but couldn’t even contain their own emotions, their words of reassurance spoken with teary grimaces on their faces. I froze in place at the outskirts of the crowd. Our situation was clear enough without having to see the hospital’s ruins.
    Not Karla, though. She escaped my grip and shoved her way through our dejected schoolmates. I chased after her. She made the sign of the cross with a trembling hand, calling upon the Virgin Mary with increasing desperation the closer we got to the hospital.
    “Oh, God… oh, God, please, no… Dad!” she screamed, and collapsed to her knees, weeping into her hands. I knelt beside her and hugged her, unable to take my eyes off the ruins. She grasped onto my arms so tightly she buried her fingernails into my skin.
    I barely felt the sting, my body numbed by the sight of the hospital's five stories of bright-red brick, spotless white walls, and large sparkling windows pancaked into an amorphous mountain of rubble. Wide plumes rose from the dark crevices of the devastated hospital and were carried away by the waning breeze.
    Karla’s body turned cold and limp in my arms.
    “Karla? No, Karla, please, stay with me. It’s gonna be okay. Everything’s gonna be okay.” I shook her. “I’m sure they evacuated before… before… come on, Lala!”
    I frantically rubbed her arms. My eyes were clouded by tears. Her head sagged against my chest. My tears spilled onto her quivering lips. She moaned and whispered unintelligible words. She grasped my shirt and pressed her face against my chest, sobbing with complete abandon. I cradled her head and rested my lips on top of her dirty black hair.
    “Dad… Daddy… please, God, no…” she said between sobs.
    “He’s fine—I’m sure he’s fine,” I said, wishing I could believe it.
    St. Anne’s wasn’t an old hospital. Although such a destructive earthquake was probably the last thing on its designer’s mind, I never thought it would crumble like that. If it couldn’t withstand the violence of the earthquake, then the much taller building in which my parents worked…
    “They must’ve had time to evacuate. I know they did,” I said, thinking out loud. Karla nodded feebly and wiped her eyes with the back of her hands.
    “Hey, I think there’s someone still alive over there!” a girl screamed. She teetered on her scuffed high heels and gripped her short plaid skirt. Karla didn’t