by James Barton
“Those scientists can probably get just as much out of her dead. Take her, we are done here,” he said as the chorus of gunfire had steadily slowed to a dull silence.
“What about him?” Corporal Weats asked.
Neves looked over at the man. So much for us being the good guys. “Drop the girl and we won’t hurt you,” he called out.
The man began to tremble furiously. He glared at Neves with a look he had seen many times before. It was the look of pure hatred; it was the calm before the storm.
“Fine, just shoot him,” Neves said coldly.
He stood there watching, his hand resting on his custom handgun. Bullet after bullet tore through the man. Despite the continuous attack, the man rose defiantly to his feet, the back of his shirt bulging and pulsating as blood erupted from him. One of the shots caught him right in the forehead and he dropped to his knees and then collapsed onto the floor. Even in his apparent death, he positioned his body in a way that shielded her. The captain squinted his eyes and tried to remain detached, but the sight, well, it hurt him.
“What now?” Corporal Weats asked as the other soldiers gathered timidly.
“Now we take her home.”
The smoky silence was broken by a light plinking sound. A flattened rifle round rolled out onto the tile floor. The young man opened his eyes and raised his hand to his forehead. The bullet hole had healed over.
“He’s an alpha!” Neves shouted to his men, but that fact had little value at this point. Long, dark tentacles burst from its back and they began to drive into the chests of the soldiers. The captain suddenly realized that the man was a pack leader, one of the many different types of alphas he had encountered. Neves had taken part in killing the last pack leader alpha a few missions back. Taken part was an impressive way of saying that he called in an airstrike on a sleeping target.
As the alpha rose to his feet, tentacles flew from his back and gored the soldiers. Neves’s entire crew went silent, their deaths quick, but horribly gruesome. Neves, otherwise unharmed, was pinned to the ground with oily black tentacles. As the alpha stepped forward, the girl rose behind him, amazingly baring no signs of the destruction his men had laid upon her only minutes before. They embraced before standing over him in a victory that had seemed impossible, only moments ago.
Lying in a growing pool of his soldiers’ blood and his own shame, Neves was glad it was finally over. He had been sent to negotiate with them, to plead for their help of coexistence … and he had failed. It was better that he would die in combat, die a soldier. It beat the alternative, being subject to Court-Martial, disgraced, jailed, or worse, exiled from the Army.
Neves closed his eyes for a moment, then forced himself to reopen them. He wanted to see his end coming, a warrior’s death. Lying there, he realized he had believed it would only be a matter of time before mankind overcame these creatures, that justice would be served. But, now, looking at these two standing together hand-in-hand … he wasn’t so sure.
“It’s not too late; you could still turn yourself in,” he said in a final plea to the creature before him. “Your blood could be the key to human survival.” But the look in the man’s eyes was answer enough. The captain knew it was too late … there was no hope of getting through.
Steeling himself for the end, Neves spit out, “Look at what you’ve become.”
The alpha slowly took in the scene around him with eyes that showed more intelligence than Neves could have ever imagined. After a moment, it calmly turned its gaze back down to Neves’s face.
“Captain, it could have been worse. I could have turned out like you.”
Then, they were on him.
“Eagle-nest, this is Fox-den, come in.”
“Go ahead,” a cold, stern voice said.
“Hunter Team 1 is down. Target Alpha 4 is fleeing westbound on the highway with an unidentified male. Reaper has eyes on the target. Collection has failed.”
There was a pause before responding. “Copy.”
“We have hellfire missiles at the ready, do we have authorization to strike the target?”
“Negative.”
“Normal operating procedures state that if a hunter team is lost, the target is then …”
“Alpha 4 does not fall under normal operating procedures. Observe, do not interact. Tracking?”
“Loud and clear.”
“Be ready to send your reports to a new team,” Eagle-nest said firmly.
“Sir, that was the last hunter team. There are no more.”
“You are correct, that was the last hunter team. She is going to require something a little more advanced. Upload all collected intel, Ghost Team One will be taking over this mission. Eagle-nest out.”
Table of Contents
The Last Vacation
Do No Harm
Patient Zero
Alone in the Crowd
The Broken Blockade
Stay at Home Mother
Prepared
Nautical Nightmares
Anyone Can Be a Hero
Employee of the Month
How the Cornbread Crumbles
The Price of Order