by SD Tanner
Looking at Tank, Leon said firmly, “No flamethrowers inside of the bunker.”
“And try not to shoot the buildings. They’re full of equipment we need,” he added.
Hood gave him a look of disbelief. “Are you serious? You want us to march in under a hail of gunfire, but be careful where we aim.”
Frowning at Hood, he replied dourly, “Yeah, because I still expect you to aim when you shoot.”
After arguing the points, they agreed to set up five rows of up to nine Navigators to walk into the site. Using an old-fashioned fighting style, they would march the first line inside, firing at anything that moved. When they ran out of ammo, they would allow the next lines to move past them while they reloaded their weapons. Banks of ammo would be set up just outside of the entrance, allowing them to reload without having to move far from the front of the battle. Critters could only attack them with their claws, but had they been armed then they couldn’t have left their supplies so close to the front line.
Their main issue were the laser guns. They only needed power packs, but when used in fierce combat, they quickly ran out of juice. Outside of his squad, none of the other Navigators was proficient with their use, meaning they could accidentally carve up NORAD, making it useless. The whole plan was fraught with risk, but he wasn’t prepared to give up the satellites and missiles without a fight. Now he’d seen the face of his enemy, he’d decided he was an ugly fucker who looked even worse than he did. Imagination was a double-edged sword. Prior to seeing the images brought back by the baby bot, he’d thought their enemy was a super sleek, stunningly smart alien. What lurked at the bottom of the nest was a dirty slug hiding deep inside of the earth and it wasn’t even that smart. Had he found it in his garden, he would have ground it to death under his boot.
With the Navigators standing in their lines, he had Lexie on his right and Tank on his left. Beside Tank was Ally. Hood and Stax had also joined the first line, intending to pull back and monitor their troops while they reloaded. If it all went badly wrong, on his signal they would sprint from the engagement and regroup at the rendezvous point.
“Bill, we’re in position.”
“Roger that. Doors are unlocked.”
There were two sets of heavy blast proof doors leading into NORAD. Several of the tanks pulled the first doors open and then went inside to deal with the second set.
“Stand ready.”
The first line of Navigators raised their weapons, ready to fire at whatever came through the doors. Once the doors were open, nothing appeared to happen for what felt like minutes, but he suspected it was only seconds. Out of the gloomy light, critters were sprinting towards their position and he opened fire with the laser, cutting them down mid movement.
“Fire at will.”
Mike had said there were hundreds of critters inside of the bunker and that may have been true days earlier, but now there appeared to be thousands. A wall of jittery movement was hammering its way along the concrete corridor that led to the main doors. He’d told Hood to aim before he fired, but it proved to be a redundant order. Eager to tear into them, critters were scrambling over the top of one another, creating a floor to ceiling mass of black claws and blank faces. Holding his laser gun on continuous fire, pieces of the critters were flying at all angles, bouncing against the walls, only to be crushed underfoot. There was no way they could step forward and he thought the corridor would probably become jammed with critter corpses.
Running out of power, he called, “Pull back!”
Stepping backwards and allowing the next line of shooters to step forward, there was no break in their continuous fire. The lasers were cutting the critters into pieces, forming a carpet of crushed blackness against the grey of the concrete floor, but nothing was deterring more of them from launching over their bodies.
“You need to retreat,” Bill said firmly.
Busy reloading his laser with a power pack and fumbling to get it to lock into place, he asked, “Why?”
“Critters are headed to your positon from all directions.”
The fourth row of shooters had stepped forward and he rejoined the last row, using his long-range scanners to check the area. Just as Bill had said, thousands of green blobs were heading towards the entrance to the bunker. If they didn’t close the doors then the site would be flooded.
“We need to get inside and close the doors.”
“No way,” Bill replied confidently. “If you go inside of the bunker you’ll be cornered.”
Taking another look at the blur of green blobs now less than a mile away, he replied, “We’ll be cornered if we stay out here.”
The line moved forward and he took several steps, still trying to make sense of what he was seeing around him. “Lexie, what do you see?”
“Thousands of critters heading towards us, but the buildings and walls interfere with my visor, so I don’t know how many are inside.”
Their trucks were parked along the road leading to the entrance, and they still had time to turn tail and make it to them before they would be overwhelmed. It was yet another moment where he needed to make a fast decision. If they left via the trucks, they would be forced to leave the doors to NORAD open with thousands of critters headed towards them. If they stayed then they might not get inside with enough time to close the doors, but even if they did, they didn’t know how many critters were inside of the bunker. If they left now he might save his Navigators, but he would sacrifice the engineers inside of the bunker. If they stayed then they could all die.
Making a decision, he ordered, “Surge forward!”
In response to his order, they began marching forward with the first line firing. When they ran out of ammo, the second line stepped ahead, letting the first line drop to the back of the rows. Every step they took was hard fought for, and the number of critters pushing their way through the corridor threatened to block it entirely. When his row joined the front of the queue, they were down to the last of their ammo and not all of the rows had made it behind the second door. Now, he faced the question of whether to close the doors with three rows of Navigators behind it, abandoning almost thirty people, or try to fight for a few more feet to give everyone enough space to get behind the second door.
“Surge forward!”
Those few steps forced them into the wall of critters and their weight pressed against him. Twisting so that his right shoulder went first, he used his hydraulic limbs to push against the critters, heaving himself into them. Critters were scrambling over him, and although his knees could take their weight, his neck and back couldn’t. Fighting against the increasing pressure from above, he felt himself buckling to his knees. Now forced to crawl, he couldn’t have used his gun even if he had any ammo left. Around him, the other Navigators were being overwhelmed and flattened to the ground under the weight of so many critters. With this many critters piled on top of one another, they couldn’t draw back their skinny limbs to claw at them, but it wouldn’t have made much difference even if they had. He was being pinned to the floor, gasping for air as his chest plate finally began to bend under the strain.
Desperately trying to locate Lexie, he recognized her signal through his visor. She was only a few feet from him and he fought to push his arm towards her.
CHAPTER TEN: Garbage in, garbage out (Boris)
“You have to be receptive,” Shirley said flirtatiously. “Loosen up. Don’t be so rigid.” Her girlish giggle flickered through his mind. “Well, maybe one part of you can stay rigid.”
“I’m not sure I have that part anymore.”
“What a shame,” she replied, sounding genuinely disappointed.
Shirley was trying to teach him how to invade Steve’s mind, but he was struggling to make the connection. While he’d instinctively resisted the interrogation of his brain, it had made it impossible for him to read Steve’s mind. Mentally blowing out a long breath, he tried to visualize himself somewhere other than plastered to the side of an alien monster. Allowing h
is mind to drift, he found himself sitting on a small dinghy with a fishing rod loosely held in one hand. Opposite him, his grandfather who had been known as Papa Pino was holding onto his own fishing rod, while chewing on the end of a fat cigar. His grandfather’s roots were Italian and he had been a Marine, inspiring him to follow in his footsteps. Grouchy and blunt, Papa Pino had often taken him fishing, showing him how to catch and gut the fish he’d caught.
“So, what would you make of this?” He asked, knowing his grandfather was long dead and buried in Arlington Cemetery.
Imagining his weatherworn face with the ever-present cigar, Papa Pino would have told him to suck it up and fight like a man. That philosophy had gotten him involved in skirmishes in the schoolyard and later in life more than his fair share of bar brawls. Every time he was called out, his father would be furious, but Papa Pino would ruffle his hair and tell him he was turning into a real Marine. He hadn’t lived long enough to see him earn his Butterbar, but he knew he’d done the old man proud.
The scene inside of his mind was so serene he finally realized just how much he missed him. Where his father hadn’t understood his ruthless drive, Papa Pino had encouraged him to be more of who he was. It was bittersweet to know he’d be joining him soon enough, although he’d never be buried in Arlington. Looking across the imaginary water, he remembered that the lake was surrounded by a thick forest and was surprised when all he saw was a cavernous hole. Beams of light were shining deep inside of it, outlining the bodies of Navigators caught in a fierce battle. The scene moved closer until he was no longer sitting on the dingy, but was watching the fight at close quarters.
Rows of Navigators were marching into what he now recognized as the main entrance to NORAD. They were firing a continuous stream of lasers and bullets at a wall of critters, intent on mowing them down. His perspective suddenly shifted and now he was facing the lines of Navigators and they were firing at him. Shirley had been right and now that he’d relaxed he could see through Steve’s mind.
As the body he was seeing through was cut down by gunfire, his view shifted to another. The Navigators were wearing armor of different colors and some had skulls painted on their helmets. With at least fifty of them advancing, they cut a fine army and he felt a surge of pride. They might not look like Marines, but regardless of how they geared up, their determination remained the same. His perspective shifted again and now he was inside of NORAD. There were thousands of critters inside of the bunker, queueing to join the assault on the Navigators trying to get inside. Clearly, the critters had launched an attack and a shudder of guilt went through him. This was his fault. He was the one who had told Steve that NORAD was critical and now the son of a bitch was hell bent on destroying it.
Unwilling to be the cause of the death of his brothers, he wondered how he could distract Steve. “Shirley, I need you to do something.”
“Anything for you, sugar.”
“NORAD is under attack and we need it. It’s got the satellites and the missiles.”
Now sounding serious, she asked, “What do you need me to do?”
“We need to tell Steve he’s attacking the wrong site and that there’s a more important one.”
Wracking his brain, he tried to think of another place he could us to convince Steve that there was a more critical target. Smiling to himself, he said, “Tell everyone else in here that the most dangerous place in America is…the Statue of Liberty.”
“Okay, but I don’t see how that’ll help.”
“They need to imagine the statue is a person that can come to life.”
Shirley giggled. “Do you really think he’ll believe that?”
“Steve is like a machine. Garbage in, garbage out. He’ll believe whatever we tell him.”
While Shirley communicated with the other unfortunate souls trapped inside of Steve, he imagined the majestic statue moving from its pedestal and marching down through the city as if it were Godzilla. Trying not to see the humor of the tactic, and borrowing scenes from old movies, his monster statue stomped on buildings and grabbed the screaming people running along the streets.
The scene in front of him dissolved and a rapid flashing of images began to spin before him. Steve was looking for the statue. Despite being buried inside of a monster, he felt his mouth curve into a smile. It felt good to be back in control again.
CHAPTER ELEVEN: Ship of the lost (Ark)
They were back on the road, heading towards Albuquerque, still puzzling over what had happened at NORAD. Just before they were crushed to death, the critters had lost interest and scattered from the bunker. Nothing their enemy ever did made any sense, and after the critters had simply run away, they’d secured the bunker by locking it up again, leaving a Navigator squad to protect it. Hood and Stax’s squads had joined them to travel to the city, while the others returned to CaliTech to fix their damaged gear and get more ammo.
Sitting on the top of the truck, watching the passing scenery, his usually unruffled mood was decidedly out of sorts. After almost six weeks of doing nothing, it appeared their enemy was implementing the next stage of their process. For some reason NORAD was seen as a threat whereas CaliTech wasn’t, but they were feeling comfortable enough to invite their friends to the party in the form of the ships now hovering over Albuquerque and New York. A complacent enemy was a loser in the making and he pondered how he could exploit their laziness.
“How do you plan to get through the fence?” Leon asked.
Their mission was to recon whatever was hovering over the city, so they weren’t planning to rescue the beleaguered prisoners. Prior to today, he would have blown the fence and then run through it, but now he wasn’t keen to leave their vehicles outside of the perimeter.
“We have to get to whatever is sitting over the top of the city, so I say we drive through it and shoot any critter that gets in our way.”
“Ballsy. I like it.”
When they finally made it to Bernalillo, just north of Albuquerque, they didn’t need to drive through the fence to study what was happening. Parked a mile away from the critter fence, they stood looking up the enormous flat oval casting a shadow over the city. It was no more than four hundred yards above the ground and shaped like a thick disk with large open holes in its underbelly. Tiny specks of black buzzed in and out of the holes, creating the effect of wasps flying around a hive. It appeared to be another nest and the critters were busily doing something inside of it.
“What the hell are they doing?” Hood asked.
“It’s weird,” Lexie replied. “Some are flying in holding onto something and others are leaving empty handed.”
Using his visor to zoom in on a single black speck it became clear that it was a critter holding onto a pale, white body. The person was limp in its claws and their legs hung loosely, drifting against the wind. Choosing another black speck, he zoomed again, and it became the body of a critter flying to earth, but there was nothing in its arms. Just as he’d suspected, they were moving the newly transformed people into what he now assumed was a transport ship.
With a sudden flash of insight, he said, “I think the prisons are a processing plant. They’re transforming some of the people into the creatures we’ve found and now they’re getting ready to transport them.”
“Why would they do that?” Leon asked.
“Does it matter?” He replied flatly. “It’s over.”
“What’s over?”
He already knew there was more than one ship and suspected they would eventually harvest the entire world. They’d already lost half of the population when they’d turned into critters and now they were losing what was left. If he couldn’t prevent what was happening then they would literally become the last people left on earth. They had two choices. Either they could join the survivors on Hood’s island or they could have one last fight to regain control of their home.
“We can either hide or we can fight with everything we’ve got.”
Sounding confused, Leon asked, �
�Why do you think there’s only two choices?”
“They’re harvesting the planet and once they’re done there’ll be no one left.”
“You don’t know that,” Lexie said. “All I see are some people being taking aboard, but we don’t know whether they’ll take everyone.”
“We shouldn’t let them take anyone,” Hood said dourly.
“It’s a bit late for that,” Lexie replied. “They’ve already wiped out two thirds of the human race.”
“That still leaves billions of people, hon,” he said firmly.
Watching the critters buzzing in and out of the orange colored ship was making him angry. While they stood by, more people were being transformed and taken from their homes. Every passing second was another life lost and he tuned out of the conversation on the grid. Scanning the city, there were clusters of people inside of buildings, and just as they’d seen in the small town, these people were in an unnatural formation, making him wonder how many people had already been transformed. Based on everything they knew about the critters, transformation was a one-way trip and there was no way to become human again. Studying the seemingly endless stream of critters moving in and out of the ship, he estimated tens of thousands of people were effectively dead.
Checking the fence line, he realized they could have easily driven through it. There were almost no critters guarding the city as most of them were occupied with moving people to the ship. They clearly weren’t worried about any resistance and nor did they expect their prisoners to escape. The casual complacency to murdering their people only added to his anger.
“Bill, order NORAD to nuke that ship.”
“That’ll kill everyone in the city.”
“As Boris once said, they’re dead anyway.”
“But if we do that then they’ll know what we can do.”
“It’s time they knew.”
Turning away from the city, he said, “Pull back. We’ll go in once they bring it down.”