That’s where Forest was heading.
Reaching the counter, Forest maneuvered to lay straight out with the marble block between himself and the terrorists. His helmet pressed against a marble block no wider then his shoulders or taller than his helmet. It was only effective cover if he stayed perfectly still. Even then, it was pretty dubious. The wood veneer and aluminum structure on the marble block was effectively invisible to high-velocity rounds.
Coleman swore. He couldn’t see how badly Forest was injured, but from the way he crawled there was some fight in him yet. From the distance Bora launched the surprise attack, Forest’s body armor could have had stopped some of the damage.
‘Forest, don’t move,’ yelled out King.
‘Forest, how bad are you hit?’ called Coleman.
‘It’s just my arm.’ Forest’s voice was shaky. ‘It’s not too bad. My body armor caught two rounds.’
Gunfire hammered Forest’s position.
The light wood veneer splintered above his head. Serving trays crashed down over his legs. A bullet grazed his boot toe and tore off a chunk of rubber sole. Falling knives and forks showered his chest and torso.
The gunfire stopped.
Shredded paper napkins floated down a second later.
Keeping his body perfectly still, Forest turned his head until he found Coleman. A bead of sweat ran down his brightly flushed cheek.
His expression was obvious. Help me.
Coleman scanned the area around Forest. No hardcover existed nearby, except the fountain, and Forest would never survive the dash now the gunmen knew his position. He couldn’t even roll over without exposing a shoulder above the marble block.
A bloodstain spread over a white paper napkin fallen on Forest’s upper arm. The wound might not be life-threatening, but any second now he was going to collect a less treatable injury.
Coleman peaked over the fountain and studied the pallets. ‘Vanessa, is anything in those pallets volatile?’
She didn’t even need to check. ‘Definitely not. Nothing like that can be transported through the habitation level. It’s more likely to be rubbish and recycling. It’s all shipped off site.’
Coleman’s options were limited.
‘King, we need to draw that heat off Forest.’
The terrorists weren’t letting up. They hammered Forest’s position again. The tray counter collapsed. In moments Forest was lying behind the naked marble block, covered in splintered veneer slats and twisted aluminum frame. He shifted his body weight so the counter remains fell to one side.
‘Now!’ said Coleman.
Together, Coleman and King popped their weapons up and fired. Their immediate goal was to draw the terrorists’ gunfire from Forest.
In a second the return fire came.
Marble flakes blasted off the fountain and sliced through the air. Vanessa protected her face from the hundred marble razor-flakes zipping in every direction. A big chunk of marble dropped away from the side of the fountain and released a surge of water and a surprised red gold-fish.
The gold-fish hit the floor and slapped around.
The firing stopped.
A marble flake had clipped Vanessa’s earlobe. She touched the cut then checked her fingers for blood.
Coleman listened carefully, trying to predict Bora’s next move. Vanessa darted out her hand and caught the asphyxiating gold-fish. She slipped the fish back into the fountain.
If only everyone’s life was that easy to save, thought Coleman, wishing he could just scoop everybody up and carry them away.
He glanced back to King’s position behind the marble coffee table. The entire area around King was decimated. All the furniture was destroyed except the marble tabletop. It was the single house left standing after a twister. Covered in bullet craters, the edges of King’s cover had disintegrated under the intense firepower. Bullet damage had completely eroded away the top corners.
Third Unit were outnumbered and pinned down. Returning to the cafeteria kitchen or the dormitories was impossible. Coleman searched desperately around himself. Nothing he could use to alter the balance of the skirmish presented itself.
And then, in one second, everything got much, much worse.
#
Coleman groaned as a third force joined the skirmish.
The creatures had arrived.
Attracted to the gunfire, three creatures rushed from the dormitory corridor. They stopped right between Bora’s team and Third Unit, between the pallets and the fountain.
Then a forth creature emerged.
Then a fifth.
Their fire had drawn the creatures like iron filings to a magnet.
Coleman gave the ‘hold fire’ hand signal. Every eye watched the creatures. Coleman and Vanessa lay completely still. She lay closer to the creatures, but Coleman could see them over the lip of the fountain.
The creatures weren’t moving. They had frozen, apparently confused by the abrupt halt of the vibrations attracting them in the first place.
Everyone had ceased fire the moment the creatures arrived. Coleman hoped the terrorists would be careless enough to fire first and attract the creatures, but he knew it was a long shot. Bora knew exactly how the creatures worked. He wouldn’t make that kind of mistake.
Nobody moved. The area had become a silent graveyard in less than two seconds.
Coleman’s mind raced. No one could shoot for fear of attracting the creatures. Should Third Unit seize the opportunity and try to withdraw in full view of the terrorists who couldn’t dare fire? If the creatures sensed their vibrations, Third Unit might be forced to retreat under full fire from the terrorists. They’d be slaughtered. Coleman truly had no idea just how sensitive the creatures were to vibrations.
All their lives, the genetic material, maybe the future of the free world, depended on which direction the creatures chose to attack, from which direction they first sensed prey.
Seconds passed as everyone kept perfectly still.
Coleman winced as a piece of marble plopped into the fountain’s second tier. The creatures stirred, but didn’t advance. If the marble had hit the floor instead of the water, it might have been different.
Coleman lifted his head and looked over the fountain. Beyond the creatures, Bora stared back at him.
Even across the distance, Coleman saw Bora raise his eyebrow - What now?
Then Bora’s eyes darted past Coleman.
It was Sergeant William King.
King rose slowly from behind cover. His eyes searched the pallet train until he found Bora. He pointed squarely at Bora and then deliberately traced his thumbnail over his own Adam’s apple. The message was plain to everyone. I’m going to kill you.
For a second Coleman thought King was daring Bora to shoot at him, then King carefully laid his weapon on the floor. Feet planted solidly, he reached out and lifted a fallen chair by its two front legs.
He’s not…? My god, he is!
Amazed, Coleman watched as King twisted his body and hurled the chair at the terrorists. It was a colossal effort. The chair spun gracefully through the air, arcing silently over the creatures.
The terrorists gaped at the incoming chair in jaw-dropping disbelief. The simplicity of the attack was genius. King was using the chair like a laser-guided missile. The chair was the laser, the creatures were the missiles.
The chair smashed down among the gunmen.
Coleman actually saw Bora’s expression the moment the chair splintered apart. It was the conductor’s face when someone farted in the orchestra - frustration, disappointment, and then face-twisting anger.
As the chair flew apart, Bora was already up and running. His men ran right behind him.
The five creatures charged the seven gunmen, drawn first by the smashing chair and then by the seven pairs of fleeing boots.
‘Fall back! Fall back,’ Coleman heard Bora yelling. The creatures reached the pallets. Bara’s men were in full retreat, only turning to sporadically fire at the cr
eatures as they fled east along the pedestrian loop.
Coleman raced to Forest. King knelt beside the wounded Marine, pushing aside a piece of splintered timbre as he unclipped his first-aid kit.
Coleman thumped King’s shoulder. ‘Good thinking, you magnificent bastard.’
King didn’t answer as he worked on Forest’s arm.
‘What happened?’ asked Forest.
Vanessa gently squeezed Forest’s other arm. ‘King ran out of bullets so he started throwing furniture.’
‘That’d surprise them,’ said Forest, trying to peer around the marble block at the retreating terrorists.
‘Hold still for a second,’ urged Coleman. ‘Let King put the bandage on.’
‘The wound looks clean,’ reported King. ‘No bone fragments. Looks like it went straight through.’
Coleman nodded, half keeping his attention on the fleeing terrorists who were reaching the far end of the level. They had taken down one creature, but the four others were closing in. Bora retreated into the movie cinema occupying the north-east corner of the level. Two gunmen stopped at the cinema door, turned and fired, but the creatures were already reaching them.
King had a look of righteous satisfaction on his face as he watched the terrorists retreat into the cinema. ‘Let’s see how they like being chased for a change.’
#
When Bora saw the big black Marine throw the chair, he knew they were in deep trouble.
‘Fuck off,’ he breathed in shocked amazement as the chair sailed through the air. The single wooden chair changed everything.
Bora had the Marines pinned down. He’d wounded at least one. He had the larger force. He had the superior firepower. He was seconds away from securing the templates and leaving this shit-pit hole in the ground that the Americans loved so much.
And then?
And then the black giant had thrown the god-damned chair. The chair smashed straight down behind the pallets and destroyed every advantage Bora had gained.
In fact, it had done a lot more than that. Bora’s situation grew more desperate every second.
Now he was in full flight, sprinting for his life.
He ran into the cinema, crashing his shoulder into the swinging doors. The doors sprang open into the short corridor beyond.
‘Hold these doors!’ he ordered.
Two gunmen spun to face the charging creatures, lifting the weapons, firing.
Bora dashed six paces down the corridor and barged through a second set of double doors.
He ran straight down the main aisle between twenty rows of seats. A slight incline led down to the screen. Confused, he spun on the spot, searching for the second exit. Forcing the creatures to pursue through the bottleneck cinema corridor only worked if they could find another exit….
There’s no exit anywhere!
‘Check behind the screen,’ he shouted, shoving one gunman down the aisle towards the screen.
The gunman jerked across the curtain. He slashed the screen with his combat knife. Solid wall showed behind.
‘Nothing! There’s nothing here!’
The two gunmen flanking Bora raised their weapons towards the cinema’s front entrance.
Bora keyed his radio. ‘Gould! I’m in the cinema. I need an exit, a crawl space…anything!’
There was no answer. Bora hoped the cinema walls weren’t blocking his radio signal.
‘Answer me, Gould! I’ve got incoming hostiles!’
Gould’s voice came unhurriedly over Bora’s headset. Bora sensed Gould had been listening the entire time. ‘I’ve got nothing for you, Bora. There’s no other exit. Think about it. You’re in the corner of an underground Complex. It’s a dead end. The only way out is the way you came in.’
Bora almost spat he was so angry. Gould’s monsters were causing the problem in the first place. He said harshly, ‘Well turn something on to draw them away. They’re right on top of us!’
‘There’s nothing to turn on where you are,’ Gould replied calmly, almost jovially. ‘All the systems are disabled on the habitation level. We should have left long ago.’
Bora watched the two gunmen holding the outer doors.
They fired fully-automatic bursts at the approaching creatures. Behind them, two more gunmen held open the inner doors, their weapons ready, but unable to fire around the two forward gunmen.
Through the aperture framed by the twin doorways, the creatures were a solid wall of thrashing thorns charging the cinema. Bora’s men couldn’t focus on a single target. They jerked their weapons left and right, trying to slow down the charging wall. The creatures would overrun them in seconds.
The roar of weapon fire sounded deafening in the acoustic cinema.
Still firing, they backed away, preparing to abandon their defensive position at the outer doors.
Bora couldn’t blame them, but he couldn’t save them either. They’d left it too late.
With the hostiles just five meters away, both men’s weapons clicked empty.
Bora yelled, ‘Fall back, you two. Get those doors closed.’
Both gunmen abandoned their reload and turned to run as the creatures reached the outer doorway. A tentacle tripped the man on the left, and on his way down he lurched out desperately, searching, grasping. He grabbed his companion’s leg for support. The second man fell, tripped by the first wildly grasping gunman. He rolled on his hip and kicked out at the screaming face behind the grasping hands. His boot heal connected with the man’s cheek, splitting a wide gash, but the man didn’t let go. They both started sliding towards the outer doorway.
‘Help me!’ pleaded the entangled gunman, clutching his companion’s leg like a lifeline. ‘Shoot it!’
‘Let go,’ yelled the man being dragged by his leg. He reached out and frantically searched the passing wall. His fingers found a small ventilation grill. He shoved his fingers through the slots and gripped tight. His body jerked taunt and lifted off the floor. The grill immediately started buckling from the wall. The creatures swarmed over each other in their rush to cram through the outer doorway. ‘Let…me…GO!’
He kicked out again, this time targeting the hand gripping his fatigues. Bones snapped under the terror-fuelled kick.
The hand let go. The snagged gunman was dragged screaming under the creatures.
The second man didn’t stop to watch. As soon as the weight left his legs, he scrambled towards the inner cinema doors -
- just as they slammed in his face.
The slamming doors cut off Bora’s view of the creatures and the two prone gunmen. He didn’t have a choice. Those two men were already as good as dead.
‘Get up on the seats beside the doors,’ Bora directed his flanking gunmen. ‘Get ready for them to come through.’
Bora ignored the wet screaming beyond the doors. ‘Lock those doors. We need to slow them down long enough to use our weapons.’
The two gunmen who had slammed the inner doors searched for a way to lock them.
They weren’t fast enough. Or, Bora realized, the doors weren’t meant to lock.
Of the four gunmen in the cinema, two were trying to lock the swinging doors. Two more leapt up onto the seats, preparing to fill the corridor beyond with crossfire.
With a floor-shaking CRACK, the swinging doors caved into the cinema. It felt like someone ram-raided the cinema with a pickup truck. The doors slammed into the two gunmen trying to lock them.
The man on the right flew straight backwards, arms windmilling, legs bicycle-kicking. He crashed into the armrest three rows up from Bora.
The second gunman was less fortunate.
The door on his side ripped completely off its hinges. It struck the gunman with a bone-crunching thunk! The man flew backwards. The door flew after him. The man landed. The door landed on top of him like a giant coffin lid.
Standing sideways in the aisle, looking down his weapon-sight, Bora watched the unfolding chaos. He forced himself to wait. His first instinct was to start firing the mo
ment the doors caved in, but he resisted the powerful urge.
Raw firepower wasn’t going to carry the day.
His aisle position provided the only view into the corridor.
The doorway framed a scene that would disturb the hardest head-case. It was a snapshot into hell. A legless torso came first through the doorway, bouncing into the cinema ahead of the wall of chaotic motion. The first gunman trapped in the corridor had lost both legs. The rest of his flesh flapped from his body. The torso landed in a seat and toppled forward.
The second gunman was still trapped under the creatures. He was now just a fleshy red paintbrush.
The gunman under the door moaned and tried to shift the weight pinning him to the aisle. He couldn’t see the horror show just three meters from his boots. If he had any sense, he would have kept still.
The first creature through the corridor leapt onto the door. Its limbs wrapped under the door and found the moaning mess beneath. Panicked cries came from under the door.
‘Fire!’ yelled Bora, determining the pinned gunman was as good as dead.
The two gunmen on the seats fired down into the aisle, right into the creature’s body. The creature spent its last few seconds tearing at what was under the door. With a horrific ripping of flesh, the creature yanked the man from under the door in four different directions.
As the creature collapsed, the gunman on the seats to Bora’s left started firing into the corridor. He barely had his weapon on-target before a second creature charged over the seats towards him.
It clambered over the seats with astonishing speed. Every blurred movement seemed random, but a thousand random movements striving for the same purpose was disturbingly effective. The gunman retreated awkwardly over the seats. An armrest caught his boot heal.
He fell backwards.
Bullets streaked across the ceiling as he toppled. Cement dust rained down. The man desperately tried to squirm backwards, impossible over the fixed armrests. The creature climbed over the man, concealing his struggles in a tent of tentacles.
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