by Chris Lowry
He tried to recall where the alien beachhead was established at the Santa Monica airport in relation to the rest of LA.
The LZ would be north or south, along the coast, if they were smart.
Archie wasn’t prepared to award the Head Shed that qualifier yet.
But war was an old business, and the US had gotten pretty damn good at it in the last two hundred years.
They would insert near the coast, he decided. Probably Long Beach or Malibu.
There were a lot of mountains and canyons North of LA, he thought. Malibu was full of them.
He would put his money on Long Beach, he thought.
The port of Los Angeles would provide good places for cover, and there were long stretches of public beach hidden by the curve of the bay as land jutted out into the Pacific.
The more he thought about it, the more confident he was that Long Beach or nearby would be the insertion point.
Which put a lot of room between them and the target where a man could get lost.
“What the hell you smiling at Chief?” Snow leaned closer to him.
Archie could smell his stale breath in the darkness, feel the pressure of his shoulder bearing into his own.
“Captain,” he corrected and marveled for the moment at how automatic the reply had been.
“Got you Cap,” Snow gurgled. “I figure if I see a man smiling on the way to his execution, I got to ask him what the big joke is, so he can let me in on it.”
“No joke,” Archie answered. “Just thinking pleasant thoughts.”
“That pilot wrapped around your waist? Yeah, me too,” Snow leered.
Archie couldn’t see it on his face, but by the shape the words made in the dark, he knew that’s exactly what the man was doing.
“That what you were in for?” he asked without thinking.
“Nah man, I’m innocent. Simple case of mistaken identity,” Snow answered fast, the rehearsed rote of an experienced convict. “Besides,” he continued. “They only picked the killers for this mission. If I was guilty, I mean. Which I ain’t.”
“We’re still here,” Archie reminded him.
“I said I was innocent, not lucky.”
Two red lights flashed into life on the ceiling of the plane.
Hammer and Norman stirred.
“Asses in gear,” Hammer shouted.
Norman passed out the packs and moved on his knees to each man to ensure they were strapped in before he cinched up his own.
Archie noted he parked himself at the end of the line so he could be the last one out.
There would be no way a straggler could hang back to catch a ride home.
Or wherever the pilot planned to ditch.
A third red light flashed on and Hammer flipped open the door.
Wind roared in through the narrow opening.
Hammer held up a finger.
One minute.
A red bolt lit up the windows of the cockpit as fire lanced across the sky.
It sliced through the thin metal skin of the plane and separated the cockpit from the tail, missing Norman by less than a foot.
The front of the plane tumbled away from the fuselage, both spinning.
Archie slid along the slick floor and shot from the now open front of the plane and lost sight of the others.
The night sky was awash with stars, but they provided no light other than to let him see the shape of his arm in the darkness.
He spun out of control, head dizzy, thoughts jumbled as he tried to process what just happened.
A pop behind him launched his chute and the spinning stopped with a hard yank.
He bit back a scream as the straps dug into his crotch and squished some bits between the fabric and his leg.
“Son of a bitch,” he muttered as the world stopped spinning.
He saw the fuselage of the plane crash into the ground and wondered who else got out.
If anyone got out.
The burning wreckage sent up a small fireball, but it was smaller than he expected. He wondered if they dumped fuel before the drop or if that plane was a one way trip for all of them.
It was good he didn’t hijack it then, he thought.
He saw a small green light strobe in the air a hundred yards below and to his left.
Archie reached up and fit his hands through the loops on the line. He recalled steering was a matter of pulling on the lines, and shifted until he was just above the blinking green light.
At least one person got out, he thought. Probably Norman.
The spook had been behind him when the plane was hit, and the same physics that tore Archie through the front would have worked on Norman too.
“You fucker!” a voice screamed above him.
He recognized Snow, and heard Hammer shout as well.
“Quiet!”
Archie was glad the Sargent said it first. He didn’t want any lasers shooting into the sky and cutting him in half, and he didn’t feel like getting sprayed with goo or gore from anyone else behind sliced either.
A small beep on his chest pack sounded an alarm as they drew closer to the ground. It sounded like a bird chirping and told him he was ready to land.
He flared the chute by pulling on both loops and felt the hard packed grass swoosh under his feet.
Archie tried to roll as he landed, remembered he was toting a bomb at the last second and turned it into a rough tumble.
He sat up and felt the cords tug at his pack.
Snow walked in, Hammer right behind him, both landing like they were stepping on a runway.
Norman bent in front of him and began to undo the parachute.
“You hurt?”
Archie shook his head, more to shake off the daze than to answer. He accepted the hand to get up and adjusted the ruck to a more comfortable position.
“Can you believe that shit?” Snow grinned next to Boyd.
“Do you think they know we’re here?” Archie turned to Hammer.
“We should have tried a low insert,” Hammer grumbled. “I told them coming in high was the wrong way.”
“We’re here,” Norman answered.
“We need to get moving,” Archie interrupted.
“Where’s Toi?” Boyd asked.
“Gone Elvis,” Snow giggled.
They glanced where they had landed.
It was a long stretch of dark grass, perched on a cliff overlooking the ocean.
All they could make out were shapes in the darkness, but the open space was bordered by several palm trees along one side, and the ocean by the other.
“We missed the LZ,” said Hammer.
“Did he get out of the plane?” Norman worked his hands in his pack and snapped the cover shut.
“Who?”
“The missing one.”
“Toi,” Boyd offered.
“Yeah,” Hammer said. “We all got off.”
“Except the pilot,” said Archie.
“She knew what she signed up for,” Norman said. “We all did.”
“I didn’t sign up,” said Snow.
“Yeah, me neither,” Boyd added.
“He has the fucking detonators,” Norman spat.
“Toi?”
Norman glared at the darkness around them.
“If he got out, where the fuck did he go?”
“You didn’t think keeping the detonators with you was a good idea?” Archie asked. “Aren’t you the expert on this mission?”
Norman grumbled.
“I grabbed the wrong bag.”
“Wrong bag?”
“It was dark up there,” he said. “I got them mixed up.”
“So we have five bombs and no way to set them off?” Snow grinned. “That mean we call it off?”
“Hell no, we don’t call it off,” Hammer said. “We find Toi. He can’t be far.”
He motioned to Norman.
“Pull rear and don’t let anyone wander,” he turned and motioned the men to follow him.
Th
ey fell in step, though Archie wondered for a moment if he could make a run for the cliffs and swim for it.
The problem was, he didn’t know how high up they were.
Hell, for that matter, he didn’t know where they were. Somewhere south of LA, and he couldn’t think of soaring coastal cliffs in SoCal.
He was a little pissed at Toi though.
If the man was planning to rabbit, he could have at least told Archie.
CHAPTER NINE
“Shit!” Boyd yelped as he pitched forward on the ground.
Hammer held up the others.
“Tripped,” the soldier said as he held up a thin flagpole with a fabric triangle on the end. “The fuck is this?”
“Golf hole,” said Snow. “My dad used to play.”
Norman searched their surroundings.
“We’re not far off the LZ. That pilot knew her shit.”
Hammer glanced at a watch strapped to his wrist.
“We’re pushing it if we don’t find Toi soon.”
“Start there,” Archie pointed.
They looked in the direction he had indicated and saw a large chute flapping in the wind, half of it wrapped around a palm tree.
“Move,” Hammer ordered as they double timed to explore.
“Looks like he came in hot,” said Norman.
“No body though,” Archie pointed out.
The lines to the chute were tangled in the fronds, whipping in the breeze off the ocean.
Boyd grabbed one of the lines and felt the tip with his fingers.
“Cut,” he announced.
“He’s around,” said Hammer. “Spread out.”
He kept close to Archie as they searched the dark landscape.
Archie could hear the men around him as they fumbled through the long, unkempt grass. He wondered about snakes in California.
They had to have them, right?
Bears, he was sure about. Those were on the state flag, or what used to be the state flag.
Snakes though, he couldn’t remember.
He took a breath and let it out.
Here he was worried about snakes and Toi walked away from the group.
Archie slowed.
The man had it figured out and just waited for a window of opportunity to open up.
When it did, he disappeared.
Took the detonators with him, which put the mission in jeopardy, and Archie figured that meant they didn’t have to die.
He glanced in the direction where Norman and Hammer marched through the brush, eyes searching the dark.
They weren’t focused on him.
He could do it, he thought, as he slowed more.
Just a few more steps.
His foot couldn’t feel the ground and he pitched forward.
Archie had time to let out a startled gasp before something slithered around his face and clamped down on his mouth.
Another snake grabbed his wrists and yanked them behind his back, and burned his skin as they started to bite him.
He twisted and bucked, rolled to the side and swung with both elbows. He tried to dislodge the giant python crushing him, the stinky skin burning his nose as he struggled to breath.
Hot breath exploded across his ear as his elbow connected.
He heard the snake moan and loosen its grip on him.
Did snake’s moan?
Archie fought harder.
He twisted around, punched and shoved.
It felt like the snake was wearing denim.
The moment the realization hit him that it wasn’t a snake, Hammer yanked the person off him and slammed the long haired bearded man into the opposite side of the sand trap.
He trained a gun on the man the attacker as the others slid over the top of the pit and scrambled to a stop in the crusty sand.
“Alright Captain?” Hammer kept his eyes locked on the bearded man.
Archie coughed.
“Check him,” Hammer motioned to Boyd.
The soldier bent next to Archie, who waved him away and struggled to stand up.
“We have your man,” the guy with the beard croaked.
“Think that won’t stop me from shooting you?” Hammer spat.
“What the hell are you doing here?” Norman interrupted.
“What are you doing here?” the bearded man shot back. “Are they finally sending in the Army again? Are you a scout party?”
“Where is our man?”
“I can take you to him.”
Norman squatted next to the man as he cowered in the sand.
“Where did you take him?”
“Headquarters,” the man explained.
“HQ for what?”
“You don’t know?”
“If I said the words “for what” does that sound like I fucking know?”
“I’m Aldean,” the bearded man cleared his throat. “I’ll take you to the Resistance.”
CHAPTER TEN
Norman produced a nylon climbing rope from his pack and wrapped their captive’s wrists behind his back.
“Don’t want to lose you in the dark,” he said as he fed out a few feet. “Lead the way.”
“Wait a minute,” Archie argued. “We’re just going to follow this guy? What about Toi?”
“We’ve got him,” answered Aldean.
“We’ve got you too,” another voice called from behind them.
Hammer whipped around and lifted his rifle, but three red dots bounced off his chest.
“Be calm,” the voice advised as the dots danced across his torso.
More lasers blinked onto each of them.
Norman dropped the rope and raised his hands.
“I guess we’re going to meet the Resistance,” he called out.
Several dark bodies dropped into the sand trap.
They stripped away Hammer and Norman’s guns.
“These guys are unarmed,” the man in front of Archie said.
“What kind of rescue party comes into hostile territory unarmed?” the first voice asked.
“We’re not a rescue party,” Hammer advised.
Rough hands grabbed them by the shoulders and directed them out of the shallow pit.
Aldean rolled the climbing rope back up and handed it to Norman.
“Then why are you here?”
They marched the men to the edge of the golf course.
Archie counted six bodies around them, two to each side and two to the rear, all armed.
“We’re here to blow shit up,” Snow giggled.
“That right?”
“He’s right,” Norman said. “We’re going to the alien base.”
“Good luck with that,” Aldean said.
“You’ve seen it.”
The resistance fighter nodded.
“What can you share?”
“It’s guarded. We tried to get people to it before, but no one’s come back so far.”
“How many guards?”
“I’ll let HQ tell you.”
“Why can’t you tell me?”
“Because right now, I don’t know you. Your human, so you’re friendlies, but I don’t know if you’re that kind of friendlies. This is above my pay grade.”
“Wait,” Snow hissed. “You motherfuckers are getting paid?”
He bumped against Archie as they walked together.
“I need to talk to my lawyer.”
“He’d tell you to remain silent,” said Hammer.
“It’s called gallows humor, Sarge.”
“I know what it’s called.”
“How many of you are there?” Aldean asked.
“Just us,” Norman answered.
“Not much of a rescue.”
“Like I said, we’re not here to rescue anyone.”
Aldean grumbled.
“Shit.”
“If you’re resisting, you don’t need rescuing,”
“You’ll see,” said the man as he led them through an empty suburb.
The mini-mansions on
both sides of the street were dark and empty, black shadows hulking against a starry sky.
Archie remembered pictures of LA, shot from the side of a mountain north of the city.
Lights stretched from mountain to sea, and all the way to the southern horizon. Yellow, orange, red and white twinkling splashes of flickering color that rivaled the sky they now walked under.
It was disconcerting to think he was walking where it had been like that.
Now, it seemed a ghost town.
He wondered about the population, wondered if the government got them out in time, got them across the hills to the east.
He got the answer when they left the suburb.
Cars lines the streets, abandoned where they stood for as far as he could see.
It was too dark to make out model or style, but they were an effective roadblock.
The resistance fighters led them across the cars, stepping as quiet as they could on the dented and crimped metal hoods to drop on the asphalt on the other side.
They continued down a side street full of cars left trapped by the sheer volume of vehicles. There was no place for them to go.
Two miles inland they reached a vast parking lot that was almost empty. It looked out of place after the gridlock of the street.
The big box grocery store in the back had wood over the windows, like they had been boarded up in preparation for a hurricane.
It sat in the center of a long shopping strip mall complex in a giant L shape.
Every single window was covered on every store on both sides of the strip.
Aldean led them around back to a thick metal door embedded in the cinderblock constructed wall.
He rapped on the metal with four solid clangs.
It opened to an armed guard.
The giant black man with a gleaming skull and glittering ear rings stepped aside to let them in the door.
“Welcome to HQ,” Aldean said as they stepped inside.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
It stank.
“God damn,” Snow retched and pinched his nose between his fingers. “I’ve smelled some nasty shit in my day and trust me, this is the worst.”
“Yeah,” Aldean agreed. “You get used to it.”
“Please God, don’t let me get used to it.”
The inside of the store might have been a clothing shop or a small boutique. There were hints of it in the color of the pale walls, the long mirrors smudged from months of fire smoke.