Michaels looked slightly wild-eyed. He seemed skittish, as if the weeks of isolation before he arrived at the base had gotten to him. Something had cracked and the return of human company hadn’t quite fixed it. His thin black frame was emaciated, in spite of having plenty of food,, making the size of his eyes and wild flailing body gestures seem even more exaggerated.
Even now, he was still emotional about finding the base and seeing Major Austin in the distance.
“At first I was freaked, ‘cause I thought he was one of them,” Michaels confided. “I was ready to die, but when I realized he was a friend, a regular person, I yelled ‘Praise Jesus! Praise Jesus!”
The man seemed like he would weep. His emotional outburst was disconcerting, but since he was one of only two weapons officers for the Apache attack choppers, we hoped he would man up.
Everyone else seemed to be as normal as one could expect after such crazy events.
After a quick debriefing between Hauer and Sumner, we began to formulate a strategy.
Hauer, Freeman and the rest of us scoured the base for vehicles we could use in the attack and thankfully there were plenty of untouched vehicles with plenty of go-go juice to get us to the battlefield. Sumner and his small team began running diagnostic tests on the helicopters that had been left out in the California sun.
We gathered any weapons and ammunition that were left on the base and loaded them into the vehicles we found. Lacy and I retrieved the keys to the base vehicles and our forces spread out to any working military vehicles that were left behind. A wide variety of assault vehicles were there for the picking, so Lacy and I selected a military class hummer with a mounted MK 19 Grenade Launcher.
A pair of AH-64D Block III Apache Guardian attack helicopters, each carrying a full Hellfire 2 payload, were still in good working order and ready for the next phase of the plan. We had gotten lucky – Major Austin and Lt. Mitchell were accomplished Apache pilots with WA Michaels and Lt. Hilton as their gunners.
Colonel Sumner called the forces together for one last speech. He looked out at everyone, standing in the open gun bay of one of the Apaches. He motioned for Hauer to come forward.
“You’ve gotten them this far,” he said quietly to Hauer. “Anything you want to say before we go?”
Hauer turned to the people gathered in front of him.
“This is it, folks!” he said. “This is where we make our last stand for the human race. These things came here thinking we would lie down, that they could take us without a fight, and that we were their property. The human race turned out to have a much stronger will to exist than they expected. We’ve shown them that we won’t be slaves, and we won’t be property or cattle for anyone, alien or otherwise. This is our last hope, our last chance to stop them, to save the human race and our home. This is our goal, the only way we can keep humanity alive for future generations. This is our last chance to roar in one voice…roar so loudly that the human race is remembered forever as a species of righteous freedom fighters, remembered by every sentient being on every planet in the galaxy as a race that won’t be subjugated and will never accept a fate of slavery or unchallenged death! This is our chance to make sure these visitors and any other extraterrestrial shit bags know that the human race is not to be fucked with!”
The crowd cheered. Colonel Sumner patted Hauer on the back and said, “I couldn’t have said it better myself, boy!”
We loaded into our vehicles. Hauer, Freeman, Lacy and I lead the convoy while Sumner and his men started to warm up the choppers for Austin, Michaels, Mitchell, and Hilton.
A short time later our forces gathered a few miles from the power plant. Hauer and Freeman headed around to the back of the power station so we couldn’t see them from where were were. From a distance we could see a minimal scattering of enemy forces scattered around the power plant, but nothing intimidating.
Then, without warning the world exploded all around us from every conceivable direction. It was a complete cluster fuck disaster! Somebody totally screwed the pooch on this one…
Chapter 22 - Traitor
Sand and dirt and rock exploded in a shower around us. Tenachai soldiers strode from hiding places, some buried in sand and dirt, some in camouflage that perfectly mimicked the environment. There was no warning, no orders to surrender; they just began to open fire. An armada of vehicles pulled in from the periphery, some Earth military vehicles, others Tenachai vessels. They began a barrage of fire using advanced and precise long-range weapons.
People and vehicles exploded all around us. An armoured Winnebago with a makeshift gun turret to our right exploded in a fierce eruption and a ball of fire.
Debris from the former family home flew toward us. Armoured shrapnel cracked the windshield, but didn’t get through. The more concerning debris was a human figure flying high into the air and landing face first on the top half of our windshield.
It was Braden.
One arm had been torn away, leaving a ragged, bloody mess just below the shoulder. He struck the glass with a deafening “thump.” Blood ran across his face from a cut on his forehead. He lay flat on his belly against our windshield with his nose pressed up to it. His eyes were wide open, blank and lifeless. Any spark of the man we had known as Braden was gone into whatever afterlife may be out there.
For a moment Lacy and I were both frozen in the horror of it. She stared at Braden’s lifeless body for a moment. She was still and silent, then slowly moved closer, as if examining a very interesting pattern on a painting or trying to identify an interesting caterpillar during a warm July picnic.
And then she released a blood curdling scream of rage.
Lacy’s foot slammed down on the gas pedal, and our Hummer lurched. It launched off of a knoll as if it were a ramp. Like a scene from The Dukes of Hazzard with a much, much bigger car.
We landed with a hard thump and ran over a succession of at least eight Tenachai soldiers, struggling in vain to arm their weapons and fire before being flattened by the 8,000 pound armoured assault vehicle.
I looked over at her. Her face was twisted in rage. She was no longer there. Not listening to anything I had to say anyway.
“Lacy! Lacy!” I shouted nervously, hoping to get her attention.
The shiny metallic assault vehicle filled with Tenachai began to get larger and larger in the windshield as we barrelled toward it. It resembled a tank, but was narrower and taller, and had jointed segments every few feet, making it look like a giant metal caterpillar.
It was no use. The Hummer slammed into the side of it with tremendous force as we bailed out of our respective sides into the dirt in the nick of time.
Still lying on my stomach in the dirt, catching my breath, I heard Lacy growling with rage as I watched her climb up to the hood of the damaged hummer, onto the roof of the Tenachai tank and blow away the inhabitants point blank as they tried to exit and join the fight. It was like fish in a barrel. The tank was inhabited only by dead bodies.
The sound of laser fire whizzing by my head brought me out of the daze I was in from watching a force of nature at work. The air filled with the stink of my own singed hair. It had been close.
I don’t know if it was the fact that watching Lacy had stirred something in me, or the realization that my daydreaming had just nearly cost me my life, but I finally tapped into my own inner monster and found it rising into my throat.
I released a primal roar and jumped on the back of the damaged Humvee and fired back with everything the MK19 unit had, with no hesitation or remorse. The soldier who had fired on me, and three of his companions, were blown to smithereens.
Lacy found her way back down and joined the fire fight. We soon found ourselves side-by-side, backs against a rough embankment, crouching for cover and releasing volleys of gunfire at our enemies.
Amidst the carnage one small figure atop a salvaged 4-wheeler emerged from the back of an armoured truck. In the chaos no one noticed it speeding away toward the power plant.
The gate had been left open. Security hadn’t been a high priority in a while.
Banya cut the engine and calmly dismounted. He was happily humming to himself as he walked right into the power plant with a cocky stride.
In the distance, high above, five enormous ships hovered in the sky, the largest roughly the size of Manhattan. Many miles away, they hovered above the planet that was not their native soil, rapidly approaching the power plant.
In the meantime, resistance forces were dropping like flies. It was all we could do to keep up offensive cover fire for ourselves, let alone try to save our friends. Familiar faces that we had talked to in the mess hall, helped build the camouflage wall with, and had trained in firearms were falling lifeless all around us.
Roughly 100 yards away, the armoured vehicle that had housed a salvaged 4-wheeler not-so-long-ago sat motionless, the pneumatic ramp gaping open like the mouth of a dead whale. I looked over at Lacy.
“We’ve got to regroup somewhere safe.” I said.
We both looked at the vehicle.
I counted to 3 with my fingers and we broke into a sprint towards the open hatch. Matching pace and running shoulder to shoulder provided ample cover fire on both sides.
We didn’t hesitate until we were in the vehicle, only attempting to slow down after we had ascended the ramp, nearly running into the communications board housed inside.
“This was an ambush. They knew we were coming!” I said, panting while trying to catch my breath.
“I know. You’re right,” Lacy replied, also straining to regain her wind.
“I thought you said that brief connections to the hive wouldn’t give up our plans,” I yelled.
“It shouldn’t. They must have gotten the info another way,” she panted.
“That’s great, what are we going to do now?” I hollered.
“You’re in charge.” Lacy replied heatedly. “But I’d suggest that we need to retreat.”
I thought for a moment. There really was no other option. We had no hope of a victory or even making a dent in the Tenachai forces, all we could do is pull back and re-strategize.
“You’re right,” I said. “You see if you can round up some survivors and spread the word that we’re retreating back to HQ, I’ll contact Hauer on the radio and let him know that they won’t be able to count on us for support.”
“All right, just be ready when I get back.” Lacy replied, before bravely running back down the ramp into the battle zone.
I fidgeted with the dials and got a signal. Hauer’s voice soon crackled over the comm.
“How is it at the front gates?” asked Hauer.
“Not good. It was a fucking ambush. They knew we were coming. We have to retreat. It’s a blood bath.”
“Understood, soldier, it isn’t much better on the backside of the plant,” Hauer responded. “You’ve done all that we could ask. Pull our people out of there; the choppers are airborne with an ETA of 5 minutes. They have visual on the bogies and will start their run very soon. In the meantime, I will call up our little surprise from the warehouse on the edge of town.”
A loud thump on the ramp caught my attention and broke me from the conversation. Startled, I looked back to see Max crawling up the side of the ramp, dragging himself forward and panting.
“What?” Max panted. “We can’t quit, we can’t retreat. This is our last chance!”
I ran over and lifted Max into the vehicle. A 9mm handgun was still clenched in his hand. I quickly checked him over for wounds, relieved to find him spotless.
“How did you get across that battlefield without even a scratch?” I asked.
“I guess I’m the lucky one,” he smirked.
“We have to retreat, Max; they knew we were coming,” I said, remembering his protestations from a moment before. “It was a set-up. If we don’t pull back now there will be no survivors.”
“It’s that red-headed bitch,” he yelled. “She’s been playing us the whole time! She’s been spying for them!”
“It’s not her,” I replied firmly, and without hesitation. “I don’t know how it happened, but it’s not her. She could have ended us a thousand times by now if that was her plan.”
“We can’t give up now!” Max replied. “This is our final chance, to free the world, to finally be the heroes that we deserve to be. To be the brothers that Dad always wanted us to be.”
I turned. Thinking about what he had just said for a moment. I thought about our lives. Dad’s funeral, how happy I’d been to see him alive at the hospital, how perfectly clear his eyes were.
“How long have you been in control of my brother’s body?” I asked, voice trembling with anger.
“Since a couple days after the funeral, you filthy human scum,” the thing inside Max said.
Then a bullet from his gun tore through my shoulder.
I crumbled to the floor, bleeding, feeling nothing but burning pain in a hole that used to be a portion of my right pectoral muscle and a keen desire to kill what was left of my only brother.
The thing that possessed Max stepped forward, placed the tip of his boot under my shoulder and rolled me over to face him, before painfully resting that boot in the bullet hole he’d just made.
“The eyes,” I sputtered out as I looked up at him.
“You caught me,” the thing inside Max said with a laugh, digging around in his eye with his free hand.
He held out a painted contact in his hand, one dark black eyeball now visible.
“Old fashioned painted contacts, like in the movies,” he said. “That’s all it took to infiltrate your resistance. That’s how dumb you half-witted monkeys are.”
“You’re a shitty actor,” I spit out defiantly.
“Oh, I don’t think so. We’ve been prepared to crush your resistance the whole time,” he gloated. “Everything you humans have said and done, every plan, every location, anything I’ve seen or heard inside your makeshift headquarters has been fed directly into the hive mind, and we don’t want you to retreat now, because this is our best chance to end any more damn resistance from this insignificant garbage dump of a planet. So…I’m gonna have to shoot you in that poor excuse of a head to prevent that retreat you were talking about.”
Max swung the 9mm automatic towards my head and then out of nowhere a bayonet erupted from his chest, releasing a fine red mist into the air.
“I don’t think so, dear,” Lacy cooed into his ear from behind as her hands gripped the rifle firmly and twisted it.
The shock made him drop his gun and stagger back from me. His eyes were wide with disbelief. He began to fall limp and Lacy let him fall to the floor with a thud before crouching over to me with concern.
“It’s not good, but it’s not bad either. We need to do some quick field dressing and get back to base,” Lacy said matter-of-factly.
Before I could respond, there was a roar from behind her. The thing inside wasn’t dead, it was angry. It brushed her aside forcefully, knocking her into the comm panels.
As angry as he was, he didn’t have the advantage of surprise this time, and Max had never been versed in physical combat. I quickly kicked his knee backwards causing him to stagger and kneel screaming with agony. I pushed up to my knees and punched him hard across the face, my temper rose with me as I rose to my feet, punching him again. I lost track of the following punches and reduced his face into a pulp of fleshy paste, I was blind to everything but my rage as my hands wrapped around his neck and began choking him.
He sputtered and looked up at me as the life began to drain from him.
“Thiiink…thiiink…” he gasped with his last breaths. “Where are the rest of our forces? If this is what we did to you here, what were we doing to your hospital right now?” He laughed an evil laugh. “You fucking stupid monkey, your precious Dr. Kiebler is dead…fuck you Earth monkey….aaaahhhh………..”
A rush of air escaped his lips before his lifeless face lolled to one side.
When I looked up
, Lacy was staring at me as she leaned against the comm panels. The ramp to the vehicle held nearly a dozen resistance fighters that she’d brought back with her, looking for shelter from the battle.
They had seen everything. There would no longer be a question of whose loyalties lay where, especially Lacy’s.
We loaded up and pulled out, sounding a retreat signal for any other resistance fighters who were able to get into working vehicles. The remaining handful of vehicles in our armada headed for home at full speed.
Hauer and Freemen’s men stayed behind with a half dozen Humvees equipped with a combination of Raytheon surface-to-air missiles (CATM-120Cs) and Stingers (AN/TWQ-1) that were not committed to the battlefield and hidden, but were ready to strike the incoming mother ships when needed. Max didn’t know about these babies, thank God.
EnEmE: Fall Of Man Page 12