Chapter 4
"We're surrounded? Good! Now I can shoot the enemy no matter what direction I'm facing. Those bastards won't get away this time."
Colonel David Kessell
I didn't really get much sleep, for one simple reason; The Sky Ranger moves bloody quick. We were only in the air for a few hours before we got the message that we'd be arriving soon. I was now beginning to realise that this organisation, I was now part of, really did have all the fun stuff. I looked out of the window to see the arid deserts of Texas roll on by. Unfortunately the Sun hadn't really changed place much so I was still being partially blinded. Lucky me, eh.
"Five minutes till we get to the village, Sir." The pilot said.
"Good to hear. I've got orders from the Captain that we're to circle the village before deciding where to put down." Williams replied.
"Yes Sir." The pilot acknowledged. I watched out the small viewing hole as a small spec on the horizon began to increase in size. As I watched the spec get larger, individual buildings were able to be seen. This wasn't a very large town, but still, two hundred people don't tend to go missing just like that. We got closer to the mystery town and the pilot put us into a holding pattern that circled the area. I couldn't see the other Sky Ranger, but I assumed they were doing the same as us. The town was made up of around two hundred and fifty stone and concrete buildings. Roads crisscrossed to form a grid like pattern when viewed from above. And it was deserted. There were no pedestrians, no cars driving, nothing. It was just empty.
"We're to put down on the southern outskirts of the town, pilot." Williams ordered.
"Yes Sir." The pilot replied. I felt the aircraft descend as the pilot took us in. Within two minutes we were on the ground. The rear hatch opened and we stepped outside. It was about midday and there was barely a cloud in the sky.
"Oh shit." I said. The others looked around concerned.
"What?" Williams asked.
"Forgot my sun cream." I answered. Williams cocked his head and gave me an irritated look. Wesson just smiled to himself and shook his head. We had landed about 50 metres south of the town. The other Sky Ranger was about 10 metres to our left. Strike three were all out already scanning the town with their weapons.
"Williams!" Durand shouted over the whine of the engines. "Take your team up the Eastern side of the town. My team will take the West. If you find any sign of what's happened to the civilians, radio it in.
"Will do." Williams replied. He turned to us. "Right, you heard her. Wesson, you're on point. Johnson, you're on rear guard. Let's go people, we could well be on a time limit here." Wesson set off towards the town. I followed him. Behind me was Smart followed by Williams and at the back was Ethyl. We approached the town. It was roughly square shaped and had a diameter of about three miles. This was going to take some time. We reached the main road on the Eastern side. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary. Apart from the huge lack of people anyway. We walked along the side of the road, scanning for any sign of life. We got none. We passed several houses.
"You hear that?" Smart said to us.
"What? I don't hear anything." Ethyl answered.
"Listen." He urged. There was definitely something. Talking? No. Singing? It was coming from the nearest house. "I've got something, here." Smart said looking at the motion tracker. Williams pointed at Wesson. He indicated him to take up a firing position at the house from the road.
"Cain, Smart, Johnson, with me." Williams said. We followed him to the door of the house. Weapons raised. We aimed at the door and windows. The four of us stacked up on the door. Williams and Ethyl one side. Smart and I on the other. Williams counted down with his fingers. Four… three… two… one…. We opened the door and entered the house. With our guns leading the way we spread out through the rooms downstairs. Nothing. Empty. The singing could be heard now. It was muffled. It was coming from the floor above. We went up the stairs, still aiming with our weapons. Smart referred to the motion tracker and indicated one of the doors.
"Three metres into the room." He said. Williams nodded at me and we rushed through the now open door. It was a bedroom of some sort. A small boy's most likely. There were posters of action heroes on the walls and comic books littering the ground. That's when I saw it. The most horrifying thing imaginable. A blue parrot was singing along to some God awful song. The other three breathed a sigh of relief.
"Stand down Wesson. Negative contact." Williams said over the radio.
"What was it?" Wesson asked over the radio.
"A bird." Smart said. He began looking around the room at the different the toys covering the floor.
"Well I hope you guys were able to cope I their without me." Wesson said. The bird squawked and flapped its wings.
"They are coming." The bird squawked. "It's too late. They are coming." Now, I've never been one to heed warnings from animals that have a lower IQ than a digestive biscuit, but I was a little unsettled by the bird's message. I shuddered.
"We should probably leave, Sir." I said, shuffling towards the doorway.
"No, not just yet." Williams replied as he walked over to the bird cage.
"You're not planning on interrogating the bird, Sir?" I asked concerned. He looked at me.
"No." He said firmly. "I want everyone to look around this house. See if we can't find a reason as to why nobody is around." Smart and I looked at each other for a moment before following his orders. The team spread out through the house, trying to look for any clue as to where the owners were. We each searched separate rooms. There was nothing that could be seen out of the ordinary. We were about to give up looking when we heard a call over the radio.
"Williams, have you got anyone over by the school?" Durand asked.
"Negative on that, we're all here." Williams replied into his radio.
"Stand by." She said. We waited. One minute. Two. Five. It felt like an eternity.
"What's taki-…" Wesson began when he was interrupted by the radio.
"Williams, we've found a survivor. Bring your team over to the school." Durand ordered. Wonderful, I thought. More walking.
"Affirm, moving to the school now. Williams out." The lieutenant said. "Right people, let's go." We left the house and began walking down the street towards the town centre where the school was. I couldn't shake the feeling that we were being watched the whole time. But that was impossible. There weren't any people around at all. We continued past the main high street where all the shops were deserted. After about twenty minutes of walking the school came into view. It was a single, two story building that stretched over two hundred metres wide and was as deep as three houses. We approached the main doors which were guarded by a member of Strike three. He acknowledged the lieutenant and took us to the captain.
The inside of the school was old, but only by a few decades. The walls were made of plaster and the roof was tiled by Styrofoam. The corporal from Strike Three led us down a long corridor till we came to a classroom doorway with the door left open. Inside were the rest of Strike Three. They were checking over weapons and their gear. The captain had her back to us. She was talking to someone but we couldn't see who. As we approached I saw a little girl sitting on one of the chairs. She was barely ten years old. She had short blonde hair and was wearing a school uniform of some sort.
"Now come on Emma, what happened to everyone?" Durand asked the girl.
The little girl shuffled in her seat. She clearly was uncomfortable being here with all these strange people. "They're gone." The little girl replied in a quiet voice.
"Gone where?" The captain asked.
"Into the warehouse." The girl answered. Durand turned to one of her team.
"Flynn, find out where this warehouse." She turned back to the little girl. "Why did they go? Were they taken?" Emma nodded. "Who took them Emma?"
"Monsters." She said, looking around the room, as if the very mention of them would summon one.
"What did the monsters look like?" Durand asked.
"They were big and purple and scary." Emma looked around. She was obviously scared and who could blame her? I'm surprised she was as calm as she was.
"Does that match any alien we've come across?" I whispered to Williams.
"I'm not sure." He whispered back. "These sound similar to something but..." He trailed off.
"Argent, can you come and take Emma on a walk for me? See if you can find her some food." Durand said, standing back up.
"Sure thing, boss." One of the men said. He slung his weapon around his neck and walked over to the little girl. "Come on Emma, let's see if we can't find us some food, eh?" He said with a smile. The girl dropped off the desk and took the soldiers hand. He led her out of the door way and took her down the corridor in the direction of the canteen.
"Right. Well at least we know where to start looking." Williams said.
"Yes we do. Flynn, have you found out where this warehouse is?" Durand asked.
"Yes I have. It's to the North East on the outside town. It was abandoned some time ago." A man with a sniper rifle said. He was consorting over a map of the town. "It'll take us just over half an hour to get there."
"Right, everyone saddle up. We're moving out in five. Cross, radio Argent and tell him to take the girl back to the Sky Ranger. I don't want to be having to worry about some girl when shit hits the fan."
"Are you always this optimistic?" I asked jokingly.
"Only on the weekends." She replied with a smile.
"What of these monster? I've not come across anything like this before." Ethyl pointed out.
"We'll deal with them, when we find them. Right now, our mission is to find and help as many civilians as we can." Durand said. Ethyl didn't seem quite convinced but kept her opinion to herself. Within five minutes everyone had checked their weapons and gear and was ready to move out. Argent had radioed back to say that he was taking the girl to the Sky Rangers and would meet up with us outside of the warehouse. With everyone ready, we left the classroom and the school and headed in the direction of the warehouse. I still remember having a worrying feeling that we were being watched. Wesson said I was just getting nervous and jumping at shadows, but something still didn't feel right.
After thirty minutes of walking through the grid work of streets we turned a corner and saw the warehouse, properly, for the first time. It was a large, grey building, three stories high. The windows were smashed in in a number of places. There was a corrugated frame that, when opened, was probably used to load and unload whatever was needed to make the factory function. A few metres down from that was a metal door. The entire complex was surrounded by a wide open space and surrounding that was a rusted, old, metal fencing. Everyone took firing position and secured the perimeter.
"Right we wait here for Argent and then we go in to find out what's happened to the town folk." Durand said. We didn't have to wait long. Just over five minutes since we had secured the area, Argent joined us. He was a little out of breath. He had clearly been running or at the very least jogging. I didn't blame him. I really didn't want to be alone in a place like this. With both teams now at full strength, we advanced on the warehouse. Both teams went through the iron gates that were hanging open. The chains that held the gates closed were cut and left in a pile on the floor. We moved over the open space as quickly as we could. Making sure to check for possible signs of life. We made it to the wall and moved our way down to the metal door. With both teams on either side, the door was opened and we filed inside.
The warehouse itself was almost empty. The few machines that were left were covered in dust and rust. Age had not been kind to them. We fanned out across the factory floor. The room we had just entered was about twenty metres wide and forty metres deep. As we moved, the two men with the scanners checked for any sign of movement that would reveal where the town's people had gone. Nothing. No movement. No sound. Just, empty.
"Where is everyone?" Ethyl asked as she scanned the dark room with her torch.
"No idea." Smart replied. We continued to search the factory floor until one of Strike Three called out.
"Hey, I've got something here." We followed the sound of his voice and all gathered around what he had found. On the Western side of the factory was a doorway which led to a corridor with stairs going down ward towards the basement. The corridor could just about fit two people in side by side. What made this interesting was that there was a trail of blood leading down the stairs, as if someone had been dragged that way. We all looked at each other nervously.
"Well I think we may have found where they've all gone." Wesson said with little humour. "Who wants to go down first?" He asked rhetorically. Oh how I wish he hadn't because before I could finish my thought Williams spoke.
"Thank you for volunteering Wesson. You're an example to us all." He said. Wesson smiled dryly and looked down the corridor.
"Everyone will go down. Strike Two will lead with Strike Three behind them. We find the civilians and work out what the hell happened here." Durand said. Wesson grumbled to himself and reluctantly took the first steps into the corridor. Behind him was Ethyl, myself Williams and Smart. Behind him was Strike Three. We descended down the stairs towards the basement. The power appeared to have been switched off so we were going through by torchlight alone. We must have gone down four floors until we reached the bottom of the stairway. In front of us lay a long dark corridor. Wesson nervously approached it and moved in. The corridor seemed to be getting wider as we progressed onwards. That's when I noticed there was something odd about the walls. They were covered in some sort of secreted resin.
"Hey guys. Hold on a sec." I said. Everyone stopped. They were on edge.
"What's the problem, sergeant?" Williams asked.
"The walls. They're covered in something." I answered. Williams looked for himself. His eyes widened when he saw that not just the walls, but the roof and floor were also covered. And it was getting thicker. As the corridor continued the resin on the walls became thicker and thicker. This was worrying because the corridor wasn't getting smaller, meaning that something must have dug out the walls and replaced it with whatever that stuff was.
"Everyone stay on guard. Something's not quite right." He said.
"What was your first clue?" I asked. He shot me a dirty look and then signalled Wesson to continue onwards. We must have been walking for what felt like fifteen minutes on this basement floor. I was beginning to wonder how much further this place went. Then the corridor opened out to a large room. It was square shaped and about twenty metres in diameter. The ceiling of the room also went higher. Almost double what we were just walking through. There were four pathways that led out of the room, not including the one we had just walked down. We spread out. Strike Two took the corridors on the left, while Strike Three took the ones on the right. As I moved into position I tripped over on something. Wesson gave me a patronising look before aiming his weapon back down the corridor. I looked down to see what I had tripped on and what I saw genuinely terrified me.
"HOLY SHIT!" I exclaimed. The others all looked round at me.
"What?" Durand asked. I didn't reply I was too shocked. She followed my eyes to look at what I staring at. At the end of my foot was a human hand, jutting out of the resin on the floor. It looked almost as if it were grasping for something. As I looked more closely at the floor, I saw it wasn't the only body part. There were all sorts of dismembered limbs, hands, fingers and feet. The all looked as though something had exploded them for the inside outwards. I was about to suggest we turn back when Smart cut in.
"Movement." He shouted. We all looked at him. "Coming down the corridor. Thirty meters. Moving slowly." We aimed our weapons at the corridor that Smart had indicated. "Twenty five metres. Twenty." It was just around the corner. I put my finger on my trigger and held my breath. As it came around the corner we all breathed a sigh of relief when we saw it was a man dressed in civilian clothing. We lowered our weapons. I shuddered. I remember asking myself 'why did I shudder?' and that's when I saw it. There was something very off about the way the man was walking. He was jerking as he moved towards us. His left leg was twisted backwards. A he dragged it towards us, he snarled and grunted at us. I raised my weapon and pointed it at the man. Wesson saw me and looked puzzled.
"What are you doing?" He asked.
"Something's not right." I said. Wesson looked back at the man and began to see what I was seeing. He too aimed his weapon. Both teams were now watching the man getting closer and closer. Then he stopped. Wesson and I exchanged glances, not lowering our weapons. The man froze for just a moment before he began to convulse wildly. Smart got up and was about to go towards the man to give him aid, but before Smart had even gotten out of the room, the man exploded for the inside outwards. The three of us were sprayed with a fine mist of blood and entails as eviscerated body parts were sent flying across the corridor. In the place where the man was standing was a horrifying creature.
The creature that stood in the place where the man was standing was a black and purple monster two metres tall. It had four legs that each ended in a metre long talon. The torso lay in the centre of the four legs. The creature had two arms that extended forward of the main body. Its head was almost insect like with a pair of razor sharp mandibles that looked as though they could cut through steel and flesh with equal efficiency. The entire body was coated in a sort of plated armour that interlocked to form what looked like a horrifying jigsaw puzzle. It matched the resin that coated the surfaces of the room and tunnels that we were standing in. The eyes of the alien glowed yellow as it looked at us. Where the hell had this thing come from? Before I could speak however, Wesson and Williams opened fire. The alien shrieked as the bullets of the LMG and the assault rifle tore the monster to shreds. It fell quickly, but not before advancing several metres towards us. My God was it fast. The death shriek of the monster gave off an ear piercing scream. We stood in silence as we stared. That's when we heard it. A sort of hissing noise. It was all around us.
"Movement!" Argent Shouted.
"Where from?" Durand asked. We all raised out weapons aiming down the corridors.
"I can't pin it down." He replied. "There's movement everywhere." The hissing was getting louder.
"Well maybe you're reading it wrong." Ethyl said.
"No he's right, there's movement all around us." Smart confirmed.
"Weapons ready." Williams ordered. There was a scream that was cut off far too quickly.
"Where's Flynn." Someone shouted. "Where is he?" There was no sign of the trooper.
"Argent! Argent! Did anyone see what happened to Argent?" I looked to where he was, but all I saw was his rifle lying on the ground. I scanned the room, hoping to find the source of the movement. That's when I saw it. At first I thought it was my eyes playing tricks on me. The walls were moving. As I looked more closely I saw that what I thought was just the resin was actually an alien perfectly camouflaged against the wall. It was moving towards Smart. I was about to call out, but the alien jumped off the wall and landed on him. Before I could aim at the creature it had already lacerated him and ripped off one of his arms. I pulled my LMG up and opened fire. My rounds shot straight through the alien's torso, turning the body into pulp.
"They're coming out of the walls." I shouted. "Look at the fucking walls." The others must have noticed them now because the remaining soldiers opened fire. The shrieks of the aliens filled the area as they were shot off the walls or ceilings and cut down. Another man screamed as his body was mutilated by an alien that had dropped onto him from the ceiling.
"We've got to pull back!" Ethyl shouted. "We've got to get out of here!"
"Both teams fall back." Durand ordered. "Suppressing fire. Fall back." We didn't need to be told twice. We moved back to the tunnel we had come down. Wesson and I laid down the suppressive fire seeing as we were the only two heavies left. The others had all made it back into the entrance tunnel and were moving back towards the stair case. I was backing up through the tunnel as was Wesson to my left. Then my weapon ran dry.
"Shit. I need to reload." I said.
"Don't worry I got this." Wesson said with confidence. Throughout my years in combat, I've found there has always been something true about Fate and that is that it is fickle and has poor impulse control. Wesson's LGM stopped firing. He looked down at his weapon. "Oh crap. This isn't good." He said with a little too much certainty.
"Don't worry guys, I'll deal with them." I heard Ethyl say. Wesson and I were still moving backwards as we reloaded and we passed Ethyl, who had stopped and was facing back up the tunnel.
"What are you doing?" I asked worried. She didn't answer. She had her weapon slung around her neck. She put her hands up in front of her and seemed to brace herself against some sort of invisible wall. That's when things got weird. The empty round casings that Wesson and I had been firing rose up of the ground and started floating in mid-air in front of Ethyl. There must have been about a hundred of them. "What the actual fuck?" I asked as I retreated backwards. The purple and black aliens, having worked out which tunnel we had gone down, were now barrelling after us. Within ten seconds they'd be on top of us. Wesson and I still hadn't reloaded. Ethyl breathed in and pushed forward against the air. The hundred or so metal casings that were floating in the air suddenly shot forward. The result was as if a massive shotgun-like weapon had been fired and the casings were the pellets. They moved down the corridor as a wall at an incredible speed. The aliens that were covering the walls floor and ceiling couldn't move out of the way. The casings ripped through them leaving dozens of holes in each and every one of them. Bodies fell from the walls and ceiling onto the floor, littering the ground with dead aliens. That was all the break Wesson and I needed. We finished reloading and aimed our weapons back down the corridor ready for the next wave that was surely to be coming. We could hear the hissing getting louder.
"Right, let's catch the other up." Ethyl said with a smile. As shocked as I was at what I had just witnessed, I was more preoccupied with saving my own life to play twenty questions with Ethyl. We ran back to the stairs to see Durand and Williams placing something around the mouth of the tunnel.
"What are you doing?" Wesson asked and he ran past the two of them.
"We're sealing off the tunnel. We can't let even one of these things get out." Durand answered.
"Right that's the last one." Williams said. He picked up his weapon and aimed it down the corridor with myself and Wesson joining him.
"Good. Everyone, up the stairs." Durand ordered. We moved with so much speed it would have been quite amusing if we weren't running for our lives. This hissing, much to my dismay, was getting louder. We reached the top of the stairs and passed through the door into the factory. We took up firing positions around the doorway. I set up the bipod on my weapon as did Wesson. The others all took cover around the door and aimed down the corridor. Williams pulled out the trigger for the explosives.
"Fire in the hole." Williams said. He clicked the button. Nothing. He looked at the device in his hand puzzled. He pressed it again. Click. Click. Clickclickclickclickclick- BOOM. The floor shook as the explosives several floors down went off. The hissing of the aliens was replaced by an almighty roar as the shockwave and fireball moved up the stair case. The fireball shot out of the stairwell and dissipated as it moved onto the factory floor. Then silence. We all stared at the slightly singed corridor and stairwell we were just in.
"Well. That just happened." I said, not quite believing the events of the last half an hour.
"Yeah." Wesson said, a little stunned.
"Right, let's got see if it worked." Durand said, poking her head round her cover.
"Listen man, you can't hear them. They're gone. End of story." Wesson said, shaking a little. The effects of the adrenaline of the moment now becoming apparent.
"No, she's right. We need to make sure the tunnel is sealed." Williams agreed.
"I'm not going back in there." Wesson said. Clearly self-preservation was high on his list of priorities. Smart man. I know I sure as Hell didn't want to have to go down there.
"Fine. Cain, you're up." Fuck my life, I thought. I looked up at him. He stared at me, waiting. I sighed and reluctantly got up. I made sure I had full ammunition and moved towards the doorway that led to the stairwell. It was filled with smoke, which made it difficult to assess the damage without getting close. I edged forward towards the top of the stairs and looked down. All I saw was a dark smoky abyss. I slowly moved down the stairs taking each step as carefully as I could. Then I felt something touch my shoulder. I spun round expecting to see a horrifying alien about to tear me limb from limb. Instead I saw Ethyl. She had followed me down to give me some aid, to which I was very grateful. We moved down to the bottom of the stairs and saw the tunnel, of what was left of it anyway. The entire tunnel entrance was covered in rubble. There was no way anything was going to get past it any time soon. Once we had seen the damage, Ethyl and I ascended the stairs and reported back to Durand. I hadn't actually noticed how badly things had actually gone in the tunnels till I was back with the other. Apart from Ethyl and I, there were only three other survivors. Williams, Wesson and Durand. Of the ten who went into the tunnel only five made it back out.
"Well, is it sealed?" Williams asked.
"If it wasn't do you think I'd be here to tell you?" I asked with a slight hint of sarcasm as I walked through the doorway. Williams shrugged.
"Right, we're going to head back to the Sky Ranger and report what's happened to Central. Then we're going to blow this place to kingdom come." Durand said as she came round from her cover.
"Sounds like a plan to me." Wesson agreed, standing up from the wall he was leaning on.
"Right, let's get going." Williams said. We picked ourselves up and went back through the doorway we had used to get into the warehouse. Once outside Durand got on the radio to ask for a pick up from the Sky Rangers.
"Alpha two, this is Strike Three, request immediate pick up from factory." There wasn't a reply. "Alpha two, this is Strike Three, respond." Static.
"Maybe they're out of our radio range." Ethyl suggested.
"Unlikely. Nevertheless we need to report back as soon as possible. Let's go people." Durand ordered. We set off at a jog back through the town to get to the Sky Rangers that were still on the Southern side of the town. As we marched through the town, I couldn't help but notice that it was getting dark rather quickly. We had been in the town for some time now and the Sun was beginning to set. It took us twenty minutes to get to the Sky Rangers. We reached the edge of the town to see the Sky Rangers where we left them. Something was odd though. They hadn't responded, yet nothing seemed out of the norm. We approached the Sky Rangers with our weapons aimed. After what we'd seen today we weren't taking any chances. We reached the rear hatch of the nearest aircraft and looked inside. Empty. Williams and I exchanged looks. I drew my sword and moved towards the hatch that led to the cockpit. It was open. I slowly moved in ready to use my sword at a moment's notice. I looked inside and saw why the pilot's hadn't responded. The inside of the cockpit was covered with the eviscerated remains of the pilots. Blood was sprayed all over the windows, instruments and controls. I left the cockpit and went to go and tell the others. Durand and Williams were talking about something. Durand looked up at me.
"Well?" She asked.
"Dead. It seems that whatever attacked us in the tunnel managed to get out and kill our pilot." I looked over to Ethyl who was coming out the back of the other Sky Ranger. She saw our faces and simply shook her head.
"Merde." Durand said.
"Well this is fucking great." Wesson began. "What the hell are we supposed to do now?" He started pacing around randomly, just staring at random parts of the sky.
"Maybe we should build a fire, sing songs…" I replied sarcastically. Climbed out the back of the Sky Ranger and looked around.
"It's game over man, game over." He said.
"Wesson shut up." Williams said.
"I'll send a message to XCOM, tell them that we'll need a method of extraction. Unless any of you have the ability to fly a plane?" She asked. We all shook our heads. "Wonderful." She said with little enthusiasm. She left us and entered the Sky Ranger.
"So what do we do now?" Ethyl asked. She was looking off towards the town.
"We find somewhere to wait till we can be picked up, then we're going to blast this place to kingdom come." Williams said.
"Great. So where are we waiting?" Wesson asked.
"Durand's chosen the school to wait in." Williams replied.
"Why the school?" I asked.
"Because the school is easy to spot from the air." Durand replied as she stepped out the back of the Sky Ranger. "It's certainly big enough. And it's also got the added benefit of being relatively far away from that bloody warehouse."
"Speaking of which, what're we planning on doing about that?" I asked.
"I don't know. That's for the Commander to decide." She said levelly. "Right. I've sent word to XCOM. We should be relieved in about 4 hours. Till then, we'll have to make due. Everyone load up from the spare ammunition and med kits aboard the Sky Rangers. Once we're all set, we're moving off. You've got 10 minutes people." We stocked up on as much ammunition and equipment as we could carry and set off in the direction of the school. While we were searching we found a few claymore explosive mines which we picked up. Wesson didn't think we'd need them, but Williams didn't want to take the chance. As we walked back I couldn't help but wonder what I saw back in the tunnel with Ethyl. It just didn't make sense. I caught up to her as we were walking. I needed to know what the Hell that was.
"Ethyl?" She glanced at me as we moved. She was still scanning the alleys and streets just like everyone else.
"Yes?" She asked, turning towards me.
"How did you do that thing back in the tunnel?" I asked. My mind was still trying to comprehend what I had seen.
"What thing?" She asked a little confused.
"The bullet casing? The levitation? The saving-all-our-lives thing?" I pointed out in a rather patronising tone.
"Oh that." She recalled. "I'm psychic, remember?"
"You're what?" I asked. I was certain I had misheard her or something.
"Psychic? You know. You… did know, didn't you?" She asked. I looked at her confused. "Has no one told you?"
"No." I said bluntly.
"Oh right. Well yeah. I'm psychic." She looked at me and smiled.
"So you can read minds?" I asked, sounding a little bit more worried than I'd like to admit.
"Oh God, no. I'm not that kind. I just move stuff with my mind." She said with pride.
"There are other kind of psychics?" I asked intrigued.
"Oh yeah! There are loads. Telepathic, telekinetic, mind controllers... I'm sure there are others too." I made a bit of a distance between me and Ethyl. I can tell you now, I was a little more concerned about my situation than I was a few moments before. The thought of being mind-controlled was not something that I liked. Plus if people could get inside my head… well put it this way, there were certain things I didn't want people to know. And I know if they did get hold of it my life expectancy was probably going to drop very rapidly.
"So is everyone psychic?" I asked, a little concerned.
"Oh no. It's only me in our Squad. I think I heard Durand is too. One of the more powerful ones, too." Ethyl said cheerfully. Wonderful I thought. I looked round and glanced at Durand. She was checking her side of the street for any sign of movement. Well I now had an explanation as to why I felt so odd around those two. I'd certainly be keeping a close eye on them now that I had learned that information.
"Right." I said. "Well you learn something new every day."
"Yep." Ethyl said. I fell out of step and back into my place behind Ethyl as we continued towards the school. The Sun had set, but there was still some light in the sky as the last evidence of day clung on to the clouds. We finally made it to the school some twenty minutes later and went inside. I was last inside and looked around before entering. I couldn't see anything but that feeling that I was being watched was still there. Inside, nothing had changed since we were last here, which was good, because it meant there weren't any of those purple and black aliens around. We went to the classroom to figure out what we were going to do till the Sky Ranger arrived.
We waited in the school for some time. We had taken the precaution of setting up some of the explosives around the doors and corridors. If those things somehow turned up we'd be ready for them. I was the lucky guy who drew lookout so I had set up my machine gun and had it pointing down the corridor towards the main entrance. There was only one way they could come so it was easy enough to set up. All I had to do was wait. I was given the remaining motion tracker. The other one had been lost in the tunnel during our escape. If those things did turn up, I'd know about it before it happened. I don't know what the others were doing, because I couldn't see into the classroom from where I was but I'd assumed they were getting some shut eye. Lord know that's what I wanted to be doing at the moment. I was checking over my sword, making sure nothing had damaged it when I heard a beeping. I looked around and saw that it was coming from the motion tracker. Well crap. This was not good. I called the others straight away.
"Guys! I've got something on the tracker." The others came out almost immediately.
"Where is it?" Durand asked.
"Twenty metres." I replied looking down at the device. "Just beyond the end of the corridor."
"How many?" Williams asked as he came over to see for himself. I looked down at the device a little confused.
"Just the one." I said.
"Right, Wesson, Cain, you're with me." Williams ordered. Wesson groaned. I got up and we slowly moved down the corridor. I continued to check the device o I knew where the thing was. We got to the other end of the corridor. The blip hadn't changed position.
"It's just on the other side of this door." I whispered. Williams signalled us to either side of the door. He counted down. Three… two… one… we opened the door and on the other side was a startled little girl knocked over on the floor. It was Emma, the little girl we had seen earlier. We all breathed a sigh of relief.
"What are you doing here?" Wesson asked the girl as he helped her up. She seemed scared and upset.
"I… I… ran away from the plane." She answered timidly.
"Why?" Williams asked. While the other two checked on the girl I looked down the corridor, but they wasn't any sign of life. It was eerie.
"Because the monsters could find me there. I ran back here as soon as I could." She replied.
"Didn't the pilots tell you to stop?" Williams asked a little suspiciously.
"No. They didn't know I had gone." Williams and I looked at each other. Something didn't seem quite right, but we couldn't put our finger on it.
"Well come with us, we'll make sure you're safe." Williams said. He took her by the hand and led her back into the classroom. He gave her to Ethyl to look after and then went over to talk to Durand about something. As I walked back to my position I turned to Wesson.
"Does something seem a little odd to you?" I asked.
"You mean apart from the killer aliens, the ghost town and this girl that seems to just appear around the school? No. Seems like a pretty normal day really." Wesson replied.
"You just fill me with confidence, you know that?" I said.
"Hey, I'm a people person." He answered with a grin. That smile was short lived however because one of the explosives placed on the front of the school wet off. "Shit!" Wesson exclaimed. I found myself agreeing with him. We both set up at the far end of the corridor and waited. Our weapons were locked and loaded. The corridor was clear. We were as ready as we'd ever be. The others were with us too. Behind me was Williams and to the right of him was Durand. I couldn't see Ethyl or Emma, but I assumed that they were behind the officers. I checked the motion tracker. They were closing. And then the lights went out.
"They cut the power." Williams said levelly.
"What do you mean they cut the power? They're animals, man, just animals." Wesson said. He was getting worrying nervous at this point. We all switched on our head and weapon torches. It was now the only light we had.
"Pull you shit together, Wesson." Williams ordered. "Cain, how close?"
"Forty metres." I said. "Thirty metres. Twenty metres." They burst through the door. The purple and black monsters ripped the door of its hinged as they surged down the corridor towards us. We opened fire. Bullets and shotgun shells ripped through the tide of aliens as they ran towards us. The front ones we killed quickly due to the incoming fire, but the sheer numbers of aliens propped them up and carried them a number of metres before they fell to the ground. Despite taking huge losses, the aliens were gaining ground. And we were going to have to reload soon.
"Wesson!" Durand shouted over to sound of the gunfire. "Use your rocket!" A smile appeared on Wesson's face. He stopped firing and switched to the rocket launcher on his back. He pulled it down and aimed it at the mass of writhing bodies, slowly edging towards us.
"Well any fucking time, sweetheart." I shouted. Wesson pulled back the trigger on his rocket and fired. The rocket flew straight into the aliens at the front of the rush. It hit the middle one centre mass and blew a hole through it, leaving a gap the size of a football in it. The rocket then impacted on the alien behind the first one and detonated. The explosion that ensued ripped through the alien horde incinerating those that were too close to the blast radius and ripping body parts from the others with the concussive shock wave. The explosion was so loud that a ringing set in and I was seriously doubting that my hearing would ever return. Once the smoke had cleared, the effects of the rocket could truly be seen. The hallway was covered in ash and limbs from the shredded remains of the creatures. The walls on either side of the explosion had been blown through and we could see into the adjoining classrooms there. I took the moment to reload. Far too often I've noticed that if you fail to make a point of reloading, Fate will be more than happy to stop your weapon firing. Usually, right at the moment when you need it to work the most.
"Well." Wesson began. "That worked." He put down his rocket launcher and switched back to his main weapon.
"Right everyone stay on guard, there's bound to be more of them." Williams said. We aimed our guns down the hall way where they had been coming from. The silence was deafening.
"Extraction team, where are you?" Durand asked through the radio.
"Inbound, we'll be there in ten minutes." Came the reply.
"We'll light flares on top of the school for you." She said.
"Roger." The pilot said.
"Right people, we're moving to the roof. Cain, you're on point, Wesson, you take the rear. Move it people." Durand ordered. We got up and moved purposefully towards the doorway. I checked the motion detector. It said nothing was nearby, but I didn't want to take any chances. We moved into the main hallway and found the stairway, leading upwards. We ascended the stairs till we were several floors up and we came to a locked door. I shot the lock and we went through it. On the other side was the roof top of the school. It was about half the size of a football pitch with the doorway we had come up on one of the smaller edges. Once everyone was through the door, I set up the final explosive at the doorway, ready for when the aliens came back. We spread outwards to get as far away from the door as possible. Durand lit two bright red flares and threw them down on the roof. We all aimed at the doorway and waited.
"How long?" I asked. Durand checked her watch.
"Three minutes." It was pitch black. We weren't going to see them, but we could hear the roar of the engines as they approached. "Right people. Let's do this." I heard the motion tracker making a noise and looked down to inspect it.
"Aww crap." I said.
"What?" Ethyl asked as she jumped up. While the rest of us were getting tired and exhausted, she seemed to just have a limitless supply of energy.
"I'll give you three guesses…" I answered.
"Strikes Two and Three, we see the flares. We'll be there imminently." The pilot called over the radio. I looked up to see the lights of the Sky Ranger as it began descending. This was going to be close.
"We've got multiple contacts people." I told the others,
"Prepare to fall back to the Sky Ranger on my order. Until then, fire at will." Durand said calmly.
"If you insist." Wesson replied. The roar of the engines was so loud now, that I was certain it was going to land on top of us. Fortunately, it landed about fifteen metres behind us. That was when the first alien appeared. However it hadn't come up the stairway as we had thought they would, but instead it had climbed up the side of the walls.
"Target right!" Williams shouted. We turned to see the monster climb over the side and charge towards us. And it wasn't alone.
"Aliens left!" Wesson called out. I glanced to see three more aliens climbing over the ramparts of the roof on the opposite side. We were quickly becoming surrounded.
"Everyone fall back." Durand ordered. We stood up and started to move backwards towards the doorway of the Sky Ranger. As we moved, we fired at the aliens, but they just kept coming. When one was killed another just took its place. Wesson and I were the last ones outside the Sky Ranger.
"You two get on board. NOW!" Durand called. We stopped firing and turned to the aircraft. Wesson and I stepped on board and I heard Durand shout something at the pilot. We immediately took off, the rear hatch door still open. I looked back through the open doorway and it probably saved my life. As I turned I say one of the aliens jump impossibly high towards the Sky Ranger. Its horrible black mandibles snapping as it flew through the air, right towards me. I brought up my weapon to try and shoot it. I remember thinking, 'oh shit, oh shit, oh shit…' as I trained my weapon on it. I pulled the trigger and the alien exploded in mid-air. I looked at the others. Most of them gave me a relieved smile but Williams just stared at me for a moment before looking away. I took my seat in the spare chair and for the first time, in what felt like years, took a deep breath and relaxed. My mind and body had been on overdrive trying to keep me alive these last few hours, so it was no surprise that the moment I got the chance I fell asleep. Oh how I wish I didn't wake up. It would have made life so much simpler. I looked out the window and saw the sun beginning to rise. It looked to be a nice day. A thought occurred to me and I turned to Durand.
"So if we're Strike Two and Three, where are Strike One?"
"They're currently on a mission in Tokyo at the moment. Something about an Alien ship. I'm not completely sure. I wasn't given their briefing." She replied.
"I see." I looked around the Sky Ranger at the other people. I caught eyes with Ethyl for a moment before looking away. What she did in the tunnel unnerved me. It wasn't natural. Not by any stretch of the imagination. There was clearly more to this XCOM project than I had been told. I wanted to find out the answers, but at the same time, I really, really didn't. I thought to myself, after what happened today, I doubt much more could surprise me.