XIV

"Five meters," called Green, gripping the motion tracker he'd commandeered, spinning around as he tried to lock a target to open fire. So far, he had drawn a blank, and with the tracker reading the multiple advancing targets as being that close, he should have been able to pull up his weapon and fire a round off at point-blank range. As it was, the chamber was eerily vacant other than the squad of Marines and their ringing trackers. The advance of the creatures had slowed down once they hit ten meters, but they were still approaching and somehow were invisible. Was that possible? How?

"Two meters," he croaked, his throat parched as he managed to croak the update. As he did so, a wave of a nauseating odour washed over his, a pungent reek that reminded him slick oil and rusted iron. He'd not served any time in a war zone, but he had assisted in some cleanup details following raider hits, and the sights and smells of those details had stayed in his mind. The cloying scent that enveloped him now reminded him those missions, the stench of dead flesh, spilled blood and cooked meat that clung to your clothing and lingered on your tongue for days after, no matter how many times you brushed your teeth. Whatever the smell was, it was all around him… it was as it was coming from…

Beneath him?

Too late, the truth was revealed. The decking plate he stood on bulged, twisted, tore open as a thick, powerful and ridged tail ripped through the ground and coiled itself around his arms, pinning them to his side and restricting his movements as the creature in the crawlspace beneath him rose to its full seven foot stature. Green felt like he was going to topple over as the floor beneath him shifted and gave way to the creature, but the loops of muscle around him tightened and kept him upright with ease as the tail took his full weight. The world around him seemed to fade out as the tail curled around, brought him face to face with the grinning, salivating maw of the creature: he watched as the thin lips of the creature curled back; paralysed in fear as the razor sharp teeth parted, a curtain of mucus slipping from the glistening, cavernous mouth as it opened, and the faintest glimmer of a second set of teeth nestling deep within the darkness appeared. The sounds of screaming men and animals and the cacophony of gunshots as they erupted around him were lost as he stared at the impossible creature that held him up, like a rabbit trapped in the headlamps of an oncoming truck.

The last thing to enter the mind of Gunnery Sergeant Green was the toothed inner jaw of the alien creature as it lunged forwards and smashed through the front of his skull.

"Sarge is down!"

Stevens cast a wary glance over his shoulder, away from the wall of dark-skinned aliens that had simultaneously ripped their way through the floor all around the squad, and saw that Green had indeed fallen foul to the attacking creatures. Wrapped in the powerful coils of its tail, the creature's jaws dripped crimson gore as it stared eyelessly at the visage of the slaughtered Marine and the fist-sized ragged hole that had been punched through the front of his skull. sensing the life-force had left the body, the creature unravelled its tail and let the corpse fall to the floor before turning on the next Marine, flexing talons and snaking out its deadly tail.

Stevens was quick to react, squeezing off a salvo of shots that smashed into the glistening carapace of the creature and spraying putrid blood across the decking. Far more powerful than the soft-slugs his men had been issued with, the high explosive rounds punched holes in the torso of the animal as it fell, but Stevens didn't have enough time to gloat over his superior weapons, nor did her have time to mourn the downed Marine.

"Man down," he called out, knowing that there was no point in calling out for a medic, or setting Evelyn to go and check on him. "Close up."

The Marines tried to form up closer, keeping their ranks tightly knit while overlapping fields of fire as the marauding creatures advanced on them, hauling their bulk from the crawlspace beneath the flooring and screaming their daunting, high-pitched wails. Bullets ripped through their carapace, their chitinous armour no match for the explosive piercing rounds from the pulse rifles: nor were their toughened bodies any match for the high-powered ammunition that the smartgun was spewing.

Mallard moved his weapon gracefully from side to side, the eyes of an experienced weapons operator pressing the firing stud as perfect targets presented themselves: limbs snapping as they were surgically removed with a ten millimetre round, heads erupting as they were peppered with rounds, ribcages shattering with acidic gouts of juice. His movements were as graceful as a ballet, his macabre dance of death mesmerising as each of his dancing partners fell at his feet, but even though he looked like he was out of control, Stevens knew that he wasn't. He'd seen smartgun operators in combat before, knew that the symbiosis formed between man and machine was deadly, and that Mallard was more in control than any other Marine there. But with Green down, the only Marine that needed to be completely in control was Stevens himself.

"We're fucking losing it here," Stevens shook his head, and both Dawes and JT nodded their agreement. Evelyn stayed close to JT, feverishly looking around at the demonic creatures that danced in the flickering flashes of gunfire. He raised his voice so it could be heard on the com-channel and over the sounds of combat, of men and creatures dying.

"Pull back to the hangar: we can't hold them here: we need to flush the lower decks."

Stevens planned on using a scheme similar to the plan Green had worked out, only instead of waiting until the creatures flooded the hanger before sucking them into vacuum, he was going to bring the vacuum to them and flush the lower decks from the hangar. If he could get the Marines secured in the dropship and open the hangar doors, they would be safe while the animals were flushed out into space. Sucking the atmosphere out the lower decks wouldn't do any good to any of the people strapped to the walls; but at the same time, if anyone was fixed into the hive structure they would either be dead already… or worse.

"Fall back," Stevens repeated himself, pausing by an unsightly mound of organic residue as he dropped an empty magazine from his weapon and slammed home a fresh one. Despite the fact the ammo had more of a kick than the soft slugs and far more effective at taking down the creatures, they were quick and, despite the fact they were packed in tight, managed to evade most of the controlled salvos: only the self-targeting smartgun was raking up the casualties.

His eyes darting feverishly from side to side, he cycled a round from the magazine into the chamber and snarled in anger as the weapon jammed. He dropped to the floor, cursing under his breath as he tried to work free the caseless round, and felt the air above him be sliced in two as a lengthy, muscular tail lashed out from the shapeless mound of hive structure he knelt beside. A creature pulled itself from the resinous node it had coiled itself around, its seamless camouflage breaking up as its movements betrayed its hiding place and raised itself to its full height. It suddenly dawned on Stevens why the creatures went to the trouble of covering the walls with the organic growth: not just as a method of incapacitating their hosts, but also to blend in with the environment. He lifted his rifle up to aim at the looming creature, pumped the underslung grenade launcher and fired at point blank range, the canister round crashing into the distended ribcage of the creature and knocking it backwards, sending it skittering backwards across the ground and crashing into the form of a nearby Marine lying injured on the decking. Both human and alien soldier curled into a ball as limbs became entwined with one another, fingers raked armour and talons shredded flesh, while acidic juices mixed with crimson blood and formed a lethal cocktail of bubbling pink sludge. The Marine's death was by no means quick, but at least he was dead: Stevens had noticed that the aliens were still managing to take living prey in the fray of a firefight that had casualties on both sides, unlike the one sided slaughter that had happened in the barracks.

Finally clearing the round from his rifle and with his three close companions surrounding him as he worked, he pulled himself back to his feet and panned his weapon around, seeing that more than half of the squad had been killed or taken, but the flow of alien creatures was certainly starting to ebb. Other than the four survivors of the massacre in the barracks, only Mallard and a second Marine remained standing, the six quickly bunching up and the soldiers instinctively forming a protective circle around the civilians, despite the fact JT had his own weapon. For a moment, there were no signs of the aliens other than the shattered corpses lying prone on the ground amongst twisted human forms, and a heady acrid odour that came in thick putrid clouds rising from the corpses and lingering in the air as a muddy, tawny mist. The acid mixed with the stench of spent propellant was choking, forcing JT and Evelyn to pull the collar of their clothing up over their mouth to filter some of the detritus from the air. The Marines were unable to adjust any of their clothing to do that, but Mallard had a black rag of material tied around his belt that he unfastened and wrapped around his mouth: it wasn't perfect, but it would help filter some of the air.

"They've pulled back," murmured Dawes, taking the opportunity to reload her weapon in the lull in the fighting. "What's happening?"

"Either we've done enough to scare them off, or they need to regroup just like we do."

"The end to the assault, or the eye of the storm," JT nodded in agreement.

"Fuckers," grumbled Mallard, motioning to JT to cover him while he stripped his weapon and replaced the ammo drum. He hadn't spent the full five hundred rounds, but he knew it was better to have a full load ready instead of a half load. He moved quickly, threading in ammunition and pulling back on the cocking mechanism before raising back into position. He glanced over his shoulder, caught Stevens eye and nodded grimly. "What's the plan?"

"How far to the control panel?"

"Couple of hundred meters," JT shrugged his shoulders, "give or take."

"And what about the hanger?"

"About the same."

"Retreat," Stevens nodded, "We know what lies back there, there could be anything waiting for us in there. That's their hive, their home, and you seen that bastard that nearly got me: when they're clinging to those walls they're practically invisible."

"Come back with more men?" suggested Dawes, nodding in agreement.

"Fuck that, I ain't comin' back in here," hissed the young private, the words 'Deviant Heart' etched into his shoulder plate. "Count me out."

"Pull back to the hanger," Stevens nodded, his decision made. "Better the devil you know than the devil you don't. Slow retreat, Dawes and me lead the way, Mallard, you cover our back: now we know roughly where they're coming from, it makes more sense to have the main firepower at the back. Let's hustle."

The six began to slowly move back the way they came, returning into the confines of the corridor littered with pipes and conduits, thick with moisture and steam. The corridor seemed alive now, pipes rattling and airshafts creaking, as if something were moving through them unseen, ghosting the retreating soldiers and tracking their movements. They moved quick, quicker than they had on their tentative journey into the lower decks, and quickly found themselves at the sealed hatch. Stevens hammered on the door, his back pressed against it while he scanned the dark corridor he'd just travelled back through: had something moved there, glistening wetly in the dim light of the ill-lit tunnel. He looked at the tracker he held, seeing the blank screen, and looked towards the barrel of the smartgun: it didn't twitch, didn't jerk towards any potential target. A trick of the light, or just an overactive imagination?

"C'mon, open up," he shouted, his voice cracking slightly as panic crept into his voice. Panic turned to fear as the slithering movement in the darkness was accompanied by a soft, rasping hiss. It could simply be one of the myriad of pipes venting steam, but it could just as easily be one of the creatures stalking them in the background.

"We're working on it," a muffled voice from the other side of the door spoke up, then became clearer as they adjusted the headset they wore. "We need to cut the locks."

"Any time soon would be good," Stevens growled, leaning against the door with his back and bracing his weapon against his hip. This close to home, he would be more than willing to throw all his training to the winds and let rip on full-auto, knowing fine well that there were more magazines filled with rounds just waiting for him on the other side of the door.

"We're through two locks now," the soldier on the other side of the door updated him. "Two more to go."

"Fuck," spat Mallard, glancing over his shoulder at the door. "It's a good job we ain't in a rush or nothin'. C'mon, man, get that piece of shit open."

"Thought you were a badass ground pounder, 'Roid Rage," the Marine working the cutting torch laughed, a harsh and barking sound that crackled on the radio link. "What's the matter? Need another hit of drugs?"

"I'll hit you soon as we get through if you don't hurry up," grumbled Mallard. "Pound your face into the damn ground, asshole."

Stevens felt a grin spread across his face as he heard the third lock of the hatch give way, and knew they were almost safe: almost, but not quite.

That hissing rasp sounded again, longer and closer this time, and it certainly wasn't a pipe venting steam or alleviating pressure. Stevens held his breath, survival instincts kicking in, and he watched as the darkness erupted into a blur of movement as one of the creatures erupted into the dull light of the corridor and rushed the group of six armed people.

In the sudden flash of movement, Stevens managed to make out some details of the creature: he knew that even after what he'd seen in the corridors leading into the bowels of the engineering deck, he still had to check his targets to make sure there wasn't any survivors in the firing line.

Its sleek head was encased in an opaque membrane that ran the length of its extended cranium, different to the exposed and ridged heads of the other creatures Stevens had already encountered. With saliva dripping from its maw, and scrambled along the ground on all fours, possessing powerful hind legs jointed like that of a racehorse or dog that pushed it forwards on a collision course with the six. Its back long and smooth, missing the ridges and pipes that the other creatures had, and a tail that whipped along behind it longer than those of the other creatures. It was still one of the alien creatures, but looked different: a subspecies? An evolved form? Unless it had evolved an immunity to armour piercing rounds, it was still going to go the same way that its brethren had. Before Stevens could further assess the target or fire a round off, the young private brought his own weapon into play, unleashing a salvo of bullets that ripped through the creature's lower abdomen. Its legs smashed into a useless, acid-riddled pulp and it collapsed onto the floor, but momentum and its immense powerful claws kept it hurtling onwards, ploughing into the young soldier and pulling him down to the ground just as the door behind Stevens slowly cycled open.

"Get in," Stevens commanded, ushering JT and Evelyn into the hanger, beyond the surprised and confused faces of the Marines guarding the entrance, and rushed to Mallard's side as he tried to fish the screaming private from the swirling, bubbling remains of the thrashing alien.

"Leave him, it's too late for him," Dawes shouted, watching as Mallard managed to grab the outstretched arm of the flailing Marine and pull hard, the limb coming away from the seething mess with a ragged lump of smoking flesh where the Marine's shoulder should have been. Disgusted, Mallard threw the limb back into the frothing mass of bodies and brought his weapon about to bear on the darkened end of the corridor, and the cacophony of rattling hisses and mewling screams that echoed down the cramped hallway. He gripped the handles of the weapon tightly, motioning for Stevens and Dawes to head through the hatchway and followed closely behind him.

"Here they come," he grunted before squeezing the firing stud, hosing the corridor with ten millimetre rounds and grinning sadistically, his face and the demonic apparitions that dominated the far end of the corridor illuminated by the stuttering muzzle flash. The advance of the creatures were like movements in a flickering strobe, each burst of light bringing the wall or chitinous armour ever-closer, jaws dripping with fresh saliva and talons outstretched. They fell beneath the onslaught of Mallard's machinegun as he backed up and nudged Stevens and Dawes through the hatch.

"Seal it up," he shouted, remaining on the other side of the doorway. "Get this hatch sealed up."

"Get in here first," Stevens yelled above the staccato of gunfire. "We can't seal it with you out there."

"If I come in, you won't be able to seal it up before they come in. Close it! Seal it! Now!"

"Damnit," Stevens hissed, knowing he was right. If Mallard broke away from the oncoming aliens, there'd be a lull in the firing as the hatchway was sealed that could be enough for them to squeeze through and cause havoc in the landing bay. He knew that Mallard knew there'd be no surviving the onslaught, and was more than willing to let himself fall so his friends may survive. Cursing, Stevens nodded to one of the Marines huddled around the hatch.

"Seal it."

"What? You can't be…"

"Don't have time for this," Mallard hollered, "Shut the fucking door and lock it down tight!"

Stevens hammered the controls for the hatch himself, snapping off a short salute to Mallard as he vanished from view. Even with the reinforced hatchway sealed tight, and the number of welding torched that were already going to work to weld the door to its frame, the repeating drone of the gunfire almost muting the screams of the advancing creatures.

"Come get it," the voice of Mallard sounded as the constant drone of gunfire ceased. It changed pitch as the sounds of his handgun being discharged, the trumpeting wails of the animals came closer and closer, and the dull 'whoomph' of a grenade going off temporarily drowned out the sounds of the aliens. There were screams, both human and inhuman, then the first of a series of thumps against the door, the animals on the other side of the barricade throwing their weight and oversized craniums against it. The Marines welding the door shut flinched involuntary as the door bounced, then worked twice as fast to secure the door, securing it as best they could before piling up packing crates and welding those to the walls and floor around the door.

As the Marines finished of the last of the welding, and the creatures continued their relentless assault against the door, Stevens paced back and forth, throwing his rifle on the ground and scowling at the obscured door. For a moment he was silent, and all eyes were on him as he stalked back and forth. His anger finally erupted as he lost his temper.

"Fuck!"

He pulled his helmet off and hurled it across the hanger as he screamed at the top of his voice, looking around the faces of the Marines that were left in the hanger. Of the squad that had went into the depths of Engineering, only the four crew of The Eden were lucky enough – or prepared enough – to survive the encounter. None of the other soldiers seemed to be able to comprehend the loss of highly trained soldiers. With a snarl, Stevens headed towards the open ramp of the dropship, his three friends trailing him as he bounded up the open ramp, into the vehicle itself and pulled up a seat in front of the operations console. It was no where near as large as the one that had been stationed in The Eden's barracks, but it would serve its purpose.

"We need to get in touch with Thorn, let him know we're fucked, and see if we can arrange an evac."

"Do you think that'll happen?" JT asked, sounding hopeful. Stevens simply shrugged his shoulders: he wasn't hopeful.