Revelation

Christian watched as a Theron Guard came out of the dark tree line. Its scarlet armor reflecting off the moonlight, essentially making it an easier target to spot. This is how Christian spotted it. Therons were considered the elite of the locust horde. They were slightly bigger then an average drone, but due to the presence of their armor they seemed huge compared to the lower grub. They led the regular drones into battle and if memory served him correctly they were a lot tougher to kill. Christian remembered during the lightmass offensive that it took nearly his entire squad to put down full fire just to take out one.

The Theron took a knee at the edge of the clearing and put up its hand. It seemed that the whole forest suddenly came alive with all different kinds of locust. It was mostly drones, armed with Lancers, Hammerburst and a few Longshots in the mix. They formed up around the Theron without making a noise. Something that must have taken a lot of discipline on their part.

"How much do you count?" Christian asked Marissa who had better eyes then him.

"About 30 maybe 40, but there's too many for us to even think of going up against." She replied with a hint of fear in her voice.

Christian quickly took in his surroundings and accessed the situation. The church wasn't that big so his squad should be able to defend. There were only four entrances into the church, one door and three windows. Two of the windows were near the door so as long as those windows were covered then the door didn't have to be guarded. That left the window that was towards the back of the church as the only other problem, he didn't think that the locust would be able to flank around the back of the church without getting spotted as there was too much open ground for them to cover. But just incase he would station the rookie to guard that window. Also he noticed that the church was smack dab in the middle of the clearing, and the trees only formed a half circle around the clearing, the other half of the clearing was bordered by a steep cliff that went down into more forest below. With coordinated fire from below and Marissa putting down sniper fire from up here in the church tower they might actually survive this.

"Stay here, pick your targets when I give the signal, stay on squad com too," Christian ordered as he made his way down stairs. Marissa nodded and put her orange tinted sniper goggles, which was resting on her forehead, over her eyes and took a crouched position.

Christian sprinted down the stairs as fast as he could. He leapt past the last flight of stairs and landed with a thump on his feet. Myles was awakened by the coming of his Sarge and almost fell out of his makeshift bed of a few chairs cobbled together, "What's going on Sarge?"

Christian sprinted towards the window and peeked out before ducking his head, "Locust a whole shit load of them outside." Chris who had been sleeping with his Lancer on top of his chest was up and ready at the mention of locust. Christian sprinted back over to where the two Gears were.

"So how we doing this, Cspos?" inquired Chris clicking the safety of on his gun. "Right here's the general idea of my plan," Christian said taking a knee, his squad followed suit, "We got four entrances, the three windows and the door." He began making a crudely drawn diagram of the churches frame, on the dusty floor. "The door is placed between these two windows so it necessarily doesn't have to be defended, as we can defend these two windows easily," he marked the door and the two windows, "Chris me n' you will defend these two windows and with Marissa providing sniper support in the church tower we should be able to hold off this attack."

Myles looked over the plan and realized he hadn't been mentioned, "Sir where am I during all this?"

Christian looked up as if noticing the rookie for the first time, "Ah rookie you will be defending this window in the back, don't worry about too many of the grubs flanking around and overtaking your position, there's way too much open ground for too many of them to get by us with out us noticing so you should be good."

"Yessir!" Myles responded with a crisp salute, though on the inside he once again felt he was being cheated out of any action.

"Shit, be quieter," Chris loudly whispered, he turned back to the Sarge, "How you think they know we are here, think they followed us?"

"Nah I don't think so, we would've noticed if we were being tracked," Christian estimated, "though I think that this attack force wasn't for us but for Gamma one, Gamma had about 12 members in it and they probably have been giving the locust hell for a while and now the locust have mustered up a significant counterforce to try to wipe them out."

Chris nodded in agreement as Christian continued, "If the locust think that Gamma is still held up in this building that probably means that Gamma is still alive and out there somewhere."

"Which probably means we have just wasted our time… and possibly our lives coming here," grunted Chris with a hint of annoyance in his voice.

Christian was about to respond, but it was silenced by a primeval roared erupted from outside.

The Latino and black Gear sprinted towards the two front windows, Chris on the left and Christian on the right, Myles had all ready gone to the back room to cover the window there. The Latino Gear switched on squad com, "Alright Hunter here they come, and don't fire till my mark."

About half a dozen of the drones had moved out of the tree line and were moving across the clearing fast, a few were firing potshots from their assault rifles as they ran.

A few bullets sizzled past Christian, he raised his Gnasher shotgun and uttered over squad com, "Give 'em hell Hunter!"

In unison, Christian, Chris and Marissa opened fire with their respective weapons. Christian's Gnasher pumped out shot after shot, Chris's Lancer crackled to life as he fired at the two closest locusts, Marissa snapped of two quick successive shots with her Long Shot, dropping two grubs.

Chris ducked down as a hail of bullets filled the window space, then he popped back up and returned fire at the incoming drones. He wasn't the best shot but he wasn't bad either and he made quick work of the last few drones with a few well placed headshots.

"Charge you worthless scum, move!" The Theron yelled using the butt of his Torque bow to urge the lower ranking locust forward. More Locusts charged and the Gears returned fire. Firing in quick burst Chris put down another drone and then another. He was about to duck down to reload his lancer when he noticed that a drone with a Hammerburst was had broken from the main group and was closing the distance fast to the church. He fumbled for his snub pistol. He brought it out and aimed down sight at the approaching locust. He fired once but the shot bounced of the armor of the grub. "Oh shit," he mumbled, but right as the drone was about to get its shot off, its head exploded. Chris recognized the work of a Longshot, "Good ole Marissa."

Christian fired his Gnasher at the nearing Locust, the shotgun shells spraying out at a short distance but able to cover a wider area. Locust after locust fell, occasionally a bullet would ping of his armor here and there but the power armor was meant to be tough and it was able to prevent any real injury.

Christian ducked behind his window sill to reload his shotgun. He had only been able to put two shells in when the door to the church blew inward. He turned just as a drone with a lancer came through spraying. He put a shot right in the creatures chest sending it flying against the wall. Suddenly the Theron came through the door way. Christian brought his gun up to fire, but with surprising speed the scarlet armored locust grabbed the barrel of the gun forcing it downwards. Christian pre maturely fired into the ground, and the Theron hit Christian right in the cheek with a powerful right hook. He stumbled back, but wasn't able to recover before the Theron sent a quick jab to his stomach knocking him flat.

Christian lay there dazed. Through hazy vision he saw the Theron lift its boot in preparation to curb stomp him. He closed his eyes in defeat and prepared for the inevitable. But it never came, he opened his eyes and saw the Theron convulsing then suddenly a chainsaw bayonet came diagonally through the locust's body. It fell to the floor in a gory mess.

Christian looked from the bloody corpse to his savoir, Chris stood there with a little reddish orange blood on his armor and a little on his face. He offered a hand to Christian, who accepted it and was helped, pulled up. Chris picked up the fallen drones lancer and handed it to Christian with a slight annoyed look on his face, "Next time I won't be there to save your ass."

Christian was quite surprised that his best friend would say something like that, but since the death of Ricky Chris has been a lot more serious when it comes to battling. Both Gears retook their positions at the window to continue the battle against the locust swarm.

Private Myles ducked as a few bullets whizzed into the back room from the front. That was pretty much all the action he had got since the start of the attack. He had guessed the Sarge had put him back here to keep out of the veteran Gears way but now he was certain that was the reason. "Son of a bitch," he said ducking down as more bullets whizzed in. After that salvo he peered up again. "There would be no locust that would run all the way around the church to swarm through one back window," he thought to himself.

Suddenly Myles noticed that a spot in the ground was beginning to cave inward and the ground began shaking. "Shit E-Hole!" he yelled out to no one in particular. The hole became wider and out came six locust drones. The drones moved slowly forward with the best stealth they could give, though do to there size and excessive growling they weren't doing a very good job.

Myles ducked down, "I don't think they saw me, or they would've started firing," he thought to himself. He quickly checked if his lancer was full of ammo then he sighed to himself and prepared for his first firefight.

The lead drone was approaching the window, when suddenly he was cut down with a burst of fire right across his unprotected torso. He went down roaring in agony and only had to see who his attacker was before he took another burst in the face killing him instantly. The other locust looked down at their fallen comrade then at the window opening where the fire had come from. There in the window frame a helmeted Gear stood poised to fire again. The locust roared and charged.

Myles had been quite surprised that his blind shot through the window had hit anything, and when he was rewarded with a cry of pain he had to see how he had fared on his first shots. That had been a mistake, he had only hit one of the drones and the rest were standing around their comrade when he popped up. They had noticed him and now they charged straight at him. He pulled his lancer up quickly a popped of a few shots. It caught the lead locust, but he only stumbled before catching himself and rejoining the charge. The other locust fired their weapons as they closed in on the opening. Myles felt the shots pepper of his armor, but they didn't penetrate. "Thank god," he thought to himself as he returned fire. The locusts were tough, but without any cover they were nothing. Soon all but one remained; Myles sighted on him and pressed the trigger, nothing. "Shit," he yelled out realizing he had exhausted all the ammo in the gun currently and needed to reload. The locust grub, who had pretty much realized it was in a precarious position with no way out, smiled and raised its lancer to fire at the gear.

BAM! Its head disappeared in a mist of red. The headless body fell to the floor, as Damon stand there awestruck. "Dam it rookie, you would have been grub food, if I hadn't decided to take a peek at your progress," Marissa said over squad comm. Damon let out a weak, "Thanks," in return and sighed.

Back in the front things weren't looking to well. Christian had confiscated the Torque Bow from the chain sawed Theron Guard and was putting it to good use. He charged up the weapon then peeked around the corner and fired. The armor-piercing projectile that resembles a large arrow (or rather, a Crossbow Bolt) flew out of the weapon and in the blink of an eye penetrated into the skin of a grappler drone. The grappler only had a half second to look at the arrow before it blew up into gory bits and pieces.

The Hispanic gear cracked a smile, but it soon vanished when he had to duck out of the way as dozens of rounds came through the opening. The volume of incoming fire was intense. The locust realized that they outnumbered the gears by a lot and were really pouring it on now. More had joined the fight since the original group, even a couple boomers; yelling out their signature, "BOOM!" as they fired their boomshots grenade launchers. The weapons high explosive round screeched out and impacted on the churches walls shaking the whole place.

"Fuck, this place is gonna fall," Chris cried out over squad comm. Christian had never seen the black gear so stressed, "Calm down Chris, we can hold." Lead was flying through the air like a swarm of angry wasp.

"Sarge, I'm pinned down hard, I can't provide sniper support anymore," Marissa said, her voice barely audible over the gunfire. "Right, Marissa reposition up front with us if you can," Christian said charging up the Torque Bow for another go. He popped up quickly and fired, but he had to duck so fast that he hadn't had much time to aim. But the projectile took off the head of a grenadier. His vanquished foe fell in a bloody heap and dropped his shotgun. The weapon went off and the blast went into an advancing boomer, decapitating the monstrosity.

Chris fired into the oncoming horde of locust. He didn't have to aim he just fired his lancer with reckless abandon. Bullet holes dotted his cover giving it the look of Swiss cheese. "There's way too many of them!" he yelled out but the sound of his voice fell on deaf ears. No one could hear him over all the fighting. He ducked down and reloaded; he was on his last clip. He popped back up and fired into the oncoming horde. They were literally only a few meters from the window firing. Chris could actually hear some of their horrid grunts and laughs as they realized they were about to slaughter this human. Chris fired with the intensity of a mad man; he knew this was his final stand.

Suddenly the ground outside of the church exploded. Locusts were thrown every which way, some going straight up at least fifteen feet in the air. Chris was blown back from the window and skidded to a halt towards the back of the room. He was seeing stars and his vision was blurry. Marissa appeared over him and offered a hand which he groggily took. "You ok man?" she asked with a look of concern on her face. Chris nodded and picked up his lancer from the floor. The two made their way back to the window Chris was guarding, now a gaping hole. "Who the fuck set that off?" Christian demanded angrily, as he and Damon joined them. The two other gears just shrugged, and looked outside at the carnage.

The explosion had created a giant crater in the middle of the clearing. There was dead locust everywhere, some with missing limbs, others burned to a crisp. There were a few stragglers who were mopping around in a daze of confusion. The gears of hunter raised their weapons and prepared to fire, but suddenly from the forest across the clearing, the lights of four lancers firing took out any of the stragglers.

"Who is that?" Myles asked completely bewildered. The rest of the squad was pondering the same thing.

A gruff voice spoke through their comm. "This is Gamma one-one, we are coming out of the tree line now, any COG forces in the Church hold your fire."