Please read forgivingly (and if you have the time corrections are welcomed).
Inside
the barn, Se-se was cursing herself for being so stupid. Not knowing
what else to do she had made her way home and walked blindly into a
trap. She did not know why she had walked Charlie to the front barn,
it was not where she was normally stabled, it was the store for two
of the huge harvesters, but whatever prompted her to do it had saved
her life. When the shooting started she was pitched headlong to the
floor as poor Charlie was shot from under her. A fortunate landing on
soft straw meant she was not hurt and she was able to take cover
behind a harvester and do her best to work out who was shooting at
her. They were using heavy rifles, just like the ones she had heard
in the distance, whoever had murdered her Uncle was now trying to
kill her and they were in her house. If they were in her house Aunt
Tam was dead.
Who
or what were they? The glimpses she aimed at were nothing she
recognised, either they were a new alien far from their territory or
mercenaries in the strangest outfits she had ever seen.
Then
she watched unbelieving as two of the things were thrown back from a
window by the blast of an energy rifle. Was her Aunt still alive? If
she was she had brought reinforcements with her. Maybe she had a
chance after all.
A
crash from behind made her spin round and instinctively fire off two
rounds at chest height.
Luckily
for Shaw the door had burst open and the energy from his run had
turned into a dive. The slugs from Se-se's rifle travelled over his
head and buried themselves in the back wall.
“Don't
shoot!”
Se-se
froze. The man getting back to his feet was not one of the things
shooting at her. Where had he come from? There were no soldiers on
planet, the 48th
Light Infantry had finished their training exercise and left a month
earlier.
“I'm
not the enemy,” Shaw was cautious, he had no wish to be killed by a
terrified colonist. “I'm not going to hurt you.”
“What
the hell is going on?” Se-se demanded.
“You
tell me. What are they?”
“I
don't know. I came out of the forest and I'm being shot at.”
“Is
it just you? Is there anyone else here?”
Se-se
shook her head. “It's just me.” There was no point lying to the
stranger, if he was going to kill her there was little she could do
to stop him.
“I've
got a survivor in here.” Shaw reported back.
“Keep
him secure and hold your position.” Felton was quick with the
order. “We're closing in.”
Shaw
moved forward to take the place Se-se had been holding and pulled her
out of the way just as a shot scythed into the barn. He turned them
both so the edge of the shot grazed across his back armour, knocking
them both off their feet but causing no harm beyond the dark scoring
on Shaw's back plate. With firm words to the young colonist to keep
back out of sight Shaw returned to position. It was a good vantage
point, he could see two-thirds of the farm house and one of the two
other barns.
Se-se
did not know what to do as the fight continued. She had only returned
to find her Aunt but there was little chance of that happening now
and she had no idea if she had just been rescued or if she was now in
more trouble than she had been before.
Chase
moved forward with his men and tried to concentrate purely on the
situation in front of him, on flushing out the strange creatures in
the farm buildings but in the back of his mind he was wondering just
what they were going to do next. Either way it was perfectly clear
the colonists had not just switched their transmitter off, they had
been thrown into a deadly situation and were painfully unprepared for
it.
They
were in the farmyard in minutes. Each building had at least one dead
creature in it and the yard had several laid dead in the open. Chase
was curious but he had other priorities as his men cleared the area.
He stepped into the barn and find out what Shaw's colonist had to
say.
A
shot suddenly whistled past his head. He ducked and turned in one
movement, coming face to face with the alien he had just stepped by
who had made it to it’s knees and put a hand on one of the rifles.
As he watched the alien toppled, the shot to it's chest finishing the
work began by his own men.
A
young woman carrying a hunting rifle and dressed in forest camouflage
stepped down from the back of a large piece of unidentified
machinery. She surveyed the soldiers through narrowed eyes, tearing
them from the odd alien she had just shot with deadly accuracy. “Who
are you?” she demanded.
Chase
stood slowly, aware the rifle was still trained in his direction.
“Captain Chase,” he stressed the rank as he spoke. “2nd
Hestonians,
Imperial Marines. Who are you?”
“Sergeant
Se-se,” she too stressed the rank. “How did you get here? And
what are those things?” she had got no more from the other soldier
who had since moved away to make sure the barn really was secure and
free of aliens.
“You're
a little young to be a Sergeant.” Now the woman had drawn closer he
could see she was actually little more than a girl at most.
Se-se
nodded at the observation. “Cadet Sergeant, if you must know, but
I'm still aiming a loaded rifle at you, Captain. How did you get
here?”
A
series of options flitted through Chase's mind, but the girl in front
of him was indeed holding a loaded weapon and most importantly she
was a colonist who was alive and well. He opted for simple honesty.
“We arrived last night. We were on a training assignment on Jacob 8
when your transmitter went down and we were ordered to investigate.
What happened?”
“You
tell me.” Se-se countered coldly. “Everyone in the town is dead.
Was it those?”
Chase
glanced down at the alien before looking up sharply. “You've been
into town?” he was thinking of the bodies still laying in the open.
Se-se
hesitated, uncertainty showing on her face. “I–
I went as far as the outskirts before I came here.”
“We
think it was them. Do you know who lived here?”
Se-se
lowered the rifle, whatever these marines were doing, they had been
being attacked by the things that were killing her livestock.
“Everyone knows Joe and Tammy.” she answered flatly and strode
towards the house.
“Wait,”
Chase followed grabbing her arm as she passed him. Jonas had already
found the woman's body in the kitchen of the house, there was no need
for the girl to see it. “You don't need to go in there.”
Se-se
only had to look at the Captain to know why he was stopping her. She
had already known that Tam was dead, if she had still been alive
Se-se would not have been left alone in the forest, but knowing it by
logic and having it confirmed in fact were very different. Se-se's
shoulders dropped and she fought the tears beginning to well against
her orders. “Is no one alive?”
Gently,
Chase sat Se-se down on a wooden bench, his hands on her shoulders.
“We haven't found everyone. We were ordered to find Colonel
Castleman, but he wasn't in the town.”
Se-se
closed her eyes and let out a long sigh.
“Do
you have any idea where he could be? I think some of the colonists
are with him too.”
“When
the trouble started, it was training night, he'll be with the other
cadets.”
“Where?”
Se-se
looked up, her eyes boring into the officer in front of her. “I
don't know.”
“Where
would he take the cadets? Would he have taken them into the forest?”
Chase could not stress how important it was to know, he could not
explain why he had to find the Colonel. It would unfair in the
extreme to tell a lone survivor that he was actually there to
evacuate someone else. “We don't know what the aliens are after but
they're killing everyone they come across. Do you have any idea where
he would go?”
There
were two places Se-se could think of, one much safer than the other,
but the less secure place was closer and if they had had to run
without warning or equipment it was the best first stop. She should
have gone there rather than heading back to the farm, her Aunt and
Uncle would have expected that of her. They had both told her to
trust the Colonel. Now she had a group of Marines who she could not
be sure of trusting, but they were wearing the Imperial seal and what
real reason did she have for doubting them when their reason for
being there sounded so plausible. She had no choice, there was no one
else alive. “I think I can guess.” she offered. “We have a
training hut in the forest. We always keep kit in there.”
“How
far away is it?”
“Almost
a day by foot.”
“Then
we can't waste time. Felton!”
The
dark haired Sergeant appeared from another barn. “Sir?”
“We're
moving out.”
“Yes,
sir.”
“Se-se,”
Chase turned his attention back to the girl. “Were you out by
yourself?”
Se-se
nodded.
“Why
weren't you with the cadets? You said it was a training night.”
“I
was late, then the shooting started and,” she hesitated. “I went
into the forest.”
“It
was a sensible thing to do.” Chase reassured her gently. “Are you
going to be able to lead us to this hut? It'll probably be dark
before we get there.”
“It
will be dark, but I can lead the way.” Se-se was confident. She
looked back towards the house. She wanted to go to her Aunt, but she
had already seen her Uncle die and she knew she would always remember
him laying on the track covered in blood, she was not sure she wanted
that memory of her Aunt.
“Come
on.” Chase could see where she was looking. He took her arm and led
her back towards the forest, away from the house and it's contents.
“Which direction do we need to head in?”
Se-se
indicated almost the way she had come from.
“Sir,”
Bateman appeared beside them. “Before we go, I need to look at your
arm.”
It
took Chase a moment to register what the medic was saying, for a few
minutes he had been able to forget the worst of the pain of the
wound, but the reminder brought back the searing burn with fresh
insistence. “Right. Do it.”
With
the Captain now distracted, Se-se found her attention going to the
alien laying where it had been shot in the chest.
Shaw
was already prodding it with a foot.
It
was humanoid, almost human, far more so than any of the other alien
races they had encountered in the past.
As
Shaw prodded the side of the head one of the bulbous yellow eyes
moved, it broke off the face and landed on the ground.
“Fucking
arseholes.”
Underneath
the make-up, under the false eye, a distinctly human one stared
blankly up at the sky.
“It's
human.” Se-se whispered. “Why?”
Chase
stared at the body for long seconds. “We're leaving. Now.”
“But
what-”
“Sergeant,”
Chase pulled the girl round to face him. “I need you to lead us and
I need you to do it now.”
There
was a pause. Se-se felt way out of her depth, she did not know if she
could really trust these soldiers but it felt right and leading them
would at least take her in the right direction. She made her
decision. “Yes, sir.”
“And
put that body back exactly as it was.” Chase ordered sharply.
“Sir?”
Shaw was confused. Why should it matter how the bodies were left?
“Someone
has gone to a lot of trouble to make us think we're being attacked by
aliens. Let's not let them know they've been rumbled just yet.” it
was a short explanation but Chase was not about to let anyone know
what exactly what was going through is head. There was a lot of
confusion as he tried to connect the dots and see the whole picture.
Someone was trying to destroy an entire colony, to leave a dead
world, but just in case a witness survived or a recording was
recovered, they were playing unidentified aliens. It was a huge
amount of effort to go to, a subterfuge with no obvious advantage but
there had to be a reason for it and he was determined to find it and
use it to avenge not just his lost men but those poor children in the
school.
Felton
organised the men with all the efficiency Chase had come to expect
from his Sergeant and they were soon enveloped by the cool greenery
of the ancient forest with only their new young ally guiding their
way.
FraidyKat Runs - from dirty tricks
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