“Could be coming now, what with all this yappin’ we’re doin’ outside their home,” Robbie said.
“He’s right,” Charlie said, “move out!”
The men broke, just like that, falling into the prearranged teams. Charlie, Turn, Sammy and Tommy took up the left while on the right Fred, Bobbie, Robbie, and the quiet Paul grouped together. They were only fifty yards from the cave entrance, a low-rock overhang on a small hill set before a larger ridge. There were old stumps and moss and rotten limbs piled around, and it seemed as if a mist was in the air just before the yawning maw that was its entrance.
“Corporal,” Sammy said, quietly as both teams continued to advance, their guns up and sighted up on the cave entrance, their nerves taut.
“Let’s wake ‘em up,” Tommy said in response, then motioned upward with his arm, although it was more out of habit than any need, “two on either side, near the stumps and logs.”
“Got it,” Charlie said a moment later, while at the same time Turn said “see it.” Both men’s guns fired off one of the rocket-propelled grenades mounted on their side and a moment later there were twin explosions about halfway up the hill along the side of the cave entrance where the stumps and the logs had been. Both sent up a shower of sparks, something that’d be unusual if the men didn’t know that the sensing and perimeter security guard devices were located there, or at least had been.
“They’re onto us now,” Bobbie laughed.
“Then keep a lid on it,” Fred said over his shoulder. While the six super soldiers may have been the real brains and muscle behind the operation, it was still the two newbies calling the shots.
“I’d keep a lid on it if you weren’t so—”
Whatever insult Robbie was about to hurl Bobbie’s way was cutoff as a large turbine-like sound started from the cave entrance, or at least somewhere within, and quickly grew in pitch and frequency and volume, until the lights burst on.
“Shit!” Charlie said up ahead, then ripped the night vision goggles from his head at the same moment everyone of the other med did the same.
“Down!” Fred shouted next, gaining a bit of his senses back, and right as he dove down to the brush beside him. It was a good thing, too, for at just that moment some kind of rocket or something shot out and exploded right near where he’d been.
The others did the same, and the rockets — there were actually four shooting forth — all landed where the men had been or had been going. Still, the men had been far enough away that they were only showered with dirt and branches and leaves as the missiles impacted upon the forest floor. And that’s when Turn saw them.
“There!” he shouted, putting his arm up while pushing his M240 machine gun up with the other, getting it up over the small dirt mound and pointing at the Gray right there at the cave entrance, just inside, the earthen walls illuminated now by the floodlights shooting outward, blindingly so, but not so blindingly that Turn couldn’t see the thing’s face, and what he hoped was fear in its eyes.
“Light ‘em up!” Charlie said, and a moment later the men did so.
Turn was the first to get a shot off, or at least he liked to think he was. The Gray he’d pointed out was in his sights and he pulled the trigger and saw the bullet hole appear in its head. Greenish-ooze began to seep out — not blood, Turn knew, but that vat liquid they used below Dulce — and the thing fell forward.
A shudder went through Turn’s body. He’d killed them before, but he never got over how strange it was, how… different. When you killed a man you could see his eyes roll up or flutter shut or just the life go out of them. When you killed a Gray… nothing.
Sometimes he didn’t think they were dead, for there was never any expression in those faces, never any ‘humanity’ in those black orbs they called eyes. But they were dead, he knew, and that was what made all the difference, and why he’d know they’d win eventually, because they could be killed.
“Look alive!” Sammy shouted ahead of him, knocking Turn from his thoughts. He blinked a few times and focused his attention back on the cave entrance, and was surprised by what he saw.
“They’re on the run!” Tommy shouted in glee from beside him.
It was true — there were just three dead Grays in the mouth of the cave and the lights were beginning to dim, although they weren’t going out completely.
“Into the rabbit hole, boys,” Charlie said with a laugh, and once again Turn admired him for his bravery, his courage, and his blind-stupidity. The men did as well, for they gave a ‘hell-yeah’ and started forward.
Fred’s group was moving ahead slightly faster than Charlie’s, mainly because Bobbie kept jumping up ahead, his enthusiasm to kill the aliens outweighing his sense of safety. Fred was able to hold him back, but they were getting out of formation because of it.
“Pick it up,” Sammy said, and he pushed forward ahead of Charlie.
Charlie didn’t protest, and a few moments later the men were at the cave entrance, the dead Grays at their feet, the lit-tunnel open before them. The mouth only went a dozen feet before hitting the back wall, although the tunnel itself twisted to the right. They reached that turn and started around it.
“Damn!” Sammy shouted, then fired three short bursts. The Gray that’d appeared ahead of them fell to the floor, followed a moment later by its head, shot off at the neck.”
“Whoo-ee!” Bobbie laughed, then whistled too for good measure. “Love it when that happens!”
Charlie and Fred gave him a strange look as they reached the creature, and got their first real good look at the things they’d only until that point heard about.
“Damn those eyes are lifeless,” Fred said, and Charlie nodded.
“So’s their souls,” Paul said, the first words out of him since they’d gotten off the helicopter.
“Why the hell’d that one just stand there and let itself get shot to shit like that?” Charlie said, his mouth hanging open in surprise and his eyes darting from one super soldier to the other.
“Thought he could get me,” Sammy replied, looking at the two ‘commanders’ of the mission.
“He didn’t know that Sammy, Bobbie and me ain’t susceptible to that mind attack crap,” Tommy said, in a serious tone for a change.
“That’s why you all need to stay close to us,” Sammy said, looking at the others but especially at Charlie and Fred. “Stay close to us and you’ll be fine.”
The men nodded and they started forward again. The lights were still on, some kind of dull-yellow orbs built into the side of the tunnel, which was now beginning to turn to metal, the walls at least.
“How far’s this thing go down?” Robbie asked no one in particular as they kept on moving.
“It’s a shuttle port,” Paul replied, “could go on for miles.”
“You said a half mile outside there,” Charlie said, turning to Paul.
Paul shrugged. “It’s hard to say, though the intel on this one said—”
“Shut up!” Turn said as loudly as he could without shouting. “Listen.”
The others listened, then the super soldiers looked at one another and their eyes went wide.
“Get down!” they shouted as one, then dove for the sides of the tunnel. Fred and Charlie did the same, their training taking over for any lack of understanding, and a moment later a ‘whooshing’ sound of some sort could be heard.
“Robbie!” Sammy yelled at the same moment some kind of UFO flew over their heads.
“Got it!” Robbie shouted back, and he did, his M203 China Lake model grenade launcher pointing forward and ready. He hit the button and the thing fired to life, shooting out after the UFO as it was just reaching the turn to the tunnel entrance.