Page 11 of Trigger Discipline
The twin guns on its shoulder whirred with a horrifying clicking sound, then they leveled on the car.
“Move!” Gabriel shouted, sprinting away from the vehicle with his head down.
The car exploded behind them, flipping through the air to land with a crunch in the building beside them. Windows shattered and the front door splintered under the passenger side of the sedan.
Without that car, they were completely out in the open. Gabriel cast his eyes around while Judd and Phin unloaded onto the alien, a last desperate attempt to somehow sever its head or stop its progress.
The bipedal alien’s head whirred. Hefting his rifle, Gabriel grabbed the lid of a metal trash can and slung it toward the thing’s head. One of the shoulder guns neatly blew the lid out of the sky. A twisted, burning metal lump landed and skittered across the asphalt. The silver was glowing red-hot.
While the alien was distracted by the trash can lid, Gabriel moved to stand beside Phin and Judd.
He caught their eyes. “Let’s make it rain.”
Judd whooped.
Side by side, in perfect sync, the three soldiers let loose on the behemoth. Their bullets plinked off, falling back in a hailof spent brass shells being spat out onto the asphalt. In a storm of projectiles, the alien slowed. Two of the sensors on its head began cracking.
“Advance!”
They began moving forward, one agonizing step at a time. Gabriel couldn’t hear anything but the blood rushing in his ears and the muted echo of his gun retorting in his hands. Limbs numb, his entire world narrowed down to the scope on his rifle and the two men beside him. Step by agonizing step, they pushed the thing backward.
Phin’s belt-fed rifle was doing the heavy work. Finally, holes and dents in the creature’s armored chest were beginning to appear.
Then they heard the clicking.
From their right.
Phin turned, grabbing Gabriel and pulling him to the ground just as something big sailed over him. They landed with a thud, rolling to their feet. Judd wasn’t so lucky.
It was another alien. This one had four legs and some weird snapping pinchers attached to its chest. Faster than the bipedal, it clambered to regain traction from its jump. Metal feet sparked against the street as it turned to face them. The little pinchers under its chest clacked open and closed excitedly.
Gabriel reached for the gun he’d dropped. Palm scraping against the gravel, he just barely snagged the stock, hauling it towards him. Jumping to his feet, he unleashed several controlled bursts at the quadruped’s head.
“That’s a fucking ugly bitch!” Phin grated, joining him.
Judd was holding his arm, blood pooling from his fingers as he struggled to get his knees under him.
The bipedal stepped over to the shorter alien, standing behind it like an owner about tosicits dogs on a couple of intruders.
The thing whined, then clicked twice.
There are some things Blake will never be able to forget. The smell of his mom’s perfume. His father’s laugh whenever some cornball commercial came on. The feeling of freedom the first time he drove a car by himself.
He never thought the sound of a human melting would be one of them.
The man under his hands gasped wetly, the skin congealing to his bones as his blood boiled. Blake froze, his hands hovering above the man as he tried to think of something, anything, he could do to save him. There was nothing in his training that could have prepared him for the wet popping noise of skin sloughing onto the pavement, dripping from his bones like a melting candle, and the final shattering gurgle of the man finally dying.
“Blake!” Tommy’s shrill cry shattered his concentration. He looked up in time to see his EMT dragging a half-conscious woman from the street. One of the metallic dog-looking things raced towards them.
Jerking to his feet, he ran towards the truck. The fire extinguisher was hooked right inside the door. Jerking it from its holder, he ran forward, untangling the hose from the clamp holding it to the metal cylinder.Blake jumped over some downed power lines laid across the street, limp and dead. No longer dangerous now the electricity was down.
The creature did some weird whistling screech as Blake approached, its stupid claws chattering. Heart in his mouth, he pointed the hose at the thing and sprayed white foam the couple of feet between them. At a full run, the four-legged thing braked, sliding forward until it struck Blake. Knocked on his back, he tried to roll out of the way of the powerful hind legs.
Shaking its triangle head, the thing tried to rid itself of the foam clinging to its sensors, or eyes—whatever they were.Blake rolled out from under it, bringing the fire extinguisher down onto its head twice before one of its legs rotated and kicked him.
Flying backward, he landed hard. Seeing stars, his brain was screaming that he needed to get up. His legs wouldn’t listen, and he couldn’t breathe. His lungs felt like pancakes.
Enraged clicking and chittering pierced through his wheezing. He managed to push himself onto his elbows just as the thing got one bulbous eye clear. Boots scrambling against shattered safety glass and gravel, he backed up until he hit the curb.