Chapter Fifty-Five - I Meant To Do That

"After the first incursion, the people of the world turned to the scientific community for answers. Samples of the first aliens to make verifiable landfall on Earth were brought to labs across the country, footage was shared, and speculation and hypothesis began.

On the same day as the Antithesis arrived, a whole new branch of scientific studies was born."

--MIT Pamphlet on Xenology, 2026

***

Gomorrah and I hitched a ride in the back of a troop transport.

Not one of those big armoured ones. This was basically a four-wheel-drive truck, with a low bed filled with twin rows of seats facing each other and an optional tarp roof--currently down.

It wasn't fancy, but it was pretty fast. Or the driver was pretty fast in any case, cutting through red lights like it was nothing, the escort of light armoured vehicles probably helped. People tended to slow down when half a dozen cars with turrets on their roofs came rushing down the road, police-lights flashing and sirens wailing the entire time.

When Gomorrah had outlined the plan, I had expected it to be a little simpler. Gomorrah and I would rock up to the hive, burn and-slash-or explode it up, then head back home for a quick nap.

Instead, we were heading to the hive with an escort. A full platoon of force recon.

I glanced at the row of men and a few women next to me. They were serious-faced, probably because their sergeant chewed up the guy who'd dared to whistle when we came in. The lot of them were dressed for war. Thick gambesons to stop bites, armoured collars around their heads and helmets that covered everything but their mouth and nose.

They had a very standardised kit. Some sort of bullpup assault rifle, a few magazines strapped to their chest. A sidearm at their hip. The same pale green armour all around, with a few highlighter-green bands around their rather ugly helmets.

The only good thing I could say about their gear, at least as far as looks went, was that it would make Gomorrah and I stand out.

I got a ping from Gomorrah, and glanced across at her a moment before we were connected for a call. "Stop staring. You'll make them nervous," I heard over the call. Notably, I couldn't hear her saying it aloud.

"I'm not usually this close to the soldiers while sitting in a car with nothing better to do," I said after making sure my voice wouldn't escape my helmet. "Are these guys good?"

"Seventy-Seventh recon," Gomorrah said. "They're pretty much the best. At least as far as normal soldiers go. They've cleared out hives without any samurai support before. If we weren't here, they'd still be rushing over to the hive right now."

"Huh. Brave of them," I said.

"Someone has to do it," Gomorrah said. "I think a lot of them have family in New Montreal. They have a reason to fight. So stop staring."

I raised my hands a little, a small gesture of surrender before I leaned back into my seat. It wasn't a very comfortable seat. "We'll see if we can't impress them, then," I said.

"I think shooting straight and not tripping over your own feet would impress them a lot," Gomorrah said.

I laughed. "Right, right. I'll try to be half-way competent for once. Are we expecting a lot of resistance?"

"Not really. The hives here aren't exactly dormant at night, but they seem less busy than usual. Atyacus explained it to me once. Something about the sun being down, the temperature dropping, and also there being less human activity and aggression. The antithesis are very good at noticing patterns like that. So night is when they do a lot of digesting and the hive expands."

I nodded along. I haven't made a point of studying the aliens, but that sounded about right, at least from what I'd picked up from movies and tv. There were probably people out there with entire degrees about antithesis behaviour. Compared to that, I was working off personal experience and a few tidbits I'd caught along the way.

We reached the secondary wall, and I noted that some of the buildings nearest the wall had been collapsed. I hadn't actually noticed that from above. It looked like someone was smart enough to create a killing field on the inside of the wall as well as the exterior.

The gate leading out of the city was manned, but they were quick to let us through.

Almost the instant we were past the gate, the sirens and lights were shut off. I hadn't realized it in the city, but the cars were silent. No engine rumbles, and their suspensions were good enough that they barely made any noise as we rode ahead.

I leaned back, glancing over the side of the truck. The cars ahead were turning off their lights, and soon the transport we were in did the same. The entire convoy was running dark on a road I could only see because of my better eye and my helmet's optics.

"Hope the driver can see," I muttered.

"Don't worry about it," Gomorrah said. "I vetted the drivers before we left. Otherwise we would have met them with the Fury."

"Still don't know why we couldn't go ahead," I said.

"Because we want the nice soldiers to want to protect us," Gomorrah said. "And they can help carry things too. It doesn't hurt to be kind."

I shrugged. Couldn't say I cared too much either way, but maybe she was right.

In any case, with the speed we were going at--probably twice the speed limit--it only took a few minutes to reach our spot.

The convoy slowed down, decelerating until we were all moving at a slow crawl, then the car at the front went off the road and into a field, using a small dirt road over a wide ditch to cross over. The moment we were offroad, I pulled back into the seat and sat properly. The suspension might have been good, but we were crossing an open field. It had probably been... corn or something, once. Now it was nothing but small bumps for as far as I could see.

The off-roading continued for a good long while. We couldn't move as fast, and when we crossed from one field to another, it had to be done over small dirt bridges over deep ditches. Once, the entire convoy stopped so that a truck just like the one we were in but with gear in the back could slip ahead. A few guys jumped out, then literally installed an unfolding bridge for us to cross in about three minutes flat.

It took another ten minutes before the entire group came to a stop, this time for real.

The soldiers stood up, the sergeant in the group making a few quick gestures accompanied by a few clicking noises. Everyone disembarked, and they were going slow, moving so that they didn't make much noise.

Some noise was unavoidable, but they were doing what they could to be quiet. "Silent bunch," I muttered.

"You might learn something from observing them," Gomorrah commented.

I blinked, then glanced her way. "You okay? You're testier than usual."

"Sorry," she replied instantly. "Just... a lot on my mind. I shouldn't take it out on you."

"It's fine. If I couldn't handle some amount of snark I wouldn't be able to survive." I patted her on the back. "Would burning some xenos brighten up your mood?" I asked.

"It would."

"Alright, then let's go set some aliens on fire."

We clambered out of the back of the truck and were met by three sergeants and a guy that had lieutenant stripes. "Miss Gomorrah, Miss Stray Cat. We're ready to begin the operation."

"Any details we should know?" Gomorrah asked.

"Latest satellite scan paints the hive as being within a two kilometre-wide radius of this forest. Mostly on the surface. We'd like to go in quiet, if at all possible," he said.

The more aliens that died without the others realising, the easier it would be for the soldiers, I figured. "I can do quiet. At least until it's time for the bombs to go off. I'm not sure how stealthy fire is."

"It's bright, but fire doesn't need to be loud," Gomorrah said. "We can manage. Set your IFFs on. Let's get to the centre of the hive, then burn it out from within."

That sounded like a plan to me. A fun one, even. I shouldered my gun, then started off for the forest. "I'll do a bit of scouting ahead," I said before going invisible.

It was just in time, too, because I tripped on my next step.

Fucking muddy fields.

***