Chapter Sixty-Five – A Change in Tactics

Chapter Sixty-Five – A Change in Tactics

“There are different sorts of incursions, but for the most part, the opening salvo of Antithesis forces will concentrate on overwhelming numbers.

Each fruiting vine can hold anywhere from a hundred to three thousand flowers, each one a fruit which will grow into a man-killing alien in an afternoon. The more time passes, the more biomass the hive collects, the greater the number of models it produces.”

–Excerpt from ‘The Most Dangerous Weed,’ 2025

***

I slapped the side of the truck’s cabin. “Go!” I shouted.

The truck revved, a high pitched whine escaping from its electric engine a moment before its rearmost wheels spun with a crunch of gravel on asphalt and the whole thing started forwards.

I ignored the tons of steel moving right past me and brought Whisper up to take a few shots at the bastards sticking their heads over our road block.

“I’m lighting up the wall!” Gomorrah called back a moment before the temporary blockade we’d built up across the street turned into a flaming barrier, the few aliens scrambling up the side flopping back down on the wrong end of toasty.

A glance over my shoulder showed the last truck taking the corner at a speed that would have earned it a ticket in normal circumstances. “That’s it,” I said.

No more civilians. Nearly two thousand–or maybe a bit over that since I hadn’t really been counting–all removed from an area that was about to get swamped by enough aliens to drown in.

Gomorrah shifted a bit. She’d gained a pair of shoulder mounted flame throwers, similar to my own shoulder mounted guns, and her backpack had changed a bit, getting smaller and more compact. I wasn’t sure when she’d picked up the new gear, but I couldn’t throw rocks from my glass house.

I was planning on finding a nice calm spot soon to equip some new toys of my own.

“How are we evacuating?” Gommorah asked.

“Uh,” I said. I looked back down the road the trucks had gone down, then towards the other side where the antithesis tide had been stalled if only for a little bit. The aliens seemed to take that as an excuse to start breaking into every building along the sides of the roads. “There are a few more shelters to check out, but they’re on the safer side of the hospital we’re using as a rendez-vous point,” I said.

“Well then, perhaps we should reach the hospital first. If there are more soldiers there then perhaps we could use them as aids to evacuate the other shelters.”

I nodded along. “That makes sense.”

We both just stood there for a bit.

“So?” Gommorah asked at last.

“Yeah?”

“How are we getting there?”

I reached into my hood and scratched at the nape of my neck. “I don’t know. We could walk?”

The nun stared at me, the unmoving face of her mask not hiding the fact that couldn’t pick an emotion. “You don’t know? You mean to tell me that we just sent the last transport away with no way to get out ourselves?”

“That’s simplifying it a bit,” I said.

“Please do explain then,” she said.

That stereotype about nuns being on the acerbic side was proving itself true. “Look, we can probably jack a car and drive out of here,” I said. “I mean… you know how to drive, right?”

“You… No. No I don’t!”

“Ah,” I said. “We can walk then? Maybe a bit of jogging. It’s cardio. Good for your health.”

Gomorrah’s fists tightened by her sides before she spun towards the far end of the street and started stomping off.

“That’s the spirit,” I said. “One step at a time and all that. Isn’t that what Jesus said?”

“He never said that!” she shouted back.

I snorted back a laugh and jogged to catch up with her. “Come on, it’s not that bad. The boring logistics parts will all be over by the time we get there. Plus we can kill a few more aliens on the way over. More points!”