The fight for the future

552

A/n: woo hoo! 30th part! I am so glad I've made it this far. Thank you to the IRL versions of StormHarrow , InspectorLion , lschwartzbard , @DabblingFandoms , MrWordsmith and the voice of Triton221 . Without these people The fight for the future would never be what it is now. Thanks guys!(and girls) Now then, enough of me being wishy washy. Back to the story!

-yeti14

"How many men did we loose?" Lee asks, surveying the soldiers in the foyer.

"Ninety six." A young corporal says, plopping down on one of the couches that litter the foyer.

"Fuck. this is bad." I say, starting to pace. With only fifty four men remaining, the chances of survival are very slim. We've barricaded the doors to keep the bugs out but we don't know where the Aliens went. "Erica, take Dominick, Ella and a platoon and investigate the upstairs. Lee, Ana, Liam, Laurel. Come with me. We're checking out the main floor. Kate, Cathy, take a platoon and check out the basement."

"Roger." They all reply and I make my way towards one of the doors set into the walls.

"Hey," Kate says, coming up behind me, "stay safe." She still has her helmet on, as do I but I can sense her worry.

"I'll be fine. Promise." I say, touching my forehead to hers. She goes off with her platoon and I open the door, gun raised.

***

"Clear." Liam calls flatly as we enter another room in the massive house. So far we've only seen broken shells of some sort of material in all the rooms we've searched in the past hour.

"J'son?" Erica calls through the comms. "nothing's up here. It's empty. Heading back now."

"Copy." I reply. "We should head back too. I say to my squad and we trek back to the foyer. Twenty men lie on the various chairs and couches, all of them too wounded to explore the house.

"Any word from the others?" Laurel asks as Erica walks into the room.

"No, nothing." She says grimly.

"Alright. Pair up. We're going after them." I say, and all my friends pair up. Erica with Lee, Ana with Liam, Ella with some guy I don't know, Laurel with Dominick and I'm by myself. "Where did they go?" I ask one of the men I left in the foyer.

"Down the elevator shaft." He says, pointing to a dark closet like space.

"Alright. Switch to thermal." I say to my group and I walk over to the shaft.

"See anything?" Erica asks as I survey the dark chasm.

"I'm getting a small heat signature from the bottom but not much else." I say before I jump in. I fall about sixty feet before I hit the ground. "Shit. I can't see a thing." I think to myself. Then press two buttons on the side of my helmet. One activates night vision, the other, personal radar/sonar. With all three features turned on I can see that I've landed at the mouth of a huge cave. No heat signatures can be seen except for a small pool of blood on the ground next to me. It is not human blood as it has a different heat signature. "It's okay to come down!" I call back up and seconds later my team hits the ground.

"See anything?" Erica asks, taking her rifle off her back.

"Nothing." I say and I start waking forward through the cave, gun raised.

***

Two hours later we find them. Kate, Cathy and nine other guys all sprawled on the ground unconscious.

"Laurel, help them." I say as we all rush over and inspect the soldiers for injuries. after ten minutes they are all up on their feet without a mark on them. "what happened?" I ask Kate.

"I have no idea." she says, shaking her head. "we were exploring this cave when we all were rendered unconscious.

"huh." Erica says and lee walks over to take a look.

"what is this shit?" he asks, recoiling from a substance on the floor.

"from my visor scans its....amniotic fluid..." Erica says worriedly.

"well then. well have to keep an eye out for the bastard." Kate says, cocking her rifle. "lets move!"

As a unit we move through the cave, looking for any signs of life. at one point Ella tries to lift some tension that's been building up. we are all like coiled springs. ready to act if we become in danger.

"so a neutron walks into a bar..." she says then several things happen at once. Lee screams

"CONTACT!" and something green bursts out of the cave wall and rips Ella's throat out with its huge talons.