Peter aims his XM at an area receiving heavy fire from fellow brothers. He squints through the scope to better focus on the area.
A Herculean appears.
“Your mine.” Peter pulls the trigger for the first time at a visible Herculean target.
Nothing happens.
“Fucking fire!” Then upon realization he mutters quietly, “Oh shit.” His gun was on safety—come on Peter!
“Target two hands my right!” reports Blake.
A red diamond appears on Peter’s visor indicating the target Blake spotted. He aims his XM at the spotted location. This time he’ll finally get them he reassures himself, checking twice that the safety is off. He spots a Herculean’s weapon poking out from cover. The XM jerks against his shoulder.
BANG! BANG!
He readjusts himself, the Herculean is moving to the left now. He fires another controlled burst.
BANG! BANG! BANG!
“Fuck,” mutters Peter again. The Herculean has disappeared.
“Gotta be faster,” says Isaac, “I’m already on my second kill.”
“Fire for effect!” says Blake, as he targets a Herculean position back to a Stryker assault vehicle behind him. The vehicle’s turret lights up as it demolishes the short wall ahead into dust. A Herculean crawls out, rolling about on the ground like a beat dog. The marines turn their attention to the wailing Herculean and light it up till it’s an undistinguishable pile. “Another!” says Blake. The Stryker rips apart the rubble, bright sparks zip about and the rounds bounce and skip off the earth colliding against buildings deeper into the city. Blake gives a thumbs-up to the vehicle for a direct hit.
The rifles make a special sound of their own, as the entire line roars of barrels burping light into alien flesh. Peter’s visor explodes with numerous red diamonds indicating targeted Herculeans. He picks another one to focus on, and soon spots the selected Herculean, and fires. The bright burst of exhaust leaves his rifle tip combining with all of the other participating guns.
BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG!
The unrelenting storm of rounds flying at supersonic speeds against the enemy is breathtaking. XM-12’s from LMG crews add their unique sound to the thunderous chaos alongside AT rockets and falling ordinance—it is an orchestra of might! Empty shells spit out the sides of rifles, and bounce off the shoulders and helmets of the next brother over. The Herculeans respond with their instruments of war—for both sides have been practicing diligently for this debut—mechanical hums of ionized searing hot metal jackets, coated in energy plasma slice through the air in search of human.
Peter’s fight instinct thunders inside of him. He is fully taken over in the moment. These brave comrades to each side of him and their powerful weapons make him feel invincible—yes little warrior!
“KILL! KILL! KILL!” screams Herus. The UN flag, that signifies that this is a peace keeping mission, wraps around his body as jets scream overhead cropping up dirt and flapping the tattered banner about him. Herus rattles his revolver in the air out at the ruins; he has become the conductor of the orchestra, leading a capriccio of death, shooting wildly.
The choirs of troops rant and yell at the Herculeans.
“They’re all going to die!” says Herus. The UN banner is now draped around his shoulders like a cape, perfectly complementing the heroic cause of the Coalition as champions bringing justice to the evil Herculeans. “Keep at them comrades! You are part of an insuperable force of mankind, on a just cause to defend our brethren!”
Peter’s chance arrives to bring action to his passion once more, and add his solo to the orchestra of might. A Herculean leaps out of cover to sprint to another position. Peter aligns his XM leading it, noticing how they move for the first time. They stand hunched over, their steps more like hobbles and when in full sprint—like this Herculean—the hobbling turns into a sort of gallop. The marines next to him also have the same idea, and they fire at the Herculean with a breathtaking melody. Earth flies around the Herculean as the bullets tear away the land. The Herculean is hit in the leg and begins a frantic dance to try and reach the cover it sought. It falls under the storm of bullets and crawls begging pathetically for life. Peter peers through his scope at the Herculean, so he can lay the barrel exactly on the body for the note of the glorious finale. He pulls the trigger. Rounds rip apart its torso as it rebelliously accepts death, and then comes to a still slump against the ground. The critics agree, humanity’s orchestra is better received.
His first confirmed kill. Peter raises his middle finger to it, “Fuck you!”
“Yeah right, that was mine!” says Isaac.
“You wish.”
“Advance behind the armor!” says Blake. Vehicles trek over the trench and down the destroyed streets. Gunships fly overhead, pounding the city with payloads as they go. The humans pile out of the trench into columns behind the progressing vehicles. The Herculean fire has stopped. “They retreated!” says a marine. Cheering resonates among them as they move up.
“We did it,” says Vance.
“I guess so,” says Julian with a sigh.
“Stay frosty men,” alerts Blake, “There can still be some out there.”
Jericho, with its once huge metal slick skyscrapers and architecture, now bows forward with its twisted support beams and collapsed walls. They enter the outskirts and are welcomed by thick ash and smoke that congest the air. Some of the men place gasmasks over their faces to breathe freely. “Look,” coughs Isaac. To their side lies a Herculean against other dead of its own species, limp and maimed by rifle fire. Its blood pours out into the scorched earth, red like a human’s notices Peter. They too have hemoglobin that bleeds red—but it changes nothing of their despicable nature.
It wears snow hued armor similar to a Greek phalanx of old, over a dark gray baggy exosuit that puffs out between the armor plates. On its face is a respirator and full head shield—bulky and awkward, suggesting that their heads are of strange proportions too. On the sides of the helmet—where a human’s cheeks would be—the armor extends out slightly where on these small bumps on either side are foreign symbols and shapes, and large sealed holes where maybe tubes would connect into. These Herculeans are fully encased in their armor and an exoskeleton that hides their actual appearance, protecting them from this alien environment that would threaten their autonomy. But they have four limbs and a distinguishable head, even though they have three short tails protruding from the rear of their enclosed helmets in decorated sockets of wild colors that look like rings, and their hands end into a pronged shape, almost like two large thumbs.
Peter pauses by another dead Herculean near his feet, the creature’s body crushed under debris. He stares at bits of puke colored exposed flesh through the cracked helmet, the face is slightly humanoid. It lacks lips and a nose though. Mammals apparently, are only special to Earth.
“Gaze at their hideous bodies!” says Herus, tailing at the end of the advance. Similar sentiments are repeated by other Commissars throughout the assault. “This is the face of the monsters that tried to kill you, our brothers we are liberating!”
Farther down, soldiers and marines gather around the growing scene of dead Herculeans. Some discharge side arms into the corpses. Others pick up pieces of their armor or gear to examine them, or add them to their knapsacks. One man cuts the head off of a Herculean with his combat knife, and dangles it about by its short tails for everyone to see as another takes pictures. A different group of soldiers, close to Peter, forms around a Herculean corpse and begin pissing on it while jeering. The chants of defeating the Herculeans repeat among them as they desecrate their bodies.