Chapter Forty-Three - Danger Close


    Chapter Forty-Three - Danger Close


    All locations in proximity to a samurai in action are to be considered danger close.


    --US Armed Forces NCO Basics manual, 2027


    ***


    When I thought the swarm would be on me soon I meant in a few minutes.


    I severely underestimated the speed that a few thousand aliens could pick up when they were hungry for human. The tip of the swarm poured down the streets below me. Teeth glistened, eyes narrowed, and they started their mad search for threats. No growling, or mad howls though. The creeps were as silent as ever.


    So I decided to make up for their silence all on my own.


    Thanks, I muttered as I caught a grenade out of the air. I tugged the pin off, then underhanded it down the street.


    Dropping to one knee, I watched the explosive disappear in the swarm.


    Then it detonated.


    A loud whomp filled the air while a circle a couple of metres wide appeared in the swarm. Every alien in the circle was flattened to the ground, as if theyd just been stuffed into the worlds biggest hydraulic press.


    Body parts flipped along the edges of the effect, entirely detached from the rest of their bodies.


    Not bad, I muttered.


    The hole filled itself up a half-second later. There were just too many of the bastards for it to make a difference.


    Not bad, but not enough, I said. I glanced around the city. Lots of apartments, plenty of shopfronts. All fucked now. Yeah, were giving up on the no-collateral thing. We can rebuild, but only if every last one of these fucks is dead. Myalis, I need something thatll wipe the street.


    There are hundreds of options.


    Not fire, I said. Dont want to step on Gomorrahs toes. How about... hey, do you think we could melt them all?


    An acid? There are grenades that can spread acids around them. There are even some that will hover over the ground and mist the air with highly corrosive chemicals, some of which are tailored to melting Antithesis flesh.


    That wasnt what I had in mind, but it sounded really cool. Yeah, I like that idea. Gimme something to drop, I want to see how it works.


    Myalis summoned a box next to me. It had a container with a sloshing liquid within, and three little propellers on stalks around it. It looked a bit like a cheap toy drone.


    Certainly. Though while you toss those down, I should warn you that at the speed the swarm is moving, neither the resonators nor the acid will be sufficient to kill even the smaller models.


    Right, I muttered.


    What else could I do?


    Ideas? I asked.


    You essentially need weapons that can kill the antithesis in a sustained way. Turrets placed above, combined with area-denial explosives such as your garrot grenades. Though, both would eventually be overrun.


    Yeah, maybe, but itll blunt the edge of the swarm, and I think thats what we need right now. Push the worst of it back so that they can get on with building the wall. Nades first.


    Myalis dropped a box full of grenades next to me, and I kicked it open, picked up a few, then flicked them down and onto the road. My aim wasnt perfect, but I didn''t exactly need accuracy for the oncoming horde. When the garrote grenades went off, it created pockets where everything was shredded apart.


    The swarm pushed into them as if trying to blunt the edge of the grenades with sheer force of meat.


    The grenades won out, though one of them did spark and break apart as a model five charged through it. The tougher hide was able to blunt and eventually break the explosive, though not without killing the model five first.


    Give the cats a few of these, I said. They can toss them in, keep the area deadly.


    Fewer aliens were making it past, and those that did often flopped over dead a few dozen metres past the intersection. Too many cuts and acid and melting internals.


    Still, the wave came, and I knew there would be more big fuckers to come.


    I set down a few turrets, one near the middle of the roof, just to ward off any flyers, another near the roof-access doorway, for when some halfway clever alien inevitably snuck onto the roof.


    In the meantime, I kicked the door open and ran down myself. Just offices and break rooms and a sea of cubicles. I ran to the nearest window and started setting up more automated turrets. The cheap laser ones that could recharge themselves over time with a bit of sunlight. Cheap, weak, but dependable.


    I left proximity charges next to each, for the first lucky alien that came around and tried to grab a bite out of them.


    I glanced down onto the street and grinned.


    The pile of melting bodies was already hip-high in places, and it was only growing bigger as the wave pushed against itself, like meat through a strainer.


    This is going pretty well, I said.


    Which is about when the artillery started to hit my position.


    ***