Wolf Pack_Invasion and Conquest

by Rob Buckman

  "I'm betting it’s a fire base to control movement through this area."

  "So, we go round it?" Decker scratched his scar thoughtfully.

  Taking this base would give them useful Intel, but was it worth the risk to the Pack? The mech units now walking patrol around the perimeter, didn't give him any warm fuzzy feeling about their chances of doing it without sustaining casualties. As dawn crept up over the horizon, and the light strengthened, more details of the base came into focus. Decker carefully scanned the ground out from the base through his scope, looking for anything out of the ordinary, and it wasn't long before he spotted what he was looking for.

  "Shit! The UMFs have planted mines."

  "What! Where?"

  "See that little hump in the ground about twenty feet from the wall. Take a close look at the grass just to the left."

  “I don't… wait. I see a glassy looking dome.”

  “They put the mine in the ground with the dome sticking up just above ground level. The sensor unit probably. Not very subtle are they.”

  "No they’re not. Shit! They are all over the place… Oh, shit. The minefield extends all the way to the lake."

  "You've got it. If you try to sneak around, boom, you die. If you walk up the road they've got you."

  "Either way you're dead."

  "We could try wading in the lake after dark." An unseen voice whispered.

  "True, unless they planted a few along the banks and in the shallows."

  "How about crossing and passing on the other side?" It was a thought.

  Decker eyed the lake, not liking what he saw. As far as he could see, the water was deep except at Paradise Cove, and there was the added possibility the UMF’s had planted mines on the other bank as well, a pretty fair bet. Whoever was running their show wasn't about to miss that. He also didn’t relish trying to take the whole team over this peak at night, as the possibilities of falls were too great.

  "What the hell…" Decker brought his attention back to the base and saw the main gate opening. Instead of another alien patrol, out walked five men in military BDU's, who started walking down the road back toward Lake Isabella.

  "What the fuck is going on… sir. Those are men… human soldiers."

  "That's a very good question. Why don't we just go and ask them?" Dennis Michelson shot him a sharp look and saw the smile. Decker wasn't kidding. "Yes, why don't we just do that?" Grinning in return.

  "Leave two on guard - the rest fade back with me."

  "Okay. Who wants to get naked and go for a nice swim?" The girls looked at him, smiling, and shook their heads, remembering what happened to the girl’s the last time someone volunteered.

  "What do you have in mind… besides the obvious of seeing the young girl's naked that is." June asked, grinning from ear to ear. Decker sniffed and shot her a frown of disapproval, not that the suggestion didn't have merit.

  "Distraction and razzle dazzle. We have five low life human assholes coming down the road towards us, and we only have a short time to get ready."

  "A few naked girls taking a dawn swim to draw them in, and we swarm them, right?"

  "Right the first time. We want these alive this time, so be careful where you stab them.” He paused and looked around. “So, who wants to get naked?"

  "I'll do it." Joann raised her hand.

  "Me too."

  "Me three."

  "Good, strip down to your underwear. We'll set up the ambush at the lake close to the road to make sure they see you."

  "We know just the place, sir," June looked slightly embarrassed as she said it, "we took turns bathing last night." Decker looked around the group and raised an eyebrow in question.

  "I see. We'll talk about this later. Let's get to it." Someone had better come up with a good excuse for not telling him until now.

  Twenty-five of the team settled down into position in a semi-circle around the place the girls were going to swim, but left a clear path through the detritus of war for the bad guys to pass through. Even to Decker's trained eye, their points of concealment weren't out of place with the surrounding shrubs and litter. To his annoyance, Joann stripped down all the way, including her panties and stood fifteen feet away from where Decker hid to give him a full view of her body.

  "That damn girl is going to be the death of me yet." Decker muttered, blushing bright red as chuckles came back over the TAC frequency. He’d forgotten to switch off.

  "Why don't you take the little bitch to bed, sir and put us all out of your misery."

  "Heads up here come the AH's."

  "I take it AH is code for assholes?" Someone else asked.

  "Shut it!" Decker growled as the five men in uniform came into view around the slight bend in the road.

  It didn't take them long to spot the frolicking girls, and all five made a beeline straight for them. Joann of course spotted them first and let out a loud squeal, followed a few seconds later by the other two. As predicted, the five men took the easiest route to the lakeside through the abandon cars and litter, grinning from ear to ear. Joann did as she was trained, sinking to her knees the moment the leader reached out to grab her. A moment later, the other two girls did the same when the man grabbed them, sobbing and crying, begging the men not to hurt them as they wrapped their arms around their legs.

  "Oh, we ain't going to hurt you… much," One laughed, "unless you give us any shit, then we’ll really hurt you." The leader turn to the others who were keeping a careful eye around them.

  Even as Decker was about to give the order, Joann did exactly what Decker had told her to do. She stabbed upward with a small knife into the leader’s crotch. For a split second, Decker wondered where the hell she'd hid the damn thing. As predicted, the leader screamed and went onto tiptoe, even managing to squeeze off a round. Four heads swiveled to see what he was screaming about, just as the ground around their feet erupted. The leader wasn't the only one of the five to scream in terror as the very ground they stood on rose up and wrapped itself around them in a deadly embrace. In moments, all five were flat on their backs, knives of various sizes cutting into very sensitive parts of their anatomy.

  "You going to give me an excuse to cut your fucking balls off?" Joann spat in the leader's face as she straddled his chest. The leader carefully shook his head.

  "Didn't think so. Now, you behave yourself and we won't hurt you… much. Unless you give us any shit that is. Then we'll see how loud you can scream."

  Stripped down to their underwear, hands bound tightly behind their backs, Delta team led them into the CP and forced them to kneel in front of Decker. Leaning back against the desk, Decker looked them over with an obvious look of distaste on his face while he sipped his morning coffee.

  "I'm going to ask you a few questions, and depending on how you answer will depend on how much I have to hurt you.

  "What the fuck! We didn't do nothin! And who the fuck are you, anyway?" A burly man asked, clearly the leader, as the others remained silent.

  "Me? I'm just the asshole that's going to think up ways to hurt you if you don't answer my questions." As he spoke, the Delta team closed in around the men in anticipation, pulling their face netting back to show their blackened faces.

  "Well, fuck me! You’re all bitches… I mean female." The leader amended as several of the girl pulled knives out from under the ghillie suits and fingered the edges.

  "Whoa… wait up there… I didn't mean nothin' by that."

  "Listen to me, asshole. These ladies have seen what you and your kind do when you catch them, so don't look for any sympathy from them."

  "What… what do you want to know?" The leader licked his lips, his eyes flicking from knife to knife.

  "First off, who the hell are you? You're certainly not military, even if you were dressed in BDU's."

  "Well… we took them off a bunch of military guys we met a while back is all."

  "You mean you killed them and stole their uniforms, right?"

  "Yeah, I guess you could sa
y that, but they were doing the same as us."

  "Not likely, but go on, what them."

  "What you mean what then?"

  "How come you can walk in and out of the alien's compound?"

  "What… no way… we was just walking around…" Decker reached over and slapped the man across the face, hard, knocking him sideways into the man next to him, who angrily shouldered him off.

  "Don't lie to me, we saw you lot walk out of the compound an hour ago." The leader of the bunch shot Decker a hard look as if to say he'd kill him if he got half a chance.

  "So what, we was just doing a little business with them is all."

  "What's your name, asshole?"

  "Burrole, Jack Burrole."

  "Well, Jack. How do you walk into their compound?" The look in his eyes gave him away, so Decker slapped him again, even harder this time. "How about we start by cutting your dick off, and see how fast you talk then?"

  "What! Hey… we didn't do nothin wrong, man… we's just trying to survive just like you."

  "Girl's, cut his dick off and feed it to him." Even as the girl's reach down to grab him, Jack Burrole let out a scream and sank to the floor.

  "I'll tell you, I'll tell you!" It didn't help as four girls held him down while another started pulling his underwear off. "Stop for god sake…" He yelled.

  “So, what were you doing for the aliens?” Jack Burrole got that shifty eyed look again, and Decker knew he was about to start lying.

  “Look at me asshole, look at me very carefully!” Decker growled. Burrole did, turning his head slightly and squinted up at him.

  “So, what am I expected to see, a hard ass spec ops asshole.” He snarled defiantly.

  “No, what you see is a man who doesn’t have an ounce of sympathy for you. I’ll let the girls do whatever they want until you talk, and tell me every fucking thing I want to know. If, and I say if I’m satisfied I just might give you a quick clean death.”

  “And if I don’t?”

  “Then I’ll ham-string you and leave you strip naked hanging from a tree, and let you die very slowly as the wildlife rips you apart.” Burrole swallowed, turning white at the thought. He looked into those cold gray eyes and shivered, knowing this man would do exactly what he said, and not lose a second of sleep over it.

  “They attached a bit of alien crap to my chest.”

  “Hogtie the others and tie this piece of crap down on the table and send for the Doc.” After ripping his dirty tee shirt off, all they saw the large black disk stuck to the dirty white skin on his chest. Decker fingered it, tugging at the edge with his fingernail but it wouldn’t come off.

  “Did they put this on all of you?”

  “No, just me, and it hurt like hell when their boss stuck it on. They said we could go in and out of the compound…”

  “And why would the aliens do that?” Burrole hesitated for a moment until one of the girls stuck him in the crotch. He screamed in pain.

  “I’ll talk, I’ll talk… they… they wanted us to go round up people for them… up in the mountains,” he shook his head as if he couldn’t believe what he was about to confess, “they wanted us to bring them people, preferably young healthy ones.” Apart from the rustling of the wind outside, you could have heard a pin drop.

  “What on earth for?” Joann blurted out.

  “I… I don’t know… Please don’t stab me…”

  “You know something asshole!”

  “I… we saw them take the kids into one of the sheds or containers… they didn’t come out again.” Burrole’s chances of getting a nice quick clean death just went out the window. Decker gritted his teeth, wanting nothing more than to strangle the man with his bare hands.

  “And what the fuck did you get out of this deal?”

  “They didn’t kill us… and… and gave us food and promised we’d be part of their government… and… and gold.”

  “You are one dumb mother fucker. The moment they’d finished with you, you’d be dead, just like the rest of the human race. Moreover, what the hell are you going to do with gold? There’s nowhere to spend it.”

  “I know that… you think I’m stupid.” He snarled. “The first real chance we had to survive I was going to take off up into the mountains and get the fuck out of here.”

  “Why the mountains?”

  “That’s where they wanted us to go, up into the mountains and find people. Got the impression they don’t like to climb, or it’s too cold up there for them, I don’t know.”

  “How did you talk to the aliens?”

  “The head guy, or whatever, the one with the blue cape, had a translation device. It didn’t speak English too good, but it was understandable.” Just then, Doctor Mason arrived looking none too happy.

  “So what’s got your panties in a knot?” She demanded, eyeing the man on the table.

  “This piece of shit has something on his chest that lets him go in and out of the alien compound without getting shot.”

  “Really. I guess you want me to find out what it is.” She said, walking over and poking the disk on Burrole's chest.

  “I’m going to get another cup of coffee. Let me know what you find.” An hour later, Doctor Mason reported back to Decker at the CP inside the Real Estate office.

  “Whatever that thing on his chest is I can’t take it off, or tell how to remove it, but I’m betting it’s monitoring his body functions.”

  “Shit!” Decker snapped, and then held his hand up. “Sorry I snapped, Doc, I was hoping to use… well, whatever it is.”

  “Don’t sweat it,” she said brushing his apology aside with a wave of her hand, “shoot the bastard, and I’ll skin him for you, will that do?” Decker looked at her, thinking she was joking. She wasn’t. He wasn’t the only one sick and tired of running into these assholes. “What do you plan on doing?” She asked after a moment.

  “You’re serious, aren’t you?” He asked, giving her an appraising look.

  “Too right! These low life fuckers are going to end up dead one way or another, so why not put their sorry asses to good use?” She sat on the edge of the old desk and rubbed her face. It didn’t take a genius to see that the Doctor’s medical ethics were taking a beating. The proviso of ‘First, do no harm’, taking the most. Decker doubted the framers of that oath ever imagined something like an alien invasion happening. Here, a doctor’s duty was to the living, and helping them survive, not to miserable, degenerates who preyed on their fellow human beings.

  “I was thinking of using him to get into that base and have a look around.”

  “Oh. And then?” Decker pulled his ear lobe, thinking of several things at once.

  “We… high command needs as much information about these aliens as possible. Right now, we know fuck-all about them, other than the fact they kicked the living shit out of us. Hell, we are probably the first humans to see them close up, and live to tell about it.” He paused a moment to take a breath and rubbed his chin.

  “I can see getting into the base and taking a look around, but is the risk worth it… I mean, you can’t go in alone, and that means taking a few of the girl’s with you. Are you willing to put them at risk? They aren’t soldiers like you that can charge hell with a bucket of snowballs wearing nothing but your jock strap?” Decker had to smile at her description. She was definitely a soldier's wife.

  “I’m not sure even the SAS would be willing to do that. We usually leave something like that to the US Marines, but I take your point.” Decker blew out his cheeks and gripped the edge of the desk he was sitting on.

  “The truth is, Doc. These ladies need an ego boost, something that will give them pride in themselves that they can do this.”

  “You’re right,” she nodded, “at the moment they still aren’t sure of themselves. They’re learning fast, but they need to be bloodied, but I’m wondering if it’s worth it.”

  “Every soldier going into combat knows at the back of his mind, even if he’s not willing to admit it out lou
d, he could be killed or injured in battle. His hope is that it’s someone else, and somehow he will be the one to walk away.”

  “And so begins ‘survivor's guilt’. If he walks away, and his best bud takes a hit, he will always ask himself the question, ...‘why him and not me’...” Decker nodded. She’d hit the nail on the head. More than once, he’d asked himself the same question.

  “My thinking is this. I took a long hard look at the… well; I supposed you’d call it a firebase for wont of a better term. There were no guards on the walls, just automatic weapons on each corner and the mechs patrolling outside the walls. If these UMFs are anything like humans, once they’re inside, they will feel reasonably safe, especially as we’ve done nothing to stop them taking over the planet. They must feel real cocky about that right now, what with no military response, no air strikes, and no resistance at all to their takeover.”

  “So?” She asked, seeing Decker smile slightly.

  “If they are anything like us, it’s an unfailing human response, that once you were ‘safe’ in a fire base you let your guard down. You took off your armor, put down your weapon, relaxed and kicked back with a brew, a cup of coffee, or hit your rack.”

  “And you’re betting the alien soldiers will do the same, right?”

  “Can’t see why not, can you?”

  “You’re assuming they think like us, and will do the same.” She answered.

  “Doc, even if they are aliens, they are still biological beings... well at least to a degree. That being so, they need to eat, sleep, piss, and crap.”

  “I wish there was another way we could get a look inside their base to be sure without going in.” The corner of Decker’s lip twitched in what a charitable person might call a smile.