Chapter 4

"A bend in the road is not the end
of the road... unless you fail to
make the turn"
Unknown

CRACK... As Isaac's weapon discharged the slug, leaving the muzzle at speeds fast enough to create a miniature sonic boom. Traveling faster than the speed of sound, the unfortunate Griffon caught in its path couldn't even react as it penetrated its skull leaving through the other side and spraying his compatriot in blood, bone, and brain matter. As the soaked Zebra looked at his fallen comrade wide eyed and mouth open, he didn't notice a flash of light from a second story window before he fell to the same fate.

Isaac could only guess which targets presented the bigger threat to the S.W.A.T. team on the other side of the shootout. He decided to start at his end of the line and work up through the line of Griffons and Zebras.

Two more Zebras dropped before one of the Griffons drew a blade from its belt and pole-vaulted itself over the vehicle; using the wings on its back to propel itself forward. Acting on instinct, Isaac blindly aimed for the center mass of the charging bird, firing a three round burst hitting what looked like the stomach and the left wing causing the Griffon to tumble into a nearby tree with a sickening crunch.

"He's not getting up from that." Isaac thought looking at the disheveled pile of bones and feathers. Unfortunately a Minotaur caught sight of where the shot came from and started pointing and yelling in some unintelligible language in Isaac's direction. Five rounds found a new home in its chest cavity before it dropped, to little to late though as six weapons instantly trained on Isaac's position; forcing him to take cover from the blue energy they shot.

"CHRIST," Isaac yelled ducking down and crawling away from the window. Dragging his belly along the cold tile floor, he made it to another window in the blacked-out room. "Well, stealth portion of this mission is gone." He called to Adam, switching the weapon to fully-automatic getting ready to jump up and fire until he heard the sound of doors being kicked in below him. "Oh crap," he said in a whisper moving from the window to the door. Hiding in the darkness, he motioned for Adam to stay hidden and silent until the sound of hoofs on tile reached his ears.

The sound of hoofs grew louder until they could be heard right outside the room the friends were hiding in. As the door burst open, three figures ran in, completely forgetting to check the corners of the room, a mistake that would cost them dearly. Two of the three that charged in were Zebras while the third was a Minotaur. Each one sported a metallic rifle with a darkish-green hue to them; the Zebras' weapons were strapped onto their backs with reins in their mouth and blades on the left side of their bodies balancing out the weight, while the Minotaur sported what looked more like a slender version of the Zebras'. A set of darker armor matched its fur coat to perfection while giving off a faint glow to it.

As they entered the room, the Zebras started to sniff around, walking closer to the windows as the Minotaur reached into a pocket and pulled out a flashlight from somewhere on its person.

"Time to capitalize on their mistake." Isaac thought rising to his feet. As he approached the Minotaur he stayed as close to the shadows as possible the balls of his feet touched the ground with minimal sound; his knees bent to further reduce the sound he would make. Sweat rolled off him like water the closer he crept to the towering monster. Heart pounding in his chest threatened to burst out with an unholy shriek; half sure his heart would give him away.

Practically standing on top of the Minotaur at this point, one of the Zebras chose this time to turn around, spit out its rein, and yell what could only have been a warning making the Minotaur spin around. Caught completely off guard, Isaac grabbed the stock of his weapon and slammed the butt of his rifle into the behemoth's face, forcing it to drop his flashlight clutching his face in pain. Isaac promptly brought his rifle down on the Minotaur's head, knocking the monster out cold.

Before Isaac could finish it off the other Zebra charged him, the blade on the side of its weapon ready to gut him.

Grabbing his own weapon's grip, Isaac calmly walked to meet the charging opponent with his weapon raised. Slowing down only slightly wondering what the creature in front of it was thinking; it resumed the charge ready to filet Isaac like a fish.

As the two neared each other Isaac, parried the Zebra's blade to the left of him with the barrel of his rifle. Feeling the air part for the sharp instrument, Isaac slammed the heel of his right foot into its snout; throwing it back and sending it to the ground long enough for a new round to find a home in its cranium.

While this was happening, the other Zebra finished putting the reins back into its mouth, ready to finish off what its partner started. As Isaac rushed to meet it, he slammed his weapon's stock into the Zebra's head and threw the back of his fist into the Zebra face; disorientating it long enough to get behind it, hook his right arm under its neck and hook his left arm under the left fore-leg. Hooking his right hand to his left arm, Isaac stood to his full hight and started choking the Zebra with its own weight. Struggling, the Zebra bite down on the reins in a desperate attempt to save itself caused the weapon to fire dangerously close to Isaac's head. Rounds of blue energy flew past him; the heat emanating from them singing some of his hair.

The rounds began to pepper the ceiling with holes in a haphazardly manner, threatening to bring the ceiling down on the Human and Zebra. Isaac increased the pressure to the chokehold, cutting off the blood supply to the Zebra's head. Feeling its body go limp, Isaac unceremoniously dropped it on to the floor, gripped the rifle and planted a round into its head making sure it stayed down for good.

With both Zebras down Isaac turned to finish off the Minotaur, as he did three things made themselves known. One, the Minotaur was awake. Two, his weapon was charged, and three It. Was. Pissed.

Intending to take revenge for the death of its associates, the Minotaur aimed the rifle and placed his finger on the trigger. Before it could fire, however, Adam appeared out of nowhere with a chair in hand and brought the folded metal object down onto its back. Turning around the Minotaur backhanded Adam with enough force to demolish a brick wall. Seizing the moment, Isaac started a sprit into the adjacent room hoping to take cover behind the walls.

The Universe had other ideas though as the Minotaur brought its weapon to bear a second time. Isaac made it to the next room only to have blue energy fly at him through the walls, forcing him to the ground to keep from being roasted. Firing his own weapon, he emptied the magazine in the hope of hitting his pursuer. Unfortunately when an audible "click" went off energy was still flying through the wall, his efforts agitating the monster even more.

Ejecting the spent magazine from the weapon, Isaac attempted to reload another when the Minotaur forgo using the door and burst through the hole riddled wall, causing Isaac to cover his face from the flying pieces of wood raining down on him. Grabbing him by the collar, Isaac was thrown across the room; dropping his rifle in the process. Slamming into a table causing on the opposite side of the room, wearily standing on one knee; he took in his surroundings, stars flying past his eyes. Noticing the lights had been blown-out; he decided to wait for an opportune moment to strike the Minotaur.

Sinking into the shadows, Isaac followed the Minotaur with his eyes until it passed his hiding place. Taking the chance; Isaac started walking on the balls of his heels over to where his rifle lay.

Picking up the weapon he started creeping towards the Minotaur. Nothing but silence followed him as he raised to his full hight, pointed the barrel at the back of the Minotaur's head, and pulled the trigger.

It was at this point the Minotaur decided to turn around, finding a stunned human standing still, its weapon pointed at it was the last thing it would expect.

Isaac began to fidget with the rifle, as the Minotaur looked on comically, when he looked at where a magazine would be. Finding none; he had stupidly forgotten to reload the weapon when he picked it up, a mistake that was now taunting him evilly. As he looked at the empty space a low laugh started off, crescendoing into a loud booming laugh. The Minotaur was laughing its head off at Isaac's failed attempt to fire the weapon.

Forgoing conventional means of killing the Minotaur Isaac jabbed the barrel into the laughing behemoth's, face throwing it off balance long enough for Isaac to -with much effort- tackle it to the ground. Stunned, the Minotaur tried to raise its weapon; unfortunately for it Isaac slammed his fist into the weapon knocking it away while he preceded to throw the back of his fist into the Minotaur's face causing stars to swim in its eyes and causing his own hand to scream out in pain as it hit the rock hard surface.

Adrenaline coursing through his body, killing of all signs of pain Isaac reached for the Glock, switched off the safety, aimed, and fired at point-blank range into the Minotaur's face causing a small splatter of blood and the stench of burnt hair to fly onto his face.

Rolling off the Minotaur's chest, his heart attempting to free itself of his chest, Adam called to him from the other room. "Isaac, you still alive?"

"Yeah. I'm still here." Isaac replied sitting up, wiping the blood off with his sleeve smearing it even further. "Hows your face?" He asked getting to his feet and walking over to where the rifle lay.

"This is positively going to leave a bruise, and I think some of my teeth are loose too." He complained as Isaac walked back into the room a noticeable limp accompanying him.

"Good to know." He said half sarcastic and half serious. Walking over to the window he noticed that the fighting had finally turned into an even brawl. The S.W.A.T. troopers and Police officers holding their ground while the Griffons and Zebras held theirs.

Just as events started looking up, a large bellowing roar let off by an all to familiar creature pierced the night air bringing the gun fight to a dead stop. Looking up Isaac noticed that the same Dragon they ran into back at the Fed Arm descended into the field hovering just above the the Griffon's side.

With one more terrible roar the large cylinders on its sides opened fire on the Humans.

Anyone standing on the other side of the concrete wall might-as-well have been standing out in the open as the six-inch concrete wall found itself riddled with holes after a few seconds of continues fire.

Looked on with terrible awe as the Dragon made short work of the wall and anyone foolish enough to stand behind it, Isaac, filled with the desperate need to save his friends, fired his rifle at full-automatic, hoping to draw the creature away from the cornered humans.

Just as the last round in his weapon fired an explosion slammed into the dragon's side causing it to give a pained roar while another hit its head sending it careening into the ground ending the murderous fire. As the Dragon ceased moving a wave of gunfire erupted from the forest that cut through the Griffon and Zebra ranks without mercy.

The fight was over as quickly as it began, Zebra and Griffon bodies littering the ground small puddles of crimson beginning to pool around them. "We're coming out!" Someone shouted as US Army and Marine soldiers ran out of the woods checking the S.W.A.T. troopers and the Griffons as they went.

Deciding now would be a good time to leave, Isaac grabbed the duffel bags and lifted Adam to his feet to walk slowly out to the parking lot.

"Jesus Christ, don't shoot I've been shot at enough today." Adam yelled putting his free hand in the air.

"Hold your fire." Alton yelled. "Isaac? Damn, you two look like hell." He said walking up to Isaac and Adam.

"Yeah, had to engage three of them in hand-to-hoof?. And Adam here took a fist to his arrogant face, it was not pretty." Isaac said a slight pain in his voice as the adrenaline started to wear off. Adam forgo reprimanding Isaac about the comment on his face opting to tend to the wounded instead.

"Yeah well it wasn't pretty down here either, thanks for the help by the way." Alton said looking towards the window Isaac had fired from.

"No problem. We lose anyone?" Isaac asked walking to Alton side, staring at the crumbling wall.

"Yeah, five Police officers and three S.W.A.T. troopers, one from 1910 and two from 1920." Alton said his tone turning melancholic.

"Yeah well, we can grieve when we get the bodies buried. We have to get out of here before more of 'them' show up." He said with a low growl. "Might I ask, what's in the bags?" He said looking at the camouflaged bags.

"A little going away present." Isaac teased turning to look at the over stuffed bags. "We happened to stumble across a Fed Arm on the way over here, thought we should pick some up as a party favor." He said leaving out the part about hiding from the Dragon thinking Alton would be mad to know they survived and some of his friends didn't.

'fraid not son." An elderly Army soldier said walking up to the two. "Just got orders to move out. Bring only what you can carry and nothing else, and grab anything off of your dead, we'll need it for later."

"Wait, you mean I can't even take them with us? What am I supposed to do if their bodies aren't here when we come back?" Alton said confusion and irritation moving along his words.

"Orders are orders. Right now we got bigger problems then burying the dead. Just grab their gear, say a few words, and move out." With that the soldier walked off to join his squad.

"Great, just great. First we leave people back on the Highway and now this. I can't even tell their families about it. Just our luck." Alton said running a hand down his face clearly disapproving of the decision to leave his friends behind.

"Remember them for who they were and they will never die, forget them and we lose them forever." Isaac said a ghost of a smile on his face. "Just remember them and keep moving so others can remember them with you."

"... Right, just remember them. That was nice by the way, who said that?" He asked looking at Isaac.

"I did, just now." He replied, a hit of a smile painting his face. "Though cheesy, it gets the message across. I can say a few words if you'd like." Isaac offered looking over at Alton.

"No, I'll say some words and be done with it." He said, his voice displaying his sadness. "You go over and see where we're going next. Come find me later and we'll have a nice little chat about the Team's names." He said with a sad smile as he walked off to 'bury' his friends.

"You'd better keep your word on that." Isaac called after him as he walked off to find whoever was in-charge at the moment.

Walking for a few minutes Isaac noticed a group of soldiers fidgeting with a radio, most likely trying to raise someone in another squad. As he walked up to them they turned to face him, instantly cutting off their conversation. Isaac noticed that one of them was Corporal in the Army, while the other two were a Private and a Lance Corporal with the Marine Corps.

"Excuse me, but can you tell me who's in command?" Isaac asked the Marine and Army personal.

"Who want's to know?" The Corporal asked; his question sounding more like an order than an actual question.

"Second Lieutenant Isaac Temple, United States Marine Corps." He replied looking the soldier who was currently giving him the stink eye.

"Uh huh, do you have an I.D. on you to prove that, sir?" The Marine Lance Corporal asked eyeing Isaac dubiously.

Now Isaac was a patient man, but getting shot at, fighting in hand-to-hoof combat and now this started to wear on him. Annoyed and already in a hurry, he whipped out his wallet and showed them his Common Access Card, proving he was a Second Lieutenant in the Corps surprising and stunning them for a moment.

"Uh y-yes sir, the uh the Captain is this way, let me take you to him." One of the Marines said stuttering his words a little at his superior Officer.

"Thank you, oh and before I go let me give you some advice." Isaac said putting his card back into his wallet. "You don't call Mid-Westerners liars." With that Isaac followed the Marine over to a group huddled around a man who appeared to be in his early thirties.

The man was wearing an Army Combat Uniform and giving orders to those around him. He was sporting an M4 Carbine with a telescopic sight, an M9 handgun, and a handful of grenades.

Isaac dismissed the Marine and walked over to the Captain who had just sent the people around him to gather their men to head out.

"Sir, Second Lieutenant Isaac Temple reporting in." He said as the Captain turned around to acknowledge his presence.

"Hello son, welcome to the fight." He replied looking Isaac up and down. "I'm Captain Bellman, Commander of this little cavalcade of men. I assume you want to hook up with some men under you, but right now I don't have any open spots. You'll be first on my list when there are any."

"Thank you sir, um quick question. You wouldn't happen to know how this happened, would you sir?" Isaac asked motioning to the purple dome over head.

"Well, your guess is as good as my." He replied looking up at the dome. "One minute I'm in a recruiting station, the next I'm charging through some trees shooting Griffons and Zebras. Listen, I'm sure you have plenty of questions and the like, but right now we have a problem."

"You know that radio transmission we sent out from here right? The one telling all off duty personal to meet in Fort Leavenworth."

"Yeah, that's why we came." Isaac said nodding his head toward the S.W.A.T. troopers.

"Well, to put it bluntly, we lost control of the station where the signal is being broadcasted. Unfortunately we couldn't shut off the signal so the message is still being sent out. Now if we don't retake the station and change the signal, more people are going to come here and encounter the same results that nearly killed you and your friends over there."

"Its near the outskirts of the town, about three klicks out. It'll take us a few minutes to get the Bradley's and IFV's ready, but after that we should be good to go." The Captain said reaching for his radio. "We also have some spare gear that you could try on, its up by the main force."

"Great, thank you sir." Bellman nodded and started to speak into his radio signaling the others to move back into the tree line.

"OKAY PEOPLE WE ARE OSCER MIKE, LETS GO." The Captain shouted over the commotion of voices and people running around. As soon as the words left his mouth everyone instantly started to run to the woods; bringing along the S.W.A.T. troopers, Police officers, and Isaac. Adam had decided to stay a little longer with the medics and see if he could help out more with the heavily wounded.

When the Humans had left the only evidence that showed they where there were the dead and the spent casings.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

When they reached the Main Force Isaac was fairly impressed by the sheer size of Military and Law Enforcement personal in front of him.

"There's more people than I thought." Isaac said looking at the spread of personal in front of him, his mouth hanging a little. "How many people made it?"

"Not many. We don't have an exact count, but right now its between three-fifty and four hundred." Bellman said walking past Isaac. "Now we don't have the full picture yet so some information may be lacking, but I'll give you what we know so far. At 1800 hours a portal of some kind was opened in Kansas City, at 1820 hours they killed our electronics and set up that thing above our heads." He said pointing to the sky.

"After that; all military personal fell back to Leavenworth, we repurposed the radio station to send out a summoning message for everyone to meet at the Fort. Everything was going smoothly, we had people coming in by the truck full, IFV's and Bradley's trickled in every now-and-again. We thought that we would have enough to retake the city in a few hours, that is until we were completely trashed."

"Well at first it was just a scouting party, I think they were more surprised at our numbers than anything else. We took care of them pretty easily, but after about half an hour... Lets just say you've never seen someone die until they've been liquified by a Dragon." A solemn look on his face as he recalled the harrowing experience.

"Yeah, seems my Sergeant is about to give a report to the other Officers on these guys. Keep in mind that these are just preliminary reports, once we get ourselves situated we'll delve into what makes these guys tick." Bellman said a malicious smile threatening to tear his face in-two.

As the two men walked up to what appeared to be the Command tent, a flurry of noise assaulted Isaac as they stepped through the flaps. Granted the tent was pretty big, however that size was outmatched by the amount of people running around with papers and handheld radios trying to find units and enemy positions.

As Isaac and Bellman walked to the back of the tent the noise somehow lessened in sound until Isaac could hear his own thoughts again. When the two of them finally reached the back of the tent four men sat at a table surrounded by Officers from different branches. Each one of the men, a Major from the four main services, motioned for everyone to find a seat either standing or kneeling. After everyone got themselves situated a Sergeant in the Army wheeled in a white board, signaling the meeting to begin.

"Sergeant, I believe everyone is here, you may begin." The Major from the Navy said motioning to the man standing by the white board.

"Yes sir." The Sergeant said placing a handful of pictures on the board. "Now as you can see there are four different types of races in their ranks. As of now we don't know if these are the only ones or if there are more we haven't seen yet." He said pointing to each blurry picture as he went down the line. "Now there are three that are recognizable to us, the Zebras, Griffons, and the Minotaurs; as for the lizards... The jury is out on that one." He said shrugging his shoulders.

"Sergeant, I think it would be best to skip the known and move right on to the unknown." Bellman said looking over at some of the disinterested men half falling asleep.

"Rigghht. Well, skipping to the interesting parts, their weapons are one of them. They seem to use a high concentration of energy to inflict severe burns either resulting in the target's death or greatly maiming them. Their weapons' focus seems to use fire or plasma in inflicting burns or to a greater degree, melt the target completely. They seem to either have the effect of torturing an individual or outright killing them. "

The Sergeant moved to the other side of the board and pick up a small crystalline object. "Their armor uses these to power a mini 'Force Field' that covers the armor in a gel like layer." He said lifting up the crystal for all to see. "It will repel smaller calibers, like handgun ammunition; to a degree, but anything larger than a Fifty will still go through them. Anything in-between will take a random amount of shots to puncture it, like say a 5.56 or a 7.62." He placed the crystal back on the board and faced the group. "Be reminded, these are just preliminary reports so we don't have the full picture yet, once we ground our roots our first priority should be to figure out how them really work and what they are doing here."

"Thank you Sergeant," the Major for the Marine's said. Nodding the Sergeant turned and walked to the side of Bellman as the Major for the Air Force walked over to the board, removing the photos he addressed the men and women gathered.

"Now, I don't have to tell you how deep we are right now. First off, we need to find a new base to rest our heads. An area has already been chosen, but as most of you know we need to shut off the broadcast coming out of the radio station. With that in mind Captain Bellman will be leading the charge. You'll have Alpha Company at your disposal Captain, choose your Officers and get them ready. We'll also leave a handful of LAV's for you to use, just bring them back in one piece."

"Yes Sir, I'll take McKenzie, Perez, and Temple." The aforementioned three stood up, singling them out from the rest of the group.

"Alright, you have ten minutes to ready your men. Good luck, Dismissed!" With that the Officers filed out of the back entrance to the tent. Bellman walked over to his Sergeant to gather everyone needed as Isaac and the other chosen officers made their way to the makeshift armory to ready themselves for the long night ahead of them.

First Contact - Kansas City

by Shadow Walker

Chapter 4