"Hurry up and untie the rest of my men." Noah said urgently.
"Untie us too!" Jerry demanded.
"Don't do it." Noah said in response.
Having other concerns, Will backed out of the room, quickly running downstairs and out of the building. He came out in time to see one of Gerald's guys starting up their pickup truck and peeling out of the facility. But a black blur shot across the field and slammed into the side of the truck.
Bang!
The force of the impact caused the truck to topple over.
"Gerald!" Karen came out from the building and called out with worry for her neighbour.
Now that the blur had stopped moving, Will finally got a good look at the "alien".
It had vaguely the shape of a human but its entire body was covered in a black shell-like exoskeleton. Looking at its hands and feet, it had the same amount of digits a human had but they were claws instead. There seemed to be a small bulb bulging out from its backside, and it had enlarged compound eyes and two antennas on its head. It also seemed like small mandibles were growing from the sides of its mouth but it wasn't quite there yet.
It's not a Talon. Will felt a bit of relief to find out that the "alien" wasn't an actual one. But this thing is still dangerous.
"Is that a symbiote?" Donny asked once he arrived.
"No." Only a giant ant symbiote would make such a visible transformation, but it was far too early for any giant ants to appear.
Will quickly pulled out his pistol and began firing at the human ant, aiming for its large compound eyes.
Bang!
His first shot hit in the left eye as it began clawing into the truck. This caused it to release a shrill scream that sounded not quite human. It angled its body to face away from Will and continued attacking the truck more wildly.
Bang!
Bang! Bang!
Bang! Bang!
Donny and the rest of Hope soon joined in—Jerry's group having been untied, and those with guns began firing at the human ant but it ignored the ineffective attacks that merely left scratches on its hard chitin.
It soon clawed into the truck and ripped the passenger door out. It dragged out one of Gerald's neighbours and pierced him before dropping him to the ground and trying to crawl into the toppled truck. The doors on the enter side opened up. Gerald and the driver crawled out, the driving pulling out the passenger—whose head was bleeding out.
From the corner of his eye, Will could see Noah's group running for their vehicles but a raven suddenly swooped down and pecked one man right through the hockey helmet he was wearing and into his head. The man dropped dead instantly.
"Get back!" Noah shouted as he backed up.
His group turned around and retreated back but the raven gave chase. The man it closed in on swung his stun baton frantically and clipped the raven, causing it to spasm for a second, allowing the man to escape. While the raven was spasming, Will noticed it spilling a large amount of some sort of fluid from its neck area. At that moment, someone had fired a shot and clipped it right in its wing.
"Got it!" Jason called out.
Losing its ability to fly effectively, the raven squawked as it flapped away. Will joined in on firing at the now awkwardly flying raven as it flew low to the ground, dodging bullets. He was confident that he hit it somewhere vulnerable before it dove under a nearby car for cover because there was a smear of blood on the ground in front of the car.
In that time, Donny had run up to Gerald's group and helped them carry their passenger—who was unstable on his feet, while the human ant crawled out from the truck and quickly gave chase. Its speed was much too fast for them to outrun, and it soon caught up to them.
Donny turned around and held out his shield. Its claw pierced through the shield and stopped just short of clawing into Donny's body armor. The shield, stuck to the human ant's claws, was pulled away from Donny and he backed up but it gave chase.
Seeing that Donny was in danger, Will ran in that direction.
Before it could attack a now exposed Donny, a spray of burning chemicals suddenly erupted from Donny's mouth, blinding the human ant, causing it to halt its chase and screech on that spot as it clawed at its eyes.
Honk! Honk!
At that time, a loud horn blared and a large truck used for transport around the plant drove straight for Donny and the human ant. Karen was in the driver seat, signaling for Donny to move out of the way. He quickly complied, and Karen soon drove past him. By the time the human ant recovered some of its vision, the truck was barreling straight for it.
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BANG!
There was a loud crash as the truck collided with the human ant. The truck continued moving for another several meters before it suddenly tipped over onto its side, slamming onto the ground and sliding to a stop. The human ant was kneeling there on the road, a deep furrow on the cement from where it had been hit to where it the truck had tipped over.
Everyone on the scene had a look of surprise on their faces, including Will—who had seen things like this in the future. The human ant was ridiculously strong.
"Karen!" "Karen!" Will and Donny called out, the latter running towards the fallen truck.
No...not again! Will thought frantically. Although he only knew her for a short amount of time, and he found her bothersome at times, he didn't want to see the people around him die again.
Pushing himself even harder, Will ran at the human ant before it could recover. He needed to either get rid of the problem or buy the two some time to get away.
The muscles in his entire body grew tense, especially in his right shoulder and trapezius as energy began building up. By the time he reached his target, his muscles felt like they were just about ready to burst. The energy was unleashed as Will threw his entire body into a devastating strike that was four times stronger with his Halligan bar towards the human ant's head. Before his strike could reach, it raised its arm to block the strike.
Crack!
The chitin on the human ant's arm cracked as it flew to the side a couple meters and rolled over multiple times on the ground.
Will suddenly felt pain shooting through him, forcing him to kneel down and grab his left side. He looked down to see that he had been slashed in the side. His shield and body armor had been penetrated and he could see his ribs exposed.
The human ant stood up and furiously screeched at Will. Its left arm hanging there uselessly was likely the reason.
Will glanced to the side to see Donny had pulled a bleeding Karen out of the truck and was carrying her back to the administration building in his arms.
The human ant suddenly moved, sprinting at him at high speed.
"Shit." Will hissed, forcing himself to his feet despite the searing pain.
Before it could reach him, a handful of Jacques and Jerry's men arrived with their stun batons and tasers ready.
"Stop you idiots!" Will called out but Jacques arrived next to him to support Will and pulled him back.
The men surrounded and attacked the human ant at the same time. Although, the paralyzing attack showed some effectiveness, none of their follow-up attacks were enough to stop it. It soon recovered, and two men were instantly ripped in half with one swing of its remaining arm.
"Get back!"
Having seen how powerful a Category 1 could be up close, especially one that was utilizing Parasites, the rest of the men finally realized how futile it was and began running for their lives. But it ignored them and ran straight for what it perceived was the real threat, Will.
Seeing this, Will and Jacques picked up the pace back to the administration building but Will soon realized a problem. A couple zeroes had attacked them from behind at some point. From the few bodies on the ground, the ambush had caught the Hope men off guard.
What was left of the men were fighting them back but they were blocking the entrance.
Before Will could make a decision on what to do, an SUV suddenly came in from outside the complex and screeched to a halt by him.
"Fire in the hole!" Norman shouted as he tossed a small object out his window in the direction of the human ant.
BANG!
Will raised his shield to cover himself and Jacques when an extremely loud bang went off, together with a blinding flash. Will felt his ears ring but lowered his shield slightly to see Norman and the giant man had stepped out of the SUV and were currently unloading all their rifle and shotgun rounds into the human ant that was had its back turned and was huddling where it was for safety.
Jacques pulled on Will to retreat back to the administration building. Will was tempted to go to try and finish it off while it was distracted but decided not to risk it. They had already rescued Karen.
This proved to be the right decision because as they entered the lounge on the second floor, Will heard a shot from the window.
"Did you see that shit?!" Jason exclaimed. "I got its other eye!"
"Good, then I'm getting the hell out of here." Noah said, waving for the last two men from his team to leave with him.
Will was brought to the couch, where an unconscious and bleeding Karen was being treated by Donny.
"How is she?" Will asked, switching to x-ray vision to see if anything had broken. He wanted to check on her himself, but he had his own blood all over his hands.
"She seems okay." Donny said.
"Let me see." Jacques stepped in and examined her for a few moments before stepping away. "She'll be fine, she's just unconscious."
Donny and Will visibly relaxed.
Jacques came over to sit Will down and help him out of his vest to treat his wound as well.
"What's it doing now?" Jacques asked Jason, who was still looking out the window.
"I lost sight of it when it climbed up that anorexic digestion tower."
"You mean the anaerobic digester." Gerald corrected.
"Yeah, that thing."
"We should go too." Jerry said to Jacques.
"Now you care?" Jacques scoffed.
"You should know I did it for the greater good." Jerry put on a serious expression.
"You can go ahead first, I'll catch up after I help Will here." Jacques waved uncaringly. Jerry nodded and left with the two men with broken arms.
The only people left in the room now were Will's trio, Jacques, Jason, their two other team members, and Gerald and his team—who were also patching themselves up.
"So?" Jacques turned to Will and Donny while he poured a solution onto a piece of gauze. "You two wanna explain what that thing out there is?"
"I'd like to hear about this too." Norman said, stepping into the room. The giant man following behind him.
"What makes you think we know what it is?" Will grunted as his wound was disinfected.
"Because I just saw Donny breathe blinding steam at that ant alien."
"I believe it's some kind of chemical." Norman added. "An acidic chemical that can leave a scar on a hard drive."
Jacques continued. "While you were the only one strong enough to put a crack in its shell."
"Those are just the abilities we were reborn with." Will answered while schooling his features. Donny kept quiet on the side, but he had paused his bandaging of Karen.
"Really?" Jacques raised his eyebrow. "Or maybe it has something to do with whatever you collected from the cell and the field the other day."
"So our biology student did find something?" Norman asked in interest.
"I don't know what you're talking about." Will said while Jacques bandaged him.
"Don't be like that, we did just save you out there. I think we deserve a little info." Norman said.
Jacques paused his bandaging to examine Will's right shoulder. "That's strange...because that little insect you collected from the dog back then looks an awful lot like the one in your back right now." Jacques looked up at Donny. "I think that beetle lodged inside Donny's throat must be related somehow."
Shit...he can see it.
"Same with those 7 or 8 little insects inside that alien's foot."