Prologue

The rain was relentless. Every inch of Connor’s clothing was saturated and weighed more than it should. His T-shirt and brown cargo pants were molded to his body and water dripped from his brown beanie as if it had turned into a rain cloud itself. The only possession that he owned which remained dry was the scope on his rifle, thanks to the plastic cover on both ends. That and he hoped that maybe the strip of red fabric from Laura’s hoodie wasn’t too damp. He kept it in a plastic baggie inside of his boot. It should have been sealed but after walking for miles, he wasn’t sure anymore. When the Sharlah took her after the crash, it was all that he could find. She must have fought them because there were dozens of foot prints in the mud and snow around the car. Blood drops were everywhere, some red and some blue. Her hoodie was caught on a jagged piece of the front fender and torn free, leaving the scrap that Connor had found when he woke up. They must have mistaken him for dead, or maybe close to death. They were wrong.

The walking, however, was done for the day and the hunting had begun. Connor slowly shifted his weight to the right, and removed his binoculars from the pouch on his belt. They were small yet powerful and had a built in rangefinder. He began his routine of memorizing the range for one or two landmarks in every direction from his hide location and deciding how he would escape should the need arise. This evening, he was sitting on the top floor of the Vista Elementary School. The town was a ghost of it’s former self. The inhabitants were caught off guard in the first days of the invasion. Those who hadn’t immediately fled were now locked behind energized fences, shipped off world, or dead. The police station sat off to Connor’s left. There was a gaping hole in the side of it, exposing the interior of both the first and second floor, like a child’s toy with the wall cut away for easy access. There were no bodies as usual, The Sharlah seemed to waste nothing in that regard, just overturned furniture and shredded books and paperwork strewn across the floor.

One hundred and fifty yards, easy.

There was a gas station in the distance behind it that looked like a used car lot now, except the vehicles weren’t parked in a neat line with little papers listing their features and a price scrawled across the windshield. These cars were left in a panic. Windows were shattered from nearby explosions and flying debris, a few of them were even overturned, spilling their contents onto the ground around them. Fenders and panels were dented and broken, leaving razor sharp edges sticking out like knife blades.

Don’t think about it. You can’t afford this right now. Two o’ four. That’s not too bad. Aim for it’s head and it’s going down one way or another.

To the right was mostly residential. Fenced in yards, playhouses, swimming pools, tool sheds. They still looked lived in, the invasion happened fast and the only real resistance came from the military. These people had no chance. The Sharlah swept through, going door to door looking for each resident. They had their names, ages, health status, everything. Those who stayed and took their chances with greeting the new alien visitors were all taken to the camps.

Connor found his marker on that side. A house that had a decorative windmill in the front yard and a chain link fence around it. Night was approaching and he could see the light from the flashlight that he had found inside starting to illuminate the windows. He didn’t know how long the batteries would last, but for now it was working.

One hundred and seven. Dead on. Where will you run to after?

A shadow swept through the light drawing his binoculars back to it. A thin black cat jumped up into the window sill and rubbed it’s body down the screen. Connor smiled, something he hadn’t done for weeks. It felt both right and wrong at the same time. His eyes lowered from the lenses and he pulled the red cloth from his right boot, gripping it in his dirty hands. It didn’t smell like her perfume anymore, but it was still comforting. He wasn’t sure how long he had sat like that before his body demanded that he wake up. How had he fallen asleep? He was slipping.

Gas 204, police 150, house 107. Gas 204, police 150, house 107. Down the steps to the first floor and out the back. Sprint for the houses and then the woods. The creek is there even if you can’t see it right now. You know what to do.

The cat was still there, sleeping now. Probably waiting for it’s owners to come home and feed it. Connor had seen the litter box and food dish, but not the cat. She must have been hiding somewhere. Surely traumatized from all that had happened. Connor took a sip of water from his reusable bottle. The rubber rings around the lid squeaking far too loudly for his liking as he twisted the cap on and off. The school desk which he had dragged over to the window acted as a perfect rest for his rifle and the curtains in the window hid everything but the tip of his barrel and the front of his scope. He couldn’t have asked for a better place to shoot from, but at night there would be a flash from every shot. He wouldn’t get many.

The cat looked smaller in his scope than in the binoculars. It was only a 4x12 magnification. He could hit it though, he had shot groundhogs from further away on the farm. She, he had decided it was a she-Mrs. Pickles in fact, looked up and went rigid. Headlights swept across the surrounding houses and bathed them in white followed by red to not obscure the Sharlah’s natural night vision. The jet black armored truck drove carefully down the street, spotlights searching in every direction and mine sweeper working from side to side on the front.

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One crimson spotlight was holding steady on the house with the windmill causing both Connor and Mrs Pickles to flee back to their hiding spots. Connor pulled his rifle back from the window, letting the curtains fall loosely around the desk and sat with his back to the wall. It wouldn’t do him any good to be caught gazing out the window when a spotlight inevitably swept across the school. He knew they couldn’t see him there. For all of their tech in space, once their troops were on the ground, the Sharlah were not that far ahead of humanity. Their weapons were deadly, their troops strong and fierce, but they couldn’t see him through the wall, and to track him down, they would look for signs on the ground. He knew this from experience. To his surprise though, the truck didn’t stop in front of the windmill house, he heard the electric engines spool up slightly and move off into the distance.

They’ve gained a new respect for us. They wouldn’t have done that in the beginning. Good.

Connor risked a peek and saw the truck now off to the center between the police station and the residential neighborhood, unloading it’s squad in the perceived safety of a grocery store. They fanned out into a line and moved toward windmill with their weapons raised. At the end of the parking lot, the squad took cover behind abandoned cars and begin calling out through their implanted translators for the people inside to surrender. Connor slowly moved behind the old bolt action 30-06 that had been given to him when he moved away from home. He had killed his first deer with it, and every deer since, along with a lone wolf that had been terrorizing his family’s farm and now several alien soldiers.

He searched them for any clues as to who should receive the first round. They wore form fitting armor that was as black as the truck they rode inside of. Their armor was so black that they seemed to smother the light wherever they went, even the visors of their helmets were as black as space on the outside. He could see them turning to each other as they communicated privately.

That one in the middle though, he’s looking both ways like he’s talking to everyone. He has something on his wrist too, I’ve seen that before. It’s a long range communicator.

The Sharlah advanced forward, spreading out even more as they got closer so as to cover the front and sides of the house, though he got the sense that they were also becoming more casual about their movements. Surely any humans inside would have surrendered or at least shut off the light by now. There were five by his count. One went to each side, and three were stacking up at the front door. They icy cold feeling of adrenaline surged through him.

Take a deep breath, let it seep out and come to a natural pause. Keep your crosshairs on the target. They’re moving because of your heartbeat, calm down. Try again. When it comes to a pause, slowly start to squeeze the trigger. It should surprise you when it goes off. If it does, you’ll know it was a perfect shot.

The squad leader pointed to the window where Mrs. Pickles had been, telling one of his soldiers to keep an eye on it as he banged on the door. When he turned around, to check behind him, he probably saw it.

CRACK

The rifle bucked into Connor’s shoulder as the flash from the muzzle ruined his night vision. Long gone were the days where he would flinch in anticipation of the rather violent recoil from the high powered 30-06 cartridge. The slug buried itself in the squad leader’s visor and blue gore spilled out as he flailed and fell down the front steps of the windmill house. The other two in front scrambled for cover but found none and started firing wildly as they moved back toward the grocery store and the vehicles there. When they turned to see if the two from the sides of the house were following, Connor’s rifle barked again sending the closest one into the pavement in a heap. It was a spinal hit but it didn’t appear to fully penetrate the alien plate. The Sharlah was out of the fight for the time being, but would survive.

That’s enough, it’s time to go.

Connor grabbed the rifle, loaded two more into the internal magazine, and started out the door at a jog, but had to go back for the scrap from her hoodie. The hallway outside was dark, and he couldn’t really remember what it looked like, but he knew the stairs were to the left. Adrenaline was still burning inside of him, his hands now shaking because he let them. The stairs seemed longer than when he came up them the day before but he knew that couldn't be true. How long had it been since his first shot, thirty seconds maybe? He rounded the first set and nearly leaped down the second set, only touching a few of them before crashing into something at the bottom and going down against the wall. The Sharlah trooper was on top of him in a flash, snarling audibly behind his faceplate. Connor struggled to push it upward and off of his chest but he was already feeling the fatigue that used to take far longer to set it. He was probably malnourished and dehydrated among other things.

“Get. Off.” He grunted, trying once and then twice to sweep his hips to the side but the rigid metal plates of it’s armor were digging into his thighs.

The creature pressed his forearm into Connor’s face, holding it down and to the side as it reached with it’s other hand for the beam rifle that now lay a foot away from the struggle. Connor growled reached for his knife that was pinned in his leg holster and felt the cool metal of it’s handle. With everything he had, he pulled it free and slammed it between the thigh and knee plates of the Sharlah soldier where only a thin under suit was exposed.

The alien screamed in agony and lunged out toward it’s rifle but Connor was on top of it in a fraction of a second and ripping it’s helmet upward with everything that he had left. The Sharlah screamed again and raked at his arms with it’s clawed gloves, ripping bloody lines in Connor’s exposed forearms. He didn’t care. The Sharlah tried to stand but slipped in the blood from it’s wounded knee and fell to the ground again as it’s helmet was ripped free.

Connor rained down punches to the back of it’s head as it howled and rolled onto it’s back. He landed blow after blow with his blood soaked right hand and stabbed wildly with his left which was still holding the knife until red light spilled through the windows. The alien soldier gasped and coughed, spitting blue gore from it’s shattered mouth and nose. Connor stopped, letting his arms fall to his sides. He glanced at his rifle, the rage that had saved his life giving way to dread. He could not allow himself to be captured They know what he’s done.