Burn, Baby, Burn

"Congratulation! You completed your third directive! You are really getting the hang of it!" Oracle encouraged Adriano as he grimly stared at the fire where the Red Team disappeared in. The purple flames licked from the floor to the ceiling.

"Let me guess. There is another heavily fortified area that needs some softening before special ops swoop in easily?" Adriano guessed unhappily. Most of his team had died, and those that didn't were either close to a breaking point or low on ammunition.

"No! Your new directive is to hold down your position. Team Romeo and Juliet are escorting a VIP, secure their escape route, and then retreat with them." Oracle's new orders weren't as bad as he thought. Just stay put and then retreat.

The rest of the team exhaled a breath of relief and felt their strength rising; they could see the light at the end of the tunnel.

That's when Charlie started barking orders. "Don't stand there with your d**k in your hands. Prepare some makeshift covers and get in position! If HQ wants us to hold this position, it means things are about to get hot again." Grumpily pissing on their parade, Charlie went to work as well, contacting the teams supposed to help storm the previous fortification.

Minutes later, Team X-ray and Team Whiskey arrived. Just like Team Charlie, they looked haggard. X-ray lost three-quarters of their men, while whiskey fared much better, with only a handful of losses, but their commanding officer had died.

The entire gathered troops numbered 28, less than a team and a half.

Farukh, the tech specialist that survived with Charlie, suddenly spoke up. "What about Team Foxtrot?" However, the two team leaders looked away and shook their heads.

Ferguson, the leader of Team X-ray, explained with one word. "Squid." Farukh and the rest of the troops with some experience shivered at that mention.

"A squid at the edge of the ship? What is it doing here?" Romano, the demo expert who gave Adriano the mortar, looked around, paranoid.

"Don't waste time trying to guess what a fish might think about. Focus on preparing some explosive traps. If anything other than a human crosses the corner, I want to see fireworks." Charlie spat out, slowly getting to his feet.

A large patch of his uniform had disappeared as if bitten away by a beast. Underneath, fresh, smooth baby skin had covered the perfectly repaired injury.

"Oh, and Adriano." he sent through Oracle so that only him could hear it. "Thank you."

Adriano smiled. "We Folgore gotta look after each other, right?"

In turn, Charlie, too, laughed. "Right."

A dozen minutes had passed as Charlie and co stared at their live map and motion sensors. They could see the positions of the various enemy groups walking around. However, they had no idea where the escort targets were.

So, they weren't surprised when a group of five enemies led by a bird-like alien turned the corner and found themselves face to face with two dozen barrels shooting simultaneously.

The bird thing survived the first salvo thanks to an energy shield protecting it. The rest of its team fell immediately to the ground, making the bridge slick with blood.

It screeched a high-pitched scream and raised its weapon to fire back. However, a wrist-mounted rocket launcher from one of the newly arrived demos hit him before it could press the trigger.

The explosion shattered the energy shield like a thin sheet of ice and silenced the darned bird once and for all. A shower of feathers gently fell from where the bird commander stood a moment ago.

The victorious soldiers cheered and high-fived each other. Even Charlie sighed, content at the perfect execution of the encounter. The surviving newbies of the three teams had already gathered some field experience and transformed from innocent civilians into killers.

It was Ferguson's turn to splash the others with cold water. "Multiple signals inbound. They must have heard the explosion, and they are coming to investigate!"

Charlie placed his weapon on a tech's cover without checking the map himself and asked grimly. "How many?"

"Many," replied Ferguson cocking his shotgun. He gestured to his demo expert and another from Team Whiskey, and they both went to the kill box, preparing a nasty surprise and bringing back the alien weapons.

The tension felt palpable in the air as the red dots on the map moved closer and closer, stopping short of crossing the corner. They had noticed the bodies on the floor and discovered the trap.

As the enemy gathered in higher numbers, Ferguson smiled wickedly. "We hit the jackpot. Chevalier, whenever you want."

The demo expert he had sent licked his lips and spoke to his Oracle. "Light it up."

As they were sure the enemy would notice the obvious kill-box and not step to check on the bodies, Chevalier had placed two traps facing the corridors where the aliens were gathering.

Two tubes exploded, shooting forward cluster bombs. For those who don't know, a cluster explosive is one that launches many smaller explosives in the area when detonated.

The cluster bomb reached the enemy and exploded again, splitting into hundreds of small spheres that pierced bodies and armor alike before exploding for the third and last time, creating an ocean of fire and exterminating the almost fifty enemy troops gathered in the two corridors.

The fire died quick and left behind smoldering corpses as the Folgore's cheered and clapped, Chevalier especially, on the back.

"Quick, before more come. Go retrieve their weapons. Alien tech is pretty durable, and some might have survived." Charlie ordered while observing the map. The closest group wouldn't be in view for the next two minutes.

Chevalier and Adriano went forward too, one to place some extra traps, and Adriano to try his luck at getting his hands on something fancy that newbies like him could only dream of.

The cluster ammo had truly minced the enemy troops. Limbs and chunks flew everywhere, making locating their toys a gruesome exercise. However, some of them had somehow survived with varying degrees of injuries, and as the Folgores advanced, they shot them one by one.

The Geneva Convention didn't apply to non-human POWs.

Adriano too, felt like puking navigating a floor of cooked meat for a new gun and briefly thought about giving up but thinking, "what would Ophelia do?" gave him the strength to carry on.

He noticed a tentacle amongst the limbs. Remembering that squids were supposed to be more elite enemies, he followed it for almost two meters when he found a perfectly looking squid corpse.

Adriano couldn't even see where the cluster ammo had hit it or any signs of burning. However, he could see a tentacle coiled around an intricately ornated white ivory gun.

Suspecting something, he decided to double-tap the enemy. He pointed his reaper mk7 and shot a single bullet at its closed eye, but he didn't see the expected scene of blood. Instead, the bullet impacted an invisible wall, and light waves rippled along the spherical shape.

Before Adriano could shoot twice, the squid's eye opened up, and its tentacles shot forward. The first tentacle with blades along its entire length sliced the rifle like a hot knife through butter.

Then, as it rose on its limbs, two more shot forward, coiling around Adriano's legs and arms, restricting his movements and rising him in the air as a human shield between him and the rest of the Folgores.

Adriano screamed before a third powerful tentacle coiled around his neck, leaving him between choking and barely breathing.

Chevalier and the rest raised their weapons at the squid, not firing for fear of hitting Adriano. And even if they could, the squid still had its energy shield active. It was probably almost depleted after the explosions, but who would be willing to risk it.

With a wave of its tentacles, it aimed its gun at Chevalier, that barely managed to jump away before a plasma toroid (ring) flew where he had been just a moment before. The plasma shot hit the wall where it melted everything it came in contact with and left a huge hole. As if someone had dug a donut shape in the wall.

The Folgores retreated quickly before the crazy squid could fire again. Adriano heard it click its beak consecutively as if laughing. He struggled between the lack of oxygen and the powerful tentacles' bone-breaking pressure on his legs and arms.

Adriano's last thoughts went to Ophelia. He worried for her more than he was currently concerned with his situation. Had she faced the same horrors that he had met today? Had she survived until now? And if yes, would she still be alive by the time he rose enough to find her again?

A tear trickled its way down from his bloodshot eyes.

With a cough, his mind started swimming, and the world turned darker.