"Here they come!"
Shit! I knew that we weren't ready, even as the warning was cried. Noting in life could ever prepare someone for the invasion we had suffered two years past now. Calling the invaders aliens wee a waste of breath, everything not from Earth was alien. These things were not your average extraterrestrial lifeforms though. Man had always thought that our first encounter would be with a peaceful humanlike society. Nothing could have been further from the truth in describing the things that even now appeared at the edge of the snow covered plains.
Before they had started their assault on the Mountainous countries of Africa and Asia, they had bombarded the Earth from space with canisters of ice and snow. At first we had thought it was nothing, but after some time our scientists had begun to realize that the snow and ice was rapidly cooling the planet and was alive. Nothing we had could stop the cooling fast enough, and before we could even begin to contemplate an idea, the assault had begun.
That was two years ago. Now here I was defending what had once been a fertile farmer's field in Nebraska. We were surrounded on both sides by the aliens, as they had invaded the Sierra Nevada's along with the Appalachians after taking the Alps and the Himalayas and other mountain ranges around the world.
Locking my magazine in place, I looked to either side of me, taking in the view of my remaining squad. We had been fighting the things since they had taken Denver. Nothing we did had slowed down their pace at all, and all along the way we had lost men as the cold loving primitives had killed us with stone weapons. Why they used stone instead of highly sophisticated weapons was beyond me. Some people thought that maybe it was just their favored weapon and that they knew their sheer numbers and tactics would be enough to defeat any opponent. So far they were right, as nothing we threw at them mattered. Not that I was going to just let them roll over me. Oh no, until one of their stone axes or spears claimed my life, I was going to keep trying.
Fire!
Without needing a second telling, the whole line of us opened up. From behind us we could hear the same as the other group perhaps a hundred meters to the east tried to repel their opponents as well. From out of the snow came the beasts, covered in hair and walking on four legs or those with two legs riding others with six legs. It was an army of immense proportion that our bullets bit into. Round after round emptied from my standard M4 rifle. For every shot that brought down one of them another took its place.
One hundred meters out from our position, a ball of fire erupted as every bit of high explosives we had blew up in a line of flame. Even from here I could feel the heat and struggled not be knocked on my back as the energy wave slammed into our lines. Some of the others were not as lucky and struggled to rise as the blast dissipated. Because of the blast, everyone had stopped firing as we waited to see what would happen.
With the smoke rising and clearing of the field, I waited in uncertainty for the results of the blast. No way had we killed all or even most of them, but maybe just maybe we had gotten enough that we would have a chance, slim as it was, of actually surviving another day.
The number that had died in the blast was more than expected but that was not what kept out guns from firing. No, where there had been solid snow and ice before was scorched dirt and mud. It had been so long since any of us had seen real dirt before. It was at this that we all grinned but it was also what brought a wave of shock as the aliens stared at the mud and as a group turned around. From somewhere among our ranks a cry went up, "Their leaving!"
Our allies to the east of us began to cry out as well as they had detonated a blast of their own.
Suspicious as I was, I signaled for two of my squad to follow me as I leapt out of the trench and prowled across the ground to the blast site. Before I had even made it halfway my thick snow boots began to become stuck in mud as the snow and ice beneath us melted to reveal land once more. How had this happened? We had never used a blast this size before yet these results had never been shown during all of the bombing runs and artillery blasts that we had used to try and stop the advance of the primitive beasts.
Too good to be true, I ordered one man to go north and the other south to access the extent of the melting. Knowing how far it reached and if there was any sign of the creatures would put some perspective on this new strange occurrence. While I waited for them to return, others joined me as we watched the melt continue past us and travel out of our view to the north and south.
By the time that the two I had sent out got back, everything in between the two blast sites was dirt and small pools of water had formed. Unsure of cleanliness but willing to risk it I had taken a cup full of water in my hands and tentatively had sipped it. Whatever I had been expecting was nothing compared to the pureness that I felt as the water trickled down my throat. I had never tasted water so clean before, and had to refrain from gobbling it down.
Both of the scouts brought the same news. They had followed the melt for maybe a mile before they had decided that it was continuing north and south for as far as they could see. Taking this into thoughts I cleared my throat and looking to the others who had come out to join me asked, "Does anyone have a map?"
Even though I was only a Sergeant, they complied. Military rank meant nothing to us, just a reminder of the few scatted days of actual order in the beginning days of the invasion. The map that was provided showed the local terrain for a hundred kilometers in all directions. Nowhere could I see a mountain range and it stood to the twisted reason of the melt that everything would be fertile until the melt stopped either at a mountain range of if it ever ran out of energy.
Before I could ask for scouting parties to be sent out, a single spear hurtled out of the sky. Landing point first into the dirt it stood stark still, a piece of cloth wrapped around it. Unwilling to risk anyone before myself, I flicked the safety off my rifle and walked over to the spear, all the while looking and listening for the mere hint of trouble.
Leaving the spear where it had embedded itself, I returned with the cloth in hand, a smile tracing itself across my face. No one seemed to understand at first, but after letting Meyers and Rebecca read it they too began to smile. Rather than let everyone read it I announced, "In light of our bravery and blasting a trench in the ground, our enemy has given us free reign of the territory spanning from here to the Dakotas, and down to the Gulf. They have promised not to make war with us, and will trade with us if we promise not to harm them."
Cheers and boos erupted from the three hundred of us that made up the two groups. It was a good mix of men and women, from a wide variety of ethnicities. We were fortunate to have such diversity as we were all that was left of humanity. While those that had booed were right to dislike the proposal, it was our only hope of rebuilding the human race. I knew it and where ever the road took me I was willing to take it.
Turning to face the single figure who had appeared out f the mist that had begun to cloud the snowy portions of the field, I nodded before shouting "Yes."
Out of the ashes a new civilization shall rise. – unknown
Out of suffering have emerged the strongest souls, the most massive characters are seared with scars – Kahlil Gibran
Out of these ashes beauty will rise – Steven Curtis Chapman
