The XCOM Project [DEAD]

5: Operation Broken Star

"All warfare is based on deception"
-Sun Tzu, The Art of War

"This brings me back to the old days," said Larsen.

"What, arresting people?" asked Roberts from his sniper perch, slightly above the street where they had retrieved the quisling.

"It is odd that we're fighting an alien menace, and at the same time we're still having to bring people in for questioning," answered Zhao. He crouched a few feet from Roberts on the roof, having temporarily exchanged his shotgun for a more versatile assault rifle.

"Command believes that he's a collaborator, somehow. If we can get anything out of him, we will," responded Marina. "No point second-guessing up-the-chain."

"Yeah, but if he's in the way, why leave him alive? Just kill him and be done with it," answered Zhao. "it would save us from having to sit here in the heat."

"That would be so illegal," answered Kari, pushing the man in front of her.

"Sh! Did you see that?" interrupted Roberts, scanning down the alley through his scope.

"What?" Asked Vinogradova, alert in an instant.

A cloud erupted around Zhao, sickly green and iridescent, and he coughed, loud and choking. "Rooftop!" yelled the Russian, shoving their charge through a back door and into a midsize department store, the roof of which Roberts and Zhao currently occupied.

The sound of Roberts' rifle rang out. "Got him!"

Zhao ran out of the cloud, coughing and wheezing. Maria dashed into the street, taking cover behind a van. "Movement in the street!" he yelled, loosing rounds downward.

"Gottdamt, that's me!" yelled Kari. "Friendly fire!"

"caole! caole! I'm sorry!" He stopped firing.

"scheisse! Get down here, let me check you!" Larsen had the medkits. He climbed down a ladder and huddled behind a trashbin, coughing all the way, where she reached him. "Status!" she barked.

"My airways are swelling!" he said, his cough worsening. "I can fight through the pain, but I'm going to need the epipens!" She gave him an epinepherine injection as well as a steroid/adrenalin shot, not bothering to find a vein, merely tearing away the protective covering and stabbing it straight through the understuit.

"We've got movement down the street!"

"What was that?" yelled Vinogradova, still escorting the suspect through the abandoned store.

Roberts had sighted another of the little things skittering through the back door. He didn't even have a chance to sight a shot before it was gone. It stuck its head out of the doorway and fired at Larsen again, blasting a hole in the wall.

A shape appeared outside the store, where Marina was with the suspect. It reared, seeming to wave a gun in her direction. She fired, drilling the oversize rounds into its body. "Blyat, that looked human."

"That's what doused Zhao," answered Roberts. "It's like they're supposed to look human!" he cursed.

Larsen and Zhao dashed forward, Zhao much, much closer than he should have been. "Scheisse!" yelled the Danish woman, lobbing a smoke grenade to cover them.

"They're in here with me!" yelled Marina, rolling behind a line of stands even as the grey creatures shot a series of rounds towards her. "I'm hit!" she yelled as she threw a grenade towards the creature. It regarded the orb with momentary curiosity before it, the grenade, and the dispaly tables around it turned into hypervelocity clouds of expanding metal fragments, organic molecules, and gas. The suspect huddled behind his counter.

Roberts put a round through the stonework and straight into the skull of the little creature. All was silent for a moment.

"Marina, how are you?" yelled Kari.

"My armor is cooked a bit but I'll be fine," she responded.

"Copy," responded Roberts, watching as she moved down the street. The Skyranger was only a few meters away, and Larsen edged forward, staying to cover.

Another of the little beings skittered out of view around the corner. "Vino! You've got incoming again!" she yelled.

"Copy that! Roberts can you drop a grenade off the corner of the building?" yelled the Russian.

"What?"

"Just do it, it's breathing down my neck!" He complied. There was the explosion, and then a moment of silence again. "Nice shot, Texan." she said, pushing their charge before them. "Let's get you to the ship."