They Are Coming

They were safe. The walls of the Mox Bunkers were nigh-impenetrable, it was said. Still, Gault’s team clutched their Flay-Cannons tightly, with the green light switched on. They weren’t taking any chances.

As for Gault himself, well, what is there to say about him, really? Surely, he cannot be described as merely a man. Once, perhaps, he had been a man. I do not know. But now? What remained of his humanity?

Those who knew him well – which was slightly more than complete strangers did – knew that he was a machine. Not literally, of course. He was flesh and blood and brain, just like everyone else. But that was were the similarities ended.

It was his mind that was different from others. Or rather, his emotions. Simply, he didn’t have any. Well, one. Hate. Hatred burned within him, fuelled him. But in a controlled way. Gault was nothing, if not controlled. Smart, quick thinking, logical, ruthless, immoral. He did what he had to do, no matter the consequences. The ends justify the minds, in any and all cases. Thousands had died by his hands. The pain he had caused was legendary.

The underground bunker was larger than its name suggests. From the surface, sure, it just looked like a small dome made of the most impregnable material know to man. But it extended downwards quite a bit. The tip of the iceberg, Gault’s second-in-command, Marlina, used to say. They had found civilians here. Cowering in the lower levels, hiding from the hated Skralex. Poor, dispirited souls they were; none had even bothered manning any of the guns. They spoke only of nameless terror, and contributed nothing. To Gault, they were nothing.

The War had raged on for decades. It was a vicious, bloody war, one in which people such as Gault thrived. He was an excellent leader, and his hate for the Skralex knew no bounds. Of his past, I know nothing. No one did. Not even Marlina, who had first stood beside him in the trenches of Atherion, ten years ago, knew who he really was. All she knew was that he was indomitable, merciless. He was, in essence, a machine. And that was all she needed to know about him. That was all anyone needed from him, in this war.

The bunker was vast, but had little in the way of supplies. Within the first hour of seizing this bunker, Gault had had the men set up camp, and already had men at the turrets and communications room. They had incurred heavy losses, and were now holing up to avoid the inevitable wrath of the Skralex army. This was a new planet, they were on, and they were only on it because the Skralex were. The Mox knew little about it, they had just fired their bunkers into the hard earth and sent some troops down.

They didn’t know if there was still anyone up there. Marlina had sent a guy into the com room to see if he could catch anything, but so far they had been blocked by Skralex Com-Shields.

“Someone at the gates!” Yelled a guard, and the call was repeated over and over, throughout the bunker, until it reached the ears of Marlina and Gault. Supplies were scarce.

“The rear guard.” Marlina explained, and Gault immediately headed up towards the gates, his right-hand-woman a step behind. He wanted to hear if they had anything to say. If the enemy knew they were here.

They reached the huge gates, and Marlina yelled for them to be opened, after checking with one of the sentries. They opened a crack, and a diminutive figure fell into the bunker.

Gault and Marlina rushed forward to inspect the fallen soldier. The medics were called for. The newcomer was a slight woman, whose mask had several cracks in it. Marlina carefully ripped it off, revealing a horrible scalp wound. A second wound, in the lower abdomen, was slowly leaking blood all over the floor.

Gault bent over, close.

“What happened to your team, private?” He asked, loudly, in case her hearing had been damaged. The woman twitched a bit, but didn’t react. He shook her.

“I need to know what happened!” Gault said, raising his voice. The dying private tried to speak a few words, but couldn’t vocalize anything.

“Private!” Gault shook her, a bit harder. Already, the medics were arriving, though it would be useless. This soldier was as good as dead. She took a ragged breath, and barely whispered her final words.

“They are coming.”

“What?”

“What did she say?” Asked Marlina. Gault had frozen where he sat. Without having to be told, Marlina knew. A wave of coldness swept over her. It was over. She sagged, visibly, the strength draining out of her. They had only heard tales…but still.

Meanwhile, a curious thing was happening to Gault. For the first time, in quite some time, he didn’t feel the rage that constantly pumped through him. It didn’t seem important now. He did not feel afraid, or sad. He only felt regret, regret that his people wouldn’t be able to kill anymore Skralex.

For she had not meant the Skralex, the private. No, the Skralex would never be able to elicit such a reaction from the dreaded commander Gault. Had the private wished to warn Gault about the Skralex, she would have given the sign that meant so, or she would have said aloud the name of the hated aliens. No, this private had meant something entirely different. Something else was coming. Something else lived on this rock.

She could already hear it. Marlina. A faint thrumming, as though from a great distance. They all felt it, everyone, but most did not know what it was, and disregarded it as the hum of machinery. Marlina and Gault knew it for what it was. Neither of them had felt it before, but they knew without having to be told, that it was a harbinger of doom. They had spoken to others, others who had witnessed this before. Few survived it, and never intact.

Those hapless souls in the lower levels, for instance. They knew well what it meant. Their nameless terror had come, at last, and they began to scream and moan.

It increased. The thrumming. It was clearly audible now, and all the soldiers looked up from what they were doing, and listened. What did it mean, this sound? Those guarding the civilians below attempted to get them to speak, but the hysterical wretches said nothing. Was that the sound of vehicles coming? Or the roar of a ships breaking through atom?

The sound was slowly increasing, as though the author of the noise was coming closer. And it was accompanied now by a very faint vibrating. It was reminiscent of a large machine that one can hear, long before one feels it. But this, this was not caused by any machine.

The thrumming became louder, and louder, and soldiers began to panic. They, too, had heard rumors, but they did not pay them any heed. Soldiers were quite a superstitious, gossipy bunch, but they were also hardened veterans. Many gripped their weapons even more tightly, as the vibrations began to shake the entire bunker. And everything seemed to be more illuminated. Just a tiny bit, as though the light had been turned up by a tiny notch all around. Even in perfect darkness, in the lower tunnels, visibility began to increase.

The thrumming increased until it was beating against all their skulls, making their teeth vibrate. Soldiers began to moan and try to get a hold of something. The vibrations had also increased, and everything seemed to be moving slightly. It had definitely become lighter.

The civilians below broke into the upper levels, screaming and raving. A few gunshots went off. By this time, the entire bunker was shaking with the deep thrumming noise that still, still persisted. Light seemed to be shining from every wall, every object, every person. All the shadows within the bunker had been banished, and a deep feel of unspeakable terror began to grip the inhabitants of the Mox bunker. They were veteran soldiers, but they were not prepared for this. The weaker ones began to panic, screaming and running like the wild civilians. As everything increased, and the light seemed to make everything shine a bright white, people dropped to their knees, and began to cower.

Unimaginable horror gripped the inhabitants of the bunker. Most panicked and fell cowering, to the floor. Others began to pray, yelling in order to overcome the incredible thrumming that seemed to pervade everything. People hurt all over as their very bones began to vibrate within their bodies. Their skin was on fire, their eyes blinded, their eyes, deafened. Only a few, such as Marlina and Gault, remained calm. But this was because most of their emotions had bled away on the battlefields. These rare individuals simply sat, or lay, feeling oddly calm, waiting for the end.

An unbearable pressure settled down on everyone. The very senses of the soldiers were being brought to their utmost limit. Everything seemed increase, the vibration and the thrumming were all that existed, and everything was shining brightly, too bright for the human eye, everything was bathed in white light and then –

Then the vibrations and the thrumming seemed to merge, and became an endless stream of constant pressure, and then suddenly it seemed as though there wasn’t any noise or any feeling at all. A sort of numbness settled in, and everyone had the strange sensation of feeling of detachment from their bodies, as though they were a bystander, a spectator to what was occurring. Time seemed to come to a halt as the bunker was bathed in pure white light, the vibration and thrumming a thing of the past. Everything was still for a moment; the moment stretched on, everyone was waiting, for what, they did not know. The calm and silence teetered, and then was instantly obliterated as the bunker, the people, the world, everything around them seemed to shake apart in one cataclysmic moment.

And then all was silent, impossibly silent.

The bunker was empty again.

They had left.