Alex jogged alongside me, and we made it into the boats eventually. We passed a soldier on the beach, who raised a hand as we rode by.
“What about the rest?” I asked, turning to look back at the beach.
“I’m sure they’ll get there by now.”
We got in the boats, and soon they were moving, cutting through the water. We didn’t talk much, but I was glad to have him in my team. We were all excited for this mission. We all wanted to stand a chance against those robots.
The colonel was watching the boats move, but he didn’t speak to the rest of us, so we had no idea whether or not the rest of the platoon had left. I hoped so, but I wasn’t sure. Nothing had ever happened in Africa before.
Many hours later, when it became a little bit lighter, we stopped for supplies. We closed the boats inside a small bay, and deserted them. Then we went on foot, scouting the area for signs of robots, as well as following the paths the villagers use to go to the other village, through the jungle and through the trees.
One lying in the dirt by the path said something in a strange language. It did look uncannily like a woman, but I didn’t know how to communicate with it, so I simply stared back at it. It looked confused, but whatever it said slowly made more sense to me. My facial expressions slowly seemed to come across to it, and soon it was pointing at a tree, talking about a place as it drew pictures in the dirt.
After a while, we rendezvoused with the rest of the platoon, and reached the village again. We ate, and rested for a little bit. No one had seen anything suspicious or strange. In the darkness though, we set out toward the village the villagers had told us about. It was about a mile away, but we were only a few hundred feet from it when we heard something. It sounded strange, almost as though the air had been disturbed.
Alex quieted down, and the rest of us followed. The lieutenant puzzled over whatever it was we thought we heard, until one of the men shouted, and Alex shouted for him to be quiet. Something fired from the trees, a bright light. My goggles helped me to see where it came from. I shot where I thought I’d seen the man, but I didn’t hit the man who had fired the first shots.
Something blew up next to me. The trees became a little lighter as the fire spread to them.
“Take cover!” someone shouted, and everyone scattered behind bushes and behind trees.
The trees weren’t going to help us though. The creatures in them leapt down to the ground, shooting with deadly accuracy. The sound of our guns became louder, louder, until the crash and bang of their bullets was matched by the repetitive, mechanical fire of our weapons.
I fired again, and again, but they were all too quick. Bullets pooled around me, and I was already running to a new spot. The creatures turned toward me, and several of them raised guns of their own. I fired for a few seconds, after moving into a new spot, but then a gun to my head made me fall. I felt a girl’s hand grab my wrist. She was young, maybe a few years older than me. She was also wearing gold strips running down her arms, and found I could communicate with her.
She looked scared, but also confused. I didn’t have time to ask her what was going on, though.
A shot came from behind me and hit one of the creatures in the head. I saw its insides mush up, as if it had been hit by a carton of milk. It dropped, and was suddenly down on the ground, unmoving. I turned and saw one of the guys from my platoon behind me. His name was Greg, and he was holding his gun up in the air, arms shaking because of the strain.
“Thanks,” I said.
“What’s going on?” he asked.
“I don’t - “
A groan from one of the trees nearby. I turned toward it, and realized that there was a few of the creatures in the trees.
The last thing I remember was a storm of bullets whizzing around me. I screamed out, falling back, and hitting the ground.