Chapter 2: Damage
As we stood there in stupefaction, staring at what was once a beautiful city street, the reality dawned on us that this damage was not only reserved to our current residence. As far as our eyes could see, there was complete destruction everywhere.
We just stood there in the middle of the street completely dumb founded by the amount of damage done in such a short amount of time. We were in that underground room for a maximum of forty minutes and the damage had already spread to the horizon.
"Wait…How is this possible, how could those things do this much damage in such a short amount of time!?" Karl said.
His question was soon answered as just at the brink of the horizon, we could see a large mechanical structure shooting what looked like lasers, causing devastating damage to buildings and the surrounding areas.
"Woah, what is that!?" Carlos said.
"Vree, vree vrou."
A shadow that strongly resembled the structure we just witnessed destroy multiple buildings was cast upon us. In response to Carlos's question, I answered.
"We're about to find out."
Before us was a monstrous machine 5 stories tall, with a circular head on top of long mechanical tripod legs. Imagine the tripod for your camera was taller than a story building, and the camera on top was a circular shape with the lens also being circular. That was what was before us as we all prepared for the inevitable.
There was no running away as even if we did, the after shock from the blast would still be strong enough to completely vapourize our bodies, or if you are unlucky and you survive, the heat would burn off the layers of your skin, leaving only your muscle exposed to the atmosphere with you writhing in pain, waiting in agony for death to take you out of your misery.
The lens of the tripod machine began to turn red and we waited in despair for our inevitable demise. We could already feel the searing heat on our bodies and Carlos had already begun sweating.
"Well Mark, guess this is the end." Karl said.
"Hehe, we had a good run." I replied.
Just at that moment, we heard what sounded like jet engines getting closer and we immediately began to feel hope that we would be saved. Three fighter jets burst onto the scene with extreme speed and immediately fired at the supposed instrument of our demise.
"Boom! Boom!"
The missiles they fired collided with the tripod and the monstrous machine started to lose it's footing. The fighter jet pilots were smart. They aimed for its legs and knew it would be knocked off balance, it was a genius play. They fired another set of missiles at the legs of the tripod while we watched, elated as the instrument of our destruction fell to the ground.
"Wooooooooohhhhhhhhh!!" We all screamed gleefully as we watched the giant structure crash to the ground.
"Hahaha, Serves you right." Carlos screamed ecstatically as he approached the fallen Tripod.
"Haahahaa, look at you now, you ain't so tough, hahaha, Look at you".
"Skkrrrllk!!"
Something raced out of the crashed tripod in the blink of an eye and Carlos looked like he was in excruciating pain. In that moment blood started dripping on the floor.
Carlos had been impaled from behind by a tentacle-like appendage shooting out from the wreckage of the tripod. Carlos started spewing out blood from his mouth and dropped on his knees as all the strength in his body was fading fast.
He fell on his stomach, his life flickering before his eyes, I wonder what was going through his mind at the time, did he live a life he was proud of?
He coughed up his last ounce of blood and took his last breath. Carlos was dead, and we would be joining him soon if we didn't get out of there immediately.
Just as Karl and I were contemplating our grim reality, something came up from inside the crashed tripod. An oval like robotic structure came up from the wreckage of the tripod. Standing on multiple short tentacle like appendages, it stood on three legs as one of its appendages was currently in the body of Carlos. To our horror, it inserted its appendages into Carlos's eyes, ears, nose and mouth and started sucking out the blood from Carlos's body. When the blood was running dry, it actually sucked out his internal organs as well. It was a truly horrifying sight as Carlos's lungs, heart and intestines were sucked out from his body.
The tentacles expanded and contracted in response to how large the organs were. It sucked on Carlos until he was nothing but skin and bones. Drained of all substance, I experienced firsthand as a human body was reduced to nothing but a shallow shell. I don't think I had ever witnessed such a gruesome and horrifying experience in all my years as a reporter.
While all this was happening, the fighter jet pilots were watching it transpire from the air. When the alien had it's fill, it turned it's attention to Karl and I. It was at this moment that the fighter jet pilots finally decided to intervene as they sprayed the life form with bullets from every angle until the lifeform dropped down on the ground, green blood started oozing out from the lifeform and to our shock, red blood followed suit after a few moments.
"That's Carlos's blood." Karl said as he clenched his fist in anger.
"Yeah…. it is." I said.
The fighter jets landed and picked us up. They called a crew to the wreckage site to perform an autopsy of some sort. The pilot was relaying information to what seemed to be his superior officer.
"Yeah, yeah, sucked all the blood right out of him, including his organs. Shit was gruesome." The pilot said.
They spoke a little more before he eventually radioed out. The pilot then began to speak to us.
"You guys all right? You must have been through a lot, you were there from the beginning right? you saw it all happen?" He said.
"Why didn't you save Carlos." Karl replied.
"Oh that was his name? Sorry I couldn't save your buddy but we need as much information as we can on these things so we can form a plan to counter attack. Your friend was a calculated sacrifice." The pilot responded.
Those words pierced through Karl's heart like a knife but he kept his composure. He was angry but he understood what the pilot was saying. This is a war, and sacrifices like this happen. Who would it have been?
If Carlos didn't die who would? Me? him? Karl had a big heart but it wasn't so big as to blind him from the facts staring back at him. He swallowed his pain and prayed for his short-lived friend before focusing on the matter at hand. This was one of his strongest qualities, he had a big heart but he would never let it blind him from the task at hand, its one the traits that make him my closest friend.
"So… what do we know about these things." I said.
"I should be asking you Mr. Mark. I mean you were at the forefront of this whole alien thing." The pilot said.
"Were you able to find anything while you were investigating these things." The pilot said
"Honestly, I only found what looked like a crashed spacecraft. I was going to investigate further but this whole situation happened." I said
"So this situation is in no way attached to you?" He said.
"Huh?"
"I mean this whole situation started only a week after your huge discovery. Don't you think you had even a small role to play in our current situation. I mean, if you had minded your business who knows whether we would have been in this whole situation."
"..."
"Sorry. I have a family you know. Wife just gave birth too, this is not the kind if world I want to raise my child in. What even is this? Aliens sucking peoples guts out! I guess I was looking for something or someone to blame for all this." The pilot said.
"Don't worry about it, I understand…..."
The atmosphere was tense and gloomy. We sped off to the destination where we were supposed to be dropped off. As we flew to our destination, we passed multiple locations that were devastated by these attacks.
Beautiful parks looking like warzones, streets looking like they had been bombed, the aliens had been busy. In our short trip to the destination of our drop off, something lingered in my head. The words the pilot said.
"So this situation is in no way attached to you?"
"I mean, if you had minded your business who knows whether we would have been in this whole situation."
I couldn't shake those words out of my head. And worse, I couldn't shake the eerie feeling that he was right.
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