Bait

Bait

I waited quietly on the twentieth floor, in the shadows of the unfinished skyscraper watching the sky for them. Sooner or later they would come, they always do. When they did that's when my job started, I was the bait.

I remembered the day they came. They came down from space like a bad rain storm destroying and killing everyone and everything with out warning or demands. They didn't stop for two weeks, which almost annihilated every military force around the world. And nothing we launched at them was stopping them.

Then the ground forces started to land, both bugs drones and bug bots, rounding up anyone who had survived the initial attack never to be seen from again. That only six months before they just started to kill us on sight. There weren't many of the bugs from what the experts figured, only a million or so from the size of their ship in high orbit. That's why they relied on their drones and bots so much.

I didn't have to wait long. The first drone came out of the west from one of their staging compounds just after noon. It was about thirty feet across and armed to kill. If you see one you tried to hide, if you saw more than one you ran and prayed. I wasn't running, yet.

The bugs left the killing to the drones for the most part now, but they had a few weakness we learned to exploit. One was their thermal imaging got confused in very bright light or hot heat sources. You would think they would fix that but the bugs still haven't caught on, they don't care or are just that stupid. It was also the reason why we only attacked them during the day.

The second was their size. Ever try to drive a large truck down a back alley in Chicago? There isn't much room which gave us a nice advantage. Sure they've tried to kill us from above the buildings, but they had a hard time getting a good lock on us from that high up so they almost always came down to us.

Their size also made it impossible to enter a building to hunt us down so they sent in the smaller bug bots. The bug bots were similar to their bug masters. Four legs on a round lower torso with an upper body that also had four arms that held four weapons of various types. Their head was just a rectangular box with eyes and a few other sensors.

They too had their weakness. The best was their power cell which they strapped on their backs. You hit that and the bug bot is a goner, a nice loud pop and fireball. Of course getting to it was another matter since they worked in teams of three.

Another was their arms or more importantly the shoulder joint. If you were good enough all you had to so was hit the shoulder and the arm was useless. Once again that was hard to do when you had bug bots and drones coming after you.

When all that failed to kill us the bugs themselves came out, and in force. Always teams of twenty or thirty and always with more bug bots and drones. When that happened that's when you knew you pissed them off. And today that was a good thing.

I smiled when I saw two more joining up. The drones started working in teams of three's or more a few months ago when they started losing drones at an alarming rate. Guess the learned something from the bug bots. If this went right then I could add three more drones to my list of kills. If not...

I made my way towards the center of the building hiding behind a large pile of debris I set up to help hide my body heat. I pulled out a small canister from my pack took hold of the tab and waited.

The wall started to come apart where I was, their guns were tearing apart the building hoping to kill me. I pulled the tab then stuck it deep into the debris grabbed a rope next to me and gave it a hard pull. The roof above me exploded in a small but noticeable ball of black smoke and fire.

The drones quickly moved to investigate just as the smoke from the canister started. I took off running back to where I had started jumped off the edge right into a safety tube, then the canister exploded taking the debris with it. The drones were engulfed in an even bigger fireball then came crashing down.

I slide down the tube waiting for the end to open up. I hit the ground rolled jumped up and took off running pulling out two hand guns from my holsters. I knew the bug bots were coming and I had to beat them to my next check point.

I stopped at the end of the alley taking a quick look to see if it was clear. A blast hit right above my head from my right. I dove behind an old dumpster as three bug bots continued to shoot at me, the dumpster wouldn't last long.

I took out another canister pulled the tab and stuck it in one of the dumpsters pickup arms. I pushed the dumpster away from the wall far enough for some cover then took off around the corner. The dumpster exploded parts flying into the bugs bots killing them and taking out part of the building. It started to collapses behind me.

I didn't stop just kept running, dodging from cover to cover waiting for all hell to come down on me. I wasn't far from my next check point, only three city blocks. It might as well have been on the other side of the city.

I was half way there when more bug bots came out. They hadn't seen me yet so I lay still behind a car pulled out another canister and waiting. The car suddenly rocked from gun fire getting hit from above. Damn bug bots were in a nearby building too, that meant they were getting smarter. I took off running down a nearby alley pulled the tab on the canister then tossed it into the remains of a semi as I ran by.

It went off before I could reach the end of the trailer. I flew forward hitting the ground with parts of the semi landing on top of me. I got up and took off again before realizing the pain in my leg was a piece of metal was lodged in it.

I stopped long enough to pull it out, screaming at the top of my lungs when I did. I took part of my shirt and wrapped it around the wound then took off again. The drones and bugs would be coming for me and boy they would be pissed.

I lit several fires along the way with magnesium flares. I knew this would lead them to me but it would also help hid me... for a while. I even back tracked a few times when I saw them in my path. It was going to take a little longer to got to my destination, if I made it all.

It wasn't long before I hear the transport coming. And more than one from the sound of it, that meant they were really pissed off. They were out for blood now which meant I needed to get moving. I wasn't far from my destination but getting there was going to be a real pain.

I kept close to the buildings not that it mattered. They were starting to destroy the buildings behind me and fast. I could hear crash after crash with billowing dust, debris and smoke as buildings came down one by one. My body was starting to give out, it was only a matter of time now before they caught me.

I turned the corner and saw it, Millennium park or what was left of it. The whole area was wide open, no place to hide just make one last stand.

I made my way past what was left of McCormick Plaza and Cloud Gate heading towards the Pavilion. That's where they found me, the drones shooting around me forcing me to stop. I didn't matter I was were I needed to be. They surrounded me before I got to the edge of the rubble. I fell to my knees pulled off my pack looking around at the bugs.

They continued clicking, talking to each other, it was annoying as hell. I screamed at them to shut up. They slowly went quiet.

"You think this is over?" I asked. They could understand us, they had enough time to learn. "This is just the beginning!"

A large thunderous boom shook the area then three more. The bugs, the drones and the bug bots all turned to see several large black clouds rising from the distant horizon. I pulled the cord on my pack and threw it at them just as the ground opened up beneath me.

I hit the tunnel floor with a thud as the large metal door swung back up. Three men lifted a large metal beam against it lodging it between the floor and the door. Three more picked me up and ran as the ground above us started to exploded.

When I woke up I was in a hospital bed, or a bed at least. Two doctors were hanging over me while looking me over. I could feel the pain in my leg was almost gone, almost. Like an idiot I tried to sit up one of the doctors just slapped me back down then looked to his right.

"He's awake." They moved away and a tall dark man came over. It took me a moment to focus then I saw him. General Phillips was six feet two, two hundred plus pounds and built like a tank. Even at his age he was still intimidating. He must have scared the heck out the older officers in his younger days.

"General, how many made it?" He shook his head.

"Just you Johnson." He said. My gut churned. Two dozen men and women went out into the ruins of Chicago to lure the bugs out and only I made it back.

"How bad is it?" I asked not wanting to really know.

"It's just a scratch. You'll be up and walking around in a week, fighting again in a month." He smiled at me. "You did good today. The diversion drew out enough of them to give us the chance we needed to attack and destroy their base."

"The counter attack is under way and we are pushing them back. Not just here but LA, New York and DC are all pushing the bugs back. Got word that the Brits have driven the bugs out of London as did the French in Paris. We still have a long hard fight ahead of us..." He didn't finish. We all knew this was a long shot and we might still lose but this is or home, our world and no matter what we think or fell about each other we will fight for it.

"There's someone here to see you." He steeped aside and I saw my wife and daughter come running over. We held onto each other for the longest time.

We still don't know why they came, what they want or why they want to kill us. But the reasons why I fight are simple. It's for those that need protecting because they are too old, too weak to too young.

I fight for the lives of my wife, my daughter, my friends that died and those still alive. And yes, I even fight for those that refuse to fight, hoping someday they will see the reality of this war for what it is... the extinction of the human race.