“Juliet Three Command to J-3 HK Alpha, open up the doors on the PPD Building and get some noses in there.”
“Roger that, Juliet Command we are Oscar Mike.”
“Romeo 5 to Romeo Command, we’ve got large scat outside the Johnson Elementary School. Looks recent, might be a, ah, Stumphide in the area.”
“Romeo 5 this is Romeo Command, hard copy. Clear the school with caution then search for tracks.”
A flurry of gunshots to the west pulled Nina’s ear from the radio.
“Juliet Two this is Boss, is that your fire?”
An out-of-breath voice replied, “Boss, Juliet Command, J-2 Charlie engaging hostiles between Front and Nutt streets. We’ve got a swarm of jellyfish coming out of a some kind of old railroad building.”
Nina slapped her hand on the roll bar and ordered the driver, “Get us over there.”
In response, the Humvee accelerated from a crawl and sped south on 3 ^ rd Street. Momentum caused her to tilt backwards as one hand held firmly to the bar while the other kept the walkie-talkie close to her ear. The navigator in the front passenger seat of the roofless Humvee relayed directions to the driver.
As they drove, Nina took note of her forces deployed and searching to either side of the main road. To her right, a female handler used a rifle butt to shatter a large plate glass window leading into some old retail shop; a trio of dogs stormed through the hole to search the darkness inside.
To her left, a pair of Rottweilers trapped something scaly in a withering bush at the rim of a parking lot. She saw their jaws work as her ride zipped by.
Further along they passed a massive skeleton-picked so clean the bones shined pure ivory-in a field adjacent to a Salvation Army building.
“Here’s our turn, Captain, hold on,” the soldier steering the Humvee warned as he swerved to the right. Nina’s body swayed in response.
They came upon a skirmish in the streets around an old train station, possibly a museum. The sounds of gunfire and a chorus of barking dogs carried over an open lot and echoed through a nearby parking garage.
Nina nearly fell forward as the Humvee came to an abrupt stop to avoid crashing into the center of the fray.
She counted twenty Giant Jellyfish ranging from six feet around to twice that size, each with cloudy white bodies and rows of similarly colored tendrils. A perimeter of K9s alternated between retreating from the things and attacking.
Nina saw one German shepherd lunge in and take an obviously foul-tasting chunk from one of the beasts as it slithered over a rusted Volkswagen at the middle of an intersection.
She watched as a different Jellyfish propelled its pulsating bulbous body into the air with a blast of expelled gas that sounded like a soda fizzing. The extraterrestrial creature floated-almost flew-for several seconds until landing atop a huge Irish Wolfhound. Everything above the dog’s neck melted inside the attacker’s translucent body.
Before it could ingest the entire Grenadier, two Dobermans charged in from either side and pulled it apart, but a splash of internal digestive juices disintegrated a K9 snout, inflicting yet another Hunter-Killer casualty.
A blast from a handler’s shotgun caused one of the enemy swarm to pop like a water balloon while tendrils from another punctured a Rottweiler’s hide.
However, as the balance of Juliet Two’s Grenadiers converged, the battle turned decisively. Giant Jellyfish slinking on the ground met the gnashing teeth of K9s three or four to one. Jellyfish taking to the air fell to well- placed bullets and buckshot.
She raised her radio and transmitted, “Boss to Juliet Two, remind your team leaders not to kick over hives of Jellyfish; they shouldn’t be this difficult to deal with.”
“Umm, Juliet Two Command to Boss, received and understood. Rookie handler took a pot shot without thinking.”
Another message terminated that conversation: “Juliet Three Command to Boss, we found and destroyed a Devilbat nest on the top floor of the PPD building.”
“Copy that, J-3 Command.”
“Boss, Juliet Three Command, our HK team reported lots of hostile bones in the nest, probably hunting this area good and doing a lot of work for us.”
“Hard Copy, J-3, keep your eyes open for scavengers and bottom-feeders living off the leftovers. Sweep that building good.”
A flurry of gunshots came from her left. An animal of some kind howled in pain, sounding like a cross between a wolf and a rooster. Behind her a small explosion, probably a grenade, and a puff of smoke rose from somewhere to the northeast.
An incoming transmission reported, “Juliet Two to Boss, we’ve got two HK teams at the Convention Center. Something new over here. Some kind of froggy, pig-things.”
“Juliet Two, this is Boss, I copy. Are they giving you a problem?”
“Ahh, that’s a negative, Boss, the dogs can tear them up but they look new to me.”
“Juliet Two, take some photos and box up a couple of samples for the eggheads to dissect.”
“Roger that, Boss.”
Nina leaned between the front seats and told the driver, “Take us down the road a bit.”
They drove through the remains of the Jellyfish battle heading south on North Front Street. They passed a cluster of satellite dishes outside a television station and crossed an overpass that traveled above a parking lot where ten Grenadiers surrounded a trio of three-foot-tall bipedal ‘Gremlins’ resembling a cross between monkeys and wingless bats. The things shrieked as the dogs tore them to pieces.
A block further along, the Humvee stopped in the heart of Cape Fear Community College. Nina watched twenty or so K9s with handlers-including one with a flamethrower-invade the college’s administration building. Two vans hurried to a stop on the sidewalk outside the main entrance and black-BDU clad people unloaded boxes, crates, and folding tables.
Nina radioed, “Juliet Four, get those buildings clear and set up operations. We know there are some people living locally and I want somewhere to put them.”
“Juliet Four, hard copy all. We should be open for business in thirty-minutes.”
Nina heard a gun shot, a bark, and the dying scream of something unworldly come from the building entered by the Hunter-Killers but gave it no consideration; at this point she knew how to distinguish the nuances in gun shots, barks, and alien screams that made the difference between things going according to plan and things going awry.
Instead, she gazed ahead. Front Street narrowed with address after address of retail shops and small businesses, each a potential breeding ground for nasty little things. It would take hours to clear this quadrant, but she would push as hard as necessary to finish the job by day’s end. After all, Shep counted on her.
“Romeo Command to Boss, you copy?”
“Go ahead, Romeo Command.”
“Romeo 5 reports Stumphide tracks heading south. Ah, looks like it’s nesting up here but hunting downtown.”
“Hard copy, Romeo Command. I’ll get reconnaissance on it.”
She leaned to the navigator and asked, “What’s the book say on a Stumphide?”
While the navigator thought, the driver answered, “About one mile hunting radius.”
The navigator consulted his map, ran his finger in several directions, and said, “Well it’s not going to cross the river. Odds are it’s either in our sector or somewhere to the east.” Nina raised her radio and transmitted, “Boss to Overwatch, you copy?”
After a few seconds, a muffled voice replied, “Overwatch, copy, Boss. Go ahead.”
She looked to the sky and, in the distance to the southwest, saw the helicopter flying over the river.
“Need you to scout downtown. We’ve got a Stumphide somewhere in our sector. Need you to spot it before it spots us.”
“Understood, Boss, we’re on it.”
The chopper banked hard to the east.
A flurry of frantic automatic gunfire reached her ears. Radio chatter confirmed that these sounds belonged
