‘Southeast tower gunner has been taken out, I repeat, southeast tower gunner has been taken out! Blue Unit, move up to take over the position!’
A burst of thunderous fire shook the walls of the room he was in, raining down dust and stone fragments all over him, and he dropped to the floor and covered his head as a high-pitched howl announced an incoming mortar. AK-47 fire began chattering with sustained fury out to his left, but the ground-shaking explosion of the mortar put a swift end to that, leaving only an eerie silence in its wake.
On the dusty, debris-crunchy floor, he scrambled for his walkie-talkie.
‘Blue Unit, come in! Blue Unit! Come in Blue Unit, I repeat, come in Blue Unit!’
Silence.
The final unit has fallen. This is it then; this is the end. We have fought hard, for two hours now, but in the end, we could not resist them, and the city has fallen. Well, no, not just yet. It is about to fall, that much is certain. But I’m not about to let it go without taking as many of the invaders down with me as I can.
Hubble stripped off his helmet, flak jacket and other body armour, and then took off his camouflage fatigues. When he was fully unclothed, he transformed into his animal form – that of a chimpanzee. Now he put everything except the fatigues back on, adjusting the battle equipment to the dimensions of his chimpanzee body so that everything fit snugly and securely. Finally, he slung his AK-47 over his shoulder, and then in his right hand he picked up his wickedly sharp machete. With the Evening Star gleam of vengeance shining with naked fury in his eyes, he set off, moving on swift and silent feet.
***
‘Is that there C4 ready, Jimbo?’ barked Colonel Rudd from behind the cover of the fallen statue.
‘IT’S READY TO BLOW, SIR!’
‘Take those fuckin’ doors out then!’
‘DETONATION IN THREE, TWO—’
Jimbo hit the remote button, setting off the C4 charges that had been planted around all the reinforced doors of the city. With an earth-shaking blast the explosives detonated in unison, tearing the hardwood doors out of the stone walls as if they were made of nothing but flimsy cardboard.
‘MacKenzie, send in a lil’ box a’ welcome cookies!’ Colonel Rudd bellowed before the debris and smoke had even settled.
With a malevolent grin MacKenzie laid down a heavy, scything fire with his minigun, sending hundreds of rounds spitting through the blasted-open doors into the city, and he kept going until his entire ammunition belt had been spent. As the minigun whirred with a slowing drone to a halt, Colonel Rudd’s troops waited in silence for a few moments, their guns all aimed at the open doorway, from which clouds of smoke and masonry dust were still belching.
After MacKenzie had clipped a new belt of ammunition into his minigun, Colonel Rudd prepared to order the advance into the city.
‘Err’body ready t’ head inside an’ liven up the party in there?’
‘SIR YES SIR!’ was the unified, roared-out reply.
‘Jimbo, MacKenzie, you two are armoured up like a pair a’ lil ol’ turtles. You got point, so get your asses through them doors. Find cover right away; Jimbo you sweep right, MacKenzie sweeps left. After that we’ll send in Ellis, Kowalcyk, Chan and Cortez! Y’all ready?’
‘SIR YES SIR!’
‘Move the fuck out!’
With the rest of the troops covering their advance, MacKenzie and Jimbo rushed in, crouched low with their fingers on the triggers of their miniguns. As soon as they got inside the walls of the city, each immediately sought out cover behind the piles of rubble they found in the inner courtyard. They gave the area a visual sweep, and then Jimbo called out to Colonel Rudd.
‘All clear in here, sir!’
‘Y’hear that, boys? Seems like the party’s a bit of a dead one! Just like a couple a’ lil’ ol’ ladies havin’ tea an’ cookies an playin’ bingo or some shit. Well, we’ll have to liven it up a bit then, won’t we?! Ellis, Kowalcyk, Chan and Cortez, get your asses in there!’
‘SIR YES SIR!’
The four marines charged in through the smoking, twisted wreck of the doorway, each aiming his M-16 from one of the four corners of the rough square formation they were in.
‘Scout out the first few buildings there boys!’ shouted Colonel Rudd. ‘Sweep ‘em clear, then when you’re satisfied that all’s well, give the rest a’ us the green light t’—’
A barrage of automatic AK-47 fire suddenly erupted from the shadows, dropping both Ellis and Chan with headshots that blew the men’s heads apart as if they were ripe pumpkins. MacKenzie was hit too, but while his body armour took most of the damage, one of the rounds shattered his wrist and prevented him from firing his minigun, and he fell to the ground, howling with pain. Kowalcyk and Cortez dived for cover, only just avoiding the flying bullets, while Jimbo sprang brazenly out into the open, howling with murderous fury as he opened up with his minigun, spraying everything around him with a hailstorm of supersonic lead.
‘What the fuck is going on in there?!’ Colonel Rudd shouted. ‘Get the fuckin’ situation under control, fir Christ’s sake!’
Jimbo stopped firing and retreated to a section of cover, while Kowalcyk and Cortez crawled through the rubble, searching for suitable cover themselves. Then, from out the ruins of a half-crumbled house to the left, Colonel Hubble bounded out in chimpanzee form, hooting and howling and whirling his machete around his head. Jimbo saw him and dashed out from his section of cover to unleash the wrath of his minigun, but Hubble was too fast; he leaped through the air ahead of the blazing arc of bullets, and as he landed he took Kowalcyk’s head off of his shoulders with one savage stroke of his machete. Cortez blasted out a burst of M-16 fire at point blank range at the chimpanzee, but the rounds thudded into Hubble’s body
