A bullet hit Ripley’s shoulder, not penetrating the armor, but altering her flight. She hit the ground hard, her chest exploding in pain from the previous injury. Worse, she almost lost her breathing mask. When she rolled over, a Pushtal was rushing at her, claws out. She shot him in the face, shattering his mask and blowing off the top of his head. “Bad kitty, no snacks,” she groaned and got back to her feet in time to fire at another.
* * *
Drake’s rifle ran empty a second time just as he was coming down. A Pushtal screeched and reached for him, arms wide and claws sparkling in the cold sun. Drake reversed the gun, grabbing the still hot barrel in his gloved hands, and brought it down like he was chopping wood. The Pushtal’s head gave a sickening crack! Blood flew, freezing almost instantly in the cold. Even so, when he hit the cat, he felt claws dig into his side. They didn’t die easy.
He let the pain flow through him, driving his rage. The gun barrel had bent. No matter, he ripped his sidearm free from the holster and shot the closest enemy.
* * *
Sonya was a little behind her brothers and sister as they advanced. She used her rifle like a scalpel, firing a burst here, a shot there, aiming to take out any Pushtal who looked to have it together a little more than the others. Despite their unexpected attack, the damned cats were rallying. Nobody doubted their ferocity, only their personal hygiene.
As she angled to get a better shot, her right leg exploded in agony. An enemy grabbed it from below, pulling and tearing the flesh. That altered the arc of her jump, slamming her mercilessly into the ground. She blacked out for a second, and when her vision cleared, the Pushtal was moving in for the kill, confident it had her. She raised the rifle with numb hands and somehow managed to pull the trigger, stitching the cat from foot to head.
“You okay sis?” Ripley yelled over the gunfire.
“Piece of piss,” she replied and struggled up. Good news, she told herself, the blood is freezing on the suit, so it should stop the bleeding. Opposite of cauterizing. Definitely a thing.
* * *
The same strange sensation made Shadow look to the side. Sonya half-stood behind and to the side of him, one leg stained red with quickly freezing blood. She was barely holding off a group of Pushtal sensing an easy kill. The drive for revenge battled with duty, and duty won.
He spun in his next leap and fired, dropping two of the Pushtal advancing on Sonya. “Drake, get to Sonya!” In that instant, everything changed, solidifying into laser sharp focus. “Bana, move everyone over to the wreckage of this transport. Andrews, grenades on the right flank!” He barked out order after order as he fought, dodged, fired, moved.
He forgot his knife as he used his sidearm and voice to command. He didn’t know where the commands came from, some deep part of himself, yet they were all right, and the men followed them without hesitation. Somewhere his father’s voice echoed an old lesson. If you ever have to command, do it with complete confidence.
Dad…what if I’m wrong?
You won’t be, Shadow. You’re my son. Do what needs doing.
The battle swirled around them in chaos, but awareness of his siblings burned into his brain. Drake took a bloody but non-lethal wound to his left arm. A bullet cracked Ripley’s face shield, cutting her face and nearly taking out an eye. Several of the Human members of Silent Night fell to the marauding Pushtal, who largely kept trying to get at them with claw and tooth.
“If they ever give up on hand to hand, we’re bloody fucked,” Bana said.
“The rate we’re going down, we’re fucked anyway,” Corporal Plesh replied. “Look out, they’re rushing again!”
* * *
“Come on!” Meesh screamed at his troops. “There aren’t even fifty of them remaining. We outnumber them three to one, easy.” His troopers were beginning to lose their resolve. Many were fingering weapons and glancing to the side, considering gunning the lightly armed Humans down or maybe just running away. But that isn’t what Meesh wanted, entropy curse them. The Zuul had cost him an eye and his offspring. He wanted their blood in his mouth.
“Follow me, cowards!” he snarled and charged.
That did the trick, as all 150 or so of his surviving clan moved in a rippling wave of fury toward the Humans and Zuul. Now we end it! He leaped over a pair of Humans toward the nearest Zuul.
* * *
“Drake!” Shadow yelled as a Pushtal suddenly jumped over the ragged line. He had a half glimpse of an eyepatch. “There he is!”
Drake ducked and pivoted as Eye Patch went directly over him. Drake ripped his oxygen mask clear and bit the passing leg. Even 10 meters away, Shadow heard bone crunch, and the cat howled in pain. Even badly injured, it landed and kicked out, sending Drake sprawling. A nearby corporal had the presence of mind to rush over and replace the oxygen mask on Drake while he lay stunned on the bitterly cold ground.
Ripley was a hand’s reach away from the Pushtal’s landing spot. In a flash, she drew her own knife and plunged it into the Pushtal’s thigh, only to be backhanded a dozen meters. She cartwheeled through the frozen air to crash into a group of Silent Night fighting for their lives.
Shadow pulled his father’s long knife from between the crossed belts on his armor, advancing. Sonya made an amazing one-legged leap from behind, mounting the massive feline and, like her brother, removing her mask to sink her long canines into the bastard’s neck. Eye Patch jerked sideways at the last second, so Sonya’s teeth sank into
