The Rain: The End by Marietta Standlee (good summer reads TXT) 📕

the trigger. He doesn’t even have time to figure out what happened before his upper body wins the struggle with gravity and comes crashing to the ground.

I reach for my knife, which has fallen out of his dead hand, and put it back into its sheath. Colin is a few feet from me. He found cover behind one of the many vehicles and returns fire with a Gorongiaths. Crouching, I run back towards him. From my peripheral vision, I notice somebody closing in on me and twist around, kicking out and hitting a Gorongiath into the side, making him stumble back.

Before he has time to get up, I'm on top of him. His fist connects with my jaw, and my head flies back. I have just enough time to notice that this is the alien I nicknamed Two at the beginning of our training. I remember his condescending demeanor, and that's enough for my adrenaline to kick up a notch. I block his next jab and, with a smirk on my face, bring my other fist down right into his left eye.

The way my fist just sinks into his huge eye is making me sick, and I jump back. All I want is shake my hand to get rid of the amber goo sticking to it, but my self-control wins out. I won't give in to the primal urge. Instead, I ignore the goo on my hand and pull my Glock back out with my right hand, getting to Colin's side, returning fire towards a group of three Gorongiaths, who too took cover behind a vehicle.

"Took you long enough, princess." Colin admonishes.

"I thought you would've taken care of those three by now," I reply dryly, earning me a smirk from him.

"Keep firing, I'll go around." He's already on the move, before finishing his sentence. Leaving me with no choice but to do just that, while watching him crouch walk around a vehicle before taking cover behind another. I intensify my fire to keep the aliens busy, so they won't notice Colin sneaking up behind them.

A streak appears in the sky, accompanied by another screech, as one more spaceship falls out of the heavens. This one crashes at the other end of town, far enough away from us for me to ignore it and to keep the Gorongiaths distracted.

A loud bang followed by a short shaking of the ground beneath us announces another spaceship crash. Bullets whizz by my head, and I pull back down; shit, that was close. I need to pay more attention to the gun battle I'm engaged in instead of crashing alien crafts. I hope Colin didn't notice.

My magazine runs empty, and in one fluid motion, I eject it with one hand, while the other, still gore covered hand, goes for a spare. I push it back home, pull the slide back, and I'm back in business. Meanwhile Colin advances; he's almost behind them now. I pull the trigger, ever mindful not to hit my man.

He brings his gun up and fires three times, hitting his targets. I come out from my hiding spot, gun still raised, checking our surrounding area in all directions. Colin shoots at something above me, and an alien falls. I nod at him, and we continue on through the narrow streets.

Suddenly there is more screeching, loud and close. Colin throws himself on top of me, and I feel the impact like missiles as the ground underneath me shakes.  Over and over, the spaceships come tumbling down in quick succession now. I lose count and bury the right side of my face in the dirt underneath me. The impacts won't stop; they just keep coming.

Colin pulls me to my feet. "Over here."

He points at a larger vehicle with more space between it and the ground; we roll underneath. The ground is still trembling, and now some of the surrounding buildings are starting to collapse.

"We need to get out of here!" Colin screams at me to be heard over all the noise.

We crawl back out from the relative safety the vehicle provided and run to the end of town. Shots ring out from all sides, and Colin curses. Worried, I glance at him, but he waves me on. "Keep running."

More buildings begin to collapse as the ships keep raining down from all sides, except, thankfully, from straight above us. We're not the only ones running; everybody is. Friend, foe, alien, human and animals, everybody and everything, tries to get away from the doomed colony.

"How many ships do we have to shoot down?" I ask breathlessly.

"Too many, keep going." He answers just as breathless.

Ah yes, now I remember, somewhere around three hundred ships will rain down on us. "We need to get back to our transporter!" I yell.

Colin pushes me down just in time to avoid a huge rock whizzing by. I have no idea how he heard it coming over all the noises. Occasional gunfire still rings out from all sides. The screeching of the plunging spaceships is just one never-ending orchestra, their impacts the only interruption to the morbid symphony around us.

The smoke is so dense now, it's not just making it hard to see, but I'm coughing and having a hard time catching my breath.

Two Gorongiaths without the black ribbons on their arms come running straight at us, their weapons up they start to aim at us, my gun up, I take aim as well, just as a breeze drives the smoke into their direction, making them invisible to me. I still shoot and am rewarded by a cry of pain—the other escapes.

Colin finds something to shoot at, too, before he pulls my sleeve, and we're on the move again. A stabbing pain in my calf has me stumble, just as Colin curses out loud and shoots at something behind us.

The ground underneath us shakes from all the impacts, and I have a hard time finding my balance, I manage to sit up somewhat and aim into the swirling smoke, where I make out moving