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

easy, but somehow we weed out the enemy's ranks as three alien soldiers go down. They are still herded together because the ramp hasn't fully extended yet, but they spread out as soon as it does, making it harder for us to peel them off.

As soon as the ramp is down, they use it for cover, diving to the other side, and now it's my team and I that is exposed without protection. We are out in the open; flowers are all around us, making moving hard, especially with bones, large and small, embedded in their midst.

A muffled scream reaches my ear. The bandanas we wear for protection silences our sounds. I don't have time to turn and see who was hit or if he or she is wounded or dead. All I can do is lay on my belly and return fire towards the ramp. Take a break and commando crawl forward. Shoot again. Repeat.

More Gorongiaths pour out of the spaceship, and I concentrate my fire on them. The ones shooting at us from the other side of the ramp are the real problem, though. That they haven't utterly decimated us yet, is only due to the awkward angle they have on us.

Something zips by close to me. I instinctively duck and roll myself around to make it hard for whoever has me in his scope to keep track of me. Something poky scratches me on the arm, probably a bone; I shudder. It seems like all the aliens made it out of the ship now and are either collected on the ramp or diving for cover to join their friends. Either way, they keep their rifles directed our way.

"Spread out more!" I yell through my bandana.

Flattening myself just in time as a barrage of bullets goes right over my head. So much that I can't return fire, nor can I lift my head to see what is happening. All I can do is lie as still as possible and wait it out, hoping they think I'm dead or lose sight of me. This is just a matter of luck, nothing else.

More shots ring out, they sound further away, and something screeches loudly, followed almost immediately by a huge boom, making the earth underneath me tremble.

Using the momentum of distraction, I scream at the remnants of my team to spread out and flank the enemy. I dash to the right, relieved to see Kat following close behind. Alex and Leslie make their way around the ramp to the left, followed by the Marine whose name I still can't remember. I don't see a trace of Brad and hope he's injured, not dead.

The Gorongiaths recover from the shockwave that must have pressed them against their ship and the ramp. They can't see us from their vantage point; blindly, they keep firing as to where they last assumed us to be. Not realizing, we are about to pounce on them from their flanks.

Coming around the spacecraft, I'm ever mindful of my three teammates who will emerge at any second on the left. I make sure each shot I fire is well aimed at a Gorongiath the moment they come into sight, as I turn the corner. I don't need to warn Kat; she is seasoned enough to do the same.

A bullet pings by my head, and I duck, realizing the rest of my team has arrived from the other side and are not as cognizant of us as we are of them. But the crossfire we have the enemy in is short-lived. Within seconds, and without a chance for the Gorongiath to realize what just happened, my team of four and I have decimated an entire alien battalion.

A few hundred yards further out, I see the burning ship that crashed moments ago, saving our asses. Even from here, I can feel the heat emanating from the flames.

Chapter 6

We don't have time to rest and celebrate or collect our thoughts on the carnage we just created.

"Advance!" I scream at my men and women and rush towards the downed ship.

Without any hesitation, I start to pick off the defenseless surviving aliens as they crawl out of the burning spaceship.

One, two, three, I lose count as the butt of my gun keeps hitting my shoulder over and over. More go down as my team takes aim as well. It's over within a minute.

We kept our distance from the burning ship, but when it explodes, a wave of heat pushes me backward. Whoever was left onboard was incinerated for good. I'm fairly sure the heat singed off a few of my lashes and eyebrows, but I don't have time to contemplate it.

I turn back towards the hangars and take a second to assess the situation. While several of my soldiers are still shooting at the last few running harvest overseers, Gorongiath troops stream out of the hangars.

From scouting trips, we learned the main body of the Gorongiath security force takes their breakfast in the hangar while the harvesting crew is switched out.

Well this morning, their meal got interrupted. It took the alien soldiers a few minutes to get ready, but now that they are, they're streaming out of the building like a red tidal wave.

My team engages them instantly, even though they outnumber us. Because this is where Colin comes in. He and his squad snuck in while it was dark; they spread out on top of the roof and the shadows of the hangars.

Luckily for us, the aliens didn't think they needed many guards to patrol at night, past the plantation fence line. Too secure in their perceived superiority, and deal negotiations with our President, they didn't expect any kind of attack, leave alone an ambush.

Colin only brought fifty soldiers—keeping the number small made it easier to bypass the guards and spread out, using the darkness as cover. Some hid on top of the hangar's flat roof; others used vehicles or crates as hiding spots or whatever else they could find.

Now, Colin's