Chapter 2
EGGBEATER
Wind buffeted the Sikorsky Black Hawk as it flew over the coast. Even through the protective headgear, it was loud. The helicopter rocked and shook as its twin rotors pulsed through the air.
Traveling at two hundred miles per hour, the twenty-one-million-dollar machine was equipped to carry eleven soldiers and their tactical gear. Today, it carried three.
Gabriel wasn’t accustomed to the extra space.
He resisted the urge to look out the window as he closed his eyes, taking in a deep breath.
His stomach swooped as the helicopter hit turbulence.
He would never show it, but he hated flying.
Even after nearly fifteen years of service, he could never get used to the machines.
They’d shown him the science, and he knew some ace pilots.
He trusted them with his life. He just didn’t like it.
The skyline was hazy. Dawn was just beginning to creep over the horizon.
For some reason, it seemed absurd to him.
The world was still turning. Despite it all, the sun was still rising from the east, and later it would set in the west as normal.
There had to be an allegory on the fleeting nature of humanity in there somewhere, but what would Gabriel know?
He spent his life as a grunt with boots on the ground.
Exhaling, he sat up straighter in the uncomfortable seat and looked around at his squad.
As Squad Leader, he was in charge of these souls. Men he’d known for years. Men he trusted. Men he cared about.
Phin raised an eyebrow at him. His dark hair was buzzed close to his skull, and his large light machine gun with armor-piercing rounds rested across his knees. Phin’s eyes were eerily light, not quite brown or gray. It was unnerving under the helmet's visor.
“You going to tell us or are we guessing?” his deep voice crackled across the headset, so low the microphone struggled to pick it up.
The heavy weapon specialist had been the first to volunteer.
The words hadn’t even left Irving’s mouth when he stepped up.
Phin was always up for a fight. They’d met during his first deployment when they were still young men struggling to grow hair on their chests.
At 6’6”, Phineas ‘Phin’ Johnson was like a planet, and Gabriel had gravitated to the man.
Theirs was a natural kind of friendship. It wasn’t intentional but it grew slowly over time, and it had stuck. Through bad and worse, and when countries and oceans kept them apart, somehow they always found their way back to each other.
After getting medically discharged, Gabriel had pulled Phin into working for Irving at Kinetic Solutions. He brought with him his heavy weapons knowledge and the worst case of PTSD Gabriel had ever seen.
There was no one else he’d rather have at his side.
“Yesterday at around 1000 EST, an unidentified aircraft entered US airspace. It launched an attack on Washington, DC. Within an hour, local power plants, cell towers, and overhead satellites were destroyed.”
Across the helo, Judd made a face. The reconnaissance specialist always appreciated a joke, but even he was having a hard time buying this.
“Commander—” he began, but Gabriel held his hand up.
“An evacuation was ordered, but the city was already under attack. Local and state law enforcement did what they could to protect civilians and assist with the evacuation. They held on as long as they could, but by the time the National Guard was able to roll in, their ranks were already decimated.”
Gabriel swallowed past his emotions. When Irving called him into his office in the middle of the night, he hadn’t known what to expect. He certainly couldn’t make sense of the blurry photos on his desk. They’d been able to get some images from satellites before they suddenly went offline.
For a long moment Gabriel thought he was looking at colorized photos from WWII.
Blood ran down the streets. Bodies were strewn across parks and sidewalks.
Chunks of buildings had been blown out, exposing rebar and insulation.
Cars were overturned and smashed, the rubber on their tires burning into the night.
It was a massacre.
Heavily outnumbered and outgunned, DC police had fought until the end. They’d stayed behind when they could have run. Could have grabbed their families and evacuated with the rest. But they didn’t.
It was those images that made him volunteer for this mission.
Judd shared a look with Phin before looking back at Gabriel. “Was it…?”
Gabriel shook his head. “It’s not just DC. Sydney has fallen. So has London. No one has heard from Seoul. Italy is a scorched hole in the ground. Last we heard, Shanghai was putting up a fight, but it wasn’t looking good.”
“Someone launched an attack on major cities throughout the world?”
“It appears so.”
“Who?” Judd asked again, his eyebrows crashing together. His jaw was working. Gabriel could relate to his frustration.
“It…” he couldn’t believe these words were leaving his mouth. “They’re saying it’s extraterrestrial.”
The two men stared at him.
“Fucking aliens?” Phin snapped incredulously.
“I didn’t say that,” he responded. “Truth is, they don’t know. Whoever they are, they were smart. They cut off our communications first, then took out the government. The White House and Pentagon were among the first hit. Then the military bases.”
Phin leaned back. “An invasion.”
“Smart aliens,” Judd muttered as he shook his head. “The hell are we supposed to do?”
“First objective, is to reestablish communications on the ground. If we can’t do that, then we gather intel and report back what we can. Second objective, is to assist in the evacuation and to protect civilians.”
Judd mulled that over. He was the best reconnaissance man Gabriel had ever seen.
If anyone could do it, he could. But that didn’t mean it would be easy.
Or even possible, before they lost all satellite coverage.
He had seen the damage; the attackers hadn’t just disabled communications with an EMP—they had destroyed them.
“How many casualties so far?”
Gabriel didn’t answer. He didn’t have to; the look on his face said it all.
As they drew closer to the city, he could smell smoke. It was thick, but he supposed if an entire city was on fire, it would be. They all tried to look out the window, but it was still too dark to see anything.
Gabriel withdrew a map of DC from his pocket. “About six clicks from our drop zone is a cell tower. Before we lost our satellite, it looked like it was in pretty decent condition. We’re going to make our way to it. Once we’re there, we’ll try to utilize it to reestablish communications.”
His team didn’t look convinced.
After leaving the Army, Gabriel had found himself adrift.
Lost without the rigid structure that had been such a big part of his life for longer than it hadn’t.
Purposeless, with a head full of knowledge that was useless to the outside world, he struggled.
It was a chance meeting at a grocery store that changed everything.
He’d met Irving—whether that was his first or last name was hotly debated—in the cereal aisle.
It had been so brief, a mere half smile and shrug after they had nearly run into each other, but in those few moments, Irving had seen something in Gabriel.
Something that had him extending a matte black business card between two fingers.
Kinetic Solutions was a private security group run by Irving. Who owned and funded the operation was a strict secret, one Gabriel had never felt the need to know.
The pay was good, the perks were better, and Gabriel finally had the structure he needed to keep himself grounded.
It didn’t take long for Irving to trust him when it came to picking out new recruits. Judd Briggs had been a no-brainer. The scout was loud, brash, and Southern. But he was damn good at his job. If you could tolerate the bad jokes.
Phin had been a little more difficult. He came with a criminal record and PTSD. Irving hadn’t been keen. Gabriel had pulled his one and only favor with the man.
So, dubious or not, there was no one he’d rather have by his side.
No one had asked them to be here. Irving had told him there would be no help.
The government, if they still had one, was in shambles.
The White House was a smoldering ruin, and no one knew if the President was even alive.
The National Guard was operating based on their training and the desire to protect civilians, but the chain of command was limited to whichever field command was on the ground.
They needed to get some form of communication up. If they could communicate with the various pockets of resistance, they might be able to set up a coordinated defense.
“Where are they evacuating? Ft. Detrick?” Phin asked.
“Ft. Detrick is gone,” Gabriel said, trying not to think of the enormity of his words. “So is Andrews and the Naval base. They’ve hit all large military strongholds. As of a few hours ago, the official evacuation was north, towards Bethesda.”
That was hours ago. No one knew what the situation on the ground looked like.
After the first wave of attacks, the official evacuation went out the window.
It became a mad scramble. Last he checked, the National Guard had been splintered across the city, desperately trying to keep the attack towards downtown and away from the suburban neighborhoods.
Gabriel never expected to be having this conversation. Not just because of the whole ‘alien’ thing, but he never imagined he would be discussing an attack on his home soil. He remembered the pain of 911. Of seeing all those people in desperate need of help and being unable to do anything about it.
Against his parents’ wishes, he joined the Army the moment he turned eighteen.
Starting at the bottom, he worked his way up to Delta Force.
Gabriel’s late twenties were spent under a bushy beard, working, and living in countries he had never heard of.
Completely black ops, he knew if he died there would be no one claiming his body. He would never make it home.
Which was fine by him. He had something to prove.
He had been stationed in the Middle East shortly after Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell was repealed.
Phin told him not to. Begged him not to come out, but Gabriel did it anyway.
It had to start with someone, and he was strong enough to pave the way.
The abuse was bad. But Gabriel proved just how capable a homosexual man could be when he put on his uniform every day.
He let his work speak for itself, and by the time he retired, he had the career to prove it.
Gay or not, he left the Army with the respect of his fellow soldiers.
Judd wiped the back of his hand, staring at the front of the helo where their pilot was expertly navigating through the darkness.
“So what? The Enterprise belched out a bunch of fucking orcs to take over DC?” His Southern accent got thicker when he was emotional, and right now, Judd sounded like he was ready to boot scoot boogie with his tactical boots.
Phin glared at him. “You don’t even know how fucking stupid you sound, man.”
Judd was about to rise to the insult when Gabriel lifted a hand. “It was cloudy, but reports said there was an unidentified flying object—”
“UFO,” Judd said, his lips curling into a shit eating grin.
Gabriel clenched his teeth. “Yes, a UFO, floating just across the river from the Pentagon. People thought it was a low-flying aircraft or a weather balloon.”
“It’s always a weather balloon,” Judd muttered.
Gabriel continued going over the map. As he took in the cross streets and narrow alleys, he realized just how inadequate their force was. Irving had no idea if other private companies were sending in reinforcements or if a pocket of their military was still functioning and able to mobilize.
Gabriel and his men might be the only cavalry they were going to get.
The pilot called that they were getting ready to hit the drop zone. Gabriel stood up.
“Listen up,” he said over the comms as his men got ready. “We’re more than likely outmanned, outgunned, and going up against an enemy who thinks we’re no better than the gum on the bottom of their shoe.”
The sun finally peeked over the horizon, and they caught their first glimpse of the city.
Flames licked the sky, smoke billowed, and ash clouded the air. Occasionally, the sun broke through, casting a glow like a dimmed spotlight on the destruction below.
“Now, I don’t know what the enemy looks like. I don’t know why they’re here, and I don’t give a damn. We are the last line of defense, and by god, we’re going to make it count. If they came here to conquer, then we’re going to show them they have a fight on their hands.”
Judd and Phin lifted their fists, bellowing cheers. Gabriel hoped their adrenaline would be enough to carry them.
“Protect the innocent. Honor the sacrifice. Avenge the fallen.”
Phin stood, sliding his massive gun over his shoulder. “I just hope there’s enough fuckers for all of us.”
Gabriel didn’t think that would be a problem.