The Tactical Black Caiman

I quickly told them to follow me and hide behind a large rock nearby. Since it was also located on a more elevated ground, I found out that we could scout the whole field thanks to a better view from there. When we finally reached the elevated ground and covered behind the rock, I explained about what I had realized just earlier to the two of them.

I first began by asking them if they knew full well if the ashes that kept on falling on us should naturally fall to the ground if nothing was blocking them. They both nodded, and therefore I immediately continued to my second point, which was about a reduction in vision for not only humans, but also naturally for many kinds of living things whenever dusts-like things are falling from above them. They also agreed upon that explanation, and I quickly proceeded to my third point, which was also one of the main reasons for what I had thought in mind.

I asked them if they somehow felt a sudden increase in temperature around them, to which they said that they had been feeling it right when we arrived just in front of the sugarcane field. Just then, Jessica looked like she had just reminded about something and immediately mentioned that volcanic ashes would not tend to be hot if they were far away from the volcano, but the closer they were to the volcano, the hotter they would be. Since we were technically pretty close to the volcano, it would be absolutely natural for us to feel significantly hotter than before.

It did felt like we were standing right in front of a metal furnace, and I also took a rough guess that the temperature around us was no less than three hundred and twenty kelvins, obviously a concerning temperature but nevertheless it also provided us with few advantages. I continued by explaining to them that back in Chicago three years earlier, the aliens released some sort of a mist which had functions still yet to be known to us, but was most likely for thermal detection.

I noticed that Both Billy and Jessica began to show their confused expression, and so I told them that if the current aliens also detect other earthly living things by using the same thermal detection method, it would actually be advantageous to us since the volcanic ashes would most likely disrupt their readings. With that in mind, we would be able to move more freely as long as we could keep down the noises while we were moving.

There was however, another thing that we had to keep in our mind as well. I immediately pointed them towards the northwestern part of the sugarcane field, and told them that if they took a closer look, they would be able to see that something seemed to be blocking some of the ashes from falling down to the ground below them. They were both surprised when they found out about a few while later that there were indeed a few small piles of ashes that for some reason, strangely seemed to form in the middle of the air.

I quickly made them recall that the Beetle Hovering Object had the ability to go full stealth, however right before we realized upon the limitation of that ability, we seemed to have missed the fact that essentially, a stealth camouflage would only hide the object from others' sight and not to make the object completely gone to thin air. What we had just seen on that section of the sugarcane field, was actually the real life explanation upon that concept.

Therefore, I told them that once we could carefully pinpoint similar strange occurrences, added with the more limited vision of the aliens, we would be able to know where we should be going in order to not be detected by them. It would also be the easier for us, since the similar wind from back on the meadow was also blowing, which could provide us a safer movement in the middle of the sugarcane field by disguising our movement through the plants rustling caused by the wind blow.

"Are you saying that we can now evade them and be on our way to the mountain more easily?" Jessica then asked me.

"Kayaknya… dia justru mau make kesempatan ini buat nyerang balik, Jess.." Billy responded to her, saying that I might be instead seeing the current opportunity to make a counter attack.

I suppose that Billy had realized upon the main point of my idea. I told the both of them that I speculated the aliens had been wearing some sort of a mask to cover their faces from the hazardous volcanic ashes, which actually did not put them in much advantage anyway. Assuming that the mask would also provide them with some sort of an enhanced thermal detection function as well, it would not have worked that good either since everything around them were all practically hot.

That being said, they would have to risk themselves getting exposed to the hazards of the ashes were they to release their masks. In the end, the aliens had actually put on their masks, if any, because they had no choice from the start. I was actually concerned as to how long the three of us could stay inside the same hazardous zone without any protection at all, especially considering that our physical traits would definitely be significantly more inferior compared to the aliens. Nevertheless, I shrugged that concern for now since I believed that there would be no other opportunity to make the counter attack.

I then continued to my fourth point, which would be the peak and most crucial part of my counter attack plan. I told the two of them that we were to slowly approach the Beetle Hovering Object, and only moved closer to it whenever the wind blew. Since I had assumed earlier that the object's vision would not be hindered by the volcanic ashes, the first thing that we need to do would be to get away as far as possible from its range of vision. Then, as we had gone to the side or the back of the object, we would slowly get nearer to it until it is right in front us.

From then on, things would take an extremely dangerous turn – we would try to destroy the extruded wheel fender-like parts on both of its sides that seemingly had the function to make the object hover, in order to take away its hovering ability. Jessica immediately asked me how I would do it, but Billy answered her that I would most likely use my two dynamites that we had obtained back from the abandoned mine station and was exactly what I was about to say.

"But Travis…" Billy continued, "To be honest, I have a high doubt that two dynamites will be enough to destroy those parts."

"I have my doubts as well, but I have another alternative if it does not work…" I responded to him as I nodded to his words of concern.

I first asked them if they remembered that back when we had arrived near the crater and witnessed with our own eyes how the Beetle Hovering Object had removed its stealth camouflage, to which they said they did. I then told them that on the rear hatch of the object there were also three aliens, each stationed on a mounted machine gun-like weapon.

Those mounted weapons had barrels quite similar to the ones on the aliens' beam rifle back in Chicago three years earlier. Therefore, I supposed that if it did not work, we could aim for those barrels instead and destroy the object from its rear side, at least partially. The thing that concerned me was, if we indeed had to shoot the barrels because the dynamites' firepower were not enough to destroy, or at least seriously damage the wheel fenders, then we would definitely have an extremely hard time aiming at them just by using our submachine guns since the barrels were all thinner and smaller.

Another thing that occurred in my mind was how close we could get to the wheel fenders before it became too close and ended up in harming us. I instantly remembered on how the stone had been broken to pieces back in the first jungle when we had first witnessed the presence of the object. Since the communication line between me and Commodore Quentin had been completely cut off, I had no idea at all as to how big the power and/or the force that came out from each of the wheel fenders that enabled the whole object to hover like that.

Since there was no other choice, I said to the both of them that we would use the dynamites against it by first lighting it up and waited for a few moments before it was about to explode and quickly threw to the wheel fenders. That way, we could still be at some few distances away from the dangerous wheel fenders and still be able to put a serious damage to them, well hopefully.

"And if that does not work?" Jessica asked me again, with face full of concerns.

"As I said before…" I answered her and sighed, "This idea of mine is extremely risky…"

The three of us then fell silent for a short while, not sure on what to respond again anymore. For me, I had actually also thought that if we were to opt to evade the aliens on the sugarcane field and just to proceed back to the mountain, it could become a problem to us once they decided to go back to their teammates on the crater later on, and making all three of us more difficult to move further up to the mountain as a result.

On the other hand, if we indeed were to attack the hovering object, and also inevitably the aliens too on the sugarcane field, there would also be a possibility that they called an emergency backup by sending one of the hovering objects on the crater to the sugarcane field, and I really doubted that we would have enough firepower, if any to also counter their backup team by the time they arrived.

That being said, I wondered why some of the aliens had decided to stay on the sugarcane field instead of helping their teammates to dig out the meteorite that they had been looking for since thousands of years ago. There would be absolutely no reason for them to wander around on the field in front of us, unless they were somehow planning to harvest all of the sugarcanes there for their own food supplies. As far as I had noticed however, I had not seen even a single of those aliens equipped with another variant of their tools aside from their beam spears and unusually large drills.

The only unpredictable factor on our current situation was none other than the volcanic ashes. As far as it had currently gone, the volume of the ashes that was being spewed out by the volcano seemed to be as stagnant as it currently was. However, a matter on how intense it could get sooner or later was completely beyond our knowledge. It might be different if Billy could contact his Commander General to receive more updated information, but it was indeed such a shame since that was not the case at the moment.

"Looks like no matter what we choose, all of the possible consequences are nonetheless deadly dangerous, is not it?" Billy said as he looked straight to my eyes.

"Well, I suppose that if you look at it that way, in the end whatever we decided to do from here on out will be extremely risky, if not also deadly…" I said to him as I looked towards Jessica.

"Gimana, Bill?" she asked him for his decision.

"We will do the counter attack." he finally said after he went silent again for a moment. "We have no other choice."

The unanimous decision had been called, and the three of us proceeded to first check out all of our equipment before proceeding further into initiating the plan. Both Billy and I first checked our submachine guns and how many magazines we had left at the moment while Jessica reloaded a couple of rounds into her shotgun. After that, I proceeded to give Billy one of my two dynamites before I decided to shorten the fuse of the one on my hand by biting it, so that it would explode faster once it had been lighted.

When all preparations had been finished, I told them the fifth and the last point on my plan that I had yet to tell them earlier, which was regarding how we would go away from the sugarcane field once the hovering object hopefully had been severely damaged or destroyed, and some numbers of the aliens had been wiped out due to its destruction. That being said, actually even if we failed on the previous step we would have to go away from the sugarcane field immediately in the first place.

Unlike most of our previous journey where either Billy or me being in charge of the line, it would be Jessica instead to lead. The reason was none other than to immediately blast away any alien that could suddenly emerged right in front of us. She was completely surprised upon hearing it, but I convinced her through my further explanation.

I first mentioned what she had just told us earlier, that the closer we got to the volcano, the hotter it would be. When she nodded, I asked again if that would also mean the increase of volcano ashes volume as we were getting closer to the volcano. Again, she confirmed it to be correct. I continued by saying that since it would mean that the thermal detection of the aliens would also be less accurate than it already was, we would not need to be as sneaky as we would have been on the sugarcane field.

However, that would not also mean that the aliens would be completely blind for they would definitely still be able to see what was right in front of them but just within a shorter distance than before. By then, we would most likely be rushing away from the sugarcane field because of the explosions that we had made there would attract the attentions of the other aliens around the crater.

We had to assume that at least some of them there would go rushing towards the sugarcane field, but in a rather disorganized manner that they would practically become scattered away in the process. As a result, it would be inevitable for us if we eventually came across against few of them all of a sudden in the middle of our getaway, and when that actually happened we would need a devastating firepower that could take them down almost immediately, if not instantly. At the very moment, the only one who possessed such firepower was none other than Jessica.

"Wait a minute…" she said, in full hesitation. "I am not the one possessing that kind of firepower, it is my shotgun…"

"Exactly, and you can use it with a good proficiency, especially as a civilian…" I told her, trying to convince her as well.

"Jess… gue ga terbiasa pake shotgun jenis lever action…" Billy said to her, also trying to convince her by saying that he was not used to lever action shotguns. "Selama pelatihan kopassus dulu ga pernah ada pelatihan khusus penggunaan shotgun lever action, dan sekarang ini lagi genting…"

She fell silent, but eventually agreed upon it, and I somehow could sense a good relief within Billy right after she said yes. With everything had then become clear and confirmed, I told the two of them that we would wait until the next wind to blow again before we would initiate our counter attack. We waited for around ten minutes before the strong wind blew again. I then signaled the both of them that we should make our move right away, officially beginning our plan of counter attack.

"Now!" I told the both of them quickly in a low voice as we began to go down from the higher surface and crawl along the sugarcane field.

Sweat had then drenched my back and neck completely as we began to carefully traverse along the ground on the sugarcane field. I had noticed earlier that the head part of the hovering object apparently overlooking towards the southeast direction of the field based on the fait sight upon an unusual floating pile of ashes in the air, which was actually a rather good thing for us since it did not directly faced towards our direction on the south. We made a full stop when the wind no longer blew, and the distance between us and the object was still pretty far away.

It might be a little bit of a hindrance since we must first determine which direction the object was facing to whenever the wind blew again in order to make sure that it did not directly face us, for it would most likely still be able to detect our presence if it did. Thankfully, the hovering object seemed to still be facing to the exact same direction when the wind blew hard again for the second time, however at that time, another obstacle suddenly emerged before us.

It was one of the aliens, suddenly approaching towards our direction but obviously completely oblivious towards our presence since it did not show any signs of alert. I had first intended to just let it go pass through right in front of us, but Billy urged me to take it down instead while they still had their trouble with their own thermal detector.

Since it would also indeed prove to be a little easier for us later on, I let him aimed at the alien as it moved right in front of us before he then fired a few shots towards the back of its head, taking it down very quickly after that. Thanks to the sugarcane rustling sounds due to the strong blow of the wind, the thudding sound created when it fell down became very faint to be heard.

The wind no longer blew, but at least one minor threat had also been removed without any imminent problem and with the current situation, I was also pretty sure that it would take some time before another alien would come again and possibly noticed the dead body. The fourth wind however, did not seem that it would blow for some time either forcing us to just stay and absolutely not moving at all. I did not know how long it had been until I began to feel a little bit of an itch on the back of my neck when suddenly the third wind blew again.

At that moment, the hovering object seemed to have changed its position a bit, and had then facing almost entirely to the east. We then continued to proceed to the back of the object and as we continued to crawl, the sight of the floating pile of ashes slowly became more vivid. Unfortunately, the third wind blew for a shorter time compared to the first and second ones, and thus right after we had to stop moving again.

As we were waiting for the fourth wind, another thing came to my mind. If there were indeed three aliens on the rear hatch just like it had been for the hovering objects back on the crater, would not that also mean that they could see us through without problem? Or would it be just for the head part of the object? Would they also benefit from the object's stealth camouflage? The only way to know the answer to the questions would be to test it out ourselves right away, which would mean that it would be one massive gamble.

I had to admit that I was seriously anxious and nervous as we approached the hovering object closer again when the fourth wind finally blew. But to the least of my expectation, we could then see rather clearly that there were indeed three aliens each standing on a very familiar mounted auto-beam. Since the auto-beams could also be seen, I assumed that the hovering objects did not have them installed initially back when it had been completely manufactured. By the time the fourth wind stopped blowing, we must have been less than sixty feet apart from the hovering object.

Another similar obstacle then approached us again not too long after the wind had no longer blowing. It was not just one alien, but two instead, and each from a completely opposing direction. The next wind had yet to blow, and therefore we had no choice but to just let them pass through in front of us, however something that I had never thought of happened.

It was the sight of those aliens collided upon each other, as if one had not seen the other right in front of it right from the start. I must hold myself from laughing for a moment since I saw it as something so foolish for such creatures. I also knew full well that both Billy and Jessica must have also seen that, and I could only imagine how they would react to it.

Then, as if nothing had happened, the aliens seemed to communicate with some sort of a sign language through their hands to each other before they then distanced themselves a little bit and proceeded to walk away. All of that strange event happened just roughly five feet right in front of me.

They had become separated quite far from each other by the time the fifth wind blew and thankfully it blew for quite a longer time that we were able to cover the rest of the needed distance before it stopped, even after I had determined that the hovering object seemed to have returned to its initial position. The wind was actually still blowing when I decided that we had to stop just about nine feet away from what I believed to be the most rear part of the hovering object, and so I proceeded to take out my dynamite, although I had to wait for the wind to stop blowing before lighting up the fuse.

Just as the wind was no longer blowing, I turned on Jessica's lighter and as I slowly directed it towards the dynamite while I kept on hoping that I had been making the correct calculation on where the object's wheel fenders were. The dynamite then shortly had its fuse lit up, and since I had shortened it earlier I believed that it would take no more than five seconds before it blew up. I had my hands shaking for two seconds before I then threw the dynamite towards the object, hoping that it would blew right as it touched one of the wheel fenders before I rushed to get some distances away from the blast.

'GA-BOOOM'

The noise made my ears rang for quite some time, and apparently all three of us jumped away from the explosion in reflex. I still could only faintly hear the noises that followed, but as I turned around, apparently our plan to damage the hovering object succeeded. In fact, when I looked at it after three seconds, apparently it worked a little better than what I had expected.

First of all, either it was because of the dynamite's blast or the damage sustained by the wheel fenders, the hovering object seemed to no longer able to activate its stealth camouflage, forcing itself to reveal its whole physical appearance. Then, at least three out four wheel fenders on its right side had been completely destroyed, which could then be clearly seen through the violet-colored flame raging out from all three of them.

The last significant thing that was clearly resulted from the blast was that the hovering object seemed to then seriously have lost its balance, and tilted to the right direction as it slowly attempted to rotate to our direction. Just then, right when I had my hearings back with me again, I noticed that one of the aliens on the rear hatch had already aimed its auto-beam towards me. In an instant, I had my body completely frozen as I had chills run down my spine when I realized that I had been too reckless to not paying attention towards the aliens on the rear hatch.

'Oh crap… I have completely forgotten about them!!!' I thought to myself as I was sure that it was about to shoot at me at any moment.

'THUB THUB THUB THUB THUB THUB'

Then, all of a sudden the barrels exploded and the alien instantly caught fire all across its body as a result right after several suppressed gunshot noises were heard right from my left direction. As the same alien was still burning, I proceeded to aim my submachine gun towards the barrels of the rest of the two remaining auto-beam while at the very same time the aliens right behind the weapons were also aiming towards me. But just as I was about to fire at them, they were all also suddenly blew up by the same gunshot noises.

When I turned around, it had been Billy all along who had provided me cover earlier when I was about to lose my life because of my own recklessness. He only briefly looked towards me before he then swiftly took down a couple more aliens that were rushing towards us as I also managed to fire five rounds to an alien that was fast rushing towards me. As the imminent threat before us had fallen, the hovering object slowly collapsed to the ground, and was no longer able to hover up in the air anymore.

"I owe you, Bill…" I said as I gave out a sigh of relief.

"Change of plans, I will lead us out and back to the mountain." Billy responded as he nodded. "Jess, kalo ga terpaksa, shotgun elu jangan dipake."

"Oke." Jessica nodded as she agreed on not to fire the shotgun unless she really had to.

I was not sure if Billy had just called upon a good decision or not, but I fully realized that we were totally not in a situation to argue with each other. We then rushed towards the northeast direction and headed straight towards where the mountain was, with him on the lead, and no longer concerning about any quiet and silent approach anymore as I could also see him reloading his submachine gun very quickly. The situation upon us had turned for the extreme…