fought a scream, dove to the side of the bunker behind slight cover as blaz - ing heat washed over her back and her lungs gasped for air as she buried her face. She coughed and sputtered, her body feeling intense heat after-effects, and heard crashing sounds like something very heavy moved past. A stutter of some kind of small arms fire from her comrades, then a BLAWWP-BLAWWP followed by an acrid stench. Whoever fired at the “spider” howled in agony -- she popped up to see a com- rade stumbling with massive fist-sized holes in their torso, right through the gel armor which was backlight by the waning flare in a surreal display of raw power, her brain struggled to register – it was beyond belief. She crawled to get inside the pathetic log bunker, her thoughts fixed on safety. As she did so, she thought only of herself and hid like a child under a flimsy table, even when she knew the bunker could not stop whatever just rampaged outside. Then suddenly quiet – after a long pause she crawled to glance outside, felt her body throbbing in pain, saw someone whimpering, missing a limb like something very hot lopped off his left arm above the elbow but simultane- ously cauterized it leaving little blood, just scorch marks. Mildred: [rattled] Where – where did it go! [forceful even while her voice sounded weak] Report! Staff Orderly: [looks up towards her, face etched in pain] In – in – into the sea, the sea… Mildred stumbled towards the beach, using her red-lensed torch to sweep until she found the faint marks where an object literally walked then rolled into the waves apparently. She just stood there – astonished. Whatever this was, it was generations ahead of anything they had. She was no scientist but had never seen or heard of anything like this before. She stood there a long moment until she regained her composure and felt deep fear as uncontrolled chills ran down her body, causing her to convulse and dry heave. She fell to her knees, took a big gulp of isotonic from her drinking tube attached to the gel armor suit reservoir until the moment of weakness passed. She composed herself and tried to seem like a leader instead of a terrified child who had seen something utterly abominable which her young brain could not com - prehend. Once they took stock of the situation, she dictated a shaky report to
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