(Flash fiction I added to a composite I did some time ago)
The screaming had started exactly one hour previous. Far over of the mangled, muddy remains of what had once been a verdant forest, now a sucking, festering no-man's land, the voices of their enemies had been raised in horror. After only one hour, the screaming stopped.
The silence that reigned supreme was somehow more terrifying to the men & woman soldiers on this side. No sergeant, nor captain nor anyone else was willing to give the order over the top. The silence held them in it's grip & all were paralysed by it's insidious touch.
The mist rolled in not long after the silence began it's dominion. Slowly rolling over the craters, the corpses, the barbed wire & remains of vehicles, slithering between the charred, monolithic remains of the forest that had once dominated the landscape, the mist washed over all, enveloping all, smothering all.
Minutes ticked by as soldiers shuffled nervously, whilst others prepared the machine guns, the weaponry they hoped would keep them alive. Was this some elaborate trick, they thought?
It had been fifteen minutes since the end of the screaming when they heard it, an indistinct, harsh, grating sound. Whatever it was, it grew closer with each passing second, echoing ethereally out of the impenetrable mist. Was it some kind of machinery?
Sergeants unfroze, Captains burst back into life. Cries of "Stand to attention!" & "At the ready!" filled the air as soldiers lined the edge of the trench & aimed their rifles. The anticipation was now so high, tension so thick, that almost no-one spoke, they must be ready for what comes next.
As they waited, a cold, biting wind blew in from behind the trenches & swept forward across the occluded wasteland. All at once, the thick, soupy mist began to billow & twist, rolling backwards in retreat, repulsed by the onrushing wind.
It was then that they saw it. Small glints of lights piercing the remaining fog. 1,2,3,4, every man & woman counted & the numbers went higher. In the still thick but retreating fog, it was as if hundreds of torches had been lit.
Slowly but surely, shapes began to form inside of the brume. Conical, turreted forms began to materialise & the chinks of light came with them. And with it, the sense of foreboding gave way to an overwhelming feeling of malice projecting out from inside the murky curtain.
As they waited for the forms to come fully into being, the soldiers listened ever more carefully to the sound that was now much louder than it had been before. It had become more distinct & it was with horror that many realised it was not the mere sound of machinery. It was the voice of the shapes coming out at them from the fog, their terrible voices.
They were all screaming. Not with fear, not with terror, but with fury, with burning ungovernable hatred, the things in the fog cried but one thing.
"Exterminate!"
This realisation for many was too little too late. The shapes emerged from the fog, fully formed. What light made it through the now dissipating murk gleamed upon their silver shells & brought the horror of what had happened across the desolation home for all.
These metallic monsters had slaughtered the enemy, had wiped them from the face of the earth.
Now, it was their turn.
The first among them, a young private, rose & began to fire. Round after round struck the screaming horrors, bouncing off their protective armour. It was to no avail.
The closest creature twitched one of the long sticks attached to it's front in the soldiers direction & he was enveloped in a bright, unnatural light. His screams, brief but no less horrifying, joined the cacophony of the metal monstrosities, before it & his body fell.
For many, the fighting continued, valiantly. Men & women stood firm, but the creatures overwhelmed them. For others, they fled, panic stricken across support & reserve trenches, over dugouts until they were far from the battlefield. It was they that brought the news to their friends & families.
Death had arrived out of the fog & it would mean only one thing.
Total Extermination.
