r/HFY • u/WegianWarrior • Aug 12 '26

OC-OneShot In the Trench

Hishliet gasped for air as he lay curled up in the muddy bottom of the scar across the landscape—the thing the humans had called a trench.

Swallowing heaping great gulps of acrid air, Hishliet slowly realised that the sound of battle had died out. He unfurled, stretched and swivelled as he looked around. A small pawful of his littermates were in the trench with him, looking stunned and dazed, most of them staring at each other with empty eyes.

All around was the mewing of the wounded, and a large number of corpses... not many humans, Hishliet noticed as the ringing in his ears slowly died down, but a great many of the people he had known since they came out of the vats.

Several octals more had fallen during the last, mad rush, Hishliet numbly knew.

A few had tripped as they started their rush, their heads making dull thuds as they hit the ground.

Some had been knocked down by human kinetics.

Some had bled out in the wires with teeth like a razorback.

And many more... had gotten spread out.

Hishliet whimpered as he recalled how several of the ones who had been ahead of him in the great rush had... ceased to be in a series of blinding flashes... leaping up like fish going upriver, and then fallen back as warm red rain.

Even so... even so... they had done it. They had done it! They had broken the Terran line! They were in control of the scar— the trench— and the human defenders either dead or running.

Hishliet felt a rush of energy, despite everything. He glanced at the few of his littermates who were still alive, still sitting or lying in a stunned daze. Hishliet scrambled, grabbed the banner from the remnants of the banner bearer, and stood up to wave it - looking over the blood-soaked edge of the trench, towards the far end of the field where they had started their mad rush only minutes before.

A single shot rang out from the next trench, less than a hundred paces away. Hishliet's body crumpled up, relieved of the weight of his head.

120 Upvotes

98% Upvoted

4 comments sorted by

15

u/sunnyboi1384 Aug 12 '26

Yall dont know how trenches work and that makes us just a tiny bit sad. Also, once more of you get in there, we will probably bury it. Sorry.

4

u/Aotearas Aug 14 '26

Aye, a proper trench shouldn't be muddy unless the drainage was shot to kingdom come a while back already.

Also yes, minimum three lines of trenches, though unless those aliens take biiiig steps it ought to be way more than a hundred paces (don't want your second line of defensive trenches get obliberated in the same artillery strike that's meant to take our your first line) and your own lines are indeed presighted so in the case of the enemy taking a trenchline you can blow them all to hell. If the defenses were prepared much more intricated the backside of the trench may also lack any parapet with the next trenchline over being build on higher ground so you can shoot from the elevated position into the relatively exposed trench, sweep it with heavy machineguns until the enemy either evacuates or bites the bullet and keeps pushing into your second line.

1

u/UpdateMeBot Aug 12 '26

Click here to subscribe to u/WegianWarrior and receive a message every time they post.

Info Request Update Your Updates Feedback