"Move in, that thing is big. It's goitng to be making noise and we've more cover inside." Jurgen kept his gun on the windows before motioning for those with him to move up to the doorway, hurrying towards the others half crouched, gravel and debris crunching under his boots.
"Can it Doug, take point, rest of you eyes on the reception and surroundings!" Jurgen grunted, sliding up against a wall and motioning for the others to take positions with him or the wall opposite. With how the floors above were exposed by something having smashed through them, they simultaneously had more and less cover. More from the ruins around them, he noticed as he kicked the hand of the fallen colonial militiaman out of the way, and less from the fact that the upper floors were now able to fire down directly.
"Korofi, short bursts. No idea if the armoury's been emptied."
Yet nothing happened yet.
"If that thing is around, it might be looking for any survivors. Let's make sure he doesn't get that chance." He kept his machine gun trained on the approaching rubble of the reception, motioning for the others to keep their eyes elsewhere. Most of this floor was rubble piles, with many of the rooms completely buried behind the collapsing upper floors. It was enough rubble that some of the stairways were not entirely necessary; huge piles of wreckage lay stacked up and almost hill-like, leading to above.
"Vlad, eyes on the upper floors. It was running from us; maybe it's the one that got away or it's a scout."
From the footprints on a few of them, he could tell it was not merely the aliens who had used them.
Human footprints; not necessarily that old, still visible in their shape. Maybe they understood getting to high ground was a necessity.
As Jurgen swept the floor, those watching the upper floors would see but first hear movement. Ambient sounds of flickering lights, sparking wires, and crumbling architecture could have been heard from the outside but inside it was as constant as a distant waterfall or the cries of animals in the wilderness. Yet a series of sounds like footsteps but clackety and scraping immediately cut through the randomized layer of sonic decay. Jurgen was slow to hear it initially but the rest of the team would notice it; a shape large and arthropod like, familiar even, marked with purple blood splotched holes and cracked armor.
Not standing, but creeping like an overlarge earwig on the third floor, much of it cut away and scattered on the bottom gloor, leaving a patchwork rebar frame in a semi-circular shape. Enough of the floor was exposed they could see it skittering away, its weapon hidden but entirely obscured beneath its body as it crawled away from them, further into the building.
Jurgen swept his machine gun up but the blink of time needed to change his focus from potential ground floor hostiles seemed enough for it to have skitter-clattered into some of the upper floor's rooms.
"Shit, we've been made haven't we? Nothing here, that stairway with the red carpet on it - let's keep moving, catch the bastard if we can!"
He'd quickly sprint over, motioning for the others to follow as he skipped every other step, dashing up and panting audibly. Reaching the top, he'd pause for a second, mounting his machine gun over a half-crumpled couch, waiting for any sign of the creature to pop up from the doorway it had escaped to. Yet only the sound of the rotting structure greeted him.
As he looked towards another stairway, this one framed behind a doorway with its doors fallen inwards, the sound of familiar skittering limbs would greet them.
"There's more of them!" He called out, weapon sweeping around, ready to cover his squad.
"Doesn't sound like the big one, must have more of its friends but... they're heading back-"
A third sound; Jurgen almost jumped in his boots. A buzz not from the environment but his com systems - one that would replay over the rest of the group. Garbled, crackled signals and blurring audio, modulating and blurring from pure static incoherence to the vague semblance of a voice. Split between focusing on potential swarming creatures and human contact, Jurgen hesitated for a moment before tossing himself prone, rolling towards cover and uring the others near him.
"That can't have been an accident. That sounded human," He commented, raising his weapon and moving towards the stairs, peering up and finding it intact.
"Anyone got the drone still? We might be able to cannibalize it for signal boosting parts."
