Free Critical Path (The Critical Series Book2) by Wearmouth, Barnes Page A

and humans—far more of the former than the latter.
    The alien bodies were dressed in two distinct styles: those that wore the gray-blue uniforms of the farm-based aliens like Venrick, and then those that wore adapted human dress. Some wore denim while others had suits and track pants and all manner of strangely crafted clothes.
    He’d never seen the croatoans fight among themselves like this, and it was clear from the bodies and the video that this other sect was fighting alongside the humans as one group.
    “I can see the pod landing spot,” Denver said. “In fact, I see two. With the one Khan found, that makes three. That still leaves another three unaccounted for. Venrick, did you see who or what was in the second pod here?”
    With her strange clicking version of English, she said, “No see other pod open.”
    “Where were they taken?” Gregor asked as he looked down onto the scene with his hand over his eyes to shield from the low-raking sun on the east side. “The pods are gone too… they must have taken them as well as Charlie and who or whatever was in the other one.”
    “I… don’t know,” Venrick clicked and warbled, but then she stepped forward and leaned her turtle-like head forward. Squinting her almost-black eyes, large as crab apples, she stretched out her scaled hand and pointed one of her thick fingers. “There… in sky.”
    “What’s that?” Gregor snapped at the alien. “I can’t see anything. What are you playing at?”
    “There!” Venrick clicked again.
    Denver followed the direction of her arm and finger with his riflescope and zoomed in with the dial on the side, compressing the distance and bringing the background closer.
    Above the dark pine green of the tree canopy on the other side of the battleground, he saw faint wisps of smoke curling up into the dawn sky.
    It grew thin as it rose up and mixed with the salmon and orange tones of dawn.
    These days, without the heavy harvesting, the tint was becoming less pronounced as the weeks went by. Although that was clearly a good thing, it also meant less root for Denver… which also meant he needed Gregor, and that sickened him more than anything.
    But perhaps this other group would have stocks if they had a large alien population. The more Denver searched the sky and panned his scopes, the more narrow, swirling columns of smoke he spotted.
    The enemy, the pods… Dad! There must be a settlement of some kind over there.
    “I see it,” Denver said to Gregor. “Smoke columns. About twenty of them. We should be able to get there within the hour if we move now… shit, wait, what’s that?”
    “Hunter,” Venrick said as she stepped back away from the ridge and crouched low to the ground. Gregor and Denver instinctively followed.
    Denver recognized this type: it looked similar to the one that had hunted them in Manhattan and followed them to the town hall.
    For a brief moment he thought it was the same one, but this one wasn’t wounded and was visibly smaller and wearing an adapted set of army fatigues.
    It stepped out of the trees on the far side of the battleground and made its way through the hundreds of bodies, always looking, searching through its visor. It carried a large black rifle very similar to the one Denver carried.
    “How many of them patrol this area?” Denver asked Venrick in hushed tones from his prone position.
    The alien clicked nonsense in return and blinked a look of confusion.
    Holding up his hands and indicating to one finger and then the hunter, he asked again. “More than one?”
    “Don’t know. I… stayed not long.”
    “Great, so we could be surrounded and we wouldn’t even know until it’s too late. What did I say about trusting these damned things?” Gregor said, getting an intense look from Venrick in response.
    “Keep your damned voice down,” Denver whispered. “Here’s the plan. I’ll take out this one; you two flank round through the trees, see if you can spot any other movement.