Our War, Their War

Like something out of the most terrifying zombie movie, the grayish-brown horde roared like a raging tide, each wave higher than the last.

Hundreds, thousands, tens of thousands of Infested Terrans writhed forward in bodies riddled with wounds, like black clouds racing across the ground. They looked like a vast mass of crudely stitched-together puppets, with crooked noses and slanted eyes, dislocated joints, malformed limbs, and monstrous heads—creatures that had just crawled out of hell.

The sight inevitably reminded Andre of the monstrous waves on Santori, raised by its three moons. Layer upon layer of pitch-black waves, like rows of two-hundred-foot-tall buildings falling from the sky, crashed earth-shakingly onto the beach. They had scared the living daylights out of him, a landlubber raised on Chau Sara.

The giant waves of Santori could easily smash a three-story cruise ship to pieces. Andre did not know whether their position could hold out longer than those ships.

Andre had dealt with these monsters before.

Infested Terrans had once merely been shambling corpses, staggering about like drunkards. The surging tide of the dead always moved slowly, giving people plenty of time to react.

But the Infested Terrans on Chazington were both strong and agile. They could even leap from a distance to pounce and bite. Far from being slow, they were more terrifying than the Kalar Beasts of Kalis, which were accustomed to scaling cliffs and sheer rock faces.

If an ordinary tide of corpses was like scattered little waves spreading across a beach—slow and gentle—then those on Chazington were world-ending tidal waves, arriving in an instant and determined to sweep away everything.

Andre realized he was futilely firing at the Infested Terrans pouring toward him like a human tide, trying to stop a giant wave with bullets.

This war was endlessly tedious. They