Operation Orion - Kevin Dockery [82]
Sanders already had his second grenade loaded and sent it after the first before starting down the corridor at a sprint. The sailors charged behind, Roberts matching him stride for stride with the laser rifle held at the ready. They came around the corner to see that two of the Eluoi were down, killed by the blasts, while the third was stunned, struggling to climb to his feet. The officer opened up with his automatic carbine, and Roberts added a sizzling bolt from the electrical weapon.
The stunned Eluoi never made it off the floor.
“Good job, men,” Sanders said with sincere gratitude.
He went to one of the slain Eluoi and tore the bloodstained uniform tunic off the man. Then he made his way back down the hallway through the lowest level of the installation and started looking through some of the lockers in the passageway outside the door of the yetis’ cell. He was soon rewarded by the discovery of several communications devices, including comlinks, radio sets, and some of the small in-ear translators all the SEALS were wearing. Most intriguing were some larger, headphonelike devices. Holding one up to his helmet, he saw that it was far too wide for any human-size skull.
“Bingo,” he muttered, taking several of the devices and going to the locked door to the imprisoned yetis’ cell. The latch was a simple mechanical switch. Glancing through the small window, he saw that the prisoners were still sitting around listlessly; one or two looked up at him with an aura of apathy.
Still, he wasn’t sure that he wanted to open the door to a room holding twenty prisoners, each of whom weighed at least three or four times as much as he did and was a good meter taller. He looked at the window closely and saw that the plastic plate could be swiveled free, opening a small hole covered by a grid of sturdy steel bars into the prison cell.
He released the latch and casually tossed the three Eluoi headsets they’d found into the cell. The yetis blinked in surprise, and several growled, baring those long, curved fangs. One, however, regarded him with something like curiosity.
“Pick it up,” Sanders said, gesturing to the headset. “I’d like to talk to you.”
Suspiciously, the shaggy creature reached down to hoist the device in his powerful claw-tipped fingers. He was clearly familiar with it and slipped it smoothly over his head so that the padded earpieces covered his furry, ursine ears.
“Can you understand me?” the lieutenant asked.
The creature blinked in surprise, then uttered a guttural grunt. Sanders’s translator crackled, turning the grunt into a word: “Yes.” Obviously, the Eluoi had deciphered their alien language and programmed it into their translators.
“Who are you?”
“We are Kyne-Ursa,” the creature growled; again, the translator changed the animalistic sounds into English. “Who are you?”
“We are humans,” Sanders replied. “Enemies of the Eluoi.” He tossed the bloodied uniform tunic into the cell. “We killed them.”
The shred of clothing provoked a host of woofs and growls as the prisoners rose from their benches, moving forward to gather around the bloody rag. The one who had spoken raised it in his nimble paw, sniffed it, then passed it to his comrades as he looked at the young officer with an unreadable expression.
“Eluoi killed us,” the yeti said.
“They locked you in here?” the human asked.
“Yes,” the Ursa replied. “Angry we did not kill you…humans.”
“We humans are hard to kill,” Sanders noted. “You’re not the first to try and fail.”
“Now Eluoi will kill us,” the creature said glumly.
“Actually, there are not too many of these Eluoi left,” the SEALS officer replied. “They are our enemies, and we killed many of them. We destroyed their tanks and took this place away from them.”
The big creature looked at him with