Arnquist's soldiers had retreated in the general direction of the Achilles fire base, and Arnquist had just personally arrived at the perimeter of the firebase. He didn't like what he saw.
The firebase, though being valiantly defended, had been built next to a hill rather than on top. Arnquist would have murdered the CO of this base if he hadn't already been killed in one of the earlier attacks. At present, the highest ranking officer at the fire base was a Lieutenant that was doubling as a corpman at the medical tent.
Arnquist and his 11 man escort were allowed to enter Achilles through a gate that had been made in the cyclone fencing that surrounded the camp. He arrived at the comms center and overheard a sergeant trying to call in an airstrike.
"Sergeant," Arnquist hollered.
The sergeant promptly snapped to attention, "Yes sir?"
"What is the status of your communications, and what is the status of this base?"
"Sir, I have been able to send in a request for airstrikes along our perimeter and isolated pockets in the forest. This is the first time our radios have worked all day, and I believe that they are about to go down again.
As for our base, we are at half capacity, 2 of our artillery batteries are down, and a third of our mortar tubes were destroyed when a round tripped off in one of the tubes. On the plus side, we haven't been attacked in at least an hour."
"How long will it take for the bombers to fly in if the airstrikes are ordered?"
"25 minutes si-," the sergeant was suddenly stopped as an alarm went off along with weapons fire and the thunking sound of mortars being fired and the sound of artillery being used. A private ran into the tent and reported that Achilles was being attacked on all sides.
"Sergeant, call in the airstrikes."
----------------------- 26 minutes later -------------------------
The first of the bombs had fallen, lighting up the area with the warm glow of a napalm fire burning 35 meters outside of the cyclone fencing. Only 9 more of Arnquists soldiers had shown up, and it was reported by these 9 that the others had probably been captured and transformed.
By now, only 16 soldiers remained alive - the sergeant, and 15 of Achilles' original defenders. Arnquist had been killed by a grenade that had been thrown by one of the werewolf creatures. The sergeant was coordinating the airstrikes while the other 15 people defended the bunker that they had all been forced into. They knew that they were dead, but they would not give up without a violent fight. This had been proven 5 minutes prior to the bombings.
A wolf creature had charged the bunker as the 16 men and women were retreating into it, and had actually gotten inside. The defenders couldn't shoot it for fear of missing and having the bullets ricochet inside of the confined space. One woman pulled out her bayonet and stabbed the creature to death while one other soldier used the butt of his rifle to bludgeon the creature to death.
The defenders had ample ammunition, having pulled it off of the bodies of fallen comrades as they retreated, and using M-16's and M-4 carbines, the defenders were picking off the werewolves as they advanced, but there were just too many of them. The bombers had all dropped their ordnance and would be returning to the airfield. It would be 50 minutes before they could return, and return they did. The airstrikes lasted for roughly 20 hours, and then the defenders began to run low on ammunition.
They 16 men and women discussed what to do while still shooting, and they reached an agreement - die as heroes. So the sergeant gave the bombers the final coordinates for the last of the bombers - a 1,500 pound bomb was to be dropped onto the bunker in 60 seconds.
The sergeant locked the door to the bunker as they soldiers stopped firing. They all sat down in a circle, and they could hear the werewolves pounding on the metal door, and they could see them through the fire holes in the bunker.
From the air, the captain that was flying one of the F-18's reported that she could see werewolves of all colors all over the last bunker, just swarming around it, hundreds if not a thousand of them. The pilot of the B-2 bomber flying high over head reached his destination on time, and gave the order to push the bomb from the back of the aircraft.
It hit the bunker dead center, and the bomb obliterated everything, creating a 50 foot crater. The entire fire base was blown away, and the hill had been partially collapsed by the blast. Dust and debris blocked the pilots' views of the blast scene, but they were certain that there was nothing left, at least not here.
The men and women of firebase Achilles had died heroes deaths. They had died as humans.
Unfortunately however, this is not the end of the story, for the town that once supplied the former humans still stood tall, and still housed many of the werewolves. And the long black clouds above were still spreading across the nation.
Then, as everyone had been expecting, the rain finally began to fall on the town near Wolf Lake.
Across the nation, people began to hear strange cries and howls, and terrible things began to happen. The world was going to become a different place, and these changes were happening now.