Makary's men moved swiftly. So swiftly, I couldn't help but suspect that they all came from some sort of spec-ops group, intentionally trained for combat within heavily wooded areas untouched by the destructiveness of human presence.
And contrary to the imperial forces that opposed them, they followed war rationale rather than blind discipline.
"Target contact, along the movement axis, two hundred!"
Chris's report continued to fuel the group with necessary intel, something that no army of this world could hope to have at the same level.
"One hundred!"
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Chris's shouts grew fainter the closer the potential enemies got.
A hundred meters also proved to be some sort of margin distance at which Makary's unit stopped and rushed to find cover somewhere nearby.
Some hid behind trees, others sheltered behind bigger rocks, and some simply dug out parts of the undergrowth with a kick of two before laying down directly on the ground.
Chris kneeled down and raised his hand to the level of his shoulders. Then, as he stared down at the screen mounted on his stomach, he brought his hand up, creating a right angle at his joint.
And a few seconds later, he squeezed his hand into a fist before hurriedly lowering his hand back to the trigger of his simple yet deadly machine gun.
"Shall we?" Makary turned his head to look at me and gave me a short yet intense glance.
"Why ask me?" I rebutted.
"We don't exactly know how to tell friend from foe, do we?"
I pressed my lips into a thin line, annoyed by the problem I'd never really encountered in my life before.
"CHARGE!" A distant voice from much deeper into the forest reached my ears, a mere moment before a huge number of uniformly dressed soldiers rushed out ahead... Only to trip and stumble on the corpses of those who went ahead before them.
"Mow them down, would you, Carl?" Chris asked, ceasing his short series and glancing over to the massive punk-like man currently dug into the ground and resting his heavy gun directly on the ground with nothing but two small legs keeping its barrel off the wet undergrowth.
The onslaught of bullets ceased all at once.
The attacking humans took it for a good note, minding not the terrible losses they sustained in the mere few moments since their charge started.
"Should we step in?" Fay asked, looking at how the humans managed to cross the fifty meters mark and started to get pretty damn near Makary's unit.
And as great of weapons as firearms were, in close-quarter combat... It would suffice to say they were vastly inferior to all sorts of arms the enemy forces were armed to the teeth with.
"KILL THEM ALL!"
One of the attacking soldiers shouted, swinging a handy axe high above his head as if he had no other choice but to put on a fake, brave act just to overcome his terror....
Or maybe he hoped that his weapon would get stuck, saving him from the fate of charging at the very front of what was left of his group?
"Hon, should I?" Fay asked again, this time with a clear hint of anxiety in her voice.
"It's fine, lady Fay," Makary replied in my stead, leisurely closing his arms on his chest and leaning to the side, resting his shoulder against a nearby tree. "If that kind of fight was one we could lose..."
We never got to know what would happen if this was the kind of fight modern forces could be defeated in.
Because the very moment Carl was done teasing everyone around, he simply pressed the trigger and created a wall of bullets that nearly instantly shredded all the twenty-or-so charging men within a single instant.
Modern weapons required several bullets to shatter the barriers locals were so readily deploying during fights. But that only applied to small and personal arms.
And when faced with rapid fire from a high-caliber, heavy machine gun...
No barrier could stand, nor would any men hoping to stay safe behind it.