xcom
Sunday, December 7th, 2008
by alphaxion
With squad morale at quite a low following Stuart’s death and visible signs of fatigue setting in, we’re told they’re giving us a couple of weeks off – unless a terror mission turns up – to relax, catch up on sleep and generally take our minds off the battlefield while they leave downed subs and prep the B team.
A few days pass by when tension increases following confirmation of an alien base location and get our own buzzed by quite a large craft. Thankfully it buggers off without attacking, we certainly can’t defend against them right now and we’re not ready for them knowing our location just yet.
About a week and a half into the much needed break it predictably gets cut short by a shipping attack.
No rest for the wicked. It’s only a week and I feel so rusty getting combat ready.
The Triton lands on the ship decking and we send the tank out – this is our first time battling them on a ship.
This is taking ages to track down the enemy, thankfully it’s our old friends the gillmen as I don’t think we could take hunting down lobsters in this tin can, full of twisting corridors and dark corners it’s paranoia inducing - Doesn’t help when one of the guys throws a corpse from an upper floor onto the path of some poor sod below. A few rounds and some choice words quickly follow, the radios crackle with giggles and suggestions of a “fresh pants” request. Cruel bastards at times, I just hope he was in view of some CCTV as that footage would be pure gold.
After snuffing out the last one and securing the top decks I’m told we have to make sure the lower decks are secure too – the guys aren’t pleased.
At least these are somewhat open compared to the maze updeck. One is spotted on a gantry above, it takes a few zinging shots before one lands and drops it.
Doesn’t take much longer for us to discover what seems like a party on the lift, must have been about 5 of them just hanging around talking about Zooblarts latest centre fold or whatever passes for their conversation pieces. Of course we spoil the get together by blasting the shit out of them.
It takes a couple of hours until we track down the final one hiding in a cupboard; I hope we don’t have many more of those missions.
Time to get back to the barn and finish off our break.
Slumping onto my bunk, I crack open the latest news from RnD – the folder is kinda thick this time.
Propulsion news
Interrogation results
Then my jaw hits the floor and a swift streak, stark bollock naked across the base ensues with plenty of whooping and hollering.
Bemused by my response Melanie picks up the papers and lets out a blast of joy too – sadly not followed by joining me in a naturists jaunt around the base.
Monday, November 17th, 2008
by alphaxion
At least we now have a boost in fire power, sadly they’ve all upgraded to these damn BFG’s.
Can’t we ever get a break?
Seems our ‘cuda pilots aren’t having much luck either.. a few scrapes with a number of big craft almost always end up with our guys having to turn tails and run.
That’s a damn big one, there’s gotta be something more going on. Whenever I press about them all the command staff get sheepish. Anyway, I’m too tired for this shit right now.
The whole squad appears to be shattered, thankfully we get a few days break from the action to sleep, sleep and more sleep.
5 days of restful bliss and we’re back to the grind…
The back of my mind is trembling at the thought of this being the lobstermen - they’re bad enough with a small team, a full on terror mission would be worse than the finest horror Mr King could dream of.
As we set up initial pointp; Melanie spots something in the shadows.
The silhouette looks depressingly familiar, don’t let me be right. Oh please please please please….
Oh crap.
“We’ve kicked their arses before, we’ll kick them again.. lets remind them why humans aren’t going down without a fight!” I yell out, picking up the cue Melanie and a couple others unleash a few volleys into the creep. They seem even more resistant to our fire, that or the guns just aren’t as effective on land.
Just as team confidence begins to rise, it takes a dip as the cry of “What the fuck is THAT?!” rings out.
A brain in a mini UFO? That’s just creepy. Of course, Gung-ho Greer lets out her soon to be trade mark battle cry “Twat it!” and lobs a grenade over the skip.
“What the hell” I think to myself and chuck one over. Lets see what these things are made of.
It takes a couple more blasta rounds before we take it down, I’m about to bemoan at how useless those grenades are the fallen brain craft lets off an almighty explosion.
We’re gonna have to be extra careful around these fuckers, take them down too close to each other and you’re toast it seems.
A few more pitched battles and we’re gaining the upper hand.
A couple of UFO brains head towards two of the guys in the warehouse, who take a few pot shots at them landing squarely on the left hand one when Melanie fires a couple of helpful rounds their way. The left one drops and detonates, amazingly the other was in range and blows up too.
Talk about luck, don’t think she’ll ever shut up about this one!
Gerhard takes a moment to have a look at one of the corpses and provides a little comic relief
“hey guys, when did Ann Summers make the ‘rampant xenomorph’?”
I get even better news, only 2 blips left on the motion scanner and one of them is pinned down in a corner.
Just as I’m ordering Melanie to conduct a search of the warehouse with Otto, a grenade whizzes out of the 2nd floor window knocking Stuart off his feet.
“Get off that roof now!” Otto yells. Stuart is too dazed to move when there’s a sickening BOOM
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!
Melanie and Otto race up the stairs and launch themselves at this creature - it never stood a chance. And with a little bit of teasing, the lobsterman comes out of his, er.. shell long enough for my two guys to chop it down.
All clear. Time to clean up and take off.
The ride back is silent, we all knew it would happen again. We can’t keep running mission after mission without losing some here and there.
Still doesn’t make it any easier and it brings everything to sharp focus. That could have been anyone and it certainly shows we need more firepower.
When we get back I immediately demand more resources be spent on researching those damn cannons or this will become a much more regular occurrence. The commander relents and orders some of the other projects have their staffing transferred.
He also lets slip as to why they’ve been cagey recently. The number crunchers have pointed out what could be an alien base not far from our pacific base.
This day gets worse, it’s about to get a whole lot worse for Stuarts family. That’s one job of the commanders I don’t envy.
I tip my hat as the body is taken away for shipping back home.
“See ya later buddy”
Continue onto part 9.
Friday, October 31st, 2008
by alphaxion
That chance encounter with the Lobster Men has made everyone incredibly anxious these past few missions. We’re all wracked with nerves until we can ID the enemy. A definate dent to our confidence.
Thing is, it’s not just us that are getting a little jittery…
What with the Gill Men blowing each other up recently, or shooting each other in the back. It is getting quite comical! Just the kinda thing we need to settle our nerves and get back in the swing once again, really.
While tackling another medium-large ship we even heard one of them screaming like a little girl! And I’m pretty sure no-one flashed the ol’ one eyed quiver detector at em.. at least, I think they didn’t.
Then again, this bunch can be pretty perverted at times!
The guys have been giving them nicknames ever since, which can be distracting at times when you’re tracking one and the radio bleets out “Morks geeky brother, just round the corner”.
We have a steady stream of small to medium craft we’re downing right now, must have been an 80/20 split between Gillmen and Aquatoids. This one mission we even had the gill men blowing up their dead to stop us from getting at them! Talk about a true scorched earth philosophy!!
After a night of successful slaugher, I had yet another report awaiting me. Seems our attempts at teasing information out of a live one has resulted in a bit more info on the really big ships that have been throwing around the ‘cudas.
We’re hurtin for some of these sonic toys to be strapped onto our attack craft!
Speaking of sonic toys, looks like we’re due for a bump in power
Just need the ammo to be perfected before we get the all clear to use them in combat, means we can pilfer them from corpses now though!
Maybe these are just what we need in our next skirmish with the Lobstermen, tho I hope we get enough time to start off with them rather than have to yank them from their lifeless claws.
I decide now would be a good time to catch a few winks of sleep, knowing our luck there’ll be a terror mission if I don’t.
The morning bell goes off, seems I’m the last one to get up - everyone else has spent the past couple of hours playing with the new blastas. I take a few minutes to chat with the research staff, seems they think it’s not long before cracking the big cannon too.
“Very welcome news! Just figure out how to attach them to the ‘cuda and tank before I resort to using duct tape!”
That damn klaxxon goes off again, another medium craft down.
Upon exiting the triton, there’s a big plane that has seen better times staring us down. Quite impressive, sadly the awe was beaten back by some baaaad news…
Looks like we’ll have to fight them with our pistols one more time.
Instead of going gung ho, I get the team to rove around in packs of 3 and to try their best at sneaking them into cross fire situations… and remind them of their new best friend for the mission, grenades and a little bit of body lootin’.
The tactic works quite well as the guys heard them into a group and launch a couple of grenades their way.
Wolfgang is the first to reach a corpse and picks up a blasta
Time to see how much more powerful these things are. After another group finishes picking off the last of the free roaming lobsters, we decend upon the stricken craft that has crashed just next to the downed plane, an earlier victim of theirs before we appeared to retaliate.
This is going to be tricky, we’ve picked up 3 of them in there…
As we’re almost in position, one of them goes nuts and fires in all directions, Wolfgang launches a round into its back. Sadly it doesn’t go down straight away - these things are proving to be a royal pain in the arse!
Luckily the others are able to get off a couple of shots before it can swing around to return fire. Seems we need 2 shots instead of 3 now - it’s an improvement.
It still makes the final one lurking in the shadows difficult to reach. Every time we try to get near it the damn thing lets out a volley of blasta fire.
Obviously bored of the waiting game, “Hold on, lads. I’ve got an idea” one of the guys quipped before yelling over the comms link “leg it! well, ok.. swim for it!!”.
Yup, he launched an explosives pack into the damn place.
BOOM
Sadly he didn’t get it close enough but it had the desired effect as the tinned lobster made a rush for cover, only to be cut down by sonic pistol fire.
The guy has an expression of supreme smugness that I know won’t be going anywhere soon.
Another lobster mission completed without casualties, and a lot easier this time around. We’ve certainly got our shit together. And of course, as we arrive back at the base I’m told they’ve cracked the ammo for the blastas.
Frigging typical!
The story continues with part 8.
Monday, October 27th, 2008
by alphaxion
While flipping through the latest research into the behaviour and tactics of our foes, Otto wanders back into the barracks.
“Hey, who missed me then?”
“You took your sweet time ya lazy git! Hope you enjoyed the rest cause it has been non-stop of late.” I throw back at him.
“Yeah, I kept up with the mission reports. Those sonic pistols look like they’re kickarse. Can’t wait to give them a try”
Alert klaxxon
“Looks like you got your wish, let’s go”
Just a small sub again. Looks like the bigger ships are either avoiding us or their operations are on hold.
As we fan out looking for the craft, a familiar face comes into view.
Well well, it’s been a while since we saw anything of these little creeps. This time we’re packing a lot more heat and slice through them in no time.
“These things are amazing. Can’t believe they take them out so quickly!” Otto exclaims.
“Don’t get too cocky tho, these are only their smallest weapons” I remind him, as I search the body of one and find nothing but those massive guns of theirs. I hope we pour some research time into these sometime soon.
We get back in time for dinner and a little rest before we’re alerted to a sub battle.
First large alien sub in days and our first try of the DUP rockets. This is gonna be an important test.
These things have a much better range on them than the Ajax torps, which allows the cuda-1 to get in a couple of shots before it’s rattled by a powerful blast from the enemy. One more torp and some cannon rounds and it’s down!
Holy shit, it’s the biggest thing we’ve beaten so far!
The whole base is buzzing, engineers skipping down the hallway and comms staff with beaming smiles on their faces. You’d have thought we just beaten an armarda of these or something.
We scramble to the triton and set off to see what our prize has in store for us.
Standard fan formation.. 5 and the tank up front and three round the back. Isn’t long before the hulking thing is in our sights.
Fuck is it big.
We’re just about to enter the colossal thing when the tank picks up something. Looks like it’s a gill men craft, and what the fuck is that he’s holding? A round fizzes past the tank and explodes a pile of rocks.
It has the troops rattled quite a bit, not enough to stop our pistol fire tho. Melanie races over to check it out.
“You’re not gonna believe this shit.. Their toys just get nastier and nastier. I think it’s some kinda concussion device, almost looks like a cross between a flame thrower and a grenade launcher! If you see anyone sporting one of these either kill it or get the hell out of the way!”
“Thanks for the intel, right keep your wits about you as they’re bound to have more of these things. Clear your sectors and converge on the downed one.” I announce over the comms channel.
After a number of us are ready we crack the doors open. Immediately inside we bump into a bouncer on duty, staring down on us.
Cool as you can, Wolfgang launches a blast into its gut and down it goes.
“Lineup and get ready to breach!”
As Wolfgang gingerly climbs the stairs, he picks up the vibration of a creature moving just ahead. Motions to the others for backup and launches the initiating shot for what quickly decends into a pitched firefight on the stairs. Another gillman sporting one of those launchers appears and is mown down as it loads a round into the barrel.
Mission over and a massive prize at the end. We’ve caught what looks like a technician unconscious on the floor!
“The guys in research will have a field day with this bugger!” we all agree.
The next few days are filled with a frustrating game of cat and mouse between the cudas and some very large craft. We’re still not up to taking out the bigger ships just yet. The cuda-2 takes a massive amount of damage in one dogfight.
In the mean time we’re comparing kills, I’m leading the pack for now but Melanie is cutting her way through these things with a worrisome amount of glee - 12 kills already!
A few minutes before breakfast, I have a look at the sightings chart. I have a bit of concern that many of the larger craft are active round the second base. I mention this to the commander, who is tucking into his breakfast, and he lets me know that it hasn’t gone past them unnoticed and they’re quite worried too. It’s why they have another squadren of 8 troops that have been earmarked for transfer.
It’s only a couple of days to go until the new base can take a crew so we’ll get a chance to meet them as they stop off here.
Just as I pick up my bowl of Fruity Loops the alarm goes off, fucking typical!
“What now?” I yell.
“First terror site in a month!” one of the techies yells back.
I’m not wasting these sugary lumps of joy, I slurp them from the bowl as I run to get changed and leave the empty on a pipeline somewhere. It causes a grumpy look from the janitor which I know I’ll pay for somehow later on.
As we land, pour out and shoot up the first couple of aliens camping our craft, there’s a noticable edgyness to the atmosphere. Almost as though these guys are concerned about losing to us again. We have been kicking the gill mens arses quite a bit of late, maybe our actions are getting noticed? But what will they do?
As the tank strolls around the corner it catches a strange sight.. one of the gillmen is unarmed and flapping about.
How odd!
Our train of thought is broken by an inexplicable explosion from the 2nd floor of a warehouse.
Are these guys the same murderous aliens we’re used to? They seem more like bungling interns trying to impress their employer, but nerviously breaking everything in sight.
This has to be the easiest terror mission ever. I can’t believe how much they bungled shots! We really must have these things on the back foot.
Another quick mission kinda confirms their new panicy nature as they take out themselves by shooting a gas mains!
Another couple of days pass, looks like our small sub missions might be coming to an end after the cuda-2 destroys a sub instead of downing it. Hey, the more time I get to rest the better!
It’s early morning April fools day, I’m plotting a few pranks when the alarm goes off.
“That real? or you just shittin us?” Soldiers are renound for their sense of humour.
“Nope, the real deal.. shot a small sub down nearby”
Hmm. Thought we were destroying these things now. *shrug*
We land nearby and set off securing the area. As we’re roving around I’m thinking that it’s a bit odd how this craft survived. Still, it’s prolly those Aquatoids gearing up their actions.
“What the fuck is that!!!” I can’t help but blurt out.
Not the best thing I could have yelled, given the circumstances. The rest of the squad check in to find out what the problem is.
“Some kind of lobster man, creature… thing”
I don’t have enough time to crack a shot off at it so I get one of the others nearby to have a go.
The bolt flies past me and slams into the monster.
Uh, oh shit.
I’ve never seen one take a hit like that before. I get him to fire again and again.
Missed one, hit one and this fucker is still up. How can it take such a beating? Maybe the shell is acting like a natural armour.
A final 3rd hit takes the mob down. I guess it’s time to resort to scorched earth tactics since one shot kills aren’t possible with these cretins.
We spot the craft as well as 2 lobsters sitting amongst the pipelines and rocks. I give the OK for the tank to fire a round off. Straight body shot. It also triggers the gas mains and there’s an unreal series of explosions, gotta be down, right?
Nope, it’s staring back at us through the bubbles. Great, the tanks are northing more than mobile cameras now!
It takes a good few concentrated movements of coordinated fire to take these two down. Gerhard checks the corpse to get a better look. They’re ugly, but solidly built. They’re gonna cause us hell!
Things are so tense now, one we didn’t notice flung a grenade our way. Thankfully we were just out of range of the blast. It seems whatever is running the show has decided to ratchet up the difficulty
I do a quick count up, we’ve struggled to kill 3 so far and there’s a confirmed 4th around here. All from a
small craft, most we’ve had has been 4. With any luck this’ll be the last one.
We round up on it and ambush with 3 people.
“come on, don’t let this slip.. think of it as having levelled up and we’re finally up against a worthy foe. You don’t want things to get boring now do you?”. Melanie lobs a grenade its way and a couple of rounds for good measure. Down it goes. Wolfgang has a peek at his motion detection unit.. there’s a 5th.
As we’re hunting for this one, another steps out of the craft and shots up the tank quite badly.. a 6th? come on, this has to be a joke!
The guys near the sub can’t think of how to get in without being killed. There’s only one way that springs to mind. Line up three in a T formation and tease it out.
In the mean time we have a loose one to deal with. Finally pin it down and suppress it with a couple of grenades then top it off with a shot.
Just the tin left to crack…
Just as we get ready to begin teasing the shrimp out, it comes out of its own accord.
Straight into a crossfire of pain.
Finally, the place is clear. We’ve had a wakeup call though, the hardest mission by far.
And to prove it, we got a bunch of promotions out of it too.
After that mission, I think I’ll be laying off the pranks this year. Suddenly I’m in no joking mood, and it’s clear we really need to move on up to those bigger toys we have been hauling in otherwise we’re gonna see a load of casualties. We got lucky this time.
Maybe that’s why they’re bringing in more troops, they knew this was coming.
Continue with part 7 here
Thursday, October 23rd, 2008
by alphaxion
It’s a run of the mill crash site, it may be dark and the 2rd in a row but that shouldn’t cause us to turn from crack shots into crap shots. Seriously, we can’t hit a single fucking thing this mission.
It took 3 of us an embarrassing 9 rounds to take down a single enemy. To cap it off, it looks like they’ve cottoned onto our thieving ways - none of them are packing those sonic pistols anymore, leaving us with our guass pistols for now.
Oh will this mission hurry up. Aha, one of the guys finds the single blip on the sonar.. Through the door and there it is, totally unarmed, within range…
*boom*
Misses the gill man and straight into one of the few remaining items to survive the crash >.<
Is it bed time yet? Grigs finally gets a shot on target and it’s back to base.
These past few days have been gruelling, so many missions. I have put in a request for a backup squad, since we’re now making money selling items on the black market. Apparently we have to wait for the next round of financing before we can afford to ramp up the facilities in the second base.
We need this second string tho, being a man down and the activity charts showing no let up is draining the guys - the number of shots embedded in the ground is testament to that!
Strangely, it goes a little quiet for a few days. Kinda nice having some downtime. We even get another good bit of news.
About fuckin time!
But as soon as we were getting used to it, we get another routine small craft.
With the new pistols, it’s all one shot and they’re dead coasting. It feels nice to be almost on a par with these things.
Then the kick to our confidence occurs.
I said there had to be bigger ships out there, I just didn’t realise how big…
First a pretty big craft shoots up the Barracuda-1 up pretty badly.. it’s gonna be out for a few days while the guys repair it.
But that was nothing compared to the way my heart was filled with dread when another blip appeared near the new base - this time it’s something massive.
This thing mauled the Barracuda-2, if the ‘cuda-2 hadn’t broken off when it did we’d have suffered our first loss of ship.
How the fuck are we supposed to beat these things? While we’ve ordered the refit of weapons to DUP missiles, I doubt even they would make a dent.
We’re gonna need a bigger boat!
A couple of the guys from research pulled the commander aside, pushed his jaw back up and whispered a few things in his ear. Couldn’t make out the first thing they said but I’m sure I over heard something about ancient and earth originated… I managed to pick up a mention of magnetic levitation during the second bit.
I see my computer light up with a new email alert, sure enough it’s a report into MagLev propulsion
But that’s only one report. The researcher gave the commander 2 files.
A little bit of nosing around the network brings up a file marked “Gill Men - classified”. Thankfully the commander is a simple man - how do you get into a position like that with the security sensibilities of a 4 year old? The password on the document is, unbelievably, his fucking surname >.<
Holy shit!
They’re from Earth?!
I have a baaaaaaad feeling about this.
Onwards to part 6
Sunday, October 19th, 2008
by alphaxion
I never thought I’d say this, but visiting landing sites and kicking alien arse is slipping into the mundane!
The thing that really concerns me is how they’re quite small craft, there has to be bigger out there since those terror missions couldn’t possibly have been organised with these 3 man crafts we’re capturing.
My PC bleeps at me to announce a new email.. it’s a report from the guys in research. It’s their findings on those first aliens, the big headed small bodied ones.
Interesting, these have been adapted from aliens in the first war. I’ll have to check out the archives, maybe they’ll show similar combat strategies. Wonder if the others are similar to this.
The base commander catches me while in deep thought and scares the crap out of me when he booms out my name.
"Mildred!" - the wireless mouse catapults across the room.
"fuckin hell" I gasp
"This is the new recruit, Melanie. I want you to give her a tour round the base."
"O.. okay." is about all I can manage, still trying to calm my heart rate down.
The newbie is abviously stifling a snigger at the whole sorry scene.
I give her a guided tour of the base.
Running her past the bunks, the ever filling and expanding stores, the detection arrays, workshops and finally stopping by at the research and containment labs. Thought it would help her nerves a little.
She is mesmerised at the live aliens we have locked away.
"So this is the face of the enemy? I was told this post would blow my mind… I had no idea. No idea at all"
*muraaangl* Yells a captive as it evades one of our researchers.
"They may look pathetic and weak now, but don’t give them the curtesy of compassion. Put them behind a gun and they’ll take every one of us out" I dole out as a good bit of advice. I’ve seen the way these things hunt us down… Long gone are my mercy days, kinda leaves me feeling numb and a little dead inside everytime I think about it.
*klaxons sound*
"ah, action time!"
It’s another small craft.. perfect mission to cut the newbie on.
The tank quickly picks up the location of the craft.
"Alright guys, there’s three of the buggers to track down. Lets keep our wits about us".
As we fan out, we stumble across one of them camping on a ledge. With the conga line of people it’s not long before it’s down.
Hmmm, another batch of these green gill men things… they’re very active right now. These ships have to be scouts, it won’t be long before another terror mission comes along. I wish we could find out where they’re coming from. And more to the point, what their mission is.
A brisk 10 minutes later and we’ve secured the site.
"I thought this would be hard" Melanie quips.
"You’ve seen nothing yet." Wolfgang corrects her.
As we load everything back into the Triton we get news of another landing. Joy, don’t even get back to re-arm. At least it’ll be light by the time we get there.
Again, more gill men. It’s not long before they too are wiped out. The Triton is stuffed with loot and even a live one that was merely stunned by one of our shots.
What a night, time to catch up with my email before grabbing some shut eye.
Another research report. What do we have here… oh fantastic!
It’s about time we started making use of these things. Shame they’ve not figured out how to make the ammo, they’re also not letting us use them until they do. Still, I send a message round to make sure the team have a play with them, maybe we can make use of the ones we recover from the aliens after they’re taken out.
I relax into my bunk and get just a fleeting attempt at sleep before I’m woken up.
"It’s the barracuda 1, it’s taking on a much larger craft.. they’re gearing up for something now!" Yells my bunk mate, racing towards the attack monitor.
I glance at the screen on the wall, sure enough the thing has to be 3 times the size of the craft we have been dealing with. Suppose I had better wake myself up and get ready to go.
Taking a little damage, our pilot downs the craft and we’re off yet again.
"OK guys, usual formations.. Melanie, you’re with me" I tell everyone as we prepare to land.
As everyone piles out of the Triton, one of the guys catches a glimpse of something. Before I can arrange a few of us to investigate, Melanie lobs a grenade over.. missing the target entirely.
"Who the fuck said you could do that? Wait next time before doing something like that"
Hmm, that was quite a piss poor throw. Even my mothers arthritic dog could have done better. I just hope it doesn’t come out in a shooting frenzy!
A couple of us sneak up and knock it down with a shot. Looks like it only grazed the thing instead, surely can’t have killed it with that. Melanie runs over and picks up its sonic pistol.
"Again, who the fuck said you could go over.. I don’t think that thing is dead" I yell, getting a little pissed off at how suddenly gun-ho she is.
The alien gets back up, thankfully it runs off in panic and is mown down as it runs directly towards our guns. It could have made the bullets work a little harder at least!
A little more combing and we pick up a few injured stragglers…
While we squabbled, the tank also located the damaged craft… we certainly did a number on it, I didn’t think we had the firepower to take something like this down. I wonder if there’s bigger, and if we stand a chance against them. Judging by the damage we took, I’d say that was a resounding no.
Some noises can be heard within, so I urged our guys to take a bit of caution - it’s the first time we’ve seen one of these so who knows what traps are inside. As Otto sneaks round the corner, ready to pounce, its occupier leaps out through the door with its guns blazing. Shoots up the tank quite badly and the operator panic fires a torpedo in retaliation.
Takes out the alien but catches Otto in the middle of it, he’s badly hurt but still alive.
Just.
Thankfully this was the last of the aliens in the area and we can pack up and head on back.
Otto is out for a good couple of weeks, he’s lucky we finished when we did. I don’t think he’d have survived long otherwise.
We must be getting too confident and sloppy. Still, thanks to Melanie’s irrational behaviour, we have a successful test of these sonic pistols. I just hope we’ll get the all clear to use them from the outset. Feels like we only just got our gauss pistols and we’re trading them in already.
Some more good news, the secondary base is up and running with the barracuda 2 having transferred over. Just need a couple more days for the sensor array to fire up and our coverage will have opened up massively.
It seems like we’re running away at a great pace. I heard we even picked up a strange device that might be used to control the mind of other creatures, the research guys are really excited about getting their teeth into it, but apparently it’s quite some time away before they can. Something about alien learning arrays that I didn’t catch.
With everything going so well, occasional blip with death and injury aside, I wonder if we have a big fall coming soon. We can’t keep riding our luck forever. Those Aquatoids have vanished and these gill creatures are everywhere.
What’s next?
Continue –> Part 5
Tuesday, October 14th, 2008
by alphaxion
After my bitching about not detecting the attack on Miami before it happened, the commanding officer let slip that construction on an early listening and quick response base has begun in the pacific to address this problem.
It shuts me up for now, at least they’re being abitious and aware they need to expand quickly to head off this growing threat - sightings around Japan has been spiking for quite some time now!
"Oh, and before you go…" he throws out
alert klaxons go off
"saved by the bell… this isn’t finished"
We race down to the sub pen, picking up info that it’s another terror mission.. this time we won’t have the luxury of daytime when we finally arrive. I just hope the chemical flares do their job. It’s hard enough dealing with these things when the sun is shining, the dead of night is never a good time for morale.
It takes a good few hours before we land, incidently, the site is a short ride away from the new base.. I hope this doesn’t bite us on the arse. There’s no-one stationed there right now other than a building crew, a base attack would kill off our expansion plans and seriously dent the momentum we have built so far.
This could be fun, not only is it pitch black out there but it’s our first trial with our new weapons above water… I hope they’re as effective, since we’re still yet to get our tank working out of the deep blue.
The moment we pour out of the triton, there’s another one of those strange green muscley aliens waiting for us.
Thankfully the one camping our ship door is shot in the back by its own team and leaves a clear shot for Amanda on the mob standing behind it… She throws out a chemical flare first then sends a volley towards the mutant.
While she misses the creature entirely she manages to hit the oil drums behind, setting off a big explosion and taking out another we hadn’t even noticed!
"I, ur.. meant to do that" she blurted
"suuuuuuree"
Another shot and the other green fucker is down, damn these gauss pistols are sweet.
We send the tank off towards the west, I signal for a couple to head off to the north east while a couple of us and myself head straight down the middle.
The guys headed to the west stumble across a couple of aliens at a good distance, crouching they pick one of them off with ease. The other green bastards drops the weapon it had and legs it towards the water.
We’ve got it paniced… It’s the first time I’ve heard of any of these things getting scared. So far they’ve been murder machines, I just wasn’t expecting that. I hear a civi meeting a sticky end just ahead of me and I lose it.
"hunt the fucker down and let him know what humanity is all about" I bark down the walkie talkie. I feel ever so slightly dirty because of it.
The guys to the north east get shot at then pin a grey thing down before it can take a civi down.
Further hunting brings up a green mutant, just before Amanda can take it out she is shot from behind by a grey fucker that was hiding in a building we thought was clear.
My stomach sinks as her body drops to the floor.
I didn’t even need to tell them before it was filled with rounds from their pistols.
It’s the groups first casualty, we all knew it would happen sooner or later. We had certainly been riding our luck with how easy it had been.
It never dampens the blow. I can slowly feel my compassion drip away and a firey hatred begin to burn away inside.
Instead of letting the massive blow get to us, it galvanises our efforts and we sweep through the area at a tremendous pace. Every time we stumble across an alien it is cut down before it even gets a chance to think. It’s not long before we have cleared the area of invasion and we’re left carrying Amandas lifeless body back to the triton.
Another city cleared, but at a cost.
You’ve pissed us off.
Continue –> Part 4
Saturday, October 11th, 2008
by alphaxion
It has been a couple of weeks since that first mission, our researchers have finally come up with something about these little fellas we slaughtered.
They have taken to calling them "Aquatoids", apparently they have been taking humans and torturing them… But then they’d anything to keep us shootin at them!
As I reached the end of the research file the alarm went off, racing to the Triton I asked if it was another craft. Apparently, this time they have invaded Miami and started shooting up the place - they called it a Terror Mission.
We landed at a port, people were screaming and running all over the place. The screams were punctuated by the strange noises of their guns, occasionally followed by a blood curdling scream. I couldn’t help but be fuelled by hate for these stumpy creatures.
We sent our tank out first for a scout around, its torpedo is useless out of water but it saves one of us getting shot to shit. In fact, pretty much all of our heavy weapons are underwater use only, so we’re left with the dartguns and explosives.
The coast is clear, we begin to pile out of the ship and start searching for something to fill with holes.
Three of us set off for a warehouse, when the guy up front spots something. It doesn’t look anything like the Aquatoids… are we up against many aliens? Surely they can’t all be trying to murder us? Haven’t they ever seen ET?!
The guy in front gets a little too close and narrowly avoids some kinda acid spit. There’s 2 different aliens here, some standard fare green guys with guns and some gray creatures that spit at you!
We prime a grenade and lob it in.
*boom*
The acid spitter drops to the ground before it can take out any more people.
The other group pin down a green guy and take him out before it takes any of us out.
Further searching brings up a couple more green guys outside of the warehouse I’m in plus at least 1 or 2 more on the floors above. I send the two guys with me out to the front in order to deal with the greenies outside as I set off upstairs to clear out whatever it is above us.
I take out the guy on the floor above with a proximity bomb, fuck these guys are dumb. Not bothered by the explosion on the 1st floor, the alien on the next floor up continues to take potshots at paniced humans outside.
So much for great intelligence, we’re kicking whatever passes for their asses with pressurised darts when they have these strange rayguns.
I sneak up the stairs and pop a well placed dart into this creatures neck and down it drops… seriously, how the fuck have we not beaten these things yet?
Seems we have the eastern side of the port clear, I tell the other two about a building we haven’t checked when the other team begin to hog the comms channel. Seems they have 2 of them trapped on different floors in the west.
With a little bit of teasing, they finally get one of them out of the building and into the path of our darts, but not before one of the guys takes a glancing shot to the arm.
My two guys stumbled across 2 more of these gray spitting things in the building across the road and dispatch them with a well placed grenade or two.
There was such fear and hushed tones about this mission, yet it seemed stupidly easy. At least we now know that there’s a few races of alien giving us bother, and the researchers eyes light up at the sight of the corpses we unload from the craft.
Seems they needed something new to work on after they introduce a new range of weapons to us…
This is more like it, so much more deadly than the dartguns and lighter too. We decide to scrap the gas guns and pack these little things instead.
I hadn’t been back for 5 minutes before we’re told to pack up again, we’ve shot down a small craft and it needs collecting.
Out we go again, hey at least it’s a great chance to try out these new pistols!
Well, I thought it might have been… seems it was a 1 man , er creature craft. It was another greenie, well not for long.. these new guns are very tasty! 
I’m getting a little worried about this.. I think that terror mission has changed me. After watching a few of these things kill innocent humans I no longer have a problem taking them out. Especially since our research guys are coming good with our weapons upgrades.
Maybe they got the right guy for the job after all.
Continue –> Part 3
Wednesday, October 8th, 2008
by alphaxion
I was never the best in my regiment.. killing my bretheren was something I did reluctantly. If there was ever a chance of using non-leathal means I would take it.
One day, I found a plain card with an X embossed in the background and a phone number on it stuffed into my locker.
Some of the guys had stories on how it was the calling card of a secret military, funded by the nations of the Earth with the express purpose of defending humanity against alien forces.
"Non-sense, if aliens existed why the fuck would they be interested in this shithole" I would retort.
Still, the card had me intrigued. Why was it there? What could they possibly see in me?
After a particularly heavy night out, I drunkenly tried the number and slurred my way past reception.
"So you finally came round" the baritone voice commented.
"yeah, who the fuck are you?" I belched into the handset.
"Be at the old shipyards in Liverpool by noon and you’ll find out" was all I could make out before the click of the phone.
I don’t think I managed a single minute of sleep that night.
I somehow made my way there an hour early, so I had a snoop around… Didn’t seem to be much around other than rusting iron and dilapidated buildings.
"Quite eager I see, a good sign" echoed the same baritone voice. Where the fuck did he come from? I noticed a strange vehicle partially submerged in the water beside him and walked on over to join him as he entered it.
The technology inside was amazing, I’d never seen anything like it in all my years with the SBS.
"wha.. who… where are we going?" I could only gasp.
The guy simply gestured towards a monitor with an indicator pointing to deep in the atlantic.
Over the hours journey I managed to glean a little info out of him. The rumours were indeed true, a secret international force of humans called XCom were here to defend Earth against forces that threaten the entire planet.
Apparently, they had already won their first major conflict, destroying an alien base on Mars in the process. The news just blew my mind… I mean, the space program had been stalled ever since the global depression that crippled the world back at the start of the century.
They thought the threat was over and let their guard down, only for the attacks to return once again from a little closer to home… It appears our oceans are home to more than the usual aquatic life forms and they need people specialised at underwater combat… So the purpose of contacting me has come into sharp focus.
Unfortunately I couldn’t get any more info out of him before we had docked at the XCom base.
It took a few days to get used to news, I tried out my assigned gear.. it was pretty crude considering we had kicked Martian arse
but then, I guess things work a little differently in water compared to space. After speaking to a few people, I realised no-one had actually seen any action yet.
The next few days I spent hanging around the research labs, some of the tech they’re working on is just insane. Then it happened, the alert klaxon went off and everyone began running all over the place - it was a craft landing site within 10 minutes of the base.
We piled onto the deployment craft, Triton-1, and set off.
There wasn’t even enough time for any of the usual good luck ceremonies, just a "kick some arse" grunt and we were out on the hunt
The moment we got out of the triton, 2 creatures unleashed their strange weapons upon us.. Thankfully they only hit the craft, our robotic tank managed to take one of them out and without thinking I had placed a dart into the skull of the other. Upon inspection, I hadn’t killed whatever it was.. merely wounded it enough to render unconcious. I’ve never seen anything like them, they had a strange blue-green complexion with really large heads. For all of their comical appearance, they had no problems trying to wipe us out.
We rapidly uncovered their craft, surrounding it with men armed with torpedoes. Our tank was too big to fit into the ship so it was up to a few of us to go in. I ordered the guy on my left to join me, we opened the hatch doors to find one of them with its back to us.
Without thinking I had slammed a dart right into its neck and watched as the thing crumpled in front of me. I’ll never forget the shriek it let out, muffled by the water.
As we pressed further, we stumbled across a few more, my wing man distracting them long enough for me to fill them with darts.
It wasn’t long before we had cleared away all of the enemy, leaving their craft eerily silent in the depths. The rest of the crew got to work stripping it for parts to bring back to the research guys… and not forgetting the only survivor in a crumpled heap by the Triton. This one mission had seen me kill 4 of these unknown creatures… four of them. I don’t think I killed that many humans in 10 years of service.
After we got back, I was informed that my actions had earned me a promotion.. I was the squads first ensign.
But I couldn’t stop thinking about those 4 mysterious creatures I had killed… We don’t even know a shred of info about them and we’re already slaughtering them.
This doesn’t bode well…
Continue –> Part 2
