Doom Ic

[TertiusHuman]

Greg kept his attention on the scanner on his forearm as he told Duke exactly what happened and of their flight from the nest, as well as their last-ditch attempt to stop or even delay their pursuers. He also mentioned the strange creatures he saw, who provided covering fire with advanced weapons. He only looked up at Duke when he drew to the conclusion: "Sir, I believe we are smack in the middle of a fire fight between forces unknown. Dr Evert and I believe that one of these combatants are the same creatures as strange fossils found under the ice in Antarctica."

Sandra raised her hand slightly: "This is not well-known, but creatures like those we have encountered have been found all over the world. Some frozen and some damaged so severely that it was clear that they died in combat."

 

[milkmaiden38]

“Middle of a fire fight” Duke repeated back, thinking about facts and how they lined up with Greg’s theory. “And these aliens have been to earth!... That is disturbing”

“Makes you wonder and worry” Dr Evert added. The thought why they visited… and what would happen if they revisited again!

“Duke, I have a suggestion. The enemy of my enemy is my friend. I think we need to try and make contact with the second group of aliens. They have had a few chances to engage us, and have not. They seem to be focused on the derelict ship and the bigger aliens. Their tactics and weapons are probably superior to ours.” Sgt Branning suggested.

“What?” Snake gasped. “That is crazy. We need to run. Get off this fucked up, shit hole, ASAP.”

“This is a unique situation, a chance to form an alliance. Might help earth, big time, in the future.” Branning countered.

“Or we all die, and earth knows nothing. We are not diplomats. We are Space Marines” Snake replied. They both waited for Duke decision.

 

[TertiusHuman]

Greg drew the palmtop from his bag and activated it, "Sir, if I may?"

Staff Lewins nodded and Greg opened up a file and selected an item, everybody could see his actions on the Holgraphic display. Images started to show of creatures standing well over 7 feet wearing metal masks shaped like snake heads, dread lock type hair, mottled lizard like skin, various bits of armor and carrying strange weapons. Sandra gasped at the images, "Greg! Where did you find those?"

"I was curious about what USP didn't want us to know, so I hacked their server." Greg replied and opened a video clip which showed part of an autopsy done on one of the creatures. He looked around the small group, "I believe that these are the guys who are doing to shooting."

"That is so classified, that they will kill you for even knowing it."

Greg nodded at Sandra's words, "True, but they also sent us in here while knowing what we would encounter."

"What do you mean?" Staff Lewins sounded ready to explode.

"While I was busy in the security booth, I ran a check for outgoing messages."

Greg left the folder he was in and opened another folder, he replayed messages where the senders clearly showed the creatures that they have encountered and every message ends with them being over run or killed.

"You knew this and didn't say anything?"

"No Sarge, I had a look at the messages and only after we encountered the creatures did I understand what happened here."

Greg opened another file and more images and reports come up about the creatures along with video clips. "I want to agree with Snake that we should get out of here Sarge, but with that ship being infected as it is, I think these creatures will over run the other extra terrestrials, the only problem is that we can't be assured of them, since they are hunters and they usually kill the strongest prey they can find."

"Prey?"

Staff Lewins ignores the question, "It is clear that we have been sent in here to gain information for USP, they did not care if we come back or not. But we are Marines, we will return even with the odds against us. Greg, show us everything you have on these creatures and the aliens. Then we can form a battle plan. We are going to wipe out those slimy mother fuckers and safe the planet."

 

[milkmaiden38]

A Plan

The senior officers reviewed the data. Then the group was quiet. Their weapons only had limited effectiveness on the creatures. Most normal battles tactics involved forces of equal abilities. Battling these creatures was not even. Finally, Branning cleared her throat and suggested a plan.

“I have an idea. It is risky. But here are my thoughts. We use a modified feigned retreat.”

“A what?” Dr Sandra Evert asked.

“A feigned retreat is a military tactic whereby a military force pretends to withdraw or to have been routed, in order to lure an enemy into a position of vulnerability.” Branning explained.

“But these creatures are not too vulnerable to our weapons” Duke pointed out.

“Agree… but the retreat will draw them here.” She said and pointed to the base’s power plant. “We’ll set it to blow. Should take down half the facility. That should kill everything in the blast radius.” Branning pointed out.

“What about us?” Duke asked.

“We’ll move the transport to be on top of the power plant control room.” Branning said. She pulled out a plant control room drawing and pointed to the hatch in the control room ceiling.

“A few problems… need to draw as many creatures to us as possible. Not sure how to do that. Also, someone will need to get to the transport and move it here. That is a dangerous job.” Branning pointed out.

“A feigned retreat is one of the more difficult tactics for a military force to undertake, and requires well-disciplined soldiers. If the enemy presses into the retreating soldiers, undisciplined troops will lose coherence and the rout will become genuine.” Branning warned everyone.

"OK... other plans? or modifications to this plan?" Duke asked everyone else.

 

[TertiusHuman]

Greg spoke up, "Though I agree with the plan, I think we will have to find a way to destroy that infested ship. If we leave that intact, it just means that we will blow up a USP building, kill a bunch of alien assholes, but still leave an enemy at our backs."

He motioned towards the hologram, where one of the endomorph aliens were rotating slowly, "I think that they use hosts to breed. All those personnel we found which seemed to have exploded from the outside? That is seemingly one of the stages of how these guys procreate. If we want to draw their attention, we will have to provide hosts, loads of them."

"What is your idea?"

"Sarge, we stick to the plan, but since I am the one with the technical know-how, I will have to hack this main frame, set up the holo-emiters which will have to show these guys that there's a large party of their hosts just hanging around, ready to get used. The squad falls back, with the holograms as the creatures approaches and that should draw out enough of them."

"You want to get into that ship."

"Yes sarge, it is old enough to be a monument, but I saw lights burning, that means that for some strange reason, it still carries power and that power can be shorted and compromise the fuel supply."

"Blowing up the ship. I like this idea. More suggestions?"

 

[milkmaiden38]

Assignments

The group blended the two ideas/plans together. They would use the holograms to draw the aliens to the facility power plant… then blow it up. While a small group with Greg as leader goes to the ancient ship and blows it up. The transport would be used to rescue the power plant team and then Greg’s team before either explosion.

Duke looked at the remaining men and women of his unit.

“Ok now for the hard part. Assignments.” Duke said. “Greg work with Dr Evert to adjust the hologram generators. Branning, you are solo back to the transport. Once Greg and Dr Evert have the holograms ready, we’ll move to the facility power plant and meet up with you. I’ll lead the main force in drawing the creatures to the plant. Greg and Dr Evert will go to the ancient ship and blow it up.”

“Sir, are you sure you want me to get the transport… I’m the only one with 105 pulsed laser cannon” Branning pointed out.

“Can’t be helped.” Duke stated. “Any other comments?” He asked.

 

[TertiusHuman]

Greg looked around, there appeared to be no other questions or suggestions, he readied his rifle and made sure he had ammunition, then looked over at Dr Evert.

"You ready doc?"

She looked unsure as hell, but nodded anyway. Greg waited for Sarge to assign the other members which would go with him and the doctor.

 

[milkmaiden38]

"Sting and Rock, go with Greg's team headed to the ancient ship." Duke ordered.

Sting and Rock moved to stand next to Greg and the Doc. Sting had long hair in a tight ponytail that went down his back. He was a skill marksman, picking off targets from a distance was his MO. But his attitude sucked. He was always gloomy. He never thought anything would work or go right.

Rock had brown, dreadlocks hangs over his beard face. The guy was big, but quick despite his bulky frame. He was a solid marine, but could not think on his own. Greg would need to direct his actions.

 

[TertiusHuman]

Greg took a deep breath

"OK guys, Rock you take point, Doc you follow him, Sting you stack up behind the doc to give us support from the middle, I will take the rear. Keep a sharp lookout, if something looks wrong or if you see something move even though it looks like there is nothing, speak up. I get a feeling that we have ended up in a cross fire and neither of them are friendlies."

Greg waited for them all to nod and then turned his attention to Sarge

"Ready when you are sir."

 

[milkmaiden38]

Duke

Everyone nodded that they were ready. Duke looked everyone in the eyes, then he addressed his unit.

“OK, marines. This is it. This is where you will make me proud, where you will make the marines proud, where you will make our planet proud. Here we will stand and fight; Here is where we will wipe out those slimy mother fuckers and safe the planet. We will pull off the impossible, against the odd, we will win this.” Duke said. “Let’s do this!” He yelled.

Then the teams headed off in their separate directions.

 

[TertiusHuman]

The four headed out, Greg directing them through the various corridors, to the backup mainframe.

"Hey Reaper, shouldn't we be at the mainframe?"

Greg shook his head and started removing access panels.

"It's damaged, when I logged into the system earlier, I noticed that the response time was slow. That is why it took so long to download these files for the doctor."

"Could have told us."

Greg connected his arm computer and grinned

"Need to know and now you needed to know."

The two marines scoffed and took up protective positions as Greg went to work.

 

[milkmaiden38]

Sgt Branning

Laura checked her combat armor to verify it was in working order. She checked to make sure she had her combat knife, two laser pulse hand guns, and the 105 pulsed laser cannon. She had used up her mines and did not want to take anything from the main force. They would need their mines.

She was ready to move out. When Duke gave the order, she departed on her own to get the transport. She headed back to the main entrance complex where they had first arrived. This was where they had found the maintenance bots cleaning the floor. Now the bots were turned off and the place was quiet, eerily quiet.

Laura preceded carefully even though the room was empty. She moved to the shuttle and peeked inside. It was clear. The shuttle was part of the subway system, which made traveling through the vast facility easy. The seats in the shuttle ran along the sides of the shuttle. Like what was common on some subway systems. She looked at the blown out back window, where she had seen something in the darkness and shot at it. If only she hit the creature, her actions might have saved some of her team mates.

She moved quietly to the front of the shuttle. She stared into the darkness in front of the shuttle. The shuttle would travel into that darkness and back to their transport ship. She looked down for a moment to activate the power to the shuttle when she saw something move in the darkness.

She went completely rigid, looking out into the darkness. There was the faintest suggestion of a dark shape ahead of the shuttle. She stared at the figure. It did not move. With a surge of adrenaline, she pushed the activate button, hoping the shuttle would crush whatever was on the tracks. The shuttle lurched forward.

 

[TertiusHuman]

Dadtih

Having killed many of the prey, Dadtih had followed the remaining Oomans and when the one warrior moved away, he followed her. Cloaked and silent, he could bring death to her in a moment's notice, but that would not have been the honorable way, it was not how you acted towards your prey, unless you were weak and a Bad Blood.

He watched as she entered the vehicle which had brought them to this place, he studied her as best he could and then suddenly the vehicle lurched forward, threatening to crash into him. With a leap, he avoided being crushed and landed on the top of the vehicle.

Greg

Greg finished calibrating the system, having linked it to his arm computer.

"OK guys, now we have to move at least three of the emitters, there's two external emitters still active, but they will not be able to create clear enough holgrams to confuse the senses of those creatures."

He unhooked and stored the cables, bringing his weapon into position, motioning for Rock to take point.

 

[milkmaiden38]

Rock

Rock headed down the west corridor towards the power plant. The corridors in this part of the complex were in good condition. Rock could move quickly as the lighting was good. Then suddenly the lighting went out.

“Fuck” Rock said over his communicator.

“Helmet Lights On” Greg ordered.

Rock’s light came on. He saw nothing and moved forward again, only now he was moving slower. He was checking the ceiling and floors. As he approached an intersection his motion detector went off.

“I have one unknown contact approaching” He said back to Greg as he got his weapon ready.

Sgt Laura Branning

Laura watched as the faint dark shape leapt into the air, and then she heard the bang of it landing on the roof of the shuttle. She realized the creature had some kind of cloaking technology. Making it almost invisible to her eyes. She quickly turned off the shuttle’s internal lights and switched her HUD to Infrared.

“It’s going to track my heat signature” Laura reasoned. She quickly pulled to fire suppression system for the shuttle. R12-P gas filled the cabin as she took cover behind a metal bulkhead. The gas would chill her armor and everything else in the shuttle to the same temperature. Now she was as invisible as the creature.

 

[TertiusHuman]

Dadtih

He crouched down as the vehicle kept on moving, he watched the Ooman warrior move to an electrical switch and how vapor started to cool the interior. Fascinating. This was a prey who thought on her feet. He switched his vision modes and picked up movement. A sound caught his attention and when he looked up, a member of the Prey jumped at him. He brought up his spear barely in time, skewering the attacker. The acidic blood melting the tip of his spear and dripping on to the roof of the vehicle, burning small holes into it.

Greg

He glanced around and then at the map on the display on his arm.

"Rock, through that door on the left, we will take up a defensive position in there."

Rock moved like the Marine he was, kicking the door open without question, leading the way into a small office. They took up a defensive position as the beeping on the motion detectors increased.

"Doc, check the ceiling. Any movement, let us know."

 

[milkmaiden38]

Greg’s Team

The creature was moving fast! The location beeper, was beeping so fast, it was basically a steady tone. The monster was on top of them. But Rock saw nothing.

“This isn’t going to work, we are going to die” Sting said in his gloomy voice. He was always negative, never thought anything would work right. The others were use to his comments, but not Dr. Sandra Evert.

“Shut the fuck up!” Doc yelled to Sting. Doc still had the hand gun from the derelict spaceship. She had it pointed at the ceiling. That was the moment the creature decided to open the ceiling up, like it was made of tin. Suddenly the monster head and dripping jaws came into the room from above.

“CEILING” Sandra screamed so high pitched it hurt everyone’s ears. She closed her eyes and just squeezed the trigger on her gun over and over.

Sgt Laura Branning

Tough as nails Sgt Laura Branning remained as still as she could. In the dark, and still, was her best defense. Then she felt the shuttle rock violently as something big hit it. There was moment on the roof as two creatures fought. She knew where they were and could blast them with her 105 cannon. But for some reason, some gut feeling she did not.

Then the struggle on the roof was over and she heard acid melting small holes in the roof. She remained still. She waited.

 

[TertiusHuman]

Dadtih

He was exposed on the vehicle and without his spear. That meant that he had to de-cloak and engage the enemy with the Plasmacaster, what an irritation. He selected the correct visual spectrum in which he could see the Prey and use the Caster, he de-cloaked and readied for the rest of the Prey, who were sure to be waiting for the travelling vehicle.

Greg

It was a surprise attack, like the creatures have been waiting for them to show up. Sarah's first shot went wild, but as the creature lunged forward, the rest of her shots hit it, even if she was firing blindly.

Creatures appeared in the doorway and more appeared through holes in the ceiling, but the room was too small for them to be able to overwhelm the group. Greg engaged the creatures coming through the ceiling, Rock and Sting engaged the ones trying to force through the door.

"Watch out for their blood, it is highly acidic."

"No shit Reaper?"

Greg reloaded and continued to fire at the appearing creatures.

 

[milkmaiden38]

Sgt Laura Branning

“I hope this asshole, knows the saying, the enemy of my enemy is my friend” Laura said to herself as she reached down, picked up her laser cannon and activated it. In the low light, she saw lots of monsters coming to attack the shuttle.

"I got your six, Asshole… I hope you cover mine." Laura yelled as she moved to the back of the shuttle and covered the alien creature’s blindside. She squeezed off round after round of laser cannon fire at the approaching monsters. Meanwhile, the alien on top of the shuttle was handling the monster’s attacking the front of the shuttle.

The battle quickly turned into total bedlam! “Bedlam” is an old word derived from a hospital in London that served as a lunatic asylum circa 1400. The scene around the shuttle was pure bedlam. There were suddenly monsters everywhere, trying to tear the shuttle to pieces. Laura and the "good" alien on top were trying to defend, but the shuttle was taking a beating.

Laura was one handing her laser cannon, and had her hand gun in her other hand. As she fired everything she had, while SCREAMING “FUCKKKKKKKKKK YOUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU!!!!” at the monsters.

Bedlam time 2

The same chaotic fight was happening with Greg’s team, only worse! There were 4 defenders firing their weapons in all different directions. Sandra gun was empty in no time, but Greg threw her a new one.

“KEEP FIRING” He ordered/yelled. Rock and Sting had crouched down and tried to protect the main door way, but they had to dodge acid dripping from the ceiling.

“Keep your head down” Sting warned as he took out an approaching monster that was on top of Rock. He cracked the monster head with his shots, killing it. Rock jump out of the way, but some acid hit his armor. Smoke came out. Then something really bad happened, another monster ripped open a bigger hole in the ceiling, exposing everyone from above.

“I’m on it” Greg yelled and jump up and grabbed the monster’s head as it came into the room. The monster pulled his head out of the hole and got ready to eat Greg. Before the thing could eat him, Greg slipped on to its back. It was totally insane. He was riding a monster!! It was pure madness. He should have died… but he did it as casually as if he was walking down the street. He aimed his gun at the back of its head and squeezed the trigger.

The creature died, plugging the hole in the room’s ceiling. Greg, however, was now trapped outside the room with another monster was approaching him. He did a nice spin and got behind the dead monster plugging the hole as he fired once into the chest of the approaching monster. That slowed it down… but did not stop it. The monster grabbed the dead monster and threw it out of the way. The hole to get back in the room was open again!! But Greg needed to get past a very angry monster first!

 

[TertiusHuman]

Dadtih

He fired his plasma caster at will, killing as much of the Prey as he could, then when they came too close, he drew his dagger and activated his gauntlet blades, slicing and stabbing the Prey that came close. Their acidic blood burning through the roof of the transport and with a screech it suddenly gave way underneath him, dumping him into the interior.

With a roar he rose to his feet and started firing his plasma caster at the Prey again, soon enough they retreated from the combined onslaught. He turned to face the Ooman female, the tri-dot laser coming to rest on her forehead.

"Ooman."

Greg

Unfortunately for the creature, it was almost point-blank range with Greg, who drew his pistol and emptied the clip into the monster's head. He jumped back as the creature fell forward and plugged the hole again. Greg holstered his pistol and brought his rifle up, he was running low on ammunition and he was certain that the others were as well. The crawl space wasn't much to work with, but it was enough for him to move about and he made his way to the front of the room. From his position he could see the last of the attackers heading for a hole that led to the door Rock and Sting were holding.

He started firing, the high velocity slugs driving into the creatures, dropping most of them where they were and the others dropped from sight. The motion detector stopped beeping. Greg breathed a sigh of relief and crawled to the hole, sliding through it into the corridor below, stepping away from the pool of blood, which smoked as it burned through the concrete.

"Greg?"

"Reaper?!"

"Out here. Watch out for the blood."

Greg knelt on one knee and reloaded his pistol as the other three of the group made their careful way out of the room.

"You're crazy man."

Greg looked up at Rock and gave him a wan smile.

"The things we do for the Core. We have to get to those emitters before these creatures over run the facility."

He frowned, "If that ship was not one of their own, how many people could it have housed?"

 

[milkmaiden38]

Sgt Laura Branning

The Asshole on the roof, came crashing down into the shuttle passenger area. Chunks of roof came with him. The acid from the monsters they had killed was the cause. It took a bit more from both her and the Asshole, but the monsters finally retreated. Laura spun around, only to find a tri-dot laser coming to rest on her forehead.

"Ooman" The Asshole said

Laura knew the Asshole was intelligent. But what the hell was it doing? Why was it here? And What the hell did it want? She did not know. She also did not know what “Ooman” meant. She thought about killing the thing. But there was no way she could get her weapon on the Asshole before she would be dead. So she did the only thing she could. She held up her hands in surrender.

“Asshole” She replied back.

The Asshole seemed to just stare at her for a few moments. Then he lowered his weapon. That was when the shuttle arrived at the docking station.

Greg’s Team

Greg team made it outside and headed for the ancient space ship. The planet’s weird atmosphere had not changed. The gloom and drifting acetylene clouds made it seem extra spooky. Visibility was still poor but the team moved quickly. Not because they wanted to, but because they had too. To answer Greg’s question on the Ancient ship size, Sandra replied “I did not see the whole thing, but I’d say at least 100.”

They placed holo-emitters as they moved to generate false targets as needed. If Greg was right, the monsters were using humans as hosts to breed more monsters. The plan was to use the emitters to show a large group of humans just hanging around. When the monsters approach, the holograms will move away. The hope was to draw them all out.

 

[TertiusHuman]

Dadtih

He looked at the human female, clearly she felt no fear. A true warrior, she would make a good trophy, but the Elders wanted proof of their combat abilities and a human trophy would only serve to prove that he was not ready yet.

He swiveled the plasma caster away from her and turned to the open door, he pointed outside and looked at the female, there was a distorted sound as the speech translator worked on the next words.

"Prey. We . . . kill."

He turned away from her, grabbed hold of one of the Prey and jumped onto the platform, dragging the limp body with him. He threw the Prey on the ground an knelt down, drawing his dagger to remove the head as a trophy.

Greg

With the emitters set up and ready, Greg lead the team into the shadow of the ship, taking cover between the ground and the ship itself. He activated the holographic images and a group of scientists with a security detail sprang to life, due to the fact that they managed to lay down more than Greg had hoped for, the images looked solid.

"Now, we need them to notice the group. Any ideas?"

Before anybody could reply, a blue bolt of plasma energy shot out of nowhere towards the hole in the ship. The resulting impact caused a high pitched scream from the inside and suddenly a large group of beasts exploded from the inside, charging over the flat surface towards the holograms.

"Now! Hustle."

Greg jumped to his feet and ran for the opening, they were on the clock and he knew they had almost no chance to pull this off, but he was also quite certain that they could not leave the nest intact. He entered the hole and ran down the corridor, glancing at the arm computer to make certain he was on the right track towards the engine room.

 

[milkmaiden38]

Greg’s Team

Rock, Sting, Sandra and Greg entered the derelict ship. As before the ship resembled a living organism, with skeletal walls, circular gangways and steep passages. They passed through the main cargo hold area and saw the strange egg shaped objects in it. The earlier explosion had damaged some of them, but many remained standing and whole. Sandra saw in the field of eggs, some had florescent blue glowing cracks in them.

“I hate this… walk faster!” Sandra urged as they all stayed away from the eggs. Greg led them deeper into the old ship towards the engine room. Greg reached the main door which partially open. They all squeezed through the opening and entered the large room.

The room contained 4 large pieces of equipment. The two towards the middle of the room. These were most likely the warp field generators. There were a series of tubes leaving these two boxes to the other large and smaller units in the room. The two other large pieces of equipment in the room were mostly likely the generators to power the warp field units.

These generators would also provided power for the ship's systems. Larger ships typically have three or more of these synchronized generators to ensure smooth operation. But this older ship seemed to have only two units. Some of the smaller pieces of gear in the room was most likely energy reciprocating recovery system, photon turbines for artificial gravity, small auxiliary engines, and other items such as air compressors, feed pumps, and fuel pumps.

“Shall we place the explosives on the outer boxes?” Sting asked.

Sgt Laura Branning

"Prey. We . . . kill." The creature said to Laura. Then remove the head of one of the monsters as a trophy.

Laura had seen soldiers “take” trophies before after a battle. Cutting off ears, noses and other body parts. It was against Marine regulations and in her mind a sick practice. But she was not going to say anything to her new ally.

“Yes, we are planning on killing as many of the mother fuckers as possible” Laura said back. She realized too late, colorful metaphor like mother fuckers, would probably not translate well for the creature. She restated her reply.

“Yes, we have a plan to kill many prey” Laura stated more simply. She moved over to the switch to open the heavy blast doors. The transport dropship was docked on the platform above. As she threw the switch, the blast door opened. She entered the building and groaned. She saw the thick bundle of severed cables hanging in the hallway, spitting out sparks. A monster or monsters were inside the building. She brought her weapon up and was ready. She moved carefully towards the stairs that lead to the docking platform.

 

[TertiusHuman]

Datih

By the time Laura had made her way to the blast doors, he had already stripped the flesh and skin from the head, leaving the skull exposed. He secured his trophy to his back and activated his cloak. He felt no obligation to the Ooman, but she had impressed him with her steadfast behavior and guts. She may not be much of a hunter, but he could appreciate strength when he saw it.

He moved in through the doors, invisible and silent, stalking the prey inside.

Greg

He inspected the layout and then shook his head

"These casings seems to be made of a different material than anything I have ever seen. I doubt that the blasts will be enough to rupture it and cause a chain reaction."

He looked around and pried what looked like a deformed pitch fork from a mass of black matter. He shoved it into a slot on one of the outer casings and pushed as hard as he could, the outer shell gave a bit of a creak and then it swung open with a click. Greg tossed the implement to Rock, who started to pry open more covers as Greg started to set the charges on the exposed energy converters and lines. As he set up the last of the explosives, he noticed a port on one of the consoles.

"Nothing ventured, nothing gained."

He took out the field laptop and plugged it into the port, to his surprise the laptop and consoled linked up and data started running over the screen. He sat down and started typing, going into the fuel system and actually found the self destruct sequence. With more serious typing he realized that the ship was actually of Earth origin, he managed to activate the self destruct at the same time that a loud scream echoed from the inside of the ship.

"Time to go."

He unplugged the laptop and stowed it, grabbing his gun and running for the exit.

 

[milkmaiden38]

Sgt Laura Branning

Laura continued to move towards the stairs. The creature helping her seemed to stay back. “What is it doing?” She thought. Then she realized the creature was using her as bait. “Not a bad idea” She thought. As she reached the stairs. The bad monster was on her. She heard nothing. How a monster that large had come through the vents without making any noise was beyond her.

The ceiling burst open, as the monster grabbed her and pulled her back into the ceiling space. This monster was larger than any Laura had seen so far. It held her as it growled, showing its teeth. Laura was unable to escape. Her back was against the ceiling tiles and the monster was above her. The monster’s jaws and teeth dripping clear saliva on her armor.

Laura took one hand off her laser cannon and grabbed her combat knife attached to her thigh. The monster was so close to her face, inches from her. Its hot breath on her skin. Just before it was going to strike, Laura slammed the knife into its jaw! The monster screeched. Laura slip away from it. Then from below, the hunting, helpful creature blade sliced up through the ceiling and into the monster’s chest. That killed the monster. The ceiling tiles gave way, as Laura scramble to avoid the acid coming out of the dead monster and land on her feet. She did both.

Greg’s Team

You would never see it on a United Space Marines Tactical Assault Squad (USMTAS) recruitment video. Those videos would never show Marines running away from danger. Running towards it , maybe, but never away. That was not the case for Rock, Sting, Sandra and Greg. They were running like the wind away from the engine room of the derelict ship.

“A 100,000 year old self destruct command is never going to work!” Sting stated sadly. “We are all going to die”

“KEEP RUNNING” Sandra yelled. As they ran back through the old hanger bay filled with the glowing eggs.

“FUCK!!” Rock yelled as he spotted one of the little monsters. Luckily, they were running so fast they just pasted it.

 

[TertiusHuman]

Greg ran as fast as he could, luckily the exit wasn't difficult to find and they ran out of the ship. The creatures have by now followed the massed holograms and were actually between Greg's team and the Installation.

"Follow me."

Greg took the lead as he had seen an alternative route on the map of the buildings, it was a long route, but if they hurried, they might make the time table that Sarge had set them.

"Sarge, this is Reaper. We are cut off from the installation, we are taking an alternative route."

"Roger that, we are moving to link up with Branning."