The Invasion
Hawkeye
Join Date: 2002-10-31 Member: 1855Members
Join Date: 2002-10-31 Member: 1855Members
Okay, I have a story. Along the way, I will say things like *cue track x*. It is entirely optional, but you can put in your half-life track and play the appropriate track for a better feel in the story.
Chapter 1 - <b>We've got hostiles</b>
*cue track 10*
The year is 2170. A lone spaceship stretches out into the deep space as the star Gamus 5 shines into view.
"Commander! We've got hostiles!" mutters a grunt through the radio. "Hostiles? What?! Where's your position, soldier?" the commander concernly replies. "... .... ambush... ... ****' all over the place! Get us out of here! .... " as the signal gets continually garbled by the static.
"Soldier?! Come in?! **** this is just what I need..." Commander slams his fist into the table. "Well, boys.. I think we just found the reason why this vessel sent out a distress beacon." After a brief moment of contemplation, he turns to his second and command. "Hopkins, I want a status check on all our troops. Get to the control room pronto and try to establish a link with the teams. We've got hostiles."
"Yes, sir" Hopkins replies and salutes the commander before racing away proceeded by several officers.
Hopkins arrives into a dark room with many controls and instruments, with the 5 curious officers following shortly behind. Many panels on the walls turned off, and couple of them with bullet holes through them. A puddle of blood lies underneath a control station, as well as a streak of blood along the ground, as if something was pulled away. "What the hell?" a soldier remarks.
"Alpha, bravo, tango, delta.. come in! I need a status check pronto. I repeat, come in alpha, bravo, tango, delta.." Hopkins nervously speaks into the radio. No response.. "There's gotta be some sort of interference! We've only been on board for 30 minutes, and already the scout teams are gone?!" Fowler frantically says.
"Fowler, get a grip. It's gotta be interference. Even if we've got hostiles on board, it is nothing we couldn't handle before. Remember the miner rebellion on Cerillion prime? They broke into the ammunitions storage and had all sorts of weapons. They were a piece of cake if you recall," replies Beeks as he leans on the side of some control instruments casually.
"Hey, you don't know what's out there?! We don't know who we're up against! Hell, we know they wiped out the entire crew!" Fowler frantically says.
Beeks squints, then walks towards Fowler slowly with gun in hand. "You scared, Fowler? Afraid? Ever heard of the Nimbus worms? They crawl inside your head and cause you to go mad briefly before you become a slave to the Nimbus worm! We could be fighting them, Fowler... You could be next!"
"Hey give it a rest!" Hopkins says, "We've got work to do.. Commander sent orders for us to rendezvous with tango team in the mess hall. Lets move, grunts! They don't pay us by the hour! Move move move!"
Beeks gives Fowler a taunting little kissy face. The soldiers exit the control room. Fowler, the last to leave, stares at the puddles of blood on the floor as he exits.
Chapter 1 - <b>We've got hostiles</b>
*cue track 10*
The year is 2170. A lone spaceship stretches out into the deep space as the star Gamus 5 shines into view.
"Commander! We've got hostiles!" mutters a grunt through the radio. "Hostiles? What?! Where's your position, soldier?" the commander concernly replies. "... .... ambush... ... ****' all over the place! Get us out of here! .... " as the signal gets continually garbled by the static.
"Soldier?! Come in?! **** this is just what I need..." Commander slams his fist into the table. "Well, boys.. I think we just found the reason why this vessel sent out a distress beacon." After a brief moment of contemplation, he turns to his second and command. "Hopkins, I want a status check on all our troops. Get to the control room pronto and try to establish a link with the teams. We've got hostiles."
"Yes, sir" Hopkins replies and salutes the commander before racing away proceeded by several officers.
Hopkins arrives into a dark room with many controls and instruments, with the 5 curious officers following shortly behind. Many panels on the walls turned off, and couple of them with bullet holes through them. A puddle of blood lies underneath a control station, as well as a streak of blood along the ground, as if something was pulled away. "What the hell?" a soldier remarks.
"Alpha, bravo, tango, delta.. come in! I need a status check pronto. I repeat, come in alpha, bravo, tango, delta.." Hopkins nervously speaks into the radio. No response.. "There's gotta be some sort of interference! We've only been on board for 30 minutes, and already the scout teams are gone?!" Fowler frantically says.
"Fowler, get a grip. It's gotta be interference. Even if we've got hostiles on board, it is nothing we couldn't handle before. Remember the miner rebellion on Cerillion prime? They broke into the ammunitions storage and had all sorts of weapons. They were a piece of cake if you recall," replies Beeks as he leans on the side of some control instruments casually.
"Hey, you don't know what's out there?! We don't know who we're up against! Hell, we know they wiped out the entire crew!" Fowler frantically says.
Beeks squints, then walks towards Fowler slowly with gun in hand. "You scared, Fowler? Afraid? Ever heard of the Nimbus worms? They crawl inside your head and cause you to go mad briefly before you become a slave to the Nimbus worm! We could be fighting them, Fowler... You could be next!"
"Hey give it a rest!" Hopkins says, "We've got work to do.. Commander sent orders for us to rendezvous with tango team in the mess hall. Lets move, grunts! They don't pay us by the hour! Move move move!"
Beeks gives Fowler a taunting little kissy face. The soldiers exit the control room. Fowler, the last to leave, stares at the puddles of blood on the floor as he exits.
Comments
*cue track 26*
"Commander, we are at the mess hall, but there is no sign of tango, over," Hopkins speaks in the radio.
Fowler takes careful notice around the room as he sees a large room with dining tables. It is particularly dark, so Fowler, then some others turn on their flashlights to take a better look. A soldier, probably from tango, rests in one of the middle tables in the dining hall.
"Poor sap," Larson replies as he shakes his head.
Beeks points and chuckles, "He got what he deserved." A few of the marines turn to Beeks in disgust at the comment, but say nothing. Beek proceeds closer to the corpse. "Look at him! He's not even of high rank! What a ****."
"That's enough, Beeks," Hopkins says.
"And look here!" Beeks says as he reaches into the grunt's pocket and pulls out a wallet. "He's got kids too. What an idiot. If he can't handle the heat, why did he join the squad?"
Hopkins drops the radio and looks at Beeks. "That's ENOUGH, Beeks!"
Beeks, seeming to ignore the comments, continues, "Those kids are going to grow up and be as stupid as their father." Beeks throws the wallet on the ground and grabs the corpses head and lifts it up to see the face. "Look at his face... I bet he looks as dumb as..."
*cue track 27*
Immediately, the corpse responds to the touch of Beeks, and grips his wrist tightly and stares straight into his eyes. "Kharaa... run... save yourself!" the corpse screams at an incredibly frightened Beeks before going into convulsions. Beeks, struggling to get out of the grip of the body, manages to free himself, pulls back, and fires a full round into the body.
"Beeks! What the **** are you doing?! That was one of our own!!" Larson shouts as he tries to attack Beeks. Several soldiers restrain him. Beeks, after having wiped the blood off his suit, walks up to a restrained Larson and whispers into his ear, "Make no mistake. I'll do you too by the time this is through."
"You're out of line soldiers! Beeks, we could have saved that man's life. What the hell were you thinking?!" an infuriated Hopkins asks.
"Didn't you see, sir? He was trying to kill us. You're lucky I stopped him," Beeks replies.
"Sure..." Larson says sarcastically. Larson shrugs off the restraints, but maintains a villigant eye over Beeks as he walks around the mess hall like nothing happened.
"Sir, we have a situation here. We found a body.. one of our own. He wasn't quite.. dead, sir..."
Fowler, taking a closer look at the corpse, sees a small thing sticking out of his head. He pulls it out, only to find it is a 4-inch bony spike that was in his head. "****.." he thinks to himself, "Whoever did this sure as hell wasn't human." Just as Fowler comes to that realization, a sound of scurrying is heard around the corner.
"What the hell was that?" Larson raises his gun in the direction of the noise followed by the rest of the group. "I can't see a freaking thing.. flashlight.. put the flashlight over there!"
Fowler, careful to keep his gun pointing in the direction of the noise, uses his other hand to switch on the flashlight and point it in that direction. A dark stairway moves upwards into oblivion. Next to it, a lift design to carry cargo is inoperable. Hopkins, moves forward slowly and cautiously ahead of the group, signalling with his hand for the rest of the marines to follow. Hopkins, suddenly stops in his tracks and holds his head. Some of the soldiers look at each other out of confusion.
*cue track 16*
"Roger, commander, we're almost there." an unknown voice says from a nearby corridor. Larson enthusiastically says, "Oh **** yeah! Damn straight! Where the hell have you been? We thought you were goners!" The tango squad walks around the corner happily to see some familiar faces again.
The tango commander smiling widely, speaks into the radio, "There are the **** now." The group happily meets and talks about anything to get their minds off the fear and anguish. Hopkins, still holding his head, as if out of pain, is away from the group. Fowler walks up to Hopkins slowly.
"Hey, Hopkins. Are you okay?" Fowler concernly says.
"Yeah, I'm fine, Fowler." Hopkins says to Fowler.
"You don't look alright.. you look a little pale," Fowler replies as he looks at Hopkins from all sides and happens to discover a red mark on the side of his head. "Holy ****! You got hit!"
"I know I know.. it is too deep to take out. It doesn't hurt anyway. I'm fine, Fowler." Hopkins says to Fowler with a look as if to say, don't speak a word about it to the group. Fowler nods, and walks to the big group.
Hopkins calmly walks to the group. "Tango squad, I want you to go up those stairs and try to find alpha."
A tango squad soldier steps out, presumably the squad leader, responds, "But sir, the comm suggested we stay grouped together and rendezvous at the bridge so we can get set the ship on autopilot to Sol system and get the hell outta here."
Hopkins shakes his head, "No, you're mistaken. Comm has told me we need to investigate the area, and hopefully find the remnants of alpha, bravo, and delta. Where's your radio?"
Tango squad leader scratches his head and looks at the ground. Hopkins continues to stare at the embarrassed squad leader awaiting an answer. "Well?"
"Well, um.. you see.. I had the radio in my hand when Charlie here," the tango squad leader inquires as nobody pointing themselves out as Charlie, "He uh.. Well he decided to play a prank while we were waiting around. He comes up behind me and he says 'BOO!' real loud while I'm looking around the corner, right? Well, I kinda sorta dropped the radio."
Beeks falls over the floor in laughter. The rest of the group laughs at the squad leader as well.. all but Hopkins, whose face seemed to dictate grave seriousness. "...Thought so. It seems you've been misinformed. He's since then updated our orders. Don't worry, um.. " Hopkins looks at tag, "...Malloy. You proceed up the stairs as ordered by the comm."
Squad leader, puzzled responds "But shouldn't I return back to base and equip with another ra..."
"That's a direct order, Malloy!"
*cue track 13*
"Sir, yes, sir! Squad, move out!" Malloy gestures the team to follow him up the stairs as he marches up the stairs into oblivion along with the rest of the squad members.
"Rest of you, follow me. We have orders to proceed to level 4 engineering. Lets move grunts!" Hopkins takes the team at the opposite entrance to the dining hall through double doors. The team follows Hopkins and Beeks reluctantly gets off the floor and follows. Fowler hesitates to follow. He turns around, and grabs the pistol from the gun sash from the corpse. He puts it in his gun sash for good measure and follows the rest of the group.
What followed afterwards was a seemingly endless amount of twists and turns into various rooms. Everything was dark and it seemed to all look like the same panels and wires and core columns. As they started to approach engineering, the floor seemed to turn into a metal grated floor which extended downwards into an endless spiral of wires, pipes, beams, and more metal grated floors beneath. A strange green glow emanated from beneath, which came through the holes in the grated metal floor. In combination with the dust in the air, they looked like small green columns of light.
Nobody was speaking, but everyone must have been wondering if Hopkins knew where he was going. Fowler, ever vigillant, was thinking to himself about the events that had transpired: the bony dagger in the corpse's head, the scurry of the unknown creature, the contradiction of the comm to split us up when he wanted us to unite, the wound on Hopkin's head. It didn't make any sense. Something didn't add up. Was the comm purposely endangering the lives of the squads? What was going on?
Larson, who seemed to be thinking along the same lines, whispered to Fowler, "Pss.. have you noticed something?" Fowler replying, "Notice something? Notice what?"
"Hopkins.. he must speak in that radio to the comm every 5 minutes! He hasn't said anything in that thing since the mess hall."
Fowler, absorbing that data for a second, then suddenly thinking "Oh my god.."
Larson, steps forward bravely and asks Hopkins, "Hopkins, do you know where we are going?"
Hopkins replies, "Yes of course. Comm gave me direct orders to get to engineering."
Hopkin's radio, muffled from being in Hopkin's pocket, could be heard to the entire group "Hopkins?! Come in! What the hell do you.." Hopkins switches off the radio and looks at the group.
*cue track 11*
Hopkins pulls out a pistol and points it at the group.
Beeks immediately pulls his weapon on Hopkins with his finger on the trigger. Larson raises his hands showing he has no weapons in his hands. "Hopkins?" Larson slowly draws nearer.
"Don't get any closer, Larson." Hopkins replies.
"Hopkins, why are you doing this?" Larson says continuing to draw closer.
Hopkins grips his head with both his hands as if in immense pain. "RUN!.. "
"What?!" Fowler replies.
"Go you sorry excuses for soldiers! That's an order! AGH!!!!" Hopkins screams while continuing to grip his head. Larson, staring at the pistol Hopkins has in his hands, makes an aggressive attack on Hopkins to take the pistol when Hopkins 'snaps' out of the pain and shoots Larson twice in the shoulder before he could get close enough to stop him. Larson falls on the ground in pain.
*Click... * *click click click...* Beeks pulls the trigger only to find his ammo clip is removed. "****, Hopkins! What the hell is wrong with you?!" Fowler shouts.
"Don't you think I thought about that, Beeks?" Hopkins says with a almost unhuman smile across his face.
"Why are you doing this!?" Fowler shouts.
"Because! The hive needs food to grow. Feel priviledged. You will become her next meal." Hopkins says with a maniacal smile across his face. Fowler, suddenly looking around, finds himself inch-deep in a strange fungus all over the walls. The room was once the reactor core, now seems to be overrun by this fungus all over the walls and ceilings. The huge door entrance to the reactor room covered top to bottom. Hopkins, being on the other side of the door, hits the switch and the door starts to close as Hopkins begins to laugh like an evil person would laugh watching poor animals get slaughtered.
Beeks throws his gun at the door right before it closes only to hit the side of the door and fall to the ground. Hopkin's laughing still barely being heard on the other side of the door as footsteps get fainter.
Beeks making a commotion hitting things shouting profanity.. something about Hopkins and being 'majorly **** up' when he gets out.
"
Fowler get on his knees and looks over Larson, who by now is bleeding very much. Fowler rips a piece of his sleeve off and wraps it around his shoulder. "Larson? Speak to me. Larson?" Fowler says while checking his pulse. "Well, he's still alive anyway. He must have passed out from the pain."
Beeks continues cussing his heart out at the fact that someone got the better of him. "**** Hopkins! Oh, oh.. you're going to be in a WORLD of hurt when I get done with your motherfucking ****!"
"Beeks! Don't you get it, yet?! That thing on the side of his head.. He was parasited or something. Mind control... It wasn't really Beeks leading us down to engineering."
"I don't care if he was Satan, oh my freaking god!" Beeks says as he kicks the door in a fury of anger.
Fowler, holding the wound on Larson, thinking aloud, "It all makes sense now.. No wonder he disobeyed orders from the comm. No wonder he sent tango on a suicide mission, and without a radio at that. He would never do that normally."
"What are we doing to do now, huh?! We're pretty much ****! We're going to die man! What are we going to do, Fowler?!" Beeks frantically says.
"Get a grip, Beeks. This is a piece of cake, remember?" Fowler says snidely. Beeks shakes his head back and forth, "That's not funny, man. What are we going to do?! Come on!"
Fowler, looking at Larson, suddenly realizing there is no blood around him. He looks carefully and sees thriving fungus around him which must have taken a liking to the spilt blood. Fowler looks at his gun only to find no ammo clip in it like Beek's. Fowler, turning on his flashlight on his gun, follows the path of the fungus where it gets thicker. The trail leads him to the other side of an enormous room. The flashlight spotlighting something enormous and pulsating. Parts of it with very bony backbone things coming out of it, and others soft and fleshy. All of it is wet and dripping with ooze. "We can't stay here long."
*cue track 12*
Beek's jaw drops slightly stopping in his pacing and staring at the unknown pulsating thing. "Whatever the hell that is, it is getting closer, Fowler!"
Fowler, trying to think on his feet, suddenly remembers the pistol he got from the corpse. "Yes, of course!"
Fowler pulls out the pistol, trying as fast as he can to load the clip as the sound of an enormous entity seems to get closer to them. With the sound seeming to originate from about half-way in the middle of the room now, Fowler finally manages to load the clip with his hands shaking and fires 12 bullets into the "thing." Sounds as if a hammer were hitting a huge slab of meat are heard, but no sounds of pain.
"Beeks! Make yourself useful! Shine your light on that thing!"
Beeks, very shaken up at this point, hesitates to move at first, then races forward to grab the machine gun on the ground, then points the flashlight at the beast. "Where the hell am I?" a weakened Larson says as he finally gains consciousness.
Spotlight is placed on an enormous eyeball, and then on two sets of very sharp teeth. One going vertical, the other going horizontal.
"Jesus!" Beeks exclaims.
"Shutup, Larson. We've got a situation here." Fowler says as he tries to find a 2nd clip into the pistol.
"Hey, guys, what the hell is going on?!" Larson saying with a frightened tone to his voice after seeing the beast as well.
By now, the sound of this massive behemoth is within 10 meters, and shows no signs of stopping. Fowler is shaking terribly, trying to place the 2nd clip in backwards being horribly unnerved and uncoordinated. "**** it," Fowler says as he starts dashing away as fast as he can from the direction of the entity. "Beeks! Grab Larson! Lets get the hell outta here!"
Fowler discovers a vent passage on the floor big enough for a person to go through. He frantically kicks it trying to break the opening. "Come on! Get your **** over here!"
Beeks runs over to Larson and begins to look through his pockets. "Beeks! Get me out of here man! I can't move!" Beeks, ignoring the comment, continues to rummage though his pockets. "Beeks? What are you doing? Please lets get out of here!" Larson shouts again.
Fowler pulls out his pistol, and somehow manages to get the 2nd clip in correctly and fires a full round in the vent seal, breaking it open. "Over here, guys! Vent exit here! What you waiting for?! Christmas?!" Fowler jumps down the vent exit.
Larson, seeing only what the flashlight on the gun on the ground would allow him to see, hears Beeks whisper in his ear, "Remember what I said, right? I meant it." Beeks gives Larson a kissy face as he scurries off to the vent exit without Larson.
"Beeks?! Beeks?! BEEEEEEEEEEEKS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" Larson screams.
Larson, seeing nothing in the dark, felt himself getting lifted in the air followed by a couple loud sadistic snaps and cracks. Feeling only a warm feeling around his waist and nothing beneath, shortly thereafter he felt his entire body was consumed by the beast and Larson was no more.
Beeks finds himself falling rapidly through a completely vertical vent passage.
"Oh ****!" Beeks screams.
Beeks, after a seemingly endless fall, lands on some more fungus like in the previous room which strangely breaks his fall quite well.
Beeks shakes his head from the long fall. He looks up the dark vent passage where he had come from.
"Rookies are all the same. Too trusting.. too stupid," Beeks thinks to himself.
Beeks, suddenly looking around and realizing where he was, sees an enormous vine webwork of fleshy fungus material. It all seemed alive and pulsating! Beeks was sitting on the shelf of a very large room. It appeared to be the reactor room, though with the fungus growing on it, the green light came out distorted and in all strange patterns. So many pipes and fungus enters and leaves the reactor core, that it is hard to tell which is which. The fungus seemed to be enjoying the heat it received from the reactor core. Beeks leans over the edge of the self only to find the core in the center of the room go down indefinitely. Beeks stands up quickly, being fearful of the substance he was sitting on as it was gradually starting to grow on him.
Beeks notices a small cleft which leads to some sort of doorway. He carefully puts his gun over his head and balances the edge all the way to the doorway.
*cue track 9*
Suddenly, pistol gunfire can be heard. Beeks opens the door and walks into a much smaller room with a low ceiling, possibly more vents. Fowler is suddenly seen moving about as fast as you can move while crawling to Beek's location. "We've got hostiles!" Fowler shouts with a goggle-eyed look on his face. Beeks looks around the corner and sees thousands upon thousands of small little creatures about the size of cats with very sharp teeth. The creatures would probably pass as cute if they didn't have claws for feet and a nasty overbite.
Fowler shoots the rest of the gun at the creatures knowing full and well it wasn't going to stop them. Fowler looks at the pipes all around the reactor core. "We're gonna have to jump!" Beeks screams.
"WHAT?!" Fowler exclaims.
Beeks doesn't think twice and jumps onto a nearby pipe almost losing his grip, then managing to get a better hold and finally wrapping his legs around it to lay on top. Fowler seriously considers his options, looking back at the very close creatures behind him, and decides dying by falling is better than getting eaten to death and jumps. The pipe he lands on isn't a pipe at all but fungus. The fungus rips and the entire line swings and slams him into the side of the reactor core followed by a crunch sound. Fowler lets out an agonizing pain.
"Hey, Fowler. Are you okay?" Beeks seems to say without much emotion. Fowler, as if painful to speak, makes a low groaning noise. Sounds of some sort of water fall can be heard as Beeks notices that the fungus branch Fowler swung on was actually a circulatory blood vessel of some sort and was releasing a purple liquid down into the abyss. The many little creatures stay piled together on the edge. Some pushing off the others out of enthusiasm for seeing a potential meal, and others are leaping towards Beeks and Fowler only to come up a little short.
"We're ****," Beeks says aloud to himself.
*cue track 14*
About 10 seconds pass when a couple loud noises are heard from a door a couple stories above them.
<bang>
...
<BANG>
...
<b><BANG></b>
Fowler looks up and sees the door bending as each hit puts another bend in it.
<b><BANG></b>
Fowler wonders if things could get any worse than they already are. "Lets see, my ribs are broken, I'm hanging on fungus in the middle of a bottomless pit, creatures want to bite my face off, my **** itches... Whatever this hellhole can give us, bring it on!"
The door is finally knocked over, and there is tango squad! "Hey! Commander says you **** need some help," the squad leader says with a wide grin. "Nah, I heard it was the other way around. Ready to be rescued?" Fowler says with a big sigh of relief as Beeks is laughing with joy.