<b><span style='font-family:Arial'><span style='color:blue'> *Finishes up his letter on the ship* "Ok, there we go. Had to leave out the fact that Venmoch died to an infestaion, 'complications of injurys'. But the'll just be happy to get a letter. Hey let me get a picture of you guys, show my family back home who I'm fighting with." *Takes pictures* "Ok, now I just have to put your names under the pictures...Terran, Nightshade, Spinviper, Nightdragon, Gwahir, Lord Darkness, Ed, Khaim.......hey, where's Bogglesteinsky?" *Looks around the ship* "Guys, I think we left him back at base....." </span></span></b>
<span style='color:green'>"He'll be right. They'll probably phase him through." *pulls a ration bar out of his pack, sits down and straps himself in, munching nervously on the bar while checking his weapons over* "Not that they'll be happy about the waste of energy involved."</span>
<span style='color:red'><span style='font-family:courier'> *looks around the shuttle* *eyes wander over and look out the window* *stares out at the Guardpost which is fading out of sight* *feels some remorse and zones out* *the flash of the camera jolts me back into reality* "Man, looking at the base as we fly away is baaad luck. What the hell am I doing..." *grips weapon tighter* *sees Grim scribble some names on the picture* "Hehe...now some people know our identities. I feel that will somehow doom us <!--emo&:)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/smile.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='smile.gif'><!--endemo-->." </span></span>
<span style='color:White'> *As the ship departed the station, Ed had dissassembeled Wynona into a dozen peices.* "Got another upgrade for you, Hon." *Ed Saysm softly to the gun, he reaches into his pocket and pulls out a small box with a set of leads leading out. He pulls a simmilar, albiet much more corroded and older looking box, off Wynona's mainboard, and attaches the new box to it where the old box was. He then reassembles Wynona and turns her on. The sound of the fan spinning up is overshadowed by a fammilar female voice. "New Hardware Detected:Polyphonic sound card installed"* "Yay, no more tinny voice, that was getting me annoyed." </span>
<b>Note: No combat value, just logically could not have a tinny speaker in the future anymore. <!--emo&:D--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/biggrin.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='biggrin.gif'><!--endemo--></b>
<i>As time passes, you move closer to the large, red planet that houses the research station. The sun of this galaxy is going down to the right of the ships approach. The moment where the sun passes the horizon, a single orbiting ship in contour to the light, is a moment of both beauty and sorrow, as you move to the station that was the origin of a war that will prove to be one of the most terrible humanity has faced.</i>
<span style='color:red'><span style='font-family:courier'> *sees the station come into view* "Man...that definately can't support any life. I mean <i>any</i> life. That includes the Kharaa. I'm sure that they are badass, but that just puts a different spin on the word. Not badass as in cool, but badass as in it hurts..." *watches it some more as it comes closer to view* "Oh my...god. Scratch that. It looks evil and badass. I wouldn't be surpirsed if Satan had taken up residence in that thing." *checks weapon saftey to be off and that its chambered* *hugs my weapon* "...mommy..." </span></span>
<span style='color:gray'>*Unsafeties and loads his weapons* "Just so you know, this is my first real combat mission, not my first mission, but first in combat..."</span>
<span style='color:white'> *Ed looks out the window* "..." *Ed grips Wynona tighter* "Reminds me of a classic movie i've seen, "Event Horizon". *Ed takes a few deep breaths, then hits an icon on Wynona's interface, slow music begins to play, a few reconize it as a classical piece: Rammstein's Mein Herz Brennt.* </span>
<span style='color:purple'>"This is getting more unusual by the minute neg?" *Taps a few buttons on his pda and sets some old, hevy metal music playing in his headset.* "Heh, adrenaline helps the fear a bit, hell I duno weather we should be more worried about satan or one of those holes in the station sucking us out into a nice void in space. Pleasant thoughts." *Walks over to the window and taps on it with a finger.* "At least these things are built well."</span>
<b><span style='font-family:Arial'><span style='color:blue'> *Watches station loom closer* "I don't think even Satan would want to live there...." *Crosses him self, mutters quick prayer, and eats some jelly beans* "Hmmmm, if this is still supposed to be a cakewalk, the cake is now made of blended rat, tar, glass shards and toped off with bile and blood frosting."
*Looks over at Dragon and Gwahir* "Don't worry, you'll do fine. Just remer your training and stick close to us. *Reaches in his pouch and pulls out some small, colourful shapes, offering them to Gwahir and Dragon* "Jelly beans?"
*Shifts around in his seat* "I'm realy begining to wish they had let us take the HA we brought back from the last mission. That and our heavy wepons." *Frowns at station* "This is starting to feel very 'weird'."
*A look passes across his face* "Hey, Xect is gone. Who's gonna command? I'm not all that great with the interface, I'd prefer not to. Any of you guys up for Commanding?" </span></span></b>
<i>After a little while, the dropship lands in the arrival hanger, and once you're off, leaves you standing in the main arrival hall. Slightly small room, with a few disks where receptionists used to recieve newcomers or visitors. Now, the room is clean (as in "not terribly dirty"), but a bit dusty.
Because it's just a peacefull investigation, no command console was brought along.</i>
<span style='color:orange'><i>"This was meant as a peaceful investigation, in other words, no console."</i> <b>"Anthony, you've got an e-mail. Hey, 'Australia's Funniest Home Videos'!"</b> <i>"Put a good one through the projector." *a hologram appears above the PDA, the same picture is seen from all angles, a long haired man (not Dark) is standing in front of the camera, his voice is replaced by the overvoice guy doing an impression of a skateboarder Guy: Dude, I've been skateboarding for years and I've had broken arms, broken legs, broken ribs, a broken collarbone. behind him, his car starts to move very slowly Cameraman: Dude I think there's a break you forgot about. Guy: What's that, Dude. Cameraman: The handbrake! the guy's car is now rolling very fast down the hill as its owner chases after it*</i></span>
<b>Xect, get that PM?</b> <span style='color:green'>*unsafeties LMG, keeping it at his hip* "Well, let's take a look around." *flips on radio* "Anyone know what the evac procedure is?" *has an idea* "The brief said they'd already eradicated all life on the station...anyone know what they used to do it?" *Pulls a rad-counter film out of his pack and sticks it to his left forearm*</span> <b>It's a little strip of film that starts dark, and a light patch progresses along it as your rad dose increases.</b> <span style='color:green'>"One of you techs wanna take a look at those terminals, see if they're still useful?"</span>
<span style='color:purple'>"Sure, why not, unless it explodes and kills us all that is." *Grins and walks over to terminal, poking a few buttons on it* [Guna let Xect Fill in whatever I find/don't find.]</span>
<span style='color:White'> "Man, this place is a tomb... You hear that?" *Ed goes quiet for a second* "That's the sound of nothing, not a moving object within a dozen meters, besides us of course." *Ed Checks a control panel near the door, assuming that it has power.* </span>
<b><span style='font-family:Arial'><span style='color:blue'> "Oh yea, it's even better inside." *Clicks of safetys on both weapons* "It just feels..... empty." *Walks around the room, lookin for anything interesting*
"Eh, one of you tech guys want to bring up a map of this place? I'd like to get the data, and get out of here."
*Munches on some jelly beans* "Night Shade, you'd recognize the sort of stuff we're looking for right?"
*Wanders over and checks out the receptionest area*
"Makes you wonder why they didn't have a whole company of Heavy Armors guading the labs. Stupid budget cuts. If any place needed that much protection, it'd be anyplace with active aliens."
*Runs a quick check on his equipment* "Ok, comm check... testing... everyone hear that ok? Check your comms people, this isn't a place where you're gonna want find out that the're not working."
"As soon as we get the layout of the place, lets head out and get what we came for." </span></span></b>
<span style='color:purple'>[After a few seconds cracking the pretty standard password procedure (that hole's been fixed years ago, system wasnt updated though), you log into a computer that was locked mid-use earlier. An email program is running, seems the userwas half-way through writing an email home, normal day-to-day stuff. Stops in the middle of a sentence though. Apart from that, looking at the older emails, you find one from two days before the alien escape:</span>
<i>Khaim - (reading the email): "Hello Jack What's going on? I overheard a few scientists mentioning that there might be something about that evolution babble after all. Can you fill me in on what's happening? Worst of it all is that they wanted to bring a specimen with them for testing. Do you know what they're trying to do? I keep asking, and they keep telling me it's confidential and I'd be better off not knowing. Well, that's what I'm used to being told, but I still don't like it, there's something creepy about them.
<span style='color:red'><span style='font-family:courier'> *looks at the structure of the building* "Oh...<i>damn</i>. I'm surprised this structure is still standing. This building looks like it should of fallen in on itself if I made a model like this for my physics project." *taps the walls* *hears some weak groans from the structure* "Err...yea. I'm uh...I'm not going to do that anymore." *shoulders rifle loosely and walks around* *hears the e-mail and Spin's comment* "Yea...that's definately hax. Secret project breaks out and kills everyone. Now, we have to come back to this place and 'check it out.'" *sighs, and now fully shoulders the weapon, but keeps it pointed down* *scans the area with a wary eye while patroling it* </span></span>
<span style='color:gray'>"I can help with the map" [Walks over to a terminal and attempts to gain access before finding the blueprint files] "Any specifics you wanted, or just general layout?"</span>
<span style='color:purple'>*Picks his rifle back up and looks at Gwahir* "You know we have HUD maps anyway right?" *pokes a button on Gwahir's visor* "See? Anyway, lets get moving, this stinking place just might fall apart any time now."</span>
<span style='color:orange'><i>*sees that no-one watched the video* "Jeez, I try to lighten the mood with a clip from Funniest Home Video's and nobody pays attention." *hears creaking from Terran tapping the wall* "HOLY SH!T!! You trying to bring this whole place crashing down around us?"</i></span>
<span style='color:green'>*looks around at Darkness* "What?" *winks, then goes back to peering over Gwahir's shoulder at the map* "So, we gonna go check this out or not? From the looks of things, we need to go that way, *points* take the third left, then the fourth right and follow that to the end." "Yeah Khaim, we have HUD maps, but a local map is a lot more useful. Gwahir, any way you can copy that onto our huds?"</span>
Comments
Lord Darkness, Ed, Khaim.......hey, where's Bogglesteinsky?" *Looks around the ship* "Guys, I think we left him back at base....." </span></span></b>
*pulls a ration bar out of his pack, sits down and straps himself in, munching nervously on the bar while checking his weapons over*
"Not that they'll be happy about the waste of energy involved."</span>
*looks around the shuttle*
*eyes wander over and look out the window*
*stares out at the Guardpost which is fading out of sight*
*feels some remorse and zones out*
*the flash of the camera jolts me back into reality*
"Man, looking at the base as we fly away is baaad luck. What the hell am I doing..."
*grips weapon tighter*
*sees Grim scribble some names on the picture*
"Hehe...now some people know our identities. I feel that will somehow doom us <!--emo&:)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/smile.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='smile.gif'><!--endemo-->."
</span></span>
"Got another upgrade for you, Hon." *Ed Saysm softly to the gun, he reaches into his pocket and pulls out a small box with a set of leads leading out. He pulls a simmilar, albiet much more corroded and older looking box, off Wynona's mainboard, and attaches the new box to it where the old box was. He then reassembles Wynona and turns her on. The sound of the fan spinning up is overshadowed by a fammilar female voice. "New Hardware Detected:Polyphonic sound card installed"*
"Yay, no more tinny voice, that was getting me annoyed."
</span>
<b>Note: No combat value, just logically could not have a tinny speaker in the future anymore. <!--emo&:D--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/biggrin.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='biggrin.gif'><!--endemo--></b>
"Man, this is turning into a bad habit."</i></span>
"Good to meet you, Im Ed."</span>
*sees the station come into view*
"Man...that definately can't support any life. I mean <i>any</i> life. That includes the Kharaa. I'm sure that they are badass, but that just puts a different spin on the word. Not badass as in cool, but badass as in it hurts..."
*watches it some more as it comes closer to view*
"Oh my...god. Scratch that. It looks evil and badass. I wouldn't be surpirsed if Satan had taken up residence in that thing."
*checks weapon saftey to be off and that its chambered*
*hugs my weapon*
"...mommy..."
</span></span>
"Just so you know, this is my first real combat mission, not my first mission, but first in combat..."</span>
edit: woops, wrong color
"..."
*Ed grips Wynona tighter*
"Reminds me of a classic movie i've seen, "Event Horizon".
*Ed takes a few deep breaths, then hits an icon on Wynona's interface, slow music begins to play, a few reconize it as a classical piece: Rammstein's Mein Herz Brennt.*
</span>
*Taps a few buttons on his pda and sets some old, hevy metal music playing in his headset.*
"Heh, adrenaline helps the fear a bit, hell I duno weather we should be more worried about satan or one of those holes in the station sucking us out into a nice void in space. Pleasant thoughts."
*Walks over to the window and taps on it with a finger.*
"At least these things are built well."</span>
*Looks over at Dragon and Gwahir* "Don't worry, you'll do fine. Just remer your training and stick close to us. *Reaches in his pouch and pulls out some small, colourful shapes, offering them to Gwahir and Dragon*
"Jelly beans?"
*Shifts around in his seat* "I'm realy begining to wish they had let us take the HA we brought back from the last mission. That and our heavy wepons." *Frowns at station* "This is starting to feel very 'weird'."
*A look passes across his face* "Hey, Xect is gone. Who's gonna command? I'm not all that great with the interface, I'd prefer not to. Any of you guys up for Commanding?" </span></span></b>
Because it's just a peacefull investigation, no command console was brought along.</i>
<b>"Anthony, you've got an e-mail. Hey, 'Australia's Funniest Home Videos'!"</b>
<i>"Put a good one through the projector."
*a hologram appears above the PDA, the same picture is seen from all angles, a long haired man (not Dark) is standing in front of the camera, his voice is replaced by the overvoice guy doing an impression of a skateboarder
Guy: Dude, I've been skateboarding for years and I've had broken arms, broken legs, broken ribs, a broken collarbone.
behind him, his car starts to move very slowly
Cameraman: Dude I think there's a break you forgot about.
Guy: What's that, Dude.
Cameraman: The handbrake!
the guy's car is now rolling very fast down the hill as its owner chases after it*</i></span>
<span style='color:green'>*unsafeties LMG, keeping it at his hip*
"Well, let's take a look around." *flips on radio*
"Anyone know what the evac procedure is?"
*has an idea*
"The brief said they'd already eradicated all life on the station...anyone know what they used to do it?"
*Pulls a rad-counter film out of his pack and sticks it to his left forearm*</span>
<b>It's a little strip of film that starts dark, and a light patch progresses along it as your rad dose increases.</b>
<span style='color:green'>"One of you techs wanna take a look at those terminals, see if they're still useful?"</span>
*Grins and walks over to terminal, poking a few buttons on it*
[Guna let Xect Fill in whatever I find/don't find.]</span>
"Man, this place is a tomb... You hear that?"
*Ed goes quiet for a second*
"That's the sound of nothing, not a moving object within a dozen meters, besides us of course."
*Ed Checks a control panel near the door, assuming that it has power.*
</span>
"It just feels..... empty." *Walks around the room, lookin for anything interesting*
"Eh, one of you tech guys want to bring up a map of this place? I'd like to get the data, and get out of here."
*Munches on some jelly beans* "Night Shade, you'd recognize the sort of stuff we're looking for right?"
*Wanders over and checks out the receptionest area*
"Makes you wonder why they didn't have a whole company of Heavy Armors guading the labs. Stupid budget cuts. If any place needed that much protection, it'd be anyplace with active aliens."
*Runs a quick check on his equipment* "Ok, comm check... testing... everyone hear that ok? Check your comms people, this isn't a place where you're gonna want find out that the're not working."
"As soon as we get the layout of the place, lets head out and get what we came for." </span></span></b>
<i>Khaim - (reading the email):
"Hello Jack
What's going on? I overheard a few scientists mentioning that there might be something about that evolution babble after all. Can you fill me in on what's happening? Worst of it all is that they wanted to bring a specimen with them for testing. Do you know what they're trying to do? I keep asking, and they keep telling me it's confidential and I'd be better off not knowing. Well, that's what I'm used to being told, but I still don't like it, there's something creepy about them.
Haring."</i>
*looks at the structure of the building*
"Oh...<i>damn</i>. I'm surprised this structure is still standing. This building looks like it should of fallen in on itself if I made a model like this for my physics project."
*taps the walls*
*hears some weak groans from the structure*
"Err...yea. I'm uh...I'm not going to do that anymore."
*shoulders rifle loosely and walks around*
*hears the e-mail and Spin's comment*
"Yea...that's definately hax. Secret project breaks out and kills everyone. Now, we have to come back to this place and 'check it out.'"
*sighs, and now fully shoulders the weapon, but keeps it pointed down*
*scans the area with a wary eye while patroling it*
</span></span>
[Walks over to a terminal and attempts to gain access before finding the blueprint files]
"Any specifics you wanted, or just general layout?"</span>
edit: changed ** to []
"You know we have HUD maps anyway right?"
*pokes a button on Gwahir's visor*
"See? Anyway, lets get moving, this stinking place just might fall apart any time now."</span>
"Jeez, I try to lighten the mood with a clip from Funniest Home Video's and nobody pays attention."
*hears creaking from Terran tapping the wall*
"HOLY SH!T!! You trying to bring this whole place crashing down around us?"</i></span>
"What?" *winks, then goes back to peering over Gwahir's shoulder at the map*
"So, we gonna go check this out or not? From the looks of things, we need to go that way, *points* take the third left, then the fourth right and follow that to the end."
"Yeah Khaim, we have HUD maps, but a local map is a lot more useful. Gwahir, any way you can copy that onto our huds?"</span>