((UPDATE NOTICE)) Ok i am happy to inform you that that my severe case of writers block is over. After I found that it was too big to move I rented out ((at great expense)) one of those tunnel boring machines to drill a highway tunnel through and I am happy to announce it has just emerged from the other side and the new tunnel is stable for now the flow of ideas can continue again. A few changes in the overall layout of the chapters at the bottom of each page i have updated the author's comments and added some new dialogue in one or two chapters to fix continuity with some of the new chapters i am working on and will be finished shortly look for the new addition to volume 2 soon but it is recommended you re read volume one to catch up on the continuity changes. Volume 2 hasn't been bumped recently so if it is not next to this story in the list it can be found here.

http://www. fanfiction .net/s/2970939/1/Alien_Shadow_vol_2_Rough_Childhood

((you'll need to enter this url manually since i needed to add spaces to keep fanfiction's document parser from eating my urls as i believe fanfiction .net is engaging in illegal censorship to keep people from posting links between stories either that or their html parser is abnormally retarded))

i don't own aliens, predator, star wars, or any other movie or book i used as a reference. any idea that you major corporations think is yours you can keep i am not making a profit and am simply having fun

OK before you start reading i would like to ask that you take the time to provide me with feed back, and point out any errors that you see.

Also, i marked this story as complete because i will not be adding any more chapters. i am still going to edit and change things based on the reviews and proof readings i get.

HELP I NEED PROOF READERS

also, please look carefully at the different ways that the characters express themselves. under special circumstances there will be symbols inside of the quotation mark representing the different modes of communication for example take the word hello.

"hello" this is normal speech

"((hello))" this means the character is thinking and no one else hears

"+hello+" this means the character is talking using telepathy

"HELLO" All caps means yelling

"any phrase with only
ONE or TWO words in ALL CAPS means emphasis on those words or phrases"

Special thanks goes to Yincira for helping me edit and for her expertise on the subject of xeno-human hybrids. I would also like to thank my parents for continually encouraging me to write down my ideas.

Nothing new in this update just some punctuation and spelling fixes in the first 2 chapters

Chapter 1

Sensor Trouble

Outside the window it was silent. Silent and cold, as it always is in deep space. Private First Class John Saunders was with the tech crew as they went over the sensor arrays. "What's this, the 80th time this month we've checked the damn Thing, or was it the 10th."

"Actually sir, it is the 24.345534933575820504842174- bleeee bleeee bloop chhckchkkchcchhhhchchk S-ir-, th- squeechchchk th- that ssschhh …………………. Voice circuitry reset successful. Sir, you could have damaged my circuitry." Said RD-21x4 as he struggled to get his treads back on the ground. After he was knocked over by a very annoyed looking John Saunders.

"First of all, you are a maintenance droid, Maintenance droids are specifically designed to survive large falling objects, hazardous chemicals, high voltage shocks, and any other foreseeable hazard you can encounter during repair work." Began lecturing the private, too annoyed to remember that the personality programming of most droids is hardwired into their circuitry, and therefor unchangeable.

"Yes sir but –" Started the droid, trying to give his report.

"Second of all that was a rhetorical question. I didn't need an answer" Continued John promptly cutting him off.

"Understood but I thin-" Continued the droid, trying in vain to get a few words in.

"Third, you know I hate it when you calculate numbers to god only knows how many decimal-"

"24 decimal places si-" The droid replied.

"Fourth, I don't care" Said John cutting him off again.

"Sir will let me give yo-" The droid muttered. Noticing that the portion of his circuitry that simulated exasperation was becoming dangerously over-clocked.

"Fifth, just shut up and give me the report" Continued John, determined not to let the droid talk.

"Yes I was just about to-," Said RD-21x4 changing his voice setting to a more exasperated one. The temperature in his emotional simulation circuitry was rising rapidly, despite him setting his liquid nitrogen cooling system to maximum.

"Don't give me that attitude, just give me report" Said John almost screaming

The droid knew he was about to overheat and fry his emotion circuits if he continued listening. At this analysis, RD-21x4 turned off his audio receptors and went into standby mode. After about 10 minutes, he detected that John's mouth had stopped moving, and began his report.

"Reports indicate no damage and or faulty components to the sensor arrays." The droid began "Might I suggest checking the cables that lead up to the bridge. Shorts or electromagnetic disturbances in the data feed could be causing the disturbance…. Or, you could simply ignore the false proximity alerts and get the system replaced when we reach the outpost dock." concluded the droid.

"I suppose we could ignore them but what bothers me is that we have never had this problem before we picked up that shipment from Gencor. They couldn't even tell the captain what it was. The container is even magnetically scrambled and lead lined so we can't scan it."

"I'm sure it is just another fine Gencor product in development, nothing to worry about. After all Gencor DID build me. My model was highly classified during the development stages" Began the droid.

"Well, if you are in any way what I can expect from Gencor in terms of user friendly equipment." Muttered John. "Than I guarantee whatever is in that container is about as user friendly as a prototype bomb, or maybe a death ray"

"You know I am not programmed to understand sarcasm sir" RD-21x4 replied.

"Just return to your recharge station and shut down" said a thoroughly exhausted and frankly pissed off Private Saunders.

"The representatives at Gencor would like to thank you for choosing the RD deep space repair drone. We hope you have a nice day" began the droid playing his sponsor message.

"((Remember deep calming breaths)) ((just think of your happy place))" thought John as he walked away from the droid who proceeded to follow him, playing a holographic add for a new Gencor product.

"((This is what you get for having a father who lets his sponsors equip his ship))" thought John. He slung his pulse rifle back over his shoulder, and looked at the now silent droid as it sped away from where john's stun round had impacted the deck moments earlier. "((thank god the self preservation circuits override the basic programming))" snickered John as he watched the little sparks of blue lightning that were still radiating outward from the dart dance across the deck.

John allowed himself a smirk as his frustration evaporated "Now if only that trick would work on people without ending up in a lawsuit" laughed John as he returned to the bridge to check the sensor readings again.

Captain Don S. Saunders shook his head as he watched his son fire off a shot at one of the maintenance droids. "I can't believe I let her talk me into giving my son that promotion, let alone making me pull all those strings to get him stationed on my ship." Said an exasperated captain to the ship's A.I. computer, S.A.R.A.H. The name stood for something, but he had never bothered to read the owners manual or look up the meaning.

"If you want I can space him for you. That entire level is currently empty except for your son and the atmosphere can be easily evacuated. All I need to do is initiate the emergency fire containment protocol."

"He may be a loose cannon and frankly a major liability but he is still my son."

"Than have the MPs detain him for the remainder of the voyage and ship him back home after we dock"

"Lauren would never forgive me for quote on quote destroying his dreams."

"Since when did you let you're personal life interfere with your job." Replied Sarah "Honestly, I don't think your wife will be upset after you show her that little holocam recording."

"Oh by the way I forgot to record it."

"Don't worry it is still in the file cache, would you like me to recover it?"

"Yes" replied the captain "and can you send it to my wife along with the official record of everything he has done in the past month. Inform her that I've been trying to be as patient as I can, but if there is one more incident she can expect John to be on the next shuttle home."

"I have just sent the letter ……" replied the computer. "By the way, the transfer was 7 terabytes. 3 over our monthly limit on bandwidth. Stellar Com is incurring a 2000 credit overage fine."

"You can't be serious, I knew he screwed up a lot but a record that large, it would have to be larger than every book in the entire colonial national library" gasped a shocked captain.

"Actually, I'm not serious. You keep forgetting that I am an AI system, more than capable of a sense of humor."

John looked stupidly at the sensor display. "((There it is again))" he thought, staring at the fuzzy blip on the proximity sensor. "Sarah get me a visual readout of the target coordinates and train all readings on the area," he said. Even though he knew exactly what the computer would find.

"No anomalies detected" came the usual response "If there was really something following us I doubt that even the most sophisticated computer guidance system would be able to keep a ship at the exact Same distance, angle, and speed, as to appear in the Same spot every time for 3 weeks." Sarah said "For that to happen, it would have to be being towed, and our scanners would have detected any type of magnetic or force grapple attached to the hull"

"Thank you Sarah" replied John

"Oh by the way" added the computer "your father saw that little display with repair droid this after noon"

"Oh great," John muttered "I thought he wasn't monitoring the sensor bays anymore"

"He's not," replied Sarah "He set the cameras to monitor you. And He told me to inform you that one more loss of temper and you are being sent home. He has already informed your mother."

John was quickly getting frustrated by the fact that he couldn't find anything wrong with the sensors. The trouble with the proximity sensor had started right after a cargo stop at the Alpha Draconis Star port. His father's ship, The military transport NCNF-Balder, was named after the invincible Norse god. The name came from the ship's impeccable record of never losing a single credit's worth of cargo. Despite numerous pirate attacks. It was no surprise that they were hired by the Gencor Corporation to transport a valuable and highly classified cargo to the colonial militia high security research lab on Gamma Prime. The cargo was nothing more than a large container typical of those used by Gencor. The first unsettling thing the crew noticed about the container, was the fact that it was hooked up to the cryo fluid feed line. The crew knew this meant one of 2 things. A, the container was holding biological specimens. Or B the container was holding extremely volatile chemicals. John and his father had good reason to be nervous about the container considering several incidents in the past few years. Other ships carrying top secret Gencor shipments had a habit of either blowing up having the crew get wiped out by an escaped super virus, or be attacked by hunter clans wanting their stolen technology back. All of the secrecy about the shipment along with knowledge of frequent accidents made the trip very tense to begin with. Now with a faulty proximity sensor. they could have an entire colonial armada sneak up on them and they would never notice.

"((Well at least we get 10 million credits for this))" thought John as he stared at the container.

((Author Comments))

Ok ASV1 is getting a overhaul I have been tearing my hair out over some continuity errors and atrocities committed against spelling and grammar that may well land me in front of a international war crimes tribunal :P but i have added a few new lines of text to one or 2 chapters in this story all together so it is worth re reading. ((chapter last updated 2/11/2009))