I regret accepting this mission already. Well that ain't true, I wanted the opportunity... But I do regret not demanding that jackass wasn't reassigned. He's looking over at me. God, not again. I shouldn't have to deal with this tripe.

"Heyy, Merida."
"What."

He barely even tries to look like he's actually offended, "Is that all you've got to say to a fellow soldier when I just wanted to ask a question?" The massive pride he gets from calling himself a soldier is just sad.

I sigh angrily, I don't like being snippy or rude, but he's worn me thin all the way through training. "What is it Travis."

"We're meant to use surnames to talk, right chief?" he turns to talk to our leader on this first operation. He's just as inexperienced as us but Scott was chosen to be in charge for the promise he apparently showed during training. No disrespect to him, but I think they just needed to pick somebody and he seemed a fine choice. I hit my targets far more than him and he certainly isn't keen on taking control of this lad.

"It's not chief, it's Scott. And yes we are, Travis. But you're just a special exception," he says grinning a little to himself and turning away to not have to deal with Travis any more. At least I'm not the only one who dislikes him.

Travis just turns back to me, still smiley faced while he shrugs like he doesn't know why people treat him like such an arse. He's been so stupidly eager to have us call him 'Touchdown', we can tell he just invented the name. Wouldn't put it past him to change it just before recruiting too.

Ok, ok focus on the task at hand. The mission is what matters. We're going in practically blind, so I've gotta keep my eyes open for anything I could use. Any weakness to exploit could turn the tide for or against us. Especially since, with their abductions and invasions so far, the aliens know so much about us..

Sitting quietly to me left, Hansen's still studying those maps of the landing site. He's been treating it like a puzzle, making marks and just muttering to himself as he does. But then when I'm taking a look he notices and answers what I'm thinking before I even ask.
"I'm marking spots of the field with good cover from enemy fire, something we ought to look at in advance I reckon. That way we'll already know where to go in a tight spot."

Scott nods, "Good thinking. Getting to know the field is all we can do to prepare."

Hansen rolls out the map and starts pointing out some good spots for cover. He's found a bunch near the corner on the dock where we'll be landing.

"These shipping containers are tall enough to conceal your whole body, though I wouldn't count on them being enough to stand solid against fire."

Travis decides to break in here as he leans in, "Well it'd be a damn fine shame to conceal that rockin body." I assume he followed that with a cheeky wink but I was too busy jamming my foot into his crotch to see.

"Merida!" Scott's eager to respond sternly now, but he's obviously not blaming me for it, "Don't injure him, at least not until we're back in base."

Me and Hansen just chuckle while Travis doubles over in pain. It takes my mind off the impending mission, if only for a little while.

"Alright" the intercom crackles, "We're here."

The mood turns somber as we land. The aliens are probably preoccupied with their abduction and not expecting our appearance. This is the first time we'll be really fighting back.

Scott orders Hansen and Travis to move out first. Before I can follow, Scott stops me to talk "Look, lay off Travis. He may be- is a moron, but he's one of the team. And he just might save your life some day."

"Sir I-well... ok." I nod reluctantly, it's not like I can try harder than I have already.

"But don't be afraid to kick him in the nads, I'd like to see that again." I grin as we both hop off our transport and hide up against some cargo left on the dock. I look around, but there's no sign of those things yet. It just looks like a normal dock, aside from the creepy quiet.

Scott heads out first, looking out over a pile of boxes. We all spread out slowly. We coulda landed in a better position, starting from right on the corner of the docks leaves us no room to retreat. And then I see them, aliens scattering off to my right. It looks like they were gathering some of the poor souls they abduct but I guess we spooked em to run inside a nearby building. I would be pleased about having a face for their kind but their speedy disappearance means they must've spotted me too.
"Hostiles, 2 o'clock," I hiss into my mic, letting the others know too.

"Jesus, what are they doing to these people?" Hansen calls back. He must've come across one of the other victims the aliens hadn't collected. I do not want to see how they look up close. The best we can do is keep it from happening to more people.

Travis runs up to me, looking out for the ones I spotted before. Oddly polite for him, he only winks at me with his smarmy face instead of talking. And then we were all just sitting there waiting for a good shot.

"Hey, I think I heard som-" I have no time to listen to Scott cause I see one of the aliens charge forward. I fire straight away and hit it cleanly. I can see shots from Hansen and Travis both fly past too but their aim is pretty piss poor and the creature just limps right into cover, still alive.

"Oh god," Scott's voice comes back again, "We're cornered."

I turn over to Scott, and I can just see more aliens disappearing into another building at the opposite side of the dock. They're already trying to surround us.

I see Scott start running back towards us, he seems to be losing his nerve already. Suddenly a bright glowing beam of light shoots right by my head. I get to see the laser technology those aliens were using up close and it's shocking. It melts a line right through an empty oil drum. Bloody luckily, Scott was not in its path. Instead I see him pop his head up and return his own fire, whipping my head around, I'm just in time to see the wounded alien go down.

"Hah! Has anyone got a visual?" Scott calls excitetedly into his mic, even with his burst of confidence he's shy about peeking out of cover.

Still staring at the creature, I see it's lying motionless, "Yes sir. It's down alright, confirmed kill." Immediately I feel relief wash through me. I dunno about the others, but up til now I was worried they could've had far more resilience than us. But if two shots took that one down, I think we really can make it.

"Heh, don't get too full of yourself chief, I've got the next one," All of a sudden, I see Travis leap over the boxes next to me like an unruly runt, running into unknown territory."Well it looks like I found our next victim!"

"What the hell are you doing Travis? Back down, NOW!"

"Don't worry, I got this coward, BOOOOM BABY" I hear gunfire, but when I look up, Travis just seems to be shaking his gun irritated. "Really? You piece of crap gun. The thing's still out there dudes, we just gotta flush it out."

"Travis, that kick I gave you earlier will be heavenly compared to what I'll do later. Hansen! Can you cover me?"

"Sure thing Merida, just be careful, alright?" He readies his shot, looking towards the alien Travis fired at and I hop my cover to sprint up that route, eyeing a safe spot across from him.

Travis just sneers, "What's the matter princess? Didn't you sign up for th-"