Disclaimer: FF: TSW characters…not mine. X-COM…not mine. Sid being a tea-totolar…my idea.

Author's Note: Another one of my longer works. I was thinking of splitting it in half, but…nah. Suck it up and deal with it, lol.

Drama on Two Fronts

"Dammit!" Aki muttered and glared at the Elerium pod sitting inside the isolation chamber's containment field. A few paces away Dr. Sid was entering data on his own holographic keyboard. Hearing her he paused, catching her hopeful gaze but a negative shake of his head made her heart sank a little. Sighing, she sat back in her chair and rubbed her temples, ignoring the scattered sheets of paper and her hasty notes scribbled upon them. The two scientists and a pair of technicians had been in the lab all day, running test after test, and they had concluded that while the element was a mineral (no problem there), it also exhibited some attributes of a living organism. Aki loudly declared that such a thing should not exist. "A living rock is impossible!" she declared, to which Sid countered what they had seen…the existence of life identical to their own from another dimension, could be considered just as implausible. His associates were all racking their brains as to how this could be.

Now Dr. Sid set his station on standby and walked around to stand beside her, reaching for his mug and taking a sip of Earl Gray. It was cold and too strong and he grimaced slightly. "But we are making some progress. This, for example." He brought up a small screen and the statistics scrolled upwards. To the uninitiated, it would appear to be just endless streams of words, phrases and the occasional graphic. "We have a basic understanding of Elerium." He shook his head, though. "And a strange material it is."

Aki slumped in her chair, barely hearing him. She was thinking on this new concept too hard because her head felt like it was filled with wool. "Yeah, I know. But it isn't related to anything on the periodic chart. And we certainly don't have the means synthesize it." She looked at the glowing amber sphere again. She spoke slowly. "Something affected it when it passed through that energy vortex, something that destabilized its very structure. And, unfortunately, the deterioration is accelerating. Look, here's the sample when I first brought it in." She opened a window on her screen. On it was an image of the Elerium as it was a few hours ago. "Now, the last scan from thirty minutes ago…okay, here. Do you see any difference?"

He leaned forward, frowning. "Can't say I do…my eyes aren't what they once were."

She highlighted the details. "Look again."

Now Sid could see that there was indeed a discrepancy. "I do now, yes!" He peered closer, a narrow finger tracing areas in that second view. Were they fainter? They looked less distinct unhealthy even. "If it were a true organism, I'd dare say that it seems to be losing its spirit."

"If only we could reverse the process."

"Almost like…it's dying." He stopped when Aki snapped her fingers. Sitting up in her seat she stared at nothing with wide eyes, before turning to focus on him. "Wait a minute…of course! Where is all the data on the completed spirit wave? The one that healed Gaia?"

"It should be in my archives. What do you have in mind?"

She was grinning now and grasped his forearm, wondering if the light bulb floating above her head was visible She shuffled through her notes, then tossed them aside with a snort of disgust. Her fingers fairly flew on her terminal's trapezoidal keys.

"I'm so stupid­–it's been in front of me, the whole time! Listen, if we can replicate the waveform–" Her bearing had become that of the high-spirited and enthusiastic Aki Ross, who displayed such enormous potential before the ill-fated experiment that had left her living on borrowed time. "I'll need the waveform, every bit of relevant data and the energy transfer equipment," she went on. She paused, and then added, with a half grin, "And my old iron bra." If this works, X-COM–and us, as well– may have a fighting chance at defeating the new invaders. I sure hope the others are doing okay out there.

Things were looking bad. In fact, from Neil's point of view, things appeared to be downright crappy. "Um, Jane…could you do us all a favor and put the gun down? Please?" He held a hand out, palm down, and was only a few paces from her, but her finger was on the trigger and knowing her reflexes, Neil knew that there was no way he could tackle her and hopefully wrestle that weapon away in time. At her feet, the usually cool and collected sarge was sweating, which was definitely not a good sign.

At the sound of his voice, her head jerked up and that terrifying stare fixed on him; her gun didn't waver one iota. Neil bit his lip, his heart hammering away as he looked at two pools of blackness from which all humanity had vanished.

Behind her, near the UFO's open doorway, Harper was pointing at him, and then she tapped her own helmet.

Huh?

Seeing that she had his attention Eri's thumb and forefinger formed a circle. Then she held up two gloved fingers, and finally splayed all five. The fretful corporal drew his brows together. What the hell was she saying? He scolded himself fiercely. C'mon, think!

Looking a bit exasperated now, Harper smacked the side of her helmet again–under any other circumstances it would have been comical–and repeated her gesture. Did she mean…radio? Of course!

"Jane, don't do this!" A drop of stinging sweat ran into Ryan's eye, making him blink; his jaw was stinging where her gun had struck him but he didn't dare move. She glared down at him again, and her upper lip rose in a snarl. Praying she wouldn't notice, Neil took the opportunity to quickly access the small control panel on his right wrist, switching his channel to oh-two-five and immediately Eri's voice sounded in his ear.

"It's about time! We're the only two on this frequency. Listen, she's under alien control. She and it share the same sight. Distract her, keep her attention on you."

"What are you going to do?" he mumbled, eyes darting between the Black Ops agent and the unnerving scene before him. "Shoot her?"

"You're cute, but kinda' dense. I'm going to get that bug." She ducked into the UFO. "If you play it smart we can save both of your teammate's lives." With that she cut the transmission, leaving Neil swallowing nervously. It was up to him now.

Dr. Sid and the two lab workers had already arranged the equipment and double-checked all connections. He nodded, pleased with himself, and turned to Aki. She had just finished installing a fresh power cell in her chest plate; she had engaged on a search earlier, and she remembered the vault, a cluttered room that was home to spare equipment, completed projects, stacks of old files and miscellaneous bric-a-brac. She finally found a small box on a top shelf, her name scrawled on its side. Inside buried in packing was the hardware that had once kept her alive.

"Hello, old friend," she murmured. She withdrew it carefully, almost reverently. "Bet you never thought you'd see the light of day again, did you?"

Now she approached the Elerium, and noted that its brilliance had waned further.

"I'm lowering the containment fields now. Stand by." Dr. Sid was standing by the near wall and manipulated a control. A deep hum sounded, and the room's lighting, soft to begin with, dimmed a little more. "Now, once the chest plate is in place it should­–what's wrong?" His voice with tinged with concern.

Aki had stopped in midstride and was holding a hand to her brow. Her eyes were squeezed shut. For the merest second, things had swum out of focus, blurring, and an odd harmonic rang in her head. Then the vertigo passed and she was looking at Dr. Sid's seamed face, creased even more so in worry. She felt his hand on her arm. "Are you all right?"

Blinking hard, she lowered her hand and smiled a little. "Yeah. overwork, I guess. Let's get this going." She ignored his dubious gaze as she aligned the chest plate directly over the glowing orb. Satisfied, she secured it onto the slick surface of the pod with a blob of rubbery instant-curing adhesive; now it could only be removed with an effort. She held out a hand, and Dr. Sid passed her one end of an umbilical cable. She plugged it in and her colleague connected the opposite end into a dedicated workstation. Contained within its specially designed preservation circuits was an identical replica of the eight spirit waves that had eliminated the phantoms.

The plate chirped and a green light winked back at her. "Powered up and standing by. Ready for the download."

Dr. Sid had activated his holographic control sphere and his wizened fingers began to manipulate it. Aki gnawed the inside of her cheek, anxiety showing on her features and she crossed her fingers so hard that they ached.

Would this work?

Out of sight within the ship, Eri pressed a series of switches and her outline blurred as the Elerium-powered device in her suit's backpack warped the photons around her, and she disappeared. The effect wasn't perfect…a vaguely humanoid-shaped distortion remained. But she didn't care, just as long as it did its job so that she could do hers, and she had a good idea of where to start her hunt. She cleared her mind and then stepped back outside. Nothing had changed. On her com she overheard Neil, trying to buy some time. Good. Keep talking. She quickly sidled around in a semi-circle, heading for the foot of a tall rocky hill that overlooked the crash site.

Neil meanwhile was entreating Jane to come to her senses, to fight whatever it was that had hold of her…to do something, anything.

But her face remained expressionless, and he felt increasingly fretful. What could he do when his teammate held a high-powered weapon to the head of her colleague and superior officer? Man, oh man, this is not turning out to be a good day. He struggled with what to say next, when he noticed something shimmering on the edge of his vision. It was at his nine o'clock, moving around him, past the others. He began to turn his head. Jesus, now what?

"Eyes forward, soldier! Don't give away my position!" Eri barked over his com, and she was relieved to see him look away.Jogging in a semi-crouch she approached the jumbled outcropping at the slope's base and rapidly searched for the quickest way up. She knew that Sectoids preferred a direct line-of-sight for their mind-control attacks to be most effective. Grays don't like to think around corners, her psi-instructor had once joked. She began to climb.

Crouching before the open access panel, Hughes withdrew the next Elerium pod, ignoring his cramping leg muscles. Suddenly a klaxon blared and this time he did start. On the gray metal surface in front of him a dark panel lit up, and on its face a series of odd red figures appeared, changing at regular intervals.

"Well, now. This can't be good."

"What? What's going on?" Atwood inquired, looking around nervously, his voice tense.

Martin sealed the glowing ball into its container and reached back into the ship's power source where three pods were still waiting. Now the power conduits overhead were pulsing in time with the alarm. "Self-destruct sequence. See that display? As far as I can translate it, there are approximately four minutes left."

"Well, you're the computer expert! Stop it!"

"Can't be stopped." He glanced at the display. "It's controlled by the bridge computer, and the controls are locked."

"Shit! Then let's go!" He gathered up as many of the cylindrical containers as he could and began to mount the stairwell rungs. He looked behind him and did a double take. Hughes had not moved from his position. As a matter of fact, he was extracting the next load, and from his unruffled expression he might as well have had all the time in the world.

"Are you nuts? Come on, we have enough Elerium!"

"There's still time…three minutes and twenty seconds. I calculate I can get it all and still be able to get the hell up out of here and reach safe distance before the ship blows. Now, you can go if you want, or stop doing your potty dance, help me out here and save a few seconds." All the while he worked rapidly, carefully withdrawing the precious energy source, placing it into another container, sealing it, reaching for the next. He dangled another carrot on his stick. "Besides, if you help me out, Harper'll be so impressed, she may even let you take her out on a date…"

"Bastard," Atwood sighed. "Okay. What do you need me to do?"

Come out, come out, wherever you are. Having reached the top as silently as possible, Eri scanned her surroundings. Around her were rocks, crevices and scrubs. Some of the growth was taller than she was. She ascertained the gray was in such a position as to overlook all the drama in the crash site. Hell, the bastard was probably gloating. She began to search in that direction, moving with the stealth of an X-COM Black Ops agent.

Whoa, wait. What was that? She halted in mid-step; already she had caught a glimpse of something…just the slightest hint of motion. She clicked over to infrared, and the whole world suddenly looked as if it were dipped in vat of gore. She nodded at what she saw standing beside the bole of a dead tree. As motionless as a rock, its lower body temperature showing dark blue, was the Sectoid. It was staring fixedly down the slope. The creature's shared consciousness was also its weakness…all but the most powerful aliens were vulnerable when they were playing puppet master.

Gotta' take him out with one shot. She hefted her plasma rifle but as her thumb slid over the activation stud she remembered how noisy the whine of the weapon's capacitor could be. If she powered it up in this relative silence she might as well walk up and ask for ID. She made a mental note to kick herself later. Hunkering behind a large boulder, she set her rifle aside and reached for the rattlesnake-skin sheath strapped to her right calf. She released its latch and fifteen centimeters of polished blue-green alloy snicked into her palm. Now for the final touch, she thought. You're gonna' love this, my friend. She unfastened and removed her helmet and emerged in a hunter's crouch; since the rest of her body remained cloaked, anyone watching would have been treated to the highly unnerving sight of a disembodied head floating above the ground with a blade traveling beside it. There you are, you little shit. This is almost too easy. She straightened up with a grin would have made a shark jealous and tweezed her throwing knife between her thumb and forefinger. "Hey, slapnuts…got a light?"

The alien turned and suddenly the knife grip was protruding from one of its bulging eyes. Its head rocked back and it stumbled, dark fluid running down its face and splattering on the dusty red ground. It began to totter towards her, hissing through a small mouth lined with tiny needle-sharp teeth. The human, totally decloaked now, stood her ground with her feet apart, shrugging off the feeble attempts of a weak mind-control attack. The alien charged but Eri nimbly stepped aside, grasped an arm and reeled it in. Its hiss rose into a shriek, and the shriek abruptly stopped when she crooked an elbow beneath its pointed chin, grasped the top of its head with her other hand and twisted. With a muffled snap neck its cervical vertebrae snapped, the jagged bone shearing through its spinal cord, and it went limp. Eri let it thump to the ground, checked to ensure that it wasn't playing possum, and then retrieved her helmet and rifle before contacting Neil.

"How is she now?" Peering over the elevation's lip, she could just make out the sergeant getting up. Jane had dropped her weapon and was still on her feet, swaying, but Ryan caught her before she could fall, and she sagged against him. Abruptly she pushed off of him, staggered a few paces away, bent over and retched. Neil replied, "Jane is…well, she's back to normal. I hope."

"Best to get her checked out when we get back. Meanwhile I got us a little trophy. Harper out." She scooped up the dead gray and began her descent. Down below the two men were watching Proudfoot closely, with more than a little concern. Whittaker tenderly touched his jaw, which had a humdinger of a bruise, and exhaled hugely. "Jane…?"

She stood still bent, hands on knees, waiting for the dry heaving to stop before kicking dirt over the mess. She spit a few times, trying to clear out the nasty bile aftertaste. "What're you looking at?" Her voice was drained. Wiping her mouth she returned their gazes, her brown eyes back but miserable in her wan face. "If you're going to ask how I feel, don't bother. I'm…not in a talking mood right now." She turned her back on them again, arms crossed. Her body language fairly shouted her shame and embarrassment. Had she not held her friend at gunpoint? She could have killed him!

"Okay, then. Tell you what. When we get back, I'll cook you a nice dinner…" Neil was about to say more when Ryan gave him a warning glance and shook his head. "Let her be."

"You can cook for me, Neil. Here. A gift to you guys." The two men looked around to see Eri trudging towards them. A small limp body was slung over her shoulder, and her knife was still embedded in its skull. She unceremoniously tossed the corpse down, and at the sound of the impact Jane raised her head and glared at it. Her face contorted into a mask of fury and without warning she took a couple of large strides and planted not one but two solid kicks in the gray's side.

"Cool!" Eri was delighted. "Damn, girl, I'm buying you a drink!"

Ryan clamped a large hand around her arm. "Hey! Jane, stop it! It's dead… you'll have more opportunities to get your revenge later." Their eyes met, her fierce ones locking with his. She frowned. Ryan was always so damn proper. She stalked away, arms crossed, and Whittaker picked up his helmet.

There was commotion in the direction of the ship and someone dashed from the entranceway, heading straight for them. Everyone jumped before they recognized Hughes and Atwood, and they were in a mighty big hurry.

"Go, go, go!" Martin was hollering through his open helmet. "The ship's on self-destruct!"

"Wha–?"

"No time for thumb-twiddling! Pound ground!" Harper took the opportunity to give Fleming's backside a smack. The others fell in behind Hughes, trying to match his pace as he dashed for the same ravine where the aliens had tried to ambush them in earlier. In his head he had kept a countdown going: he and Tyler had been able to scuttle up the ladder, cross the bridge and hurry through the roundabout corridor to the main exit. He had tried to radio ahead, but that damn interference had chosen of all times to flare up again. When he set foot on the ground outside he had been relieved to see the rest of the group present and accounted for. Eri had indeed fulfilled her promise because there was a final alien corpse present.

"Hughes…the stuff from the ship!"

"Leave it, sergeant. No time!"

"Jane! Come on!" Neil was looking back. Proudfoot was gamely attempting to stay with them, but her encounter with the gray had sapped her strength.

Sprinting beside the tech, Whittaker gave him a shove. "Go on, Neil, I got her." Proudfoot was a few steps behind the sergeant and her sweaty face was showing her distress. She said nothing as Ryan wrapped a powerful arm around her waist and half-carried, half-dragged her to cover. Up ahead, he could see the others as they bounded into the gully; once there Jane disengaged herself and slid down the slope with Whittaker right behind her.

"Aw, shit!" Harper slapped her empty sheath.

"You can always get another one. Don't be such a crybaby."

"Shut up, flyboy–"

Hughes counted down the final few seconds. "Three…two…one…mark!" Everyone tensed, waiting for the explosion…

Nothing happened. Eri lifted her head and shot an accusatory glance at him. He shrugged. "Maybe I was a little early." He belly-crawled up the slope and peeked over the edge. Nothing had changed. "Alien systems aren't known for accurate timekeeping–"

There was a flash and the downed scout was consumed in a yellow and white fireball. Common sense told Hughes to get his ass back below the protection of the rim. A split-second later the air was filled with a coughing roar that punished the ears.

KA-WHAMM!

It was as if a giant had slammed a gigantic hammer into the earth. A second explosion joined in and a sudden hot wind swept across the ground, raising a wall of dust and debris. Burning chunks of metal fell like rain; a blackened panel the size of his arm landed in some dry weeds to his right and the growth was instantly ablaze. Another piece big enough to have turned his head to jelly buried itself in the slope nearby. As the reverberations died, Neil spoke for his teammates. "Whoa."

Hughes smiled a little sheepishly. "Then again…maybe my count was a little off."

Something caught Ryan's attention. He cocked his eye skywards and scrabbled for his laser rifle. "Incoming!"

Harper also snapped her weapon up, but stopped. "No, wait!" she cried. The object fell, struck the opposite slope just a couple of meters away, and rolled to a stop. She got up and trotted over to it. "My knife!" The explosion had blown apart the ship, the gear piled outside, and both of the dead grays. She braced a foot against the Sectoid's singed and blackened head and tugged her favorite throwing knife free, punting what was left of her kill back towards the group.

Hughes' earpiece crackled, and then a static-laden voice came through. He concentrated, trying to hear over raised voices…apparently the body part had come to rest too close to Jane for comfort, and she was heatedly arguing with Eri. "What's that? Come in, please…yes, captain, we're all here. There was interference–we couldn't contact you from the ship's immediate vicinity. Yes, we have all of the Elerium, but the scout self-destructed." He stood, listening, glancing at the new crater. "Roger, we're returning to the transport now. Hughes out." Then he looked at the weary, dirty faces below him.

"And do we have a tale to tell…"