Chapter 1 The Base, and the UFO

So it started, we were all moved in to a base in Detroit, we were assigned to a group out side the law, a team that belonged to all governments of the world and answered only to the highest officials. We were now members of XCOM. At first the base was pretty small, only about 7 soldiers 25 scientist, 25 engineers, and 100 support staff. How were we support to stop an alien invasion with 7 men and the 5 of us? Most of our time was spent trying to find our way around, the base was built underground with service elevators and quick drop ramps in or for our aircrafts to escape. There were to UFO interceptor and a brand new troop transport craft, a Skyranger. It could hold only 14 troops, but there were places for a lot of our stuff (weapons etc.). Once we knew our way around they gave us Weapons, all the same ones, a quick burst rifle with a powerful scope, and a semi automatic handgun. Sam and Myself were allowed to keep and carry our trademark swords. After all we were still the frozen blades. Our swords were about 3 feet long slightly curved blades that were coated in a poison that freezes the blood; they were good in a pinch. As we all wandered around we found out things, like the fact the scientist were working on some kind of laser weapons, they already found out it could be done. Imagine a gun with no need for ammo... It would make warfare so much easier. The engineers spent most of their time down in the lounge, they never had anything to do, but they did always keep the moral up, inventing small gadgets that could make anyone laugh. We found out that those little grey men actually existed. They were called Spectiods, what a stupid name. Scientist called them that because they thought they were insect based life forms. Anyway, those are the things that took out over half the original team, in Paris. Three men limped back, and the other two were severally wounded but survived and are ready to fight again It was three weeks after we arrived, when a siren sounded, Red lights filled the halls and rooms. Nik and Andrew were up in second, weapons in hand, it was about 2 o'clock in the morning. Kerri and Sam were slowly getting dressed, and yawning. I was up not as quick as Nik and Andrew, but faster then the other two. We all shared a side of these quarters. None of the scientists were here, but all the engineers were, we had to fight our way through. It took twenty minutes to cross the room. We finally got through by Andrew threatening to shoot have of them. We ran through red flooded corridors to the command room. We arrived and saw every one watching two monitors; there were two dots on the screens getting closer to each other. One was marker Interceptor, the other wasn't marked. The dots grew closer and closer, then the screen flickered and changed to sort of an overhead shot. Must be from a satellite, I thought. We saw the UFO and the Interceptor Engage in combat. Missiles flew from the interceptor, followed by round upon round of canon blasts. The UFO returned fire with some sort of energy weapon, the pilot of the interceptor reported that the front of her ship wouldn't respond. Suddenly the UFO was losing Altitude; it was crashing, for just one second, everyone in the room held their breath. When the computer suddenly flashed UFO DOWN across its screen, that held breath turned to a great cheer. But that wasn't the end. A voice filled the halls, "All XCOM Soldiers report to the Skyranger. Bring all your weapons. There is a confirmed UFO Crash. You will be briefed on the way."
We flew down halls and tried to dodged people, sometimes only missing them at the last second. The halls abruptly ended with a quick and sudden opening, the hanger was huge, about 4 times the size of another room!! It had to be 600 meters across, 300 meters tall. The hanger crew was running back and forth, filling barrels and such stuff, one man was running to the middle of the room, to a plane. The Skyranger.... It was beautiful, sleek cold metal, boarding ramp, Highlighted gold writing, across the side. Mouth a gape, we approached the plane. Two people in black uniforms ran to the plane and hopped in to the front, they must be the pilots. The other seven soldiers appeared from the same hallway that we did. They didn't look nearly as impressed as we did; in fact they looked rather depressed. I guess having over half your team wiped out does that to you, especially when you know that your going back to do it again. We all piled in, there was enough room for two a breast if we stood up, there were seats built in to the wall to strap ourselves in, which we did quickly. We were placed in the back. It was like this; in the very back, Kerri and Nik, then Sam and Tucker, then Myself and a short American named Steven, then Carl and Kevin, then Angus and Sarah, then James the leader, and Henry in the front. As we took off and a screen built in to the back of the plane, that I never noticed before, flickered to life. A mans face appeared, He looked a little odd, he had scattered hair a crooked nose and giant smile.
Hello, for you new people, I'm Emory. I will be brief you on your mission. It seem that a 2:28 this morning our interceptor shot down a small UFO, these normal contain 2-6 aliens, we hope that a few died in the crash. So there may be only one or two to take care of. Our Orbiter tells us that it touched down near a farm house, there are no expected survivors, if there are they will be long dead be fore you get there, ETA : 4 hours and 34 minutes. That's all". The screen flicker and died. A count down lit up above the screen, it read 4:33:37.

xxx

1:52:14
The vets, of these missions were getting nervous, especially Steven. It looked like he didn't know if he wanted to throw up or to black out. James began checking his weaponry, everyone else followed his lead. Tucker and Nik were talking quietly. Sam was fast asleep, as a Soldier you get sleep were you can find it. I surveyed everyone, trying to see if anyone else was as nervous as me, after all I wanted to know who I could reply on in a pinch. I just kept thinking that these alien destroyed Paris and now we had to deal with them. How do you kill ET? The Scientists said just shoot them and they die like humans, mostly the same organs are in the same places. Although they lack a few of ours and they had a few new ones. They never said where to shoot them, or how many times, humans don't always die with the first shot, a quarter of an inch could save a life or kill someone.

xxx

0:22:12
Everyone's awake now; the ship has been slowing down for about 5 minutes. My crew looks calm, the other vets look determined, everyone was fighting there own demons about fighting or making there peace with their gods. I say an ancient battle prayer, that for some reason I remember, it's a prayer to Mars the god of war, it seemed fitting somehow.

xxx

0:0:15
The ship touched down and everyone stood up weapons at ready. 10....the deadly silence smothers us; everyone is lost in last minute thoughts of friends and loved ones. 5.....fear, panic, anger, desperation all theses emotions at the same time its enough to make you want to run away, but there's no where to go. 1........0.......the cabins door opens and the ramp hits the ground. This is the beginning; this is where most of us die.