Lobster Trap
Larry Mann
Back to X-Com Page
"X-COM: UFO Defense" and "X-COM: Terror From The Deep"
Copyright (c) 1994 MicroProse and Mythos Software
"X-Com Saga" Copyright (c) 1994 Russ Brown
"X-Com Saga II: Tales From The Deep" Copyright (c) 1996-97 Larry Mann
ASPECT FOUR:: Lobster Trap
- - -
TWO MONTHS LATER
SOMEWHERE IN THE NORTH SEA
By the time the Triton had touched bottom the hold had already filled
with water. Some of the troopers tensed up for a minute, both at the chill of
the seawater and, for those few troopers who hadn't been true aquanauts
before their recruitment (this included several of the troopers who had been
removed from cryo in the past few months), the fact that the water now
surrounded them on all sides. Lyudmila felt that tension gnawing at her, in
fact, but quickly fought it off. It wouldn't do for her to be having problems
now. Morale was shaky enough as it was, and now that she'd been
promoted to Commander and given a whole base to worry about, her
presence could very well make or break the mission. She'd be damned if it
was going to be the latter.
The other Commanders, not to mention Captain Collignon, would
have preferred that she run her base from the base's holographic geoscape
map, primarily for morale reasons, since the presence of a high-ranker in a
field op could cause undue tension, and loss of the same could be downright
devastating. At the same time, they also conceded that Lyudmila's skills,
not to mention her increasing `sixth sense' about the tactics of the enemy,
made her an excellent field operative, Commander or not. When it came
right down to it, she was probably the biggest help to the war effort -- it had,
in the past two months, officially been labeled the Second Alien War -- while
in the field.
And like it or not, X-Com was needing all the help it could get.
As soon as she'd hit the release button on the hatch, the large
Coelecanth next to her rolled out and quickly scanned a large semicircle of
space just outside the Triton. No bug markers flared on Lyudmila's HUD, so
she gave the order. "Far Squad out, left. Near Squad to right. Tank, go with
Near Squad." (It was a hell of a lot easier to say `Tank' than `SWS' or
`Coelecanth'. And the machine understood her in any case.) Lyudmila and
her troopers hurried out of the sub and ran -- `ran' being a relative term in
light of all the water surrounding them -- for the cover of a yellow and orange
structure a few meters away, while Otto and Himiko took their troopers and
the Coelecanth toward a cluster of pipelines in the opposite direction.
"USO ahead... sheeze..." Marcelle started to report before his
observation degenerated into a comment. The enemy submarine was very
large, a three-decker which was vaguely reminiscent of the old battleship
UFOs, except that the old enemies hadn't had any visible windows on their
outer surfaces. Marcelle voiced that very comparison a moment later.
"That it does--" Lyudmila started to agree when a new light flared on
her HUD. "Bug! Right!"
Marcelle saw it first as he and the other troopers immediately
crouched low, trying to find cover. It was a new species, and it looked for all
the world like a human-sized lobster. Except, of course, that it was armed
with a sonic cannon, the largest weapon of the sonic family according to the
techs back at Tsunami, who'd been working overtime trying to get X-Com up
to par with the new enemy tech. So far they'd figured out how the small
pistol weapons worked and the rifles were close to being deciphered, but the
heavy pieces hadn't even been touched yet.
Something in the back of Lyudmila's mind told her that, in this case,
that was not so good.
Marcelle swung his gauss rifle forward and had time to squeeze off a
3-shot burst before diving to avoid the green ball of death which sailed
through the space his body had occupied. His aim was very true, and all
three shots impacted with the creature's chest.
It didn't appear to care.
"Hell!" Lyudmila hissed as the thing started to aim its weapon again
to take another shot at Marcelle, who was not thrilled with the situation he'd
just found himself in. She started to raise her own gauss rifle, but after a
quarter second of consideration let it drop and grabbed her brand new sonic
pistol instead. Quickly she took aim and squeezed the trigger. The weapon
made a squawking noise and sent a green death-ball of its own toward the
lobster creature. This time the effect was much more noticeable as the shot
fractured the creature's chest shell, making a noticeable crack and
staggering the beast. Lyudmila aimed and took another shot, which blasted
through its chest completely, spraying a greenish ichor into the water. And
with a scream which Marcelle would later describe as reminiscent of a
particularly obnoxious, badly-tuned french horn, the thing fell to the sea
floor.
"Whoo..." Marcelle heaved a small sigh of relief as he righted
himself. "Thanks Lyu."
Lyudmila didn't bother acknowledging him, as she was busy
contacting Near Squad. "Zen. Lyu. We've got a new bug type. I'm calling
`em Lobstermen."
"I copy, Lyu," Zander's voice replied tensely. "Just got a solution on
one." Sure enough, the bug marker on Lyudmila's HUD flared and pointed
that very fact out.
"Use sonics, Zen, or tazers if you can hack it. These things eat
gauss for breakfast."
"Roger that-- GRENADE!!" Zen's acknowledgement turned into a yell
of imminent danger. Several yellow markers on Lyudmila's HUD scattered
away from a set of pipes, and in the next instant a flash and a shockwave
disrupted the water several meters away. This was accompanied by a
series of ten more explosions as several sections of gas pipeline detonated,
kicking up sand and clouding the water with a wall of bubbles. Zander's
marker began to flicker.
"Zen?! ZEN!! Hell! Marcelle, secure these buildings and get to
cover!!" Lyudmila barked, and then she was running, again not giving
Marcelle a chance to reply. She had the only medi-kit; the requisition for the
extras was still on order from Tsunami, damn it all to hell anyway.
Before she'd even realized it she'd crossed the area separating the
two squads. The area which had been disrupted by the grenade and
subsequent gas explosions was still full of bubbles, the remnants of the gas
pipes themselves spewing rather large ones up toward the surface, but
through it all she could see Zander on the ground, and she could see the
Lobsterman, this one with a rifle weapon, advancing on the scattered and
slightly panicked rookie troopers. She dropped down on her knees, raising
her pistol.
But before she could shoot, she was rather startled to see Zander get
back to his feet. He did not look too good from this angle: Lyudmila could
see crimson leaking from rends in his aqua-armor, and her field experience
told her he didn't have much time left with that kind of damage. Hell, at that
range he should have been dead, flat out.
But, like the Lobsterman she'd downed earlier, Zen did not appear to
care. He lumbered forward, thermal tazer in hand. The Lobsterman was
apparently startled by the reappearance of the trooper, probably just as
surprised as they were that he'd survived that chain of explosions. But
before it could bring its weapon back to bear, Zen had gotten right in its face,
and shoved his tazer into a soft spot where one of its arms connected with
the body. The creature twitched violently, and then toppled without a sound.
"Ho-ly shit..." Himiko remarked at the sight. The other troopers had
similar commentary. Lyudmila was only frozen for a moment, galvanized
back into action when Zander sagged down on top of the stunned enemy. In
a flash she was down there, plugging her medi-kit into the contacts on Zen's
armor, dumping the maximum safe amount of coagulants and stimulants into
him. He stopped bleeding, and regained some measure of alertness.
"did i get him...?" he mumbled weakly as Lyudmila tapped her
helmet against his, allowing them to speak privately.
"Oh you got him all right," Lyudmila wanted to smile but couldn't, not
with her second squad leader down. "Can you walk?"
"ow... i think so..."
"Okay, get your butt back to the sub and stay put. Marcelle," she
activated her comm unit again. "We need to regroup, single squad. All units
take up holding positions at fifty meters from target, keep your grenades
ready and for god's sake stay away from the pipes. Tank, scout the
perimeter."
The Coelecanth obediently rolled forward, sweeping its gauss turret
from left to right as it surveyed the unsecured perimeter for hostiles. The
sandy terrain was flat and open except for the few pipeline constructs, which
made detecting the lack of additional hostiles around the USO very simple.
Marcelle acknowledged Lyudmila's order and pressed ahead with his troops.
Himiko was in the process of acknowledging when she noticed something on
her own HUD.
"Wait a minute, where's Greer?"
Lyudmila heard and checked her own HUD. Nobody'd been killed, as
far as she was aware, so there should have been ten small markers
representing the troops and one big one for the Coelecanth. There were only
nine small markers.
Another bad feeling.
"Where was he, Himiko?"
"He was back by the-- what the *hell*?!" Himiko and Lyudmila both
saw it at about the same time. It was Greer... or more correctly it *had been*
Greer. The thing coming toward them was a bloated, green-skinned, hunch-
backed zombie. Which, to Lyudmila and Himiko's experienced eyes, looked
like it was about ready to finish its rapid gestation. Not good. At all.
Himiko acted first. "Sorry about this, Greer!" she yelled, kicking
forward, just a couple meters away from the zombie. It swiped at her
viciously, but she dodged the blow and unloaded three rounds of gauss into
its chest. It staggered backward, and then its body began to bulge outward
as the transformation began.
But what exploded out of the body was totally unexpected, and far
more terrifying than any Chryssalid had ever been. This thing looked like
something right out of one of Lovecraft's books: a giant brain with a beak as
its only facial feature, and green tentacles that even now were reaching out
and trying to snare Himiko. Again Himiko acted quickly and decisively,
blasting the monster with another three-round burst. Thankfully, this
creature did not share its companions' resistance to gauss, and it collapsed
in a heap, orange-colored blood oozing out of its shredded brain.
"Wha--what the hell was that thing?!" one of the rookie troopers
stammered, backing away, the combination of a fellow trooper dying and the
thing that had burst out of his corpse clearly unnerving her.
Lyudmila was in her face the next instant, shaking her hard. "Keep
your head on, soldier!!" she barked. "And get used to this! You hear?!"
"Yes ma'am!" the rookie instantly replied with an almost squeaking
voice. She knew a drill sergeant's command when she heard it. And she
wasn't going to argue with a commanding officer who had the build of a
Russian bear anyway.
"Everybody, stay frosty," Lyudmila said into her comm. "We've got
at least one Chryssalid analog--"
She was interrupted by a yell which sounded like it came from
Marcelle, and then the sound of a tazer being discharged cut through the
channel. Lyudmila looked up to see another brain-creature sagging to the
ocean floor, Marcelle standing over it.
"Well that takes care of that. I hope," Lyudmila remarked. "Okay,
people, let's get ready for some serious fishing."
Slowly and cautiously, using every available means of cover, the
troopers shuffled forward while the Coelecanth rolled ahead of them, serving
as the advance guard. The snarl of a sonic blast cut through the water as a
green pulse lanced out from one of the windows on the USO's second deck,
knocking out one of the Coelecanth's headlights and making a noticeable
dent in its front armor. The tank's turret snapped around and squeezed off
three gauss rounds before Lyudmila ordered it to get clear of the window.
Crouching behind a lightpole, she aimed at the spot where the shot had
come from and fired her pistol. The green pulse shot into the darkness of
the window, and then another trumpeting scream rang out.
"*Nice* shot, Lyu," Himiko said with a quick thumbs-up.
"Thanks," Lyudmila made her reply very brief before giving her new
orders. "Okay everybody, we're looking at a lot of catwalks and open
spaces on the second deck. Spread out and circle the outside, and hug the
walls; there may be more snipers up there. Tank, can you reach the door?"
While the troopers fanned out and surrounded the enemy vessel, the
Coelecanth rolled forward, trying to reach the inner hatchway, but banged
against the outside wall with a dull clank. It backed up and tried again, but
the passage was too tight.
"Well, there went that idea," Lyudmila sighed. "Okay, Himiko, take
two troopers and get under that catwalk ASAP. I'll cover you. Marcelle, any
more entrances on your side?"
"One more," Marcelle answered. "3 o'clock side. Dujardin, Tonida...
anything on your side?"
"Nothing at twelve," Dujardin reported. "Another catwalk and a
window, but no hatchways."
"Same at nine," Tonida seconded. "No entrances here."
"Okay," Lyudmila ordered. "Tonida, I want you back at my location
yesterday; we're going in soon as you get here. Dujardin, link up with
Marcelle and take the east entrance. Remember people, use sonics if you
have `em, tazers if you don't." Passage of ten seconds found all the
troopers clustered in position. Himiko and the troopers with her raised their
tazers in the water in acknowledgement.
"Go!"
As one, Himiko and Marcelle and their charges blazed through the
hatchways, practically colliding with a Lobsterman who was heading for the
south hatch. Himiko nailed it with her tazer before it even had a chance to
react. Quickly the troopers took up guard positions while Lyudmila and
Dujardin ran forward with their units. No shots were fired, a fact which did
not escape Lyudmila's notice.
No snipers and no reception committee? she thought. Bet there's
a nice party waiting for us topside, then.
"One door at twelve, passages at 1:30 and 4:30," Dujardin reported.
"Looks like there's a lift at the end of both."
"I've got two more passages over here, 10:30 and 7:30," Himiko
added. "And we've got another door, and one big lift in the center here."
"Damn, lotta exits to cover," Lyudmila grumbled. "All right, two
troopers on each corridor, two more check out those doors. Marcelle, we're
guarding the lift area."
Marcelle and Lyudmila crouched down, peering into the small central
alcove. The four-person lift was empty. "Wish we could've gotten the tank
in here," Marcelle grumbled.
"Probably would have gotten stuck on the upper floors anyway,"
Lyudmila replied.
"Lyu? I've got an empty chamber on the second deck. Doesn't go
anywhere!" Himiko's voice could be heard.
"Same over here. Dead end," Dujardin reported from his end. The
other troopers reported similar findings, and the trooper who had inspected
the area beyond the doors presently reported that it contained only a few
empty devices which appeared to be cryos. "Looks like the center lift's the
only way up."
"Who *designed* these things?" Marcelle quipped.
"Maybe we'll find out after we're through here," Lyudmila answered,
indicating the unconscious Lobsterman behind them. "All right people,
regroup at the lift. We're going up."
The four-person lift stopped at the second deck, which turned out to
be similarly deserted, three of the four passages ending in lifts which went
to small engine compartments and nowhere else. The veteran troopers
recognized the pattern and were getting more and more cautious, while the
rookies weren't sure whether to be happy or nervous because of the lack of
opposition. The north hallway ended in another four-person lift, and from the
layout they'd seen already they knew it only went up.
"Game time, people," Marcelle said in his best Hicks imitation as the
first group of four troopers took up position on the lift and headed up.
Lyudmila made a mental note to clobber him when this was all over.
Doors to the east and west and a small room to the south greeted
them as they reached the third deck. A quick check of the south passage
showed that it ended in a small chamber with two small windows in the far
wall, beyond which lay another corridor. "Can't get to it from here..."
Lyudmila observed. "Right. Two teams, one to each door! We'll
rendezvous at the other end of the sub, if possible." Marcelle took the east
squad, while Lyudmila headed through the west door with her troopers.
No sooner had the west door been opened than a shot rang out and a
control panel not far from Lyudmila's head was reduced to rubble. Lyudmila
dropped behind the nearest large object, another of those cryo-chambers,
crawled around to the side, and was preparing to return fire when something
landed on the deck next to her. Recognizing it in a heartbeat, she grabbed it
and threw it back, ducking behind the cryo again. A sonic shockwave ripped
through the chamber a moment later. Lyudmila glanced around the side of
the machine, sonic pistol ready. Which was good, because the swaying but
still standing Lobsterman spotted her and tried to shoot, but the shot went
wild. Lyudmila aimed and fired, and the thing went down with a howl.
"*Tough* sons of bitches," Lyudmila growled, then contacted her
squadmates, who had yet to step through the door. "Okay, room's clear.
Move your butts, people!"
The next chamber was empty, but the number of walls and alcoves
made searching it more time-consuming than Lyudmila would have liked.
That seemed to be a trend in every USO they had encountered: lots of twists
and turns, and a lot of places to hide. Those were good things if you were in
your element, familiar with the layout of the vessel. The humans were not.
Shots echoed through Lyudmila's comm as the squad on the opposite side
engaged enemies. Two alien screams rang out, and one human one. Damn.
At last they reached another door near the southern end of the ship. Tonida
hit the switch and ran through.
There was a dull thud and then a flash. Tonida collapsed without a
sound, and Lyudmila suddenly felt very woozy. Shit... stun bomb... She
focused the sum of her will on staying upright, and her vision cleared a bit,
allowing her to see the bug which had just tried to stun her. The Lobsterman
was understandably shocked at the failure of its weapon and began backing
away, trying frantically to stuff another bomb into the launcher's chamber.
But it never completed the task: behind it, a door opened and Marcelle
stepped through, leveling his weapon and shattering the back of the
creature's head with two carefully placed shots.
"Somebody give me some stim..." Lyudmila wheezed, leaning
against the nearest wall and fighting hard to stay upright. The nearest
trooper, a rookie by the name of Cormier, unhooked Lyudmila's medi-kit and
plugged it in, dumping a double dose of stimulants into Lyudmila's system.
Lyudmila instantly felt a lot more alert. "Thank you, Cormier." She glanced
around, taking in the room they were in. "Cormier, I need you and Gaudin
ahead of me for the next door; your reactions are gonna be better than mine
now."
"Yes ma'am," the troopers answered, and edged up to the door on
the inner wall.
"Dujardin, Marcelle, have your team watch those windows in the
north wall and be ready for anything."
"Yes ma'am."
The door opened, and the troopers found themselves in a narrow
corridor which ended in a right turn a few meters ahead. "Looks like this
leads to the center," Gaudin remarked.
"Good," Lyudmila answered, a little hyper from the rush the
stimulants had given her. "Sooner we're out of here the better."
A strange shrieking sound cut through the water.
"What the hell was--" Lyudmila started to ask before a reddish-
glowing object the size of a football swung around the corner and came
rushing at them. Then she knew. "**BLASTER BOMB**!!!" Every trooper
who'd heard her yell hit the deck in less than a second. Time slowed to a
near standstill for Lyudmila as she threw herself back toward the door and
tried to pull the two rookies with her. Then the world exploded.
Himiko grunted loudly as the giant shockwave struck her and nearly
knocked her back a few meters, but she held her position and her combat
reflexes put her back on her feet in the next instant. If the bug that had fired
that weapon was still alive she couldn't give it a chance to reload. She
checked her surroundings: the blast had flattened the corridor and some of
the central chamber which had been inaccessible before, and through the
wall of bubbles that had been created she could make out three human
bodies to her west. One of the bodies was Lyudmila's.
Rage possessed her when she saw Lyudmila's body. She did not
think, merely acted. Ignoring the yells of her comrades, she charged through
the opening in the wall and found herself face to face with the enemy, a new
bomb in one of its small claws and the oddly-shaped launcher in the other. It
dropped the weapon as Himiko lunged at it and tried to swat her with its
massive upper claws. Himiko ducked and stabbed at the creature with her
tazer. It staggered the beast but did not knock it down, and it swung at her
again, connecting this time, but Himiko rolled with the hit and came up again,
thrusting forward with her tazer. This time, success; the creature fell to the
ground. Himiko narrowly fought back the urge to prime one of her grenades
and stick it under the hulk at her feet. It was certainly an officer, and live
officers were what the scientists at Tsunami and Atlantia needed right now.
She checked her surroundings once more. Nothing else.
Mission accomplished. Thank god.
* * *
No, it couldn't end like this.
You must not die.
There was nothing but a dull, black haze for Lyudmila, as she fell
through a featureless void. It could not be the end. *It could not*.
Elemental, you must not die.
Not completely featureless. There was a face. That same face.
Stefanie... or Steffie... that was the name attached to the face. The visage
looked at her with eyes that were dark and seemed to be getting darker,
almost black now. Lyudmila was becoming aware of a twisting pain in her
guts.
Please don't die... please don't leave me... The girl's pleading
voice seemed to stab into her abdomen and intensify the already increasing
pain. Then, suddenly, the image was gone.
No! It wasn't over yet!
Then another face, not human. It looked like an Aquatoid's face, but
with yellow skin. Come to me, Elemental, it intoned in a deep basso
voice. You, and your Earth, shall be mine.
NO!!!
* * *
"uhhh..." Lyudmila groaned through a huge haze of pain, and
became increasingly aware of a cold sensation in her guts.
"Got her..." Dujardin heaved a huge sigh of relief, watching the
readouts on the medi-kit closely. "That was close."
"whuh..." Lyudmila opened her eyes and was greeted by the sight of
several troopers bending over her, a reddish substance -- her blood, she
realized -- floating in the water around them. "wha' th' hell...?"
"Congratulations, Commander," Marcelle said soberly, but with a hint
of awe mixed in. "You're the first person to survive a blaster bomb at
pointblank range."
"c... cormier...?"
"He didn't make it," Himiko said, emotionless. "Gaudin's dead too,
not much left. They must've taken the major force of the blow. S'probably
why you just got eviscerated."
About then Lyudmila realized that the odd cold sensation in her guts
was seawater flooding her body cavity. There probably wasn't much left of
her abdomen. She could still feel her legs, though, thank god. A corner of
her mind thanked every deity she could think of offhand that her lungs were
intact. Another part started to wonder how she was going to survive without
a lower digestive tract, before the pain came back in and made itself known
very clearly, derailing most other thought processes immediately. And she
was getting colder by the minute.
"get me outta here..."
"Already on our way out. Gonna have lots of shellfish for dinner,
Lyu," Marcelle tried to be reassuring, without much success. Lyudmila
would have laughed but she was in far too much pain now.
Damn... this was probably going to be one hell of a hospital bill...
END FOUR
END