Storm Cell iv

"Are you sure about this?" Dr. Elisabeth Weir asked her lover.

"We both know that the girl has no business leading this mission." Everett replied, "If she is not removed then the whole galaxy will suffer" he continued, a sanctimonious air in his voice. Puffing out his chest and squaring his shoulders the colonel continued, "if the only way to do that is to let her make her mistakes then so be it."
"But what about the …" she argued. The two of them were in the colonel's hardened office. Weir was looking distinctly worried but the colonel was a picture of calm. This despite the repeated calls for assistance that were echoing over the com on his desk.

"People who trust her?" Everett supplied, "I just wish there was more I could do" he continued with false sincerity, crocodile tears shining in his eyes.

Everett had always been ambitious. It had taken him very little time indeed to work out that politics was as much part of a modern soldier's role as fighting and quickly decided on the path of least resistance. In Weir he had found an ally, the woman was strong, capable and principled, on first glance of little use to his ambitions. However one night he had found her alone on the observation deck, alone and vulnerable following an argument with one of her friends. He had tried his hole card and the frankly quite beautiful woman, had been a surprisingly easy conquest. Since that time his quiet campaign had undercut the formidable woman's confidence so badly that she even accepted these barefaced lies as fact, purely because they came from his mouth.

Colonel Everett allowed himself a self-congratulatory smile, before leaning down and re-reading the UN regulations in front of him.

O

O

Not a hundred yards away Kaji was fighting for his life. An Alien raider team was working its way towards the Marine command centre, killing everyone that they could find along the way. Kaji and his small security team were doing all they could to stop the invaders but the aliens were still winning ground.

To the security chief's left another one of his team paid the final price. A shot tore through the thin wall he was hiding behind and punched a fist sized hole in the unfortunate man's chest. Shutting the sight from his mind Kaji wound up his last grenade and whispered a last prayer.

"Nabiki if you've got an ace up your sleeve now would really be a good time," he whispered, turning the corner, handgun blazing.

Through sheer luck rather than any skill on his part the alien invaders managed to miss him just long enough for him to throw his deadly projectile. Unfortunately for him an alien managed to deflect the bomb from its true target.

Pure white light blossomed, far to close for anyone's comfort. In that moment Kaji saw the blast wave tear two aliens into pieces, destroying armour and flesh with equal disregard. Then the wave bounced and Kaji had a perfect view of the blastfront heading his way. Somehow it seemed to change from a blooming flower into a grinning skull.

"Shit. I'm dead" he thought, throwing himself to the floor.

Only he wasn't, a blast door slammed shut with all the finality of a coffin lid, and instead of fiery death Kaji found himself in sudden silence. From one side a foot suddenly appeared, his eyes followed it up, along some very shapely legs, and over a very fit body, to the bandaged face of the ship's first officer.

"When you're quite finished checking me out Captain" she said with humour in her eyes, "We have something we need to do," and with that she turned around and left.

"Bloody women" he groused, hauling his battered form off the floor and following the swaying rear of his boss.

O

o

The hundred and fifty meters between the door that Ranma came in through and the base structure to the glowing dome seemed like the longest Ranma had ever known since his wedding aisle. He could feel the thousands of eyes looking out at him from tanks lining the wall. Even through his aegis hood he could feel the oppression of the hundreds of minds reaching out to probe his, dreamers trying to make sense of the intruder into this inner sanctum.

With the awareness of their minds came the realisation that his Zen-shin was slipping. The pain and strategic decisions had slowly broken down the neat walls of his emptiness. Without the careful control over his mind and body his injuries would soon drag him down, he would slow and this was no time for slow.

As his back hit the wall next to the door a sinking feeling hit him in the gut. The simple truth was that in the state he was in only the stims he was taking were keeping him upright. They came at a hideous cost to his ability to focus. Without focus the aliens would have a huge advantage, simply put they would win, it would only be a matter of time. Ranma also had to face the very real possibility of being taken alive. The truth was that, despite his best efforts, he simply knew too much, too many details of too many of Earth's anti-alien defences. If Ranma went in that door, and the aliens took him he would be betraying information directly to the enemy who could most use it. It could be the difference between….

"Shit!" Ranma swore, finally recognising the fingerprints of mental manipulation. Somehow one of the bugs had got in through all the defences, an that meant that…

The door burst open, two massive aliens rushed from its gaping maw. The were a deep green colour, so dark it was almost black. Their chitinous hides were covered in hard plates and spines, their six arms finished with cruel claws that crossed talons with pincers. Their faces were dominated by hundreds of red eyes and a massive maw that opened vertically as well as horizontally.

"Ugly bastards" Ranma muttered, pulling himself into a stance and clearing his mind. Even as the lead monster threw out its grasping arms Ranma was ducking low, bending practically at the ankle and moving for a devastating strike to the fork of the creature's lower legs.

Ranma's knife edge strike was driven by most of the muscles in his body. It cleaved through the steel strong hide between the creatures leg and groin plates like so much soggy paper. Hot ooze exploded from the alien's circulatory system, burning Ranma's skin and splattering across the walkway.

Ranma pivoted his body on his other hand and swept out a double kick to the oncoming second beast. It parried and for a long second the two of them traded lighting fast blows, Ranma's super fast kicks seeking to find a way through the marauder's furious assault. Suddenly a claw shattered and the beast's attack was holed. Ranma pushed off with his hand and looped right into the reach of the creature's arms, too close for it to fight effectively. Ranma of course had no such problems. Even as the beast craned its neck to swallow Ranma's head the warrior was reaching in for the throw.

For the sentinel this was all a new experience. Only once in its existence had it even seen one of its brethren so much as hurt yet somehow this soft bag of water had thrown off the mental commands of a master and crippled two of the most physical beasts ever to serve the alien minds. As it abandoned finesse and reverted to type it got another shock. The soft-skin dodged into its own tight zone, and instinct took over. It tried to bite the soft-skin, chew its puny little body into gobbets.

Instead the creature found itself falling, rotating over its own neck, and slamming down into the decking with the force of a freight train. As the light faded from its eyes it was still wondering "How?"

The other sentinel tried to stand, confused by its sudden inability to do so. From the corner of its vision suddenly appeared the severed fist of its brood-mate. The claw plunged, barely even slowed as it forced its way past its mandibles and in through the beast's upper palette. All became dark.

Ranma took a long breath, casting out his senses for an sign of a follow up. There was nothing nearby but from the other ends of the walkways came the distant sound of running feet, time was most definitely against him. Slowly he straightened and moved to the door, twisting his neck to crack the vertebrae back into line.

O

O

"Er what the hell just happened?" Joe asked the sergeant-major. All of a sudden the pressure had stopped. As the last few barricades were being broken down, the last defences bent to their breaking point suddenly there was silence.

"How the hell should I know marine!" Laura barked, "but I do know that we're gonna damn well use the time." Even as she barked orders to pull back the injured and strip ammo from the dead she was binding her own left arm across her chest, using a strip of uniform clenched between her teeth. The arm was little use now anyway, bloody gore had replaced the fingers and a large chunk was seared from the forearm, all courtesy of an attempt to break the circle of entrapment.

The defensive formation that had been all but smashed reformed again, smaller but better armed.

"Bout time some of Ranma's luck rubbed off" she said to herself.

O

O

O

"Damn" Ranma swore, his luck had just run out. As he had suspected the base structure of the dome was a liftroom. Unfortunately it was a shielded liftroom. Completely encircling the lift was a shimmering wall of force. A quick experiment with the severed limb from the sentinel beast revealed the explosive consequences of touching the field. Clearly visible the other side of the field were the lift controls, and an extra panel presumably for the shield.

Ranma tried shooting the field. Then grenading it. No effect.

From outside the sound of approaching forces was growing louder by the second. At any moment he would be fighting for his life with little or no hope of survival.

"Damn!" he repeated.

O

O

"Just a little longer you bastards" Tomo muttered, still fiddling with the wiring behind a panel. Behind her the door continued to dent. For the past few minutes the aliens the other side had been trying to batter their way in. The noise had been becoming more and more frantic as at Tomo had been doing became more obvious. Already she had locked out most of the vessel's targeting systems, had cut the central control over the shields and moved on to other systems. Bit by bit she was sabotaging the alien's ability to run their ship. They had quickly worked out the source of the problem and shortly after that they had turned up to stop her. Hence the force trying to barge down the door.

Seconds ago Tomo had suddenly come across a hardened circuit unlike any of the others. A vast amount of power was flowing through it and the system here was being used to regulate the spikes. Whatever the circuit was someone had gone to a great deal of trouble to make it stable and secure.

To Tomo the power was a resource and an opportunity. With an evil smile she crossed that circuit with the master control grid.

Even as the strike force broke in the door all over the base controls went crazy, lights exploded and shields collapsed.

O

O

Just as Ranma made the decision to rush the strike force everything changed. A series of explosions spread out, seemingly from everywhere at once and the world went silent and dark.

A few spilt-seconds before the aliens outside gathered enough of themselves to rush in Ranma had already turned and jumped. All they saw were his disappearing heels.

The chamber of the Mother brain no longer glowed brightly. Instead it was lit only by the eerie light of its monitors and the arcing sparks of blown lights. Revealed by the flickering luminescence were a good dozen of the sentinels, surrounding the mother brain.

Ranma dropped to one knee and levelled his rifle, training it on the rushing horde.

'Crack-crack' Two rounds passed cleanly through the skull of the lead monster.

'crack' Straight through the mouth.

'crack' Centremass.

"crack' Eye

"crack" Eye

the litany went on, each round of his rifle pronouncing well aimed death for one of the rushing creatures. One by one they collapsed and folded in upon themselves. Ranma's barrel glowed red and still they came.

Finally there was only one left, a giant among its kin, and it was already reaching for the intruder into this most private shrine.

Without hesitation Ranma whipped up the but of his rifle. It caught the brood-head first across the inside uf its highest elbow and then crushed the right side of its face into a goo-ey mess.

Ranma ditched the melting weapon, drawing his beltknife.

The mother turned its massive eye to regard him and for the very first time in its life it truly knew fear. In the eyes of this lesser species was none of the subservience, the terror or the pliability of every other creature it had met. Instead the intruder's eyes were pools of icy indifference. Even as Ranma hefted his knife to throw the mother searched for some sign of weakness, some chink in the armour to exploit that might possibly save its life.

"PLEASE!" it said, a futile gesture to puntuate a pointless end.

The knife flew and the mother finally accepted the truth, this creature would never be dissuaded, would never stop until all of her species were dead. It wept for the end of an empire that spanned the stars themselves.

Ranma spat and turned to leave. He didn't get the chance, with the mother's death it released a psychic shockwave that burst out, stripping all unshielded minds of anything approaching conscious thought. Those close to the brain suffered almost simultaneous mental meltdowns.

O

O

Aboard the Nemesis Gos's coterie were the first to spot the change, unfortunately for more than one of them this would be the last thing they ever spotted, the backlash causing haemorrhaging on a massive scale. Gos himself had felt similar before, the difference was that this time he had been fighting for much longer, and was a whole lot more sensitive. From the moment the scream touched his consciousness he knew there was little he could do, he could either close off his mind and retreat into his body or try to help the others; in the end there was no choice at all. With a mental flick Gos dumped all his reserves into the matrix, cannibalising his own body to feed the shield he built for his comrades.

"AAAAAAAAAAH!" he screamed, the last words that would ever leave his mouth.

o

o

"What the hell?" Nabiki offered. All of a sudden the entire alien fleet had gone haywire. First the alien base had seemed to lose all control over its functions and leave itself open, and now everybody else was following suit.

Just as she was about to give the order to keep firing the psychic shockwave hit. For a long moment all she could feel was pain then it was gone.

"Ranma" she muttered, somehow knowing.