Sorry about the rushed chapters, I'm in a bit of a rush to get stuck in.
Extermination
Chapter 1: Landing
USCM Transport Ship, Verlanis
Destination: Weyland-Yutani Colony World LV-312
Standing Crew: 24
USCM: 20
Tech: 4
Time: 0600
Incident: 6 weeks
The cold sleep chamber of the Verlanis was suddenly bathed in bright light. Corporal David Harris drifted out of sleep as the cryo tubes simultaneously opened.
As he sat up he looked to his left, to be greeted with the grinning face of his best friend, Private Daniel Jones.
"Man, Ghost, you feel as terrible as I do?" Ghost had been Harris' nickname in the squad ever since their first mission. He was an excellent sniper, and some people said he could sit four feet away from a Xenomorph without being noticed.
"I dunno man. You feel like you were hit by a bus?"
"I feel like I was hit by three buses."
"Then yeah, I feel as terrible as you do." Harris hobbled into the adjoining showers and moved over to one of the shaving mirrors. They weren't necessary, since none of them had changed at all since entering cold sleep, but a lot of marines still shaved when they woke up to put some sense of normality into their lives.
Harris studied himself in the mirror. He was relatively young, in his late twenties, with bright green eyes and military-short brown hair. He was by no means unattractive, but his face could hardly be called anything but average. His body was sharply medium, and perhaps the only extraordinary thing about him was his deadly calm when staring into the scope of his rifle.
Harris turned as he heard someone enter, and gave Jones' grin a returning smile.
Jones was created much like Harris, and the two had often been mistaken for twins. Jones was almost always grinning about something, and Harris found his good-natured humor to be a refreshing contrast to the crudeness of the other Marines.
"Good god, I'm starving," moaned Jones as he stripped off his muscle shirt and boxer shorts and stepped into one of the stalls, "Minute I wash off this imaginary stink I'm gonna grab me some grub."
Harris chuckled and nodded as he stripped and stepped into the next stall, "I agree whole-heartedly. It feels like of got one of those worm-things gnawing on my insides."
"If you're not careful on this mission, you might have one."
As the marines sat in the mess hall eating what passed as food, Harris studied his Squad-mates. There were twenty other marines on the ship, but he only had to worry about five:
Nathan Rigby, a giant of a man, the African-American Heavy Weapons expert could unleash hell with his minigun.
Jason Hawkins, your typical marine: Arms as thick as tree trunks, very little between the ears and a huge supply of lewd jokes. His skill with a Smart gun had saved each man's life a dozen times, however.
Harry Anderson, the demolitions expert. Rather small and wiry, Harry was almost blind without his glasses. He would go nowhere without his Grenade Launcher and Demo kit.
Finally the two grunts, Steve and Arnold Diamond. The brothers were about a month apart. Each was like his brother's shadow, watching his back. Both were crack shots with the Pulse Rifle.
With Harris and Jones as well, the squad was well-nigh invincible.
Harris was brought out of his thoughts by the entrance of Lieutenant Freeman, a grey-haired man whose strategies had kept them from losing men countless times.
"Good morning, ladies!" Freeman said, his hawk-like gaze traveling over each of them, "I trust you all slept well."
"Well actually sir, I've got this crick in my neck and-"
"Shut up, Anderson."
"Yes sir." Harris grinned to himself. On the battlefield they all followed Freeman's orders without question, but on ship banter like that was frequent. Over the years Freeman had become less like a Commanding Officer and more like a father to the marines on the Verlanis.
"All right, ladies," said Freeman again, "I want you out to the hangar bay and prepping the gear ASAP!" As one the marines stood, saluted Freeman, and ran to their respective jobs. Freeman had given each man a job to do on their first mission and it'd been done the same way since.
Harris was lost in his own thoughts as he worked. He'd done this so many times he could do it in his sleep. He was just stepping out of the Power Loader when a voice shouted, "Commander on the deck!"
The marines fell in as Freeman approached, "All right men, this is a simple reconnaissance mission. We go in, see if anyone's left alive and then get right back out again."
Rigby spoke, "We're supposed to evac survivors?"
"If there are any. With Xenomorphs they've probably all got a bug growin' inside them already. Jones, what are we looking at?"
"Not much, sir. Power's still active but the whole place is deserted."
Anderson piped up, "I vote for an air strike, sir."
Freeman shook his head, "Negative, we're cleared for light and medium munitions only, which mean no Air Strikes and no explosions. Sorry Anderson. All right men, get suited up, we leave in two hours."
The Dropship shook as it fought the buffeting wind. Ghost peered at his friend, "You ok Jones? You're all pale."
"I've got a bad feeling about this mission, Ghost."
"I've got your back, man. We're gonna be fine." Just then the voice of Dart, the squad's Synthetic, sounded over each marine's comm-link, "Hold on tight boys, this might be a bumpy landing." The Dropship shook violently as it landed, and the ramp lowered as the Marines unstrapped and armed themselves before stepping out into the landing bay of the Weyland-Yutani compound on LV-312.
