Chapter the Fourth – The New Threat

Hera Station

As Krallik made his way through the ravaged marine base, he took some time to look at the destruction that had taken place. All the spent bullet casings, the blown out grenade shells, the acid rockets and bile bombs, and the blood. Lots of blood. He laughed to himself as he last Marines were taken out without mercy.

"Foolish humans" he thought to himself "Save yourself the trouble and just surrender."

The Marines however, obviously thought surrender was the last option. No, not an option at all. The last soldiers fought viciously with their Shotguns as the Onos and Lerks tore them apart.

Krallik, the leader of the invasion army, was a new breed of alien. While he was still technically a Fade, he was much more evolved. His carapace was much harder, but much lighter, allowing for much faster movement. His bladed arms were much stronger and injected with a nerve poison. His senses were more than anything the marines could imagine. Overall, Krallik was a super fade. Just as Mikar and the Psi Corps were the Marine Elite, Krallik was the beginning of a Kharaa counter. With their capture of the resource rich Hera station, Krallik's mission was to gather resources to breed more of the super warriors. As he looked out from the station into the cold, dark space, he grinned and he lusted for battle with the so called Marine Elites.

Marine Headquarters

"Mikar, gather your team and come to headquarters ASAP, something urgent has come up" shouted the Sky Marshall into the COM link.

"Ugh, what? When? Who? Where? How? Why? Ugh" Was the only response that came from the other end of the COM link.

"God dammit Mikar, this is serious shit here, get your fucking ass over here, our future depends on it."

"Oh god damn it, can't we get a few days to ourselves?"

"No, you can't, that's the price you pay for being great. Now get over here IMMEDIATELY." Screamed the Sky Marshall.

"Fine, fine" replied Mikar.

10 Minutes Later

"What the hell is going on? Why the urgent alarm?" questioned Mikar with a look of confusion on his face.

"This recovered data tape from Hera just came in. It's disturbing."

As they watched the tape, Mikar and his team said nothing. At first they didn't see anything out of the ordinary, Kharaa and Marine casualties left and right, but halfway, they caught it. It was so fast they could barely make out the blur, even with the reduced speed of the tape.

"What the fuck was that?" breathed Sapphira.

"That, is what we're scared about" replied the Sky Marshall. Normally, an elite Fade, even with their celerity upgrade, moves at about 350 speed. This specimen however, was calculated to move at over 500 speed. That's not all, keep watching."

As they team and the Sky Marshall continued to monitor the tape, something clearly was wrong. The heavily fortified Hera station was one of the top defended bases in all of the Marines' strongholds. It's defense positions were constructed as to provide perfect cover for every other defense position. In theory, it would have taken thousands of Onos and Fades throwing themselves into the base just to take out the front defense lines, but there were only about 50 Onos and 20 Fades, and they took out the two front defense lines with barely any casualties.

Mikar and his team could barely make out anything from the tape. They could barely follow what was going on; all they knew was that the Marines were getting slaughtered by a force that shouldn't even be able to penetrate the first defensive layer.

"What the fuck" said Balan, speechless for more.

"You probably didn't catch it. It's probably too fast for you all to see what's going on. We've watched this tape over a hundred times, at the slowest speed possible. We'll show it to you magnified and at a higher resolution at the lowest speed. Watch carefully."

As the tape rolled, everything looked normal. All the Heavy Armors and Jetpacks were at their positions because the alarm sensed incoming Kharaa. They watched eagerly to the horizon, their trigger fingers itching.

Suddenly, the pack of three Heavy Armors at one turret position just seemed to crumple and go limp. The team could BARELY make out the blur that went past them. Again and again, the other teams of Heavy Armors were taken down in this fashion.

"This can't be" said a startled Aldeer. "One of those fully upgraded Heavy Armors should be able to sustain more than 10 focused Fade slashes. There is no way that one slash could disable 3 of our heaviest infantry."

"Well…the Kharaa probably thought no Marine could ever kill a Fade with its mind. You didn't seriously think the Kharaa would have no counter to you guys? As good as you guys are, the Kharaa are about a million times faster than us at evolving. Keep watching."

As he continued to watch the tape, Mikar felt the first tingle of fear go down his spine. He had never been scared in battle before because he was sure of his abilities. The Kharaa had never met anyone like him and his team so they weren't prepared for it and Mikar and his team had the element of surprise. As soon as that was gone though, who knew what the Kharaa could cough up to deal with the Psi Corps.

The rest of the tape was more horrific than the first. Jetpackers didn't even get a chance to react as they were torn apart. It was as if the whole Marine encampment was being attack by ghosts. Powerful ghosts.

The fear in the troops were obvious now. All the Marine scrambled around, unsure of what to do. The commanders were without any clue as to what to do. They had never encountered any alien that couldn't be sensed by their advanced Motion Tracking. With their troops mysteriously disappearing without even so much as a call for help, the commanders were stricken with fear.

As the tape came to an end, the camera finally caught a good glimpse of what the team could only speculate was the lead alien. Krallik.

"Krallik" said all six team members at once, almost unaware of what they were saying.

"What?" said the Sky Marshall, becoming a little uneasy.

"It's name is Krallik. The Kharaa has spent the majority of its resources and effort into breeding it" responded Mikar. "It's designed for the sole purpose of eliminating us."

"How the hell do you kno…" started the Sky Marshall but stopped midsentence.

"Do you think we're called the Psi Corps for nothing?" laughed Freyalise.

"We're capable of much more than alien killing. Our original purpose was to gather intelligence. It wasn't until it was discovered we could kill with our powers that we were turned into soldiers" responded Balan.

"It seems as if Krallik is a hyper-evolved fade infused with years of evolutionary strengths" muttered Mikar. "Unlike us, it doesn't seem to possess psi powers, but it makes up for it in speed, power, and commanding ability. If you notice in the tape, the Kharaa's attacks are extremely coordinated. Unlike anything we've ever seen before. They flank us and cover each other as well as our top trained troops do."

"The loss of Hera is a staggering blow to us. It was very strategically placed, and not only that, but had a huge abundance of resources. I'm not even gonna suggest we try and take it back, looking at this tape. I don't think even you guys can hope to retake the base without heavy casualties. What we need right now is for you guys to train. Unless you guys increase your powers and abilities exponentially by the next big encounter, we could very well be facing defeat on a large scale. As of right now, we have nothing that can stand up to this menace. They aren't good enough to take down our most important stations, but it'll only be a matter of time unless we can train more Psi Corps. I really hope you understand the seriousness of this issue. I'm sorry that you guys can't have a normal life, but the whole of humanity depends on you."

"Understood sir" replied Mikar without the slightest scent of humor in his voice.

The other five were stone faced as they pondered this new predicament. Up until now, they were the elite, they feared no Kharaa. Now, they would have competition.

"There's no way we'll fall behind, Sky Marshall" saluted Mikar as he and his team got ready to leave.

"Where are you guys going?"

"Back to my home planet. To train. Leave the rest to me, I'll see to it Krallik and the rest of the Kharaa meet their doom at our hands. Humanity will become victorious in the end, that much I can promise you."

End of chapter 4. From now on, the battles will be much more intense. Will Mikar and the Psi Corps stand up to the Kharaa Elite? Wait and find out