Staff Sergeant Angus "Bull" Carver hopped out of the Humvee that had brought him to the front of a white, but otherwise nondescript building inside the secret U.S. government base deep within Area 51, which was located in a remote area of New Mexico. Carver was a huge man, standing at 6'5, with a gleaming bald head, and a bulky frame packed with muscle. He took a single look at his destination, and spit a stream of tobacco juice on the baking hot concrete. Carver had been to Area 51 a number of times, and none of them ended in any resemblance of a good time. Scowling, Carver hefted his duffel bag over his shoulder and walked inside.

Lambert, alerted that Bull Carver was on his way, met his old comrade at the door. The two had met during the initial formation of the Corps a few years ago, and had bonded over the intense training that followed. They had gone on a few early missions together, not all of them successful, and forged in the hard crucible of blood and pain was a friendship stronger than carbon steel. It would have been a useless cliché to say that each would give his life for the other, that was an unspoken given. What they had was something deeper, which defied Lambert's ability to articulate. It just was, and no more needed to be said.

"Hey, Bull," said Lambert as Carver tromped down the hallway. "You're late. Everyone else is already here."

"Fuck you, Lambert," snarled Carver. "You better have a goddamn good reason for calling me up. I was on vacation in Cabo." Bull did not come by his nickname through accident. He was abrasive, and at times downright ornery.

"Relax, big man," said Lambert. "I wouldn't have called you away from the senoritas and margaritas unless this was a big deal. Top secret stuff." Bull didn't look any less happy, but the top secret tag grabbed his attention.

"What is it?" asked Carver, lowering his voice as the two sergeants continued to walk deeper into the building.

"You'll know soon enough," replied Lambert. "Stow your gear in quarters, and come down to Meeting Room A. I'm going to give the whole team a briefing." Carver clomped toward the living area, his bag thrown over one massive shoulder. Lambert veered off to the left, and headed for the designated meeting room, where the rest of the team had already gathered and were waiting for him.

He pushed open the double doors and strolled through the entrance. At once, every eye turned toward him. Lambert surveyed the members of his security team, who had been spread out around the room and talking amongst themselves. With General McCallister's backing, he had no trouble getting them all released from their units for this particular mission, although their individual commanders certainly did not like losing their top soldiers, even temporarily. Lambert had worked with all of them at one time or another, some for a short time, and others for an extended period. He had hand-picked every member because of their unique specialties, and because he knew every one of them could be counted on if the shit hit the fan. And at some point, it usually did.

Sergeant Ray Jackson came from deep in the heart of Texas. He had been shooting firearms since he was old enough to aim and pull the trigger. That familiarity with weapons had carried over into his military career, where he became a small arms expert. Ray could assemble, disassemble and fire almost any weapon made on Earth, and a few that were of alien design. Lambert had seen his personal weapons collection, and it was enough to make a gun control activist keel over from heart failure on the spot.

Staff Sergeant Malcolm Evans knew how to blow things up. Besides normal military ordinance, Malcolm could make explosives out of nearly anything. It was scary to sit around and listen to him describe how easy it would be to make bombs out of stuff people just had lying around their home. Once on a mission to clean out a zombie infestation, their squad had been trapped and surrounded by the undead. Lambert had watched in awe as Evans concocted a bomb out of some chemicals they had found underneath a sink in an abandoned house. Lambert figured Evans was a good guy to have around if something needed exploding.

Staff Sergeant Gwen Miller was a classic case of how looks can be deceiving. She was by far the smallest member of the team, standing a full foot shorter, in combat boots, than Bull Carver. Miller made up for these physical shortcomings by excelling in the areas of tech and communications . Machismo was rampant in the Corps, as it was throughout any military organization, and Gwen had withstood any number of sexist comments and unwanted advances. Long ago, she decided to face these problems with a blunt and direct response that any knuckle-dragger could understand. A story circulated through the ranks of an officer who had tied one of Gwen's promotions to a batch of sexual favors. Miller, as legend has it, agreed to met the guy at a hotel room of her choosing. She got there early and wired the place with audio/visual. Once the creep arrived, Miller let him make a move, then proceeded to beat the shit out of the surprised officer. After leaving him bleeding on the carpet, Miller sent the feed of the incident to his wife, and also to everyone in the lecherous officer's unit, including his commanding officer. Lambert had never been able to determine if this story was absolutely true, but he believed it.

Sergeant Jared Pierce was the counterpart to Ray Jackson. He specialized in heavy weapons. Anything from a .50 caliber machine gun to the newest particle beam weapons were his special domain. He had been the last addition to Lambert's team, because they would not be taking any heavy weapons with them on their trip through the solar system. Pierce was added because Lambert firmly believed in preparing for any eventuality, and in the inevitability of Murphy's Law, that whatever could go wrong, would go wrong. The Khunds were sure to be packing heavy weapons of some sort, and Lambert wanted someone who implicitly understood their function and capabilities by his side.

Corporal John Lone Wolf was the youngest, and without a doubt, the quietest, member of the squad. There were time when Lone Wolf seemed to disappear, and even highly trained soldiers forgot he was in the same room. Lambert did not believe in a lot of mystical native mumbo-jumbo, but he did know that John had incredible combat instincts, and an uncanny tracking ability, which made him the best scout and recon man Lambert had ever seen. After Lone Wolf's first mission with the Corps, working off the post-combat jitters, and speaking in a shaky voice, he had told Lambert about his great-great -great grandfather, who had been a Cheyenne Dog Soldier. John was just carrying on an old family tradition. It was the most Lambert had ever heard Lone Wolf talk to anyone at one time. Even now, he sat away from the others, silent while they talked and joked, although a hint of amusement would cross his eyes every so often.

"Alright, Bull is on his way," said Lambert.

"How is my favorite bald mutant?" asked Evans.

"He was on vacation in Mexico when I called him," said Lambert. Everyone groaned and Gwen rolled her eyes upward.

"Great," said Jackson. "He'll be a peach to work with."

Carver busted through the doors, banging them off the walls, and generally making a typical "Bull" entrance. "My ears are burning," he said. "Which one of you faggots was talking about me?"

"That one," said Evans, pointing at Pierce. "He was giving us an earful about how he'd like to rub oil over your entire head until it glistened. It was disgusting."

"Fuck you," said Pierce and Carver at the same time.

"See," said Evans, shrugging his shoulders. "Those two were made for each other."

"Settle down," said Lambert. He waited for everyone to find a seat and focus their attention on him. "You all know you are here for a special mission. This is it…" He outlined their orders and specifications, and was not in the least surprised when he was interrupted.

"You dragged me off of leave for a goddamn babysitting job?" asked an incredulous Bull Carver.

"Sorry, Bull," said Lambert. "I thought about it for all of about two seconds, but I decided there was no one else I'd want at my back than someone meaner and uglier than the Khunds I'd be facing. Besides, if we went without you, you'd be mad at me for not taking you along." Carver sat back and flipped his hand in a dismissive gesture, but he couldn't deny the statement.

"What concerns me," said Miller, "is this beaming of our precious selves over space, and then trusting the Psions to take up the slack. Just how stable are these teleporters, and are they compatible with the alien tech?"

"The folks at S.T.A.R. Labs assure us that everything has been tested and is safe, within parameters," said Lambert.

"Heard that before," said Pierce, to murmurs of agreement.

"We'll have a couple of days of zero-grav training to get used to space conditions, should the need arise," continued Lambert. "Then a crash course on what we know about both Khunds and Psions, and how we should react to them. We'll also work out some tactical scenarios in case things get FUBAR. Then it's off into the wasteland. Any questions?"

"When does our fearless leader arrive?" asked Jackson.

"Hard to say with civilians," admitted Lambert. "She should be here in time for the alien briefings. I'm not going to worry about it yet. Anything else?" No one raised any objections at the moment. "Good. Report to the puke chamber at 1500 hours for our first lesson about operations in outer space. Dismissed."

The soldiers began to file out of the meeting room. Bull Carver leaned in close to John Lone Wolf as they exited through the doors. "We are so fucked," said Bull. Lone Wolf just nodded sadly at the simple, yet utterly voluminous statement and continued walking.