Five years. Five short, happy years I'd known, and loved these guy's as my Hunter Siblings. Five short years I'd engaged in numerous hunts with them and each one leading up to the big cluster fck that took them from me, we'd laid waste to dozens upon dozens of shadow infested territories, and prevented what would have been planetary class infestations. But do you know what helped keep our streak. We didn't get cocky. We had capable leadership, especially from Hadrick, and we didn't become to prideful in our accomplishments. That and Weyland did what I'd told him to and stay the fck out of our way. And you can guess what make that all split like a fcking...
He stiffles a tear filled sob, as he wipes his mandibled cheeks.
And it wasn't everyone who got to uptight, it was only one person who got cocky, and that person was me, I... I began to become to prideful in what me and my siblings could accomplish. Sure I'd learned my lesson about being prideful when I fought that Predalien, but apparently I hadn't learned a hard enough lesson. I felt like we could take on anything and everything God sent our way, and through it back like it was nothing. I felt like we were superheroes. I was so eaten up in it that I stopped praying as often as I did, I stopped reading the Bible. Hell I even challenged God one time in one of my prayers.
Mistake number two was all on Weyland. He was was tired of the marines for their insubordination in destroying the specimens. Thus he devised to get rid of us, in such a way that no one would suspect a thing. While he was at it, he devised a back up plan to replace us. The Weyland Yutani Corporate Security Task Force was now more public due to the growth in crime happening among the colonies. They kept the colonies safe, but more importantly they made the colonists feel safe, and they followed orders. If the reputation of the marines was ruined, then Weyland could get rid of us and replace us entirely with the newer more popular Task Force.
Now I'd only heard rumors of this at the time, since I never traveled much outside the facility, but apparently we were losing employment because of stories Weyland had been creating and feeding the colonists. Lies that were made to make us look like we were actually what was causing so many xenomorph infestations to occur. A bunch of stupid sht like we were to lazy and corrupt to do our jobs or that we were becoming these fanatics, who worshipped the shadows like gods, and deliberately let them escape. Weyland's stories about the latter did have some scientific evidence to support those claims. All the way back in the 2100s just before the Earth War happened, there were these cases of people having nightmares about the xenomorphs, to the point where a lot of them began loosing their sht and became cultists. They worshipped them, called them "the True Messiah" and a bunch of other Lovecraftian sht.
We had no idea what Weyland was up to, and by the time we found out, it was to late.
Weyland had been releasing shadows into colonized areas allowing them to bred uncontrollably for testing purposes, which also functioned well when exterminating us marines. He'd set the infestations up, send us in, and then leave us behind allowing us to get slaughtered. There were other tricks he pulled on us. Sources vary depending upon the planet, and who you ask, but he mostly just threw us to the wolves, then covered up everything about it, and made his Task Force more and more popular, while gutting out reputation like a fish. The largest of these infestations on this planet was know as Crimer's Massacre.
Crimer's Ridge Colony. That place will always be stuck in my mind. Always. Crimer's Ridge used to be one of the largest populated colonies on the western hemisphere of the planet, spanning at a width of up to eight miles and length of up to five miles it was single handedly the most attractive settlement in the entire Northwest desert region. Funnily enough though, while it's set in that region of the planet, it's actually a oasis jungle area that leeches from the Southwest into the Northwest, so while it is in the desert it's surrounded by a lot of jungle. Speaking of the southwest that place was perfect for a shadow hive. Despite what I mentioned earlier though, I'm surprised we didn't find ourselves in bug holes the size of Crimer's Ridge. As the name implies it was situated on a sloped ridge and it was covered in the worst vine ridden, mud filled area anyone could have gone into especially in the southwest, and that place is mostly nothing but mud and water. The terrain was just horrendous for fighting in. Thankfully for myself there were plenty of trees for me to climb, and leap off of or I'd have been fighting my way through the mud like everyone else.
The reason why we were fighting in this mud pit to begin with was because the people who were in charge didn't have a clue what they were doing. Weyland had retired Hadrick and a lot of other old time Colonial Marine leaders like Dale from the Corps. He set them up in the Ralcos moon system, a common place for retirees to set up once they've reached the end of their career there are plenty of jobs there, mostly simple things like food places, pharmacies, and other crap like that.
Hadrick had been planning his leave for years now and I knew eventually his time would come when he'd leave us, but nothing ,and I mean NOTHING, could've prepared me for when that day came.
He'd done similar things to us marines on other planets too. Yeah he was tired of us and he wanted us gone for good. I read up on a lot of other planets and what the marines went through, and while some of their stories are pretty tough, I'd say that what happened to us on Crimer's Ridge was the worst thing that to ever happen to the United States Colonial Marines in history.
After replacing our leadership with a bunch of bumbling idiots from the Task Force, and making the shadow population explode out of control, with a cover story to cover his ass and put ours on the fire, all he had left to do now was sit back and watch the show. Nothing would stand in the way of him and his exploits on the xenomorphs now.
As I was saying, we were dropped in with absolutely no idea what was going on, nor did we even have a clue who was leading us. We received orders to come up on the colony on the bulk of the infestation itself and we didn't even know it. There was no air support, no set plans, no detailed information about what we were up against nothing. We'd been told that this was a simple mission, yet there were so many marines just dropped right into this mud pit. And we were suppose to fight shadows here? I would've called the entire mission off had I see what was happening. To make matters even worse, we were totally unprepared for what we were about to go up against, we had very little ammo, we had very little supplies, and the fighting equipment we were given made it even harder for us to fight in the terrain. Everyone had big bulky armor, a lot of it was acid resistant material, and we could take a few show stopping hits from a shadow, but this sht was heavy as fck! It limited our movements, made us get stuck in the mud a lot of times, and to make matters worse it was a total death trap to wear in the heat, and this was during one of the hottest summers I'd ever experienced. To say I'd fcked up tempting God would be a big understatement. And I was about to learn a hard lesson from it.
One hundred and twenty thousand marines. One hundred and twenty thousand we lost out of the total one hundred and nine eight thousand battle ready marines on this planet.
At the start it was just a couple few warriors here and there. We took them out pretty easily. They had just as much difficulty moving through the mud like we did. Now a few of them did use the trees like I did, and a couple of us did get tagged, but that was nothing compared to the slaughter we faced shortly afterward. We were met by millions upon millions of shadows, all of them streaming through the trees raining down on us. How a lot of us managed to make it through that I don't know, even my Hunter Siblings made it. But little did I know that the xenomorphs had this whole thing planned out. Their forces began to fall back allowing us to regroup and resupply, this time with almost the entire Colonial Marine's fleet on the planet. We continued forward renumbered and resupplied, before we were set upon again by the shadows, this hoard wasn't as big or strong as the first one was. These guys were just suppose to whittle our numbers down, while the hive prepared the remaining bulk of it's shadows to encapsulate us once we were where they wanted us. By the time we made it half way to the ridge we had to literally climb past the corpses of our forces and the shadows'. We fought hard through everything that came down that slope. But for everyone of us that managed to make it to the top it was to late.
He pauses for a moment, and begins to breath heavily, and whimper in an almost panicking way. A bottle of pills shakes as he takes some out to take them. It is most likely his Sertraline, which he takes to help control himself when he's about to experience an episode of PTSD.
Kj stifles a panicked sob, but quickly regains composure.
Sorry. This moment trips my PTSD a lot of times whenever I think about it.
He takes a few deep, long, relaxing breaths to help.
Once we got into the colony that's when the sht really started hitting the fan. Those of us who managed to make it, ended up getting ambushed from above, to the sides, and down bellow. Shadows began pouring out of building windows onto the streets, literally raining down on top of us, flooding out of alley ways, and coming up at us through the sewers. I don't remember much of what went on I just kept seeing a lot of marines get pulled away or flooded over the swarm. Although I did see what happened to my friends.
Me and the guys were boxed in by these fckers. William was shouting "Die mother fcker Die!" and "You want a piece of me!" all kinds of mad sht like that. Just the angriest you'd ever seen someone be, especially someone as happy go lucky as he was. He was the first to go. A bug materialized from behind him and managed to force it's tail through his back armor with it's tail, before turning his gasping body around and headbitting him! I tried my best to him in time before it could kill him, but a shadow grabbed ahold of me and pulled me away! Rich and Michelle saw what happened to Will, and angrily continued firing into the swarm! Michelle was cursing all sorts of foul phrases in Spanish while her fiancee hollered like a mad man! Their revenge firing was cut short when a face hugger latched itself around Michelle's face! Rich's firing stopped and he looked down at his future wife in horrified shock! I made it over to her fast enough, but then some guys shot struck the facehugger spraying acid everywhere! What was left ate through Michelle's face leaving nothing left but her headless body! The death of Michelle was enough to make Rich's mind snap like a twig! He couldn't handle the shock of loosing her! She was the love of his life his every reason for continuing to live, sure he still had me and Taylor, but-but! God! Oh, God!
Michelle was Richard's emotional stability after his sister died. Michelle was his world. And after she'd died, he just broke! He lost his sht! His mind couldn't handle the shock of it! Just thirty seconds ago he and his soon to be wife were avenging their fallen friend, and now he was just a vegetable! That look of terror, disbelief, and sudden sadness petrified his face! I could see it in his dead eyes that there was nothing left we could do for him!
Taylor fought as hard as he could to give me time to help Michelle, but he also fell! A Shadow had jumped out on top of him, tore his leggings off, and sliced both his legs off! I managed to pull him and Richard to safety, and-and I tried to help Taylor all I could, but he'd lost to much blood! I looked around trying to find my medicomp, or my backup medkit, just something that would help me save my friend!
He takes another moment to calm himself down before continuing.
His last moments of life were filled with nothing but pain, as I tried desperately fix his wounds with nothing but my bare hands. He was crying up a storm, but not because of the pain, but because of the rest of our Hunter Sibling pack. He knew they were all gone. Rich was still alive, but his mind was to broken.
"I'm sorry ,Kjon I'm sorry." He tearfully told me as he bled out all over me and the ground below. I couldn't see what he meant at first. I was try desperately to find something to stop the bleeding.
"Don't worry I'm going to get you home!" I told him as tears began to fill my eyes.
"It's to late for me Kjon. It's to late." He told me.
"No! No it's not I'm gonna get you out of here!"
"You can't Kjon. I'm done for. It's my time."
"Don't say that to me Taylor! You'll make it! I know you will! You have to! Your my Brother!"
"The others are gone too ,Kjon. It's their time, and it's my time too."
"STOP SAYING THAT!" I screamed at him.
"I'm sorry about this ,Kjon. But I can't stop it, and neither can you. I'm sorry that we have to leave you. But it's all on you now. Just get everybody out of here, and protect the Lord's people ,Kjon. Promise me that. Promise me it please!" He begged me, as he handed me his crucifix.
"I promise." I replied in a sob as I took the necklace cross from him.
"I-I'l-s-s-see-yo-you-i-in Heaven H-Hu-Hunter-Bro..." He managed to gasp before his soul entered into a happier place.
"No, no, no. No! NO! NO! NOOOOOO!" I roared, as I began weeping over my friends lifeless corpse. Time slowed down, everything began to quiet to a whisper, and the world around me became a blur as everything fell apart in front of me. My Hunter Siblings were gone, and I was all alone now. I continued to mourn like this until I finally came to my senses again.
After it was all over I initiated a retreat with the rest of the marines who were still breathing, all while carrying Richard and Taylor's bodies out of that hell hole.
For the next eight years, Richard remained in that death like state. That look of tragic terror, sadness, and disbelief still frozen on his face. It would've been better had I just done him in myself. That's all it would've taken just one quick shot to the head, and his suffering would have been over, but I just had to save him. The higher ups took him to a mental institution in an attempt to help fix him. Personally I think they did it just to prolong his suffering, which is what need up happening for the next eight years. I can't even imagine what must have been going on inside him, if anything went on at all. The pain and suffering his prolapsed mind was in.
I got a message two weeks before he died, which gave me a visual of his state. He was even worse than when I'd last seen him. He was as thin as a rail, looked like a concentration camp survivor from WW2, his face had grown out raggedy hair, he was bald, and his face... Ohh, God, his face... His face was still the same as it was when Michelle died.
I was in so much pain when I saw that picture. The agony I felt when I saw what had become of him... I said a prayer to God, since there was nothing else I could do, asking, begging, crying when it would all just end! That he would just end his suffering!
You have no idea how happy I was when I found out it was finally over. When I found out Richard had finally passed through the veil. He was free. Free to go home to Heaven with the others. Finally able to go back home to Michelle. I was so happy I cried like a baby for hours thanking God that his suffering was just over with.
As for me though I wasn't as lucky. My punishment I'd have to endure through to the end. For almost eight years I had to bear that burden that thought that I was responsible for the death of my siblings. In that time Weyland subjected me to all kinds of torturous punishment. I still got to do my job no less, but my job now was to protect Weyland Yutani assets. Yeah I was supposed to protect the shadows, but I never obeyed.
I learned to hate Weyland for what he'd done that day, and although I hold him partially responsible for the death of my siblings, I could not deny that it was my prideful attitude that also got them killed.
I never did go through with the threat I'd made to Weyland. Not that I couldn't, believe me I could, but I just didn't have it in me to do it. I was to broken, to out of myself to continue on. I still did though.
In that time I also became introverted, hard, and just all around unpleasant loner. I let no one become attached to me, because I didn't want to lose anybody else. Nor did I want to befriend anybody belonging to Weyland Yutani's Corporate Security Task Force, because they were all pricks. And I just remained that way for the next eight years. Fighting for what little there was left. I did it for Taylor and the promise I'd made to him. I did it for Michelle, for Richard, William, and for every other marine who died on that God forsaken ridge, and for all of the colonists who's lives were at stake. I did it because I'd made a promise, and I wouldn't stop until that promise was complete. Once I was finished with that promise then it would be all over.
I struggled with many hardships, judgments, and all the negativity everybody could give. I had no family left, no one personal I could live for. No one to help me. As you can guess that also made it difficult to cope with my PTSD. But I am a survivor, a marine, a Predator. I learned to adapt to the situations around me and the circumstances that I conflicted with.
But Crimer's Ridge still haunts me to this day, and during the long painful years since, I have often thought about it, and if it wasn't for someone very special, I'm very sure, that just like Michelle, Richard, Taylor, and Will. I'd be another corpse on Crimer's Ridge.
There is a long pause as Kj tearfully weeps over the four tombstones of his fallen friends.
"William 'Wacko' L. Paxton"
"Taylor Banks"
"Richard Green"
"Michelle Roberts"
There is a scrapping sound that can be heard in the background.
"Michelle Roberts Green"
I'm sorry. I'm so so sorry guys. I'm so sorry that I let you all down.
Sorry for the delay in response but I was having a hard time getting motivated to do this chapter. I've wanted to do it, but I also wanted to do it right. I wanted to sell Kj's performance and his character as a broken war hero, and I think I succeeded to a degree. But yeah, sorry for the delay I hope you enjoyed it, or at least I hope it did what it was supposed to, and I will be ready with the next chapter as soon as I can.