Major Zanders hardly even had a chance to stow his gear in the small but neat little room he was supplied with when the intercom buzzed. With a sigh, he strolled over to the screen and inserted his card key. The screen sprung to life, suddenly full of colour and shape in the form of Brett Smith's scowling face. The Senior Director was mid-sentence when he was patched through, and he looked pretty pissed.
"Soldier -" He began, his first mistake.
"That is Major Zanders, sir." The officer cut him off sternly.
"Major. Are your men settled in?" Before Zanders could reply, the Senior Director continued. "Orbital Control has just detected a military vessel approaching Eden. They aren't responding – do you know anything about this?"
Zanders frowned. "No sir. As far as I know, all operations are postponed until after that solar storm blocking Home System winds down."
Smith leant to the side and Zanders could just see somebody whispering into his ear. Company men. All secrets and need-to-know. Zanders hated them. After a moment, the man spoke. "It's transponder beacon is telling us it is the Sulaco. Does that change your answer?" Before Zanders could say yes, the man continued. "They aren't responding to our hail. I'm sending a team from Orbital Control to investigate."
"No!" Zanders ordered, fixing his stern gaze on the Senior Director.
"What was that, soldier?" Smith hissed, a threatening tone in his voice.
Sucking in a deep breath, Zanders squared his jaw, ready to hold his ground. "Sir, the Sulaco is a vessel of the United Nations Marine Corps and thus it falls under military jurisdiction. Mine being the only military outfit in the vicinity, it becomes my responsibility as the Commanding Officer of this unit to investigate the issue." Without waiting for a reply, Zanders ended the transmission.
He knew something wasn't right. He remembered his friend from the Military Academy, Lieutenant William Gorman, mentioning that he had been detailed to a new unit being sent to fix up some faulting communications on Acheron. Company orders. He hadn't heard from him since. Official documentation from the rescue team sent after the marines were declared overdue reported high levels of radiation where the colony had been. All signs indicated that the atmosphere processor had gone radiative and set off a thermonuclear explosion. The only signs of life that remained were from a derelict spacecraft. That's where the cargo had come from. There had to be a link between that cargo and the Sulaco.
Zanders felt a grim determination settle on his shoulders as he strapped on his helmet and body armour. He knew that all the signs pointed toward his old friend being dead. But he would be damned if he wasn't going to get to the bottom of all this.
Adjusting his helmet so he could speak into the headset he contacted his platoon. "First and Second Squads, saddle up! We're moving out."
The excited buzz in the dropship died as they approached the Sulaco's docking platform. Lieutenant Andrew Van Dyke knew that something was up. The Major was never this quiet during a drop. In fact, the arrogant young officer was usually smoking a fat cigar, filling the entire cabin with its putrid smoke. Now he was simply chewing it, and in the ten minutes it had been in his mouth it had been reduced to a mere stub. The man was nervous, Van Dyke didn't need to be a shrink to see that. But why?.
First Squad on me, we're heading for the bridge." Now the Lieutenant perked up, waiting for his squad's orders to be delivered next. "Second Squad, head for the cryo chambers. I want to know how many marines are left."
Van Dyke frowned at that last part, but would follow his orders to the letter nonetheless. "Alright ladies, you heard the Major. Assholes and elbows let's move, move move!"
In two files they jogged out, fingers resting tense on the trigger guard as the echo of their boots resounded eerily throughout the ship. One dropship was parked on the other side of the platform, with no sign of the second. There was some minor tearing in the steel grates of the floor, giving the impression of a struggle.
The intercom crackled in his helmet. "Sir, scans came up negative. This place appears dead." The dropship's pilot, Sparrow, informed the CO.
True to her word, the silent and edgy walk to the cryo chambers was uneventful. Nothing stirred. Inside the white room, dim blue lights cast long shadows everywhere. However, nothing could hide the gaping hole in the wall where an escape pod had clearly been jettisoned. All of the remaining chambers were starkly empty.
"Looks like nobody's home, Sir." One private said as he inspected the empty cryo chambers.
"No shit, Davidson. Has anyone got anything to say that I don't already know?" Van Dyke growled.
"Sir!" A female voice called from a computer terminal on the other side of the room.
"Tell me you have something, Choplyn."
"Hard to say, Sir." She mused in a thick Russian accent. "Looks to be some type of report. Looks more like a fairytale if you ask me.
Van Dyke skimmed through the file he was handed. It was written by one Warrant Officer E. Ripley. He caught a few keywords... Nostromo... LV-426...Derelict ship... and then it got interesting... eggs... impregnated... human host... alien. He paused on that last word. This woman had to be insane. After centuries of space flight and decades of human colonisation and not a single contact with extraterrestrial lifeforms, and here was this woman blabbering on about some bullshit. He palmed it off to Sergeant Watkins, who chuckled.
"You call this shit a fairytale, Choplyn? I'd hate to see your fucking nightmares." All ten of the laughed at that. However, the merriment was short lived as Major Zanders came in over the intercom.
"Lieutenant Van Dyke, what's your status?"
"Uhh, Sir we have no friendlies. However, an escape pod was launched with three cryo chambers."
"Yes. I can see it in the ship's log. It appears that a fire was detected." Before Van Dyke could disagree, Sparrow interrupted them.
"Sir! I'm receiving an urgent transmission from Third Squad, patching it through!" She spoke fast, clearly worried.
"Major! This is Corporal Taylor. You need to get back here ASAP. There's some weird shit going on down here!" Van Dyke could hear the panic in his voice – the man was clearly falling to pieces.
"Keep it together Corporal! Where is your Sergeant?"
The man's next words were choked with emotion. "Dead, Sir. At least, we think it is him."
"You think?" Zanders asked. All movement had stopped and all eyes were now on Van Dyke.
"On me marines! Back to the dropship – Choplyn grab that report!" He ordered before jogging out of the room, setting the pace back to the dropship.
"We can't tell, Sir."
There was silence for a moment, before the Major finally spoke again, this time ordering Van Dyke back to the dropship. "Already on it Sir."
The Sulaco's bridge was dark and unwelcoming. It suited Zanders just fine. He had two men watching each of the three doors, and three men patrolling the corridors around the bridge. He didn't expect any danger, but there was something about this ship that gave him the creeps – like secrets of some dark and horrible past. At the very least it gave him a chance to revise the ship's logs alone. A video log of the landing platform showed one dropship leaving with the full crew on board. Sometime later, seemingly of its own accord, the second one took off. That was the first sign that something was wrong. After fast forwarding hours worth of footage, he saw the second dropship return. But where there should have been an APC full of marines there was just a woman, a little girl and a Bishop model synth. Suddenly something removed itself from an alcove of the dropship and impaled the android. Freezing the footage, he gazed in horror at the monster on the screen. It was like some freakish nightmare – as black as night with a huge tail, broad crest on its head and no eyes to be seen.
"Bill, what did you get yourself into?" He muttered. That must be what those scientists were so interested in on Acheron! "What have I gotten myself into?"
Suddenly a red emergency light started flashing. "Warning! Weapons lock detected! Warning! Weapons lock detected!" The computerised female voice warned. "Estimated time to impact... sixty seconds."
Activating his intercom, he sought out a private channel with his 2IC. "Lieutenant Van Dyke." He spoke in a grave tone. "These are my orders. Once you have secured Third Squad, I need you to find that cargo we escorted in and destroy it! All of it!"
"Sir? What is this about?" The man asked, clearly confused.
"Ten seconds." The automated voice warned.
"An alien." Was all he could offer before closing his eyes and waiting for the end.
Van Dyke cried out in shock and pain as his earpiece peaked and cut out, leaving his ears ringing. Lifting up his harness, he marched into the cockpit to see bright flames and chunks of debris filling the space where the Sulaco had been.
"Sparrow what the fuck just happened?" He wasn't usually one for swearing, but this time he couldn't help it.
"I don't know, Sir. One second the Sulaco was there. The next, she was in a billion different places.
"Patch me through to Orbital Control!" He growled, glaring at the little space station as it hovered above Eden, appearing oblivious to what had just occurred.
"Orbital Control this is Lieutenant Van Dyke of the Colonial Marines. Do you read me?"
"Loud and clear Lieutenant. Our radar is detecting something large and fast passing right by you. Whatever it is, it just took out the Sulaco."
"There's nothing there. Now Ma... my men were on that ship! So you had better tell me what is happening out here or God help me -" He threatened the man on the other end. He knew that the man had done nothing wrong – but all reasoning had just been thrown out the window.
"Sir." Sparrow said meekly, as though distracted. "He's right. I can't see a thing, but the scanner says something just passed us. Whatever it is, it is heading for Eden."
The operator at Orbital Control spoke up tentatively. "Sir. We just finished tracing the trajectory of the anomaly... it... it is a direct match to the Valkyrie... It followed you here!"
"What the hell is going on?" He asked himself. Whatever the answer was, he was pretty sure that the answer had been on the Sulaco.