Chapter 2: Gatecrasher

51 found himself standing among a squadron composed of two other Sectoids besides him, a Muton, and a Floater. He was...back? But how? He attempted to speak to his comrades, but a sharp pain shot through his head that nearly made him sick. He felt that his limbs were frozen in place no matter how hard he focused on moving them. The Muton, his squad leader, gestured towards fleeing silhouettes in the distance.

"Their people flee. You, peons, you will cover fire for us while we enter and execute." Execute? Who? What was going on?! But 51 found that he and the rest of the Sectoids skittered towards a series of destroyed vehicles and began opening fire on a set of armed figures in the distance. They in turn, returned fire, managing to kill one of the Sectoids. He wanted to flee...but instead he moved to take its place and continued firing back at the soldiers.

He managed to turn himself to look at the Muton and Floater bursting into the building across the street, green plasma fire erupted in the windows and screams could be heard, silhouettes display against the windows featured bodies laying against the walls, or hanging lifeless from some unseen object. He could even see the Muton commander spearing some helpless individual with his plasma rifle's bayonet attachment.

He wanted to scream, he wanted to run away from the carnage, but he couldn't. Looking forward, however, he found now that the soldiers were rapidly advancing up the street despite the shooting. And he, nor his comrade were moving an inch. One of the soldiers breached the line and ran straight up to 51...the last thing he could see was something bright and glowing coming down onto him...

51 gasped as he jolted awake, panting and clutching at his chest. He looked over to see ZARA still standing in the same spot she was whenever he fell asleep. She looked towards him.

"You were having a nightmare." she said matter of factly. 51 rubbed his face and sluggishly stood up. "Nightmare...?" He asked, now feeling like his brain was throbbing. "A disturbing dream based on anxiety or fear that can awaken someone in-" ZARA began to explain before 51 waved his arms frantically for her to stop.

"I understand, I understand...Yes... A night-mare..." 51 said to himself, spacing out this new, strange word. A nightmare. He didn't even know what a dream was, much less a nightmare. "Can you inform me as to the contents of your night-terrors?" Was it called a nightmare or a night terror? 51 was confused, but just rubbed his mouthless face, slouching over in his chair.

"I was... on an unfamiliar planet with a squad. A Muton was commanding me and a pair of other Sectoids to assist them in... pacifying the local population... I felt like I couldn't move my arms or legs... I was trapped. All I could do was watch..." ZARA listened, not moving or really showing any signs of life, something odd that she and practically any other Codex would do.

"Hmm. Understandable. When did you begin experiencing these night-terrors?" 51 was flabbergasted. "I wasn't even aware that I could sleep, much less dream until last night. How do I know what I am... but I don't remember..." ZARA was silent, her form pulsing as If she were contemplating an answer. She chimed. "Unknown. Cannot parse philosophical queries." 51 rubbed a bit of residue out of his bulbous, black eyes and stood up. The large, rotunda sitting above the food court with a dome of dirty windows. The light now shining through showed that it was daytime. "What do we know about this planet?" 51 asked, grabbing an old plastic cup and observing it, before throwing it aside. ZARA gave a deep hum.

"This planet is dominated by a species of bipedal vertebrates known as Humans, or Homo Sapiens in their own, scientific tongue. They have yet to master faster than light travel, but do have robotic units surveying parts of this star system. With the only human activity beyond Earth being confined to its moon and orbit. Currently, the human population stands at 10 billion and stagnating. Our current location on Earth is Musutafu City, located in a nation known as Japan..."

51 looked up in realization. "Wait, our ship...We need to go back and see what's happened to it..." 51 though, in the back of his mind could probably guess what had become of the ship, It was likely that the humans had taken it. But who knows?

Maybe they'd left it in the park. Though, 51 realized that If he or ZARA stepped foot outside in broad daylight, they'd both either be shot to death or carted away to some laboratory and dissected... or likely both. He needed a disguise. Recently, the Elders had run across a race of shape-shifting aliens from a star system bordering the galactic center. Though the Vipers were usually selected for infiltration missions... in the rare instance infiltration was needed. The Elders had begun experimenting with allowing practically anyone under their command to use this shapeshifting ability to their advantage.

51 figured that with ZARA's help and what was left of his plasma pistol that a disguise kit would be easy to build. And sure enough, It was! Taking the form of a gauntlet, just as his plasma pistol had, it fit snug onto his right arm. All that was left after building it was the task of obtaining a template for the disguise, this mall had proven to be a blessing for a number of reasons. One of which being a clothing store nearby to the food court 51 and ZARA were camping in. It featured all kinds of facades of humans smiling and posing wearing some designer clothes. This gave 51 and ZARA the perfect reference and after scanning an assortment of the images, a disguise was crafted.

A short, gaunt build with orange spiky hair that reached down to 51's 'neck,' his new neck, rather. A pair of purple eyes, a side effect of his psionic abilities that he nor ZARA was able to actually fix. And a slightly pale skin tone.

Mostly created with the intention of allowing him to go out in the open without attracting any attention, It seemed good enough for a test run. Donning some dusty but intact clothes from the store, 51 set out back towards the park, leaving ZARA to keep watch at the mall and continue her research. Walking on both legs was a tedious affair at first, with 51 hunched over with his arms loosely hanging down. How the hell were humans able to do this so efficiently? It felt like his spine was going to snap in half! Nevertheless, he managed to act natural and no one seemed to care about his presence so... It was working. Approaching the park, 51 noticed a police line had been created, with people crowding around to see beyond the barriers. A policeman with a megaphone stood on a platform.

51 hadn't yet learned their language fluently, but passively scanning the thoughts of the humans around him allowed him to quickly gain a basic grasp of it.

"Karkoon Municipal Park is closed for the time being due to a plane crash last night! For your safety, please remain behind the fences!" A plane crash? 51 got in closer to investigate further. He could hear people around him having conversations amongst each other. "Did you hear that explosion last night? Woke me and my wife up!" "Yea seriously! I had just put the baby to sleep too..." "I saw it fall from the sky too! It was on fire!" Where did they get "plane" from? It didn't really matter. 51 pushed himself up to the fence and tried to peer into the park, but couldn't see anything with all of the crowding and the damned policemen standing in front of him.

"Step away from the fence, kid." One of the officers warned him. 51, not wanting to make a scene just stepped back. Before he could leave, he caught a glimpse of a pair of men wearing chemsuits leaving the scene. Curious, 51 carefully probed deeper into one of the men's mind using his psionics. Though with his... tenuous by design grasp of it, he could only make out bits and pieces of his thoughts in the deep fog of the man's psyche.

"-Never seen anything-impact didn't even-Larger than a winch-"

Before he could listen any further, 51 began to get a splitting headache again and stopped. Having seen and heard just about everything, he began to make his way back towards the mall. Though, still trying to catch some sort of a glimpse of anything, he wasn't looking where he was going and slammed into someone. Looking forward, he could see a boy sporting a curly green and black haircut and wearing a black school uniform, now sitting on the ground.

"S-Sorry about that." Izuku Midoryia apologized. 51 just stared at him, before reaching down and picking up a notebook off of the ground. "It's fine." 51 replied, heaving Izuku to his feet and handing him his notebook back. "Ah, thank you. Again, sorry about that. I'll watch where I'm going next time." 51 nodded, not really wanting to start a long conversation with Izuku, walked off into the crowd. Leaving a confused Izuku, whom just gave a short wave to the strange individual he ran into.

"Um... bye?"

Back at the mall, 51 entered the food court to find ZARA scanning random bits of trash everywhere. Whether It was for fun or for actual scientific research, 51 wasn't really sure, he never could pin down these Codexes sometimes. "ZARA? I was unable to get into the park. The humans have a sort of blockade... police everywhere." ZARA didn't respond, as she was busy scanning a paper cup. Seriously? This was more important than their ship? 51 stood by, awkwardly shifting in place. ZARA then turned to 51, dropping the cup rather suddenly.

"I am aware. They have every entrance to the park blocked off as well." ZARA projected a hologram of the park itself, an icon that was meant to represent her was shown freely moving about on the outskirts of the park itself, but any attempt to actually enter the park were met with a buzzing sound and a red flash. Every entrance? Wait-

"How do you know that... you weren't there with me..." ZARA gave off a sound that could be considered the Codex equivalent of a chuckle. "The news cameras nearby. I was able to access them and viewed your approach. I recommend you look forward as you are walking next time you go out in public. Otherwise You might experience unneeded injuries." Who was she, his mom? Wait... He wasn't even sure If he even had a mother...

"Can't you just access the park's camera systems then?" ZARA snapped her head towards 51, he jumped a bit. She really needed to stop doing that... "I did. Unfortunately, someone severed the connection to the park's internal cameras and I was unable to see beyond the park gate" Of course they did... Nothing seemed easy on this damned planet. "So we know... nothing. Great. It's likely they have our craft anyways, where would the humans even take it? It's not like we could-" 51 began to mutter to himself, he felt like his heart was about to jump out of his frail chest. ZARA, in the meantime, picked up an old soda can from the ground, performing a scan on It. She then glanced to 51 freaking out in the corner, and then to the soda can, and then back to him before rearing her arm back and throwing the can at him, managing to strike him in the head with a harmless tink. The can clattered to the floor, 51, now broken out of his panic, looked to ZARA with less than stellar amount of enthusiasm plastered on his already emotionless face. "I suppose we might just have to wait here until the invasion begins but... that could be years..."

Fukoaka City, Japan.

In a dark, hastily cobbled together board room, several individuals wearing military uniforms and casual business suits alike sat in silence. A middle aged man with short, black hair, sporting a wrapped up pony tail in the back and a pair of rounded glasses on his face anxiously shuffled a pile of papers around.

The door opened and two individuals stepped in, one being an older Japanese man wearing a military uniform befitting a higher ranked officer. And a younger man with short, almost buzzcut brown hair, wearing, oddly enough, a green sweater over a white business shirt and tie, despite how warm it was outside.

"Commander Taisho." the scientist shook Taisho's hand and gave a quick salute. "Dr. Manfred" Taisho responded back, before allowing the younger man to step forward. "Dr. Manfred, this is John Bradford, US Intelligence."

Bradford stepped forward and gave Dr. Manfred a handshake. "Pleasure to meet you, I've read your books on interdimensional theory before...skimmed them mostly." Dr. Manfred chuckled. "Where did a CIA spook like you find one of my books?" Bradford folded his arms behind his back and gave a wry smile. "Ah, just a friend of mine recommended them to me. Do you know Dr. Vahlen?" Dr. Manfred gave off a combination of a tired, yet fond sigh.

"Yea, I know Moira, met her while I was interning at Innsbruck..." Bradford could remember vaguely of Vahlen talking about her education in Innsbruck, though certainly nothing about Dr. Manfred. He figured perhaps It was a sore subject and just left It at that. With everyone in attendance, Dr. Manfred approached the front of the room and set down a stack of papers rather messily onto a podium next to a large screen.

"Ladies, Gentlemen, I apologize for bringing you all here on such short notice but we're currently experiencing a very time sensitive situation ongoing in Musutafu City." Everyone in attendance nodded along, having heard of the explosion that occurred last night. "At 0425 hours, a JAXA satellite detected an unknown object entering Earth's atmosphere in corroboration with several satellites hosted by NASA and the NOAA detecting a similar anomaly entering the atmosphere above Hawaii and traveling towards the Japanese mainland."

Several pictures flashed onto the screen featuring thermal images of a black, disk-like object falling from the sky, white streaks of fire could be seen trailing it. "At 0445 the object impacted in Karkoon Municipal Park located in the southern half of Musutafu City." A blurry, security camera video could be seen from Karkoon Park itself, showing a calm, serene scene disturbed by a violent flash of light, knocking some of the cameras out entirely. "Within minutes, the MCPD alongside elements of the FDMC arrived on the scene, alongside Pro-Hero 'Backdraft' to assess the damage. Now... Here's where our participation matters..."

Photos, marked hastily as 'CLASSIFIED' flashed onto the screen showing off different angles of what was undoubtedly a stereotypical flying saucer, individuals wearing hazmat gear could be seen within the pictures studying the craft or hauling materials away from the crash itself. The tone within the room had shifted into cold shock, alongside the implications beginning to set in. "And you're positive that its not perhaps an experimental craft?" Someone asked from the back of the room. Bradford shook his head. "Negative, It's definitely not an American craft. It's nothing that we've ever seen before..." Dr. Manfred gestured to Bradford with a sort of 'there you go' hand motion.

"Now, we haven't interviewed everyone on the scene. We're still moving who we can into Musutafu without causing a major amount of panic. We've already said that the crash was a plane crash carrying chemicals. But an alarming trend has been noticed among those who we have interviewed... Many have reported that there were unidentified individuals moving within the crash site. Descriptions are consistently that of a short, grey skinned individual with a large head and big eyes followed by a glowing, almost yellow entity. No one's story has changed thus far."

One of the more skeptical members of the audience, leaned back in his chair with a wave of his hand. "It could have been someone investigating the crash site themselves. Its not like certain Quirks haven't produced strange body configurations before. Right?" All eyes were placed upon various individuals in the room bearing strange body features, such as a man made up of what looked to be solid rock formations, and a woman whom possessed a head similar to that of a Hammerhead shark. "That... Is exactly why we're still interviewing the first responders, including Backdraft himself but he's been unavailable at this time due to his work with the FDMC." Commander Taisho, having heard all of this and seemingly agitated by something, spoke up.

"And is anyone else aware of this beyond this agency?" Dr. Manfred scoffed. "No, we're keeping this under wraps to the best of our ability. We'd rather not the general public panic over this. And If this gets out to the United Nations, they might consider more... drastic measures, for what could be a minor problem." Everyone in the room groaned, knowing exactly what Manfred was referring to.

One of the UN's many protocols created in times of crisis, there wasn't a situation the UN wasn't prepared for, no matter how absurd or unlikely, much to everyone's chagrin. Z-COM, for instance, a protocol designed in the event of an outbreak of a zombie virus, and, in reference to their current situation, the X-COM Project. An organization which would be formed to oppose any hostile extraterrestrial activity on Earth.

But in order to activate the XCOM Project, one would need full consent from each of the sixteen council nations, alongside damning evidence that there was indeed a hostile, alien force operating on Earth. And well, as It stood now, there was evidence of a saucer on Earth and possible aliens. But certainly no invasion force... Nor were they even sure there were aliens in the first place.

Currently, getting any nation to agree to the idea of forking over billions of dollars to an organization that operated outside and above the jurisdiction of all nations and had the authorization to engage in military operations anywhere on Earth was a hard sell indeed, though that wasn't to say that any paranoid council nations could still pass the vote forward. And the last thing Japan needed was to become 'The nation who cried alien'. "We will keep in touch as more information develops and we should expect a detailed report sometime by next week. As of right now though, we're working on attempting to transport the craft out of lower Musutafu and into a research facility as covertly as possible..."

To be continued...