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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Lazybones" data-source="post: 4952838" data-attributes="member: 143">The game ran weekly, and I more or less matched the game and RL calendars. With medicine gaining by leaps and bounds thanks to the alien tech, anything that didn't kill you could bring you back to full strength within a few days. I suppose I could have made the time between sessions equal to a month to make the base building, research, etc., more realistic, but I wanted the campaign to have a fast pace to it. Solirion, I'll see if I can put together some screen caps for posting later in the week. * * * * * Session 5 (May 12, 2008)Chapter 14Vasily and Sandoval kept an eye out for more aliens. Stan White was crouched over Catalina, working quickly and efficiently.  Her uniform was blackened from throat to navel, but she was conscious, gasping as Stan stabbed a needle into her arm.  Buzz still knelt beside her.  “Cat, you okay?” he asked. Catalina coughed.  “What… hit me?“A whole lot of alien fire, that’s what!” the hacker exclaimed.  “Just felt like one big hit, like being punched,” she coughed, “by electricity.”“Go see if Allen needs any help with Jane,” Stan said, pushing the other man aside as he continued his work.  Buzz rose and staggered off, eyes widening as they fixed on Carson’s headless body. James was pressing bandages over the cuts on Jane’s face.  “Ya need any help?” he asked as he approached, uncomfortable.  “Just stunned, a bit,” she said. “How many fingers?” James asked, holding up a hand. “Three… no, two.”Stan came over to them.  “Catalina’s stable, but she’s done for today.  “Can you get Jane back to the ship?” he asked James. “No, I’m fine, Jane insisted, pushing aside James’s hand.  “Mission to complete.”“Jane,” James began, but he was cut off by a loud rumbling noise that seemed to echo from everywhere around them.  “Earthquake?” James yelled. “No,” Vasily said.  “Damn it, where is ship?”“Northeast, Yushi said,” Sandoval replied. “Buzz, help Stan get Catalina back to the ship,” James said, hurrying after Jane as she half walked, half staggered toward the other men.  “I’m picking up spiking energy readings from the northwest,” Ken reported over their communicator links.  “It looks like the aliens are conducting repairs on their ship, might be planning on getting out of here soon.”Stan and Buzz lifted Catalina as gently as they could between them.  “Nobody would fault you if we cancelled the mission right now,” Stan said.  Vasily double-checked his rifle to make sure that the action was free and working.  “Doctor, make sure that stunned alien get in storage.”  He glanced at Sandoval.  “We move out.”The four of them—Vasily, Jane, Sandoval, and James—headed into the canyon.  The deep noises they’d heard before had stopped, but they could see the dark plume of smoke up ahead, although the shifting breeze obscured its immediate source.  They paused briefly to check out the abandoned shack, but there was nothing there, nothing left but a wreckage of wood and stone that looked to have been unoccupied for years. As they moved deeper into the canyon they saw a steep rise that offered a route to the top of the cliffs, more or less in the direction of the smoke column.  Vasily and Sandoval started up, with James pausing to give Jane a hand.  “Thanks,” she said.  She was pale, and looked worse with the bandages covering her face, but she pressed on ahead after the others with single-minded determination.  James followed behind her, careful not to slip on the treacherous slope. When she reached the summit, she saw Vasily and Sandoval staring at the alien ship. It was broad and sleek, a disk crunched into a slightly oblong oval, with a bulge in the center where the crew compartment was likely located.  The smoke had obviously come from it, but was beginning to dissipate, with only trailing wisps coming from the hatch in the rear of the vehicle.  As they watched, the alien ship quivered slightly, settling among the rocks. The communicator sounded in their ears.  “Our guest is resting comfortably,” he said.  “Catalina’s okay.  If any of you are experiencing problems, get your ass back here.”They shared a look, with the eyes of the men lingering on Jane.  She shook her head, as if responding to the unspoken question. There was a slight clatter of rocks behind them.  Vasily and Sandoval turned together, their rifles coming up to ready.  Buzz held up his hands.  “Hey!  Don’t shoot!”“You didn’t have to come after us,” Jane said.  “Hey, thought you might need a techie in there,” he said, gesturing to the ship. Vasily nodded.  With a slight gesture to Sandoval, he walked over to the hatch, and pulled it fully open.  After a quick look inside to make sure the immediate space beyond was clear, he stepped inside.  The others followed. The interior of the ship was roomier than Vasily had expected.  He couldn’t see a great deal with the smoke that swirled through the air.  Whatever it was burned his lungs, but he stifled the instinct to cough.  He glanced back to verify that Sandoval was behind him, then started carefully forward. The ship’s interior was basically a single long compartment, although there were bulges of unidentifiable machinery that subdivided the accessible space.  As Vasily moved forward, he saw a sectoid near what had to be the front of the ship.  There was a viewport there, and a series of control panels.  The sectoid was working there, pushing buttons and pulling levers, and did not appear to know they were there. Vasily thought about their briefing, and the necessity of capturing a live alien.  He glanced at Sandoval, gestured.  The two men spread out and crept forward.  Neither saw the other sectoid until it stepped out behind a bulky bank of machinery, lifted a handgun, and fired a blast of plasma energy into Sandoval’s torso from three paces away.  The soldier crumpled.  Vasily spun, and unleashed a spray of automatic fire.  Bullets pinged off of the alien machinery, the impacts creating plumes of hot gases and electrical flashes that engulfed the alien.  Several of the bullets struck it was well, and it vanished back into the toxic fog, reeling.  Vasily could no longer see it, but he kept firing, shifting his aim forward to the alien pilot, which had turned to face him.  It had a pistol as well, and even as Vasily pulled the trigger again, it fired a blast of white fire at him that exploded his perceptions in a haze of agony.  He was barely aware of hitting the floor, then everything fell apart. Vasily’s shot had missed it, but the alien fell back against the console a moment later as Jane shot it through the chest.  Behind her, James and Buzz were fighting their way through the smoke that was filling the ship’s interior afresh, coughing as they fought the effects of the toxic vapors on their lungs. Jane reached the fallen soldiers.  One look was enough to tell her that Sandoval was done for, but as she knelt by Vasily, she saw that he was still breathing.  She looked back, trying to see James, but her vision was obscured by the tendrils of smoke that thickened around them.  “Medic!” she yelled, coughing as the smoke filled her.  “Medic!” * * * * * With a start, Jane returned to the present.  She looked down at her xPhone.  With its screen off, she could just see the outline of her face reflected in the glossy surface.  “Operative Swift?”She jumped a little, startled by Chief Hallorand’s voice.  She looked up and saw the chief approaching in the company of two men she’d never seen before.  They were dressed identically in black suits, with black ties, white shirts, dark glasses, and the just-visible telltale of a clear cord running from their collars to their right ears.  In her work with the CIA she’d spent enough time with federal officials to recognize them at once.  One was black, the other white, but they were cut from the same cloth. Jane remained seated and tucked her xPhone into her pocket.  “What can I do for you, chief?”“These gentlemen are from the Department of Homeland Security.  They are looking to talk with each of the members of Alpha Team.”“Special Agent Johnson,” the first said.  “Special Agent Johnson,” the second echoed.  “No relation,” the first agent said.  “We understand that you have collected some alien weapons technology.”“Yes?”“We are taking the weapons into the custody of the United States Government,” the first Johnson said.  “Your administrator has agreed to cooperate fully,” the second added. “I’ve always turned any alien artifacts collected on missions over to base research staff, for decontamination and storage,” Jane said.  “I don’t have anything else in my possession.” Neither agent betrayed so much of a flicker of reaction.  “Do you know if any of your peers have kept any such items, ma’am?”Jane shook her head.  “I really have no idea, gentlemen.  You can always ask them.  Vasily might be a bit non-responsive, seeing as he’s in a coma right now.  He was shot by an alien.”  She stood abruptly.  “If you’ll excuse me.”  She left the lounge, trying to ignore the quiet conversation between Hallorand and the agents behind her.</blockquote>

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