Hope was in shock, not just at almost being beheaded, but at Carmine's violent reaction, but would later be told why he'd acted to strongly. He couldn't here a sound, everything was just shapes.

It suddenly came back into focus "...the Commander. Tell him we're done here". Shaking his head, Hope saluted Carmine and turned away. Walking to the where his camera lay, then to the body, he crouched, lifted his camera and started taking his photos. He was very fortunate to have his camera still functioning, having put it down when his arm broke. The pain in his arm had come back along with his senses, and he struggled to hold his camera. Eventually the pain became too great, and he reached for his radio.

Blast.
The bloody thing had been on him at the time of the EMP.

He ran down the stairs, back to the building he had been on before everything had gone to shit, back up those bloody stairs, slipping every now and then, and onto the rooftop. He grabbed the radio out of the nearest Marine he could find and sent out the message:

"Yautja dead, electronics disabled. My radio's down. Commander, I hope you can hear this. Carmine seems shaken. Awaiting your command."

He handed the Marine back his radio, and saw that it was the same one who had hit him earlier. Hope smiled and walked away, knees weak, sitting near an A/C vent.

He spent the next few minutes crying and vomiting.

FireHunter could see the building up ahead, and heard the sickening crack of a skull smashing under a boot, he could hear the human's cries of triumph and sadness, he could hear crying, and vomiting.
He listened for a few minutes, then hid himself in a bush, out of range of the nearby turrets and squeezed Shadowatching's lungs.
A scream broke out of her mouth, and he was using her as a puppet, one hand squeezing her lungs, the other holding her head so as to make it appear to move as if alive.
He squeezed the lungs again, releasing another scream, and roared like he was attacking an innocent woman.
More screams and roars followed.

Pulling the magazine from her rail gun, Gene slipped one of the loose shells in an ammunition pouch into the magazine before replacing it into the rifle. Now she was back up to full magazine capacity, less one to avoid damaging the mechanism of course. Holding up her hand she motioned for everyone to reload. The communication between Hope and the Commander was picked up through open W-Y channels and Gene turned and shouted to Vevlaa. "Take us down, your dropping Harrows and I off, and taking Hope and Carmine to get medical attention. They should enjoy a rest in Hospital. The roof is as close to secure as we can hope for." Gene shouldered her rifle and watched as the Waffle was lowered down onto the roof top, the door scraping on the concrete as the vehicle came to a rest. "Keep her running, you might need to bug out quickly."

Gene stepped out onto the rooftop, her boots steady on concrete compared to the vibrating, shaking cargo bay door earlier. "Harrows!, input the single wireless motion detectors to the PDA link and bring them with us, and drag that stinking Pred inside and secure him. I bet the commander would like the take it back with us. Pity about the skull but he might get a trophy from it."

Gene walked over to Carmine and waved to Hope who was on the roof of the other building. "Get your ass over here pronto, you have to make sure Carmine here gets back to the Hospital for treatment!" Gene called out before turning to Carmine and whispered whilst inspecting his condition. "You look like hell, make sure Hope gets to the Hospital for me." She winked before helping Carmine make his way over to the Waffle before getting him set up in a seat, removing his helmet.

"Harrows and I will go help the Commander in the sewers, we'll see you back at base once this is all over." Gene said, making small talk as she began to treat some of his wounds. Just temporary until a proper doctor could tend to him. She would have called for Vevlaa, but keeping the Waffle ready to take off at the moments notice was more important. Tapping her communication Gene contacted the Commander to update him on Harrows and herself touching down, evac'ing the wounded and replacing them.

"Commander, Wells here. Harrows and I will be replacing Hope and Carmine who are currently getting ready for evac. We'll join up as soon as we can."

Opening a case that was stowed away in the Waffle, Gene looked at the medical gear that Vevlaa had. It was very good, and stored well. Vevlaa was a good medic.

"Vev, I'm setting Carmine up with a dose of pain killers, standard dose for his size and then putting his leg in an inflatable splint after dealing with the bleeding. He has broken ribs which I'll just support with bandages and I'll have to get him on oxygen since he has a punctured lung. Get him to medical as soon as possible, he's serious." Gene had taken a medical course as apart of her police training, she was just glad that Carmine was conscious and responsive.

Looking into the case she removed a syringe and a vial of a morphine substitute, with a less addictive quality. Filling the syringe with the required volume she flicking it a few times and pushed out any air before injecting it into Carmine. It wouldn't take very long to set in. Ripping open the lower leg of his pants she irrigated the wound and removed any impurities before adding a coagulant power from the medical kit. Dressing it and bandaging it she was careful at avoid the broken bones. Slipping a heavy duty inflatable splint over the leg she pressed her lips to the inflate valve and blew into it until it was firm enough to support the break and immobilize it. Removing the clamps on his chest armour, Gene removed the majority of plating and then did the same with his shirt. Having to bandage his chest to support the broken ribs firmly but not to the point of causing excruciating pain. The lung was a problem, it wasn't causing him much trouble breathing and as Gene slipped an oxygen mask over his mouth she turned it on, letting him breath in deeply. "Make sure you let Vev know if your breathing becomes more strained..." Gene said before standing up and moving back out onto the roof.

Carmine normally would have felt a bit alienated by the assistance, since he was used to being on his own for so long, but he hardly took notice of it because he was deep in thought. Sounds and objects were fading in and out as he did so, hardly paying attention to the things that were being said unless they were related to him, specifically.

"I'm f-fine," Carmine said quietly in response to being told how bad he looked. He wasn't, not at all, but he didn't want anybody worrying about him. "Don't k-know about Hope. He got hit." He didn't object to the help getting into the dropship, though. His leg was screaming in protest to even moving, so when he finally sat down, he found that his body wouldn't allow him to stand up again if he had to. He realized that the reason why was that he had just ran up and down several flights of stairs, been put through a wall, fell a few stories down onto another roof while being bodyslammed by something that weighed at least twice as much as he did, and fought the damn thing, too. He was exhausted.

He was clutching all the trophies he had liberated from the corpse of the Yautja close to him, but set them down in the seat next to him when he finally sat down. "G-Good. You got s-stuck at the base for t-too long," he replied. He was actually just trying to keep himself from thinking too hard about what had just happened. When Gene removed his helmet, he winced slightly, but didn't object. He coughed again, and wiped away the blood with the back of his sleeve. He liked having his helmet on... It made him anonymous, it gave him a different identity. It was what made him Darman Carmine, instead of Atin Fordo. The soldier, instead of the dead.

He watched Gene with his dead looking, different colored eyes as she worked, not seeing what the huge fuss was over. He kept stuttering, but that was a combination of his ribs being busted and him being shaken by the whole ordeal. He felt odd, just sitting there and letting her work, but he didn't know what there was he could do. His eyes had widened a bit at the needle, but otherwise he didn't move unless instructed to.

He kept looking at his armor and boots, though, frowning at the green gunk against the black plating. The pain was a lot less prominent, too, but that was because of the morphine, and he had hardly noticed it anyway apart from the blood. It all still felt like crap, and very uncomfortable, especially with his movement restricted now. He thought the oxygen mask was a bit unnecessary, but she had gone through more training than he had, so she knew better than him.

He nodded at what he was told, took a deep breath, almost coughing again, but he didn't. He turned to Gene, a ghost of a smile on his face. "T-Thanks... B-Before you go, t-take this," he said, holding out a small device shaped like a gun's grip, with three buttons on it: The detonator, which could be used to collapse the central building. "Th-*Cough* That way you can b-bring it down on their h-heads if need be. And s-stomp some grubs for me, w-will ya?" he said just loud enough to be heard. Then he let himself relax, no longer forcing himself to hold up. Since he was no longer in any immediate danger, he decided there was nothing left to do but stop straining himself.

He'd done that for so many years...

It felt good to take a break.

"FUCK, FUCK, FUCK'ETY FUCK!. Delta snarled as the 'Waffle', spun around and thrusted into the air. Leaving Delta stranded. Pulling out a red flare, emergency kind. Quickly tearing off the safety foil and lighting. Using his 2IC position to contact Malus to a private link... Static. His own squads link... Static.
Vev's link... Muffled. "Good enough for me he thought".
Seeing the two new guys, Hope and Carmine running 2 blocks from him. Would he make the pick-up? Probably not as he had fired the SADAR 2 blocks away and the heavy humping bastard of a ordnace weapon was resting on his back.

He thought, and jogged to the Pred Elders body, "Unfair fight pal, i wouldnt of liked to be hit by one of these myself". Delta said smiling and hinting at the SADAR.
In case the 'Base Camp' fell. All Weyland Yutani, USCMC Marines and all civillian personnal where to report to the citys main hospital. "A fucking long walk he thought". The sun was begining to set and he had a long walk ahead of him. Either he'd get lucky and pitch a ride from Malus or Vev on a second run.
Or he'd be raw meat for any lucky Xeno hunting party.
Delta started to mess with the radio frequencies while he walked.

"Yes ma'am!" Mark replied to Gene, running out of the Waffle and rushing to drag the ripped up Pred head's body. It was, in a word or two, a mess. Green blood, torn flesh, the works. Mark could almost understand why Hope was upchucking into some civvie trash can.

Harrows knelt down and slung his pulse rifle over his shoulder, grabbed the Yaujta by the armpits, and began to drag the rather large carcass back to the Waffle. It smelled like ten different kinds of hell, and his helmet, once again, kept getting in his fucking eyes.

"I need to get this thing fixed..." Mark murmured to himself, dragging the carcass up the ramp and leaving it to the side of some gear, out of the way so no one would step on it. He looked at it's face, crushed and blasted away, and grimaced.

"Jesus Carmine!" Harrows yelled jokingly, walking back out of the Waffle with the motion sensors. "Did you need to fucking make such a mess? Vevlaa's gonna be pissed as hell at you because I had to put that thing in his bird!"

He slung the motion sensors over his shoulder, and took out the PDA. He turned the PDA on after fiddling with it a bit, and decided a test run would be good. He set the sensors on the ground, and was just about to plug it in to test it when he heard the unnatural scream. He jolted up, unslinging his pulse rifle and bringing it to bear shakily, aiming into the darkness. It sounded like it had a chance to be human, but he wasn't sure if it was at all.

"Gene!" he yelled over his shoulder. "You hear that shit?! It sounded like... Like I dunno..."

He gave it some thought, and realized it sort of sounded like one of the wounded animals back on the colony he'd lived on. But it also sounded like one of the wounded animals that was being eaten by a xeno when the colony was attacked. He couldn't be sure, but when the second scream came, he knew what it was. He'd survived long enough on Aegis Delpha when it was attacked to learn some of the xeno tricks.

Mark slowly knelt back down, plugging the PDA into the motion sensors. and looked at it. He hoped to God that there would be some sort of reading, but there was nothing for now. He looked back at Gene and hissed, "Gene! We got some company!"

As the waffle tuched down on the roof to pick up the wounded, he saw Gene shouting at him
He sighed to himself. He didn’t like to be bossed around, especially by a lower ranking Private. After all, he was a Sergeant. But that didn’t matter now. He would bring that up later. â€ÂYes Gene, I appreciate your enthusiasm, but I do know what to do.†he said a bit annoyed. Vevlaa watched as Gene picked up Carmine and got him inside the Dropship where he started his treatment. â€ÂLooks good†He said to Gene, â€ÂBut I will take off those bandages you tied around his chest. We can’t reduce his lung capacity†He said, as he gently took them off. He then went inside the Waffle and pulled out one of the beds inside. Not long after, he had loaded Carmine inside and was taking off.

About then he saw Delta’s red flare and turned around. He opened the bay and let delta in before flying back to base.

When he landed, he went back into the cargo hold, only to see it covered in green glowing blood. He sighed. When I finds out who I responsible for this, I’m going to make them scrub the ship with their toothbrushes! He ordered backwards.



(OCC: Sorry, but I really don’t have time to post more until Xmas is over from now on. The Waffle will remain stationary at the first marine base until I return. Happy holidays everyone)

FireHunter gave up, the trap obviously wasn't working, and he could see a dropship landing about 400 meters away from him, but with a screen of trees and bushes to hide him. But obviously they could hear Shadow's forced screams, so he ripped the body apart and the screaming ceased, he roared a long, low moan of mourning for the one that he felt a connection to for the first time in his life.
He crawled around the building until he was out of sight, ran at full speed, for two reasons, one to avoid the gun turrets and two so that he could smash the walls. And he crashed through one of the walls, and another.
He punched a hole in the next wall and the building began to groan under the weight of the "waffle".
He growled in pleasure and scuttled, quickly, towards the sewers, where he entered.

Gene watched as the Waffle, Carmine, Hope and Vevlaa disappeared from view, the flare died down and did the same and finally when everything seemed calmer once again she breathed in deeply. Looking around the rooftop of the 20ish story building, Gene patted Harrows on the shoulder and nodded. The sound wasn't good, no matter what it was, and knowing Mark's previous knowledge was better than her own she decided to be careful.

"Come on, we better get to Malus and help him out. Were sitting ducks up here after all that noise we just made."

Heading off towards the stairwell, Gene covered the doorway and stairwell with her sidearm, rifle shouldered due to the close confines of the building. Moving aside for Harrows to take point. "Find the nearest sewer entrance, and we'll follow the Commanders tracking chip to meet up with him. A motion tracker at any new entrance into the system we pass. Watch the corners, stay quiet and were silent unless a contact is spotted."

"I'm not looking forward to..." Gene stopped as several thumps went through the building and she felt a slight shudder from the building. "Did you feel that?" she asked, pausing for a moment before waving for him to hurry up.

They ended up getting to the ground floor, both with rifles up, watching each other's backs as they moved through the destruction. The holes in the walls were large, and structurally compromising. Holding a finger up to her lips, Gene motioned with signs for him to head out to the street, still in one hand she held the detonator for the entire building.

"Fuck me..." mark whispered looking at the holes in the walls. He didn't know xenomorphs could do that. He lived out in the country on Aegis Prime so he was mostly used to living out in the wild and trying to duck out from the aliens. This was a new type of situation for him.

Gene signaled for him to move forwards into the street and he nodded. He tightened his chin strap and rushed out into the street, darting for some cover behind a car. He knelt down beside it, not able to shake the feeling that something was nearby and following them. It was an eerie feeling, but whatever it was, he hoped that it would follow them into the sewers where they could take it on. Besides, he'd taken Carmine's grenade launcher and now he had some extra punch to pack along with his M41A1.

He signaled for Gene to move up, and once she was beside him, he moved out into the street, crouched over and kneeling beside a manhole in the center. He slung his pulse rifle over his shoulder and tried to pry the manhole cover up. He grunted with effort, but couldn't lift it for his life. He sighed and took out his entrenchment tool from the snap cover, loosened the shovel head, locked it in place, and lodged it in the crack between the pavement and the hole cover.

After a few moments of pushing and some leverage, he pulled the cover off of the hole and slid it into the street with a screech. He smiled and looked back at Gene with a thumbs up. "We're in business!"

He switched on his M3 shoulder lamp and began to descend the iron rung ladder down into the darkness of the sewers. He unslung his pulse rifle, aimed it into the darkness that was penetrated by his shoulder lamp's light, and began to edge his way into the sewers. He clicked on his radio, "Gene, we're clear down here for now, so you can come one down. I'm about to get the PDA up and running so we can get Malus's signature an all."

Now let's see if our little guest tries and follows us down here... Mark thought, walking down the sewer, brackish water sloshing at his boots and shin guards. He neared two side entrances and placed a motion sensor in each before turning on the PDA. Now they'd know if anyone tried to come at them from the front, but the rear was something that Mark still had to cover.

Gaunt had been watching Voltages body for some time now.
'I guess your not coming back this time' he thought looking at Voltages body slowly sinking into the ground.
It was time to move on, He wasn't going to miss out the rest of the battle just because he was suspicious and kept on thinking Voltage would rise from the dead over and over again.
He looked at the half sunk body one more time, Then he moved on.
Gaunt jumped to the buildings as quickly as he could, He didn't wan't to exspose himself to anything walking beneath him, Fast jumps, That's what would keep him safe.
Gaunt scuttled along, He had one objective now,
Return to the Hive.
He jumped off the roof tops and onto the ground, There was a sewer hatch, Perfect. He had found a way back into the Hive, He climbed down the sewer hatch into the pipeline, Gaunt ran along the pipeline, He was curious now, He thought to himself as he ran though the filthy sewage water 'What if the Humans or Pred's had got into the Hive, The queen would be in danger'.
Gaunt could now only hope that the Humans or Pred's hadden't got to the queen.
He stopped and turned, He had found the enterance to the Hive, He ran though, Looking for any signs of intruders along the way, Ready to strike.

FireHunter clung to the ceiling of the sewers, his black carapace blending in perfectly with the darkness, he could see the humans pass underneath him.
He dropped down with a thud and a splash, and before they could do anything, he had grabbed Mark and held him in front of his own body.
A human shield against the other soldiers, the beast had played yet another trick, and he grinned slyly and spat acid at Genewells' gun, burning it.
And with that, he dragged Mark into the blackness behind them, crawling into a side vent, still dragging Mark, he threw Mark onto the ground, roaring and preparing to bite his head off.

Walls of drones were waiting for Saysell on each side of the tunnel, but with two screeches saying "STAND BACK! GET AWAY!" Xeuss managed to get them to retreat into other tunnels leaving saysell a safe road to walk. Or run. "Well come on, we're going for the Queen. What the hell have you been doing, you look like you've been fighting a child predator!" he said to his ex-marine collegue as they followed the squad shooting at aliens in every direction. "Hey remember what i said about taking my body to the melanie if i die? Add throwing these explosives inside the Queen's mouth to it." He pulled a pretty big pack of C4 out of his coat. "Because you know, if i don't die, i'll do it myself. Hey come on, stay close to me."

Xeuss walked through the marines and right into the sea of xenomorphs that kept coming from all of the tunnels. He kept telling them to get out of the way, to stay away from saysell and every other basic command he had learned to screech. The Queen was the only one he could have a conversation with, she was linked to his thinking, if he allowed her to, she could understand all of his thoughts from a distance and shape them after her own will. Xeuss had to grab Saysell and pull on him occasionally to make it look like he was dragging him for the egg chamber. This was one of the side effects of the Queen. Each drone had a tremendous potential on its own, but with the Queen blocking their will and imposing her own... Well, she had no immagiantion at all and her aspirations were extremely limited as were her strategies.

In fact he could hear her in his head repeating "Kill them, protect me, kill for me, yadda yadda yadda..." So even though the droness could tell that the man being pulled was not at all being dragged to the egg chamber for implantation, the Queen could not be persuaded to think this. Just like every damn fat woman out there who can't ever understand when she's being delusional and won't believe anyone but herself. This explained why a lone drone could potentially take out a whole spaceship's crew while a full hive could barely stand up to a girl with a shotgun. So now, with a girl on the ship and a shotgun in his hand, his chances had grown signifficantly!

As they got to the Queen's chamber, the drones got very rare... Near the walls there were a few, but further twards the middle it looked completely empty. They walked that way keeping an eye out for the Queen, but she wasn't that hard to find, she was pretty much huge compared to any alien they had ever seen before. and aliens were big anyway. Not to menntion Queens. "Hey mum..." Xeuss said nd this was enough to get her attention. She lifted her head to look at them. Well relatively, because she had already been looking at them, but... now she looked like she was looking at them too. In an instant, the drones from the sewers stopped attacking and pulled back to the main chamber, surrounding him and Saysell.

Running through the tunnel and twisting holes Saysell quickly honed in on Xeuss who was responsible for keeping the drone off Saysell's back. Throwing himself from the tunnel he had followed for about a mile now Saysell landed neatly in front of his comrade.
"Morning" Saysell joked upon landing.
Xeuss gave the commands and Saysell listened, this was the way it was. Saysell had no intent on questioning Xeuss after all he had done this hundreds of time and this was only the first occasion Saysell had just walked into a hive.
Upon Xeuss pulling out his C4 Saysell's mind wandered back to his homemade bomb in his webbing.
C4 wired into the predator’s wristcomp he had stolen of Voltage after their subway fight.
It would have a much larger destructive force than Xeuss’s bomb. But with the location of the hive it would also probably totally destroy the surrounding area, collapsing the ground in on itself with the hive being blown away. It was only ever a last resort.


"When we get to her majesty, do you want me to deal with the praetorian guards? Seen as I doubt you will still have control over them when fighting the queen." Still walking further into the hive. Saysell began to realise his own mortality, if something happened to Xeuss he would be in the centre of the hive with some slack jawed marines and all hell reining down on them.

Walking into the biggest room of the hive, it was different to other hives, bigger and grander. Saysell took in his surroundings, this was amazing. Never had he imagined such enormity and structure. Then he saw her, in all of her majesty, the bitch responsible for the massacre of Earth. Even she was bigger than normal, her voice started again, stronger than ever.
"Kill him, save your mother, kill the abomination." The screech was deafening, Xeuss spoke but his words faded to a blur. Nothing could be heard but the queen.

"Enough get out of my head!" Saysell yelled as he opened fire in the direction of the closest xenomorph.
"Kill her Xeuss, so we can get the fuck out of here." Saysell sustained fire on the Xenomorphs now coming at him at full speed.
"Marines! On me double time! Support Xeuss, keep him alive at all costs, now move it!" The marines quickly followed the orders as they where told, Saysell was assertive just as he used to be.

A sickening click came from the rifle as the last round left the chamber, realising Saysell wasn’t carrying an extra magazine he loaded the shredder rounds into the shotgun compartment of the weapon.
"Come on you ugly motherfuckers!" The Marine shone out now more than ever.

"AT LEAST COULD YOU NOT MAKE HER ANGRY!? ARGH, YOU COULD HAVE WAITED WITH THE SHOOTING, BUT I GUESS THIS WORKS TOO!" Xeuss shouted as he kicked a drone away from Saysell. "COME ON, GET CLOSER TO HER, YOUR BACK AGAINST HER SIDE, I'LL HAVE TO CLIMB UP HER, DAMNIT I HATE THIS PART! HERE, TAKE THE SHOTGUN, I'M NOT GONNA SHOOT ANY DRONES ANYWAY!" Xeuss savagely screeche at another xenomorph to move back as he threw the man his shotgun.

The whole hive concentrating on that specific room seemed overwhelming for just the two of them, after all this was a Queen Mother, her control over the drones was much harder to sever than it would usually be. So Xeuss was able to tel the to stay back, but not at all to stand by and watch as he killed their favourite... uh... something... in the world... Xeuss didn't know what to call her, she wasn't really a person... but... what the hell was he doing? There was no time to think about things like that, he got the C4 in his left hand and jumped on the Queen's arm.

"TRY TO STAY ALIIIIIII-" he wanted to tell Saysell over the Queen's roar as she looked at him, but then her huge arm threw him 10 meters away between the aliens approaching his comrade. "DAMNIT!" he screamed as he kicked and pushed the drones out of his way with the pulse rifle in his right hand, running back in front of the Queen. "KEEP UP THE GOOD WORK SAYSELL!" was yet another shout that got diminished by one of the Queen's roars, stretching her battle jaw at Xeuss... This annoyed him a lot, so he thought he'd annoy her right back.

Xeuss let his mind become one with the hive... And the Queen talked to him again... "Kill him... he is killing us... kill him... join us..." "You know what... i'm not going to kill him... i'm not going to kill the humans killing them... and i'm not going to kill them... But you are a plague that needs to be removed... And i will remove you myself... And all of them will turn on you... Becuse you are nothing!" he thought in the purest way of thinking, with no disturbances or cares on his mind and the Queen heard him. Then as he pulled the trigger the link was severed and yet another roar, this time of pain, came out of the ueen's mouth. Her secondary jaw, so close to Xeuss, had been mutilated by the rapidfire of the pulse rifle.

He could tell she was in pain, but pain was not what he had come to bring her. He threw the C4 package and shot a few bullets at it, breaking the seal and making the segments scatter throughout the Queen's mouth. However now there was a new problem... The detonator had fallen out of his pocket sometime during the flight from the Queen to the ground. A little marine intervention would have been quite nice at that point.

"This plan is not working." Kidd thought to himself, and he looks up over at Valk and Young who are covering each other as one reloads their flame unit only to continue on with the attack. Just then, a black serphent appears right in front of Kidd, surprising the marine, but the monster did not strike at him. On the ground, looking up at the inner jaw that is shooting out from its mouth attempting to kill him, Kidd sees Sixteen holding the creature by the tail, holding it back. The synth turned completely around and as he did so, he swung the xenomorph away from Kidd and released the serphent into a group of its brethren.

Getting up from the ground, Kidd dusts himself off and changes weapons from the flame unit over to his M41A1 pulse rifle. Calling out to his marines, Kidd barked orders to them, "Retreat marines, retreat! We've just attracted the attention of a very angry family now. Let's go!" Kidd reaches down and grabs Dr. Manning by his lab coat and drags him along side of him. The scientist struggles to stay on his feet as the marine rushes out from the egg chamber and back into the tunnels from which they came, but due to the numerous tunnels that the xenomorphs used, it was proven highly difficult to do so.

Young and Valk, the two marines that were left behind as Kidd took the scientist out from the chamber in which that they are in. Seeing the squad leader running out of the room through a corridor, Valk frowns as he knows that the battle which they are fighting is futile. Turning and tapping Young on the shoulder, Valk retreats to the corridor entrance and waits for Young who soon followed him. Entering the corridor with Valk bringing up the rear, the two marines struggle to keep up with Kidd as they follow him through the zig-zagging halls and fighting the large horde that is following them.

Kidd locates a sewer door within the Hive. Running towards it and turning the wheel, the marine pushes himself against it only to find that it will not budge. Cussing, Kidd notices movement coming from behind him, Sixteen, and Manning. Quickly jumping out of the way, Kidd watches his two marines, Young leading Valk by his backpack, run towards the door only to ram it with the momentum that they have gathered. Both fell to the floor with their boots hanging out at the bottom. Quickly getting up, they both look at Kidd as he looks down at them in surprise, "Good job marines! You've found a way to cheat death. Now move it!" Kidd allows Dr. Manning to enter through the door and he too soon follows him. Coming it behind, Sixteen was not able to get a leg in before a tail ripped out from his chest. Both the marines and the scientist looks back as their synthetic companion who has white fluids coming out from his mouth and chest wound. Groaning in pain as if it were human, Sixteen reaches for the door hatch and grabs it. Looking at the marine leader, Sixteen stutters his last sentence, "R-r-remember tho-se-se that d-died he-ere." Hearing the Synth's last words, Kidd watches as Sixteen was pulled back as he holds on to pull the door shut only to latch it shut as soon it was closed.

"Well, this is getting better every freakin' second, sir." growled Young. "First, we lose half our squad up on the surface and now down here, we lost the only strongest being that has a fighting chance against those evil creatures. So, you tell me what we should do next?" Kidd shakes his head and gives the marine his answer to the question, "It is nothing. The objective is still the same. With us getting in here, we finally got away from those hideous insect, but we still don't have that much time. As we speak, they are looking away around to get to us, so I suggest one thing to you Young; Chill out!" Standing up and picking the scientist up on his feet, Kidd looks down at his marines and orders them to move out. "We may not have that long way to go to reach the hive." was all that Kidd said as he started his march.

The four-man group walks through the narrow, windy corridors of the hive, searching for a way to reach the Queen's Chamber. Knowing that he is getting close, due to the ground which they are walking on has been traversed more than others, Kidd slows his party down to take a more cautious approach. Slowly advancing, the team was about to go down another corridor before they heard something came crashing down above them. Diving for cover, the marines and the scientist jump away from the falling object that came to adrupted stop on their level. Coughing from all the dust that is floating around in the room, Kidd coughs an order to any surviving members of his squad, "Sound off!" "Valk is here! Just wondering who is the Alice who is wanting to drop a house on me. God..." spoked up Valk as he gets up on all fours, coughing. "Young still kickin' and screamin' sir." said a marine who is crawling up beside Valk but he was up in a crouch position, coughing his lungs up. "Good to hear. Dr. Manning is fine too. I had to jump on top of him just to keep in still. Now, I wonder who is wanting to mess with our plans now?" said Kidd as he ready his rifle with his marines slowly getting into position beside him. Dr. Manning crawled over to a corner, curling up into a ball and cowers down in fear of what just happened. Looking out from the corner of his eyes, Dr. Manning watches the battle-weary marines with out-of-date equipment and battlescarred armor stand before the openning pod that landed in the middle of them.

"Hold your ground boys. Anything that is coming out of this thing is not human, kill it." Kidd ordered his men as they wait for the pilot of the pod to emerge. Hearing coughing and sputtering, the marines tensed up as they aim their rifles at him. Hearing the man introducing himself, Kidd grins a suspicious grin only to respond, "Well, if you are Xeuss, then were is Hercules? We really need the help because I have a strong reason to believe that the mother is not far from here. By the way, I am First Lieutenant Kidd Junior of the United States Colonial Marine Corps, first platoon Alpha Draconis." Looking at both his marines, Kidd nods his head, and at that signal, they lower their rifles off of Xeuss.

"Do you have any questions, Xeuss?" Kidd asked only to have his question answered with a question, which Kidd gave a smart-alec grin before he answers. Pointing down the opposite way in which they came, Kidd answers,"Yea, there is a huge welcome commitee that we just ran away from. Just head down that way and you'll come across a door. The problem is, the door is locked from the inside, so you are SOL sir."
Kidd stood up to his six feet, two inches tall height, with his one pauldron, battle-scarred M3 Personal Armor, and M3 Clamshell greaves, Kidd removes his helmet to reveal his dirty, buzz cut hair style. "Xeuss, I have a favor to ask you. I lost half of my squad and that scientist's synth tonight. I don't know what else to do except for to go after the queen and end this madness. All I want from you is your cooperation. Just please help us so that the human race can keep fighting another day." Unaware that is is already morning on the surface, Kidd was not concern of the time of day but instead the mission objective that always seems to be giving him trouble ever since he landed on earth. "Will you help us?" asked Kidd as he extend his glove covered hand, to see is he can get some help from the man.

After helping Xeuss onto the Queen's back Saysell received Xeuss's shotgun, only to realise it was his own shotgun, the one he had left with Xeuss before he was left behind.
"I see you did keep some of my stuff then!" Saysell yelled over the chaos, firing rounds from his newly reacquired weapon. The kickback was huge to any normal man, but after being enhanced it was little more than a tickle. Xenomorph flew out in all directions, arms, claws and legs spreading out in a flurry after each round.
He was becoming overrun, walls of Xenomorphs. Black blocks of flesh clambering towards the ex-marine, he no longer felt fear, he felt nothing as he blew Xenomorphs apart.
Noticing Xeuss be knocked from the queen's back across the room only to jump back to his feet and keep fighting. Saysell was swept with reassurance; Xeuss knew what he was doing. They had become like brothers of a kind in their travels, Saysell knew Xeuss more than he had ever known anyone and he was dam sure going to see to it they got out of there once the Queen was dead.

"Marines! Group up on me! Double time!" Saysell's yell could barley be heard over the sound of gunfire and the queen.
"I said on me!" Saysell yelled again this time his voice echoed through out the chamber, even out sounding the queen for a brief moment. However this only brought more Xenomorphs down on them.

Turning suddenly only to meet a lumbering predalien, Saysell pulled the trigger back only to hear the click to say it was empty, reacting as quickly as he could he knocked the beast backwards giving him time to pull his knives from the front of his combat webbing.
"Lets dance" Saysell remarked coldly as his eyes glazed and he ran at the creature. Jumping seconds before contact, over the creature bringing his blades down into the beast's shoulders, he dragged the predalien to the floor and began to mercilessly beat it with his head. The blood from its face splattered all over Saysell to little more effect than to scar his armour, he had learned to acid proof it to an extent after his last nose bleed.
Stopping for a brief moment to examine his work, Saysell realised he had reduced the creatures face to an acidic goo.

Hearing Xeuss’s gunshot quickly followed by current of swearing and harsh words at the realisation of he no longer had the detonator. Saysell was close to where Xeuss had originally been knocked, and sure enough the detonator could be seen under the horde of Xenomorphs.
"Why does it always have to be out or reach?†Saysell remarked bitterly as he once more rose to his feet.
"Cover me!" Saysell yelled once more, starting at a jog and developing to a full out sprint in a defensive stance Saysell charged into the heart of the hoard. Falling to the ground close to the detonator. Xenomorphs began to slash and strike at Saysell.

His armour had been weakened by the predalien's blood and this new flurry of blows ripped through the armour like paper. His chest being sliced and torn Saysell began to strike back moving quickly and evasively, turning and slashing at his foes. He ducked, slid and dodged to the best of his ability; all the while sending blows back. Stabbing, slicing and disembowelling Xenomorphs with each blow.
After a brief moment the chaos stopped and Saysell was the only creature left standing, if somewhat beaten up. He was surrounded by the carcasses of disembowelled Xenomorphs, a brief moment of peace and serenity.

Until more could be heard coming, the sound of scurrying kicked Saysell into action running for the detonator, he scooped and threw the device to Xeuss, never breaking stride.
"Finish this!" he yelled as he scooped his shotgun back up and began to reload. He was ready for the next wave.
Quickly looking around he noted 3 Marines still standing.
"Good work Marines. Keep it up long enough and you may just see your families again." Saysell was now standing opposite the largest tunnel; the shadows of creatures could be seen as they came. There was more this time; the entire hive seemed to be on its way.
Taking hold of his cross, "We could do with one of those miracles right now." Saysell finished loading his shotgun and took aim towards the tunnel.

Just as the detonator reached Xeuss's hand, it was shot out of it by a web of resin. Xeuss and Saysell both looked towards the source of the attack.

Waralien, Kirby and the rest of the horde that followed had reached the chamber in time. War knew what was in Xeuss's hand and he had to be stopped. Luckly some quick thinking had save him some time.

Waralien began screeching out towards Xeuss: "At last, we meet. I've heard tales of you Xeuss"

Xeuss stood there unmoving, looking down upon from the Queen. He said nothing.

The Queen screamed to War: "Kill him, Kill them all!!!"

Instinctively, War and his group began advancing upon Saysell and Xeuss. Saysell brought to bear his gun, while Xeuss jumped off from the Queen.

War needed to becareful. Both these enemies are a serious threat.

Mark was taken by suprise when the Xeno scum grabbed him from behind and began to drag him away into the side sewer. He grunted, trying to get the beast off of him, kicking and thrashing but keeping his pulse rifle clutched close to his chest. He knew he had a chance that he'd have to take to blow the Xeno apart.

When it threw him to the ground, his head impacted on the wall of the sewer, and he was facing up at the monster. It towered over him and he had to be quick about his next moves. The monster was going to try and eat his head, and he was lucky he hadn't pinned him to the wall yet. He had just enough room to roll to his side and get to his feet since it had thrown him to the ground.

Mark kicked the monster in the center of the chest to give him some extra room, rolled away, and began to run back down the sewer. Once he was around ten feet away, he let a long burst of fire from his pulse rifle behind him, running as fast as he could to get to Gene. "Gene! Throw a grenade!"

FireHunter's head snapped up, not because of the futile command, not because of the sudden kick in the chest.
But because the queen was in danger.
He charged out after the human, and ran past him, knocking him over, before the other marines could react, they were in the water.
FireHunter's thudding footsteps faded into the distance.
He arrived in the queen's chamber in about a minute, seeing the detonator lying on the ground far below, encased in resin and stuck, FireHunter approached it, tore the resin off, and burned it with acid, meaning that it could not be used.
Meaning that the soldiers had to find another way to kill the queen.
He looked up at the battle and grinned.
He was getting bloodthirsty.