FireHunter's hand swiped down, a sickening crack of bone as Xeuss' head split under the force of the blow.
He roared in triumphant glory, and spotted Waralien attacking a pair of humans amongst the confusion, his insanity only increased by the loss of his queen.
He charged, knocking human and alien alike to the ground in his path, he came to a screeching halt and lifted the female human off of the ground, and roared, throwing her to the ground.
He roared louder and kicked her, and bellowed even louder and brought his tail down on the girl, his insanity causing inaccuracy, his tail plunged into the ground a millimeter away from Genewells' arm.
He bellowed louder and sank his slavering teeth into he abdomen, and scratched her legs and arms with his claws.
She kneed him in the head, causing FireHunter to let her go, his teeth left deep holes in her skin, and he howled his rage into the air, it echoed around the hive.

Waralien sneered at Firehunter. How dare he take his prey. But it didn't matter, he'll deal with him another time.

War instead advanced upon the male. He was getting himself up, ready for whatever War had in store for him.

War reached foward and tried to grab him. The male instead ducked to the side and took a swipe at him using his rifle. A few of the shots made contact with War and he howled him pain. War backhanded him, only to hit empty air as he ducked to the side.

After killing the queen Saysell quickly re-gathered himself while he waited for the Melanie to do her thing. Looking in toward the chaos he realised Xeuss had been severely wounded by the monstrous predalien he was fighting.
"Ohh shit!" Saysell shouted to himself as he leapt up and began to run to his aid, but he wasn’t fast enough.
A sickening crunch signified the end of his leader's life. For a moment Saysell bowed his head in grief over his fallen comrade. Then the rage took over.

Drawing his side arm he took aim at the predalien, but it had darted off to go kill humies before Saysell got a chance to fire any rounds.
"Fucking bugs!" Saysell yelled as he opened fire at the Xenomorphs closing in on Xeuss’s corpse. Splitting heads and crushing skulls the closer they got.

This continued until the thunderous sound of the Melanie could be herd throughout the hive. A catastrophic explosion resounded throughout as she fired he primary plasma weapon towards their coordinates. The advanced technology of the weapon tore through the hive with ease; it was as if it was shooting through paper. Leaving a smooth perfectly shaped tunnel leading straight out to the Melanie's waiting open cargo doors.

Grabbing Xeuss’s corpse, Saysell ran, he ran like he never ran before. Putting his fury into his legs he reached the ships entrance, sliding the body inside he spoke quickly to the ship.
"Wait here for me I have something to do, and start the cloning process on him." Gesturing towards Xeuss.
Saysell then rummaged around his combat webbing, until he pulled out his modified explosive.
"This should leave a lasting message." Saysell stated sadistically.
Punching in the activation code, John 10:10b his alpha numeric input system had been designed precisely for this code. It referenced a passage in the bible. The reference seemed to, Saysell at least, to sum himself up perfectly.
Setting the time for twenty minutes, more than enough for the Melanie to leave the area, Saysell ran quickly back down the tunnel and hurled the explosive device into the cavern.
"Any Marine, and I mean only Marines. No Yutani grunts. Still alive down here better follow me. Otherwise you will all burn in hell."
At the Kidd, and his still standing Marines made a run for the tunnel. One of the Marines was taken down by a predalien in an attempt to stop the fleeing humans. The creature met a quick end at Saysell's blades.
"Keeping going, get into my ship. I will get him out!" Saysell yelled to the marines as he lifted the wounded solider onto his shoulders. His extreme strength made running with such an individual no harder than running with a bag of sand sprawled across his shoulders. Within minutes of Saysell going back down the tunnel he was back with three humans.

"Lets leave my fair lady. Ohh and could to show these humans to med bay, fix them up." Saysell ordered the ship, passing the wounded Marine to Kidd, "You best take this one". As the Marines left his presence and the ship began to move into the atmosphere he spoke again to the ship. "Sedate them all, I don’t want them wandering around and finding the Yautja onboard."

Saysell finally relaxed, he wasn’t too badly wounded and....
"Shit I forgot Xeuss’s drone, he wont be able to have any new pants now."
"Don't worry, I kept some drone bodies in stasis for such a situation."

Saysell quietly took up a seat on the viewing deck and watched the planet below waiting for the fireworks, whether they would go off or not was a totally different story.

Carmine never had been one for patience. Nor was he one to complain about pain. He could wait for hours on end if he had to. He could have a large concrete block pin him down and manage to escape with many broken things. He felt like shit, and he was more or less running strictly on morphine, painkillers, past experience, and force of will. He hadn't even been at the Hospital fifteen minutes when the radio calls flooded in...

And the final straw had been drawn.

He stood up from the place where he had been lying down, removing the oxygen mask that they'd placed over his face. He pulled on the parts of his uniform that had been removed, as well as the greatcoat that had also been removed. He buttoned it all shut as fast as he could, letting out another loud, blood-filled cough. That was starting to get really, really annoying.

He then pulled on all his armor with a loud growl. He was furious, this was evident. He'd become even more bloodthirsty after that last fight. He didn't understand why. There seemed to be some sort of voice inside his head screaming for more, laughing at the sensation, at the pain... And wanting more of the thrill.

He locked the clamps on the armor plates, and rolled his shoulders, popping the joints. He took a brief look around, then walked toward the shelf that held his helmet and gloves on it. He jammed his hands into the gloves, and extended the daggers a few times before he was satisfied that they still worked. He took a look at the helmet for a moment, looking it over. When he'd first arrived, it was completely undented, unscratched, and otherwise brand new. Now, there were two large dents in it, plenty of scratches and scrapes... The opposite of what it HAD been.

He shoved it down on top of his head, sealing it as he made his way out of the building, walking toward the armory to retrieve a few weapons and new radio. He was currently unarmed apart from his pistol and daggers. He picked up the pace, trying to separate his thoughts so that he didn't think too far ahead... It'd kill him if he did.

When he walked into the armory, he spotted what he wanted instantly. He made his way over to another M90 Grenade Launcher, which he'd really taken a liking to now, and shoved it into the makeshift holster he had attached to his survival pack. He also loaded up on a few more grenades and bombs that he'd had earlier, shoving them into the survival pack, grabbed a new radio, and then made his way out... But something caught his eye.

He removed M240A1 Flamethrower from the rack, as well as the ammunition it needed. He made sure it was full, then made his way out the door and over to the motorcycles. He was NOT going to walk all the way to where he wanted to go on foot.

He turned as an explosion went off far away, his eyes widening. The central building was... Getting shorter, it appeared. They'd set off the bombs in the building. That'd open up a hole in the city that spanned a few blocks, for sure. That meant the situation where Mark and Gene were was FUBAR.

He jumped on a bike, with all the weapons secured, and started it up. He gave another loud cough, glad his helmet made it so anything outside it couldn't hear him unless he wanted them to. He didn't waste any time peeling out of the base and back into the city. He then switched over to the Commander's frequency. "I'm g- *Cough* going to go help Gene and Mark, sir. Got a fix on their location?"

The deep teeth marks in Gene's abdomen started to bleed slowly from underneath her chest armor, the plating giving her just enough protection to save her from critical wounds. Her arm's had scratches all over them, the claws getting through to the skin where ever the plating was thinner or at the joints and she could feel a rib in her side moving, which sent pain throughout her body with each move. Her arm was still burning, some of the acid had already got through and was burning through one of the titanium weave gloves Gene wore. Tearing of the plate and glove she threw it at Fire, taking the second that he belted it away from his face to charge forward, un-sheathing her combat knife. Avoiding his arms, and head she drove the blade into his back, straight down into the spinal column that connected his spinal cord to his legs. Pushing with all her might, her eyes picking up a rather nasty piece of reinforcing rod from part of the collapsed ceiling. She felt something tear into her back but didn't stop, a sickly warm fluid soaking into her uniform as she impaled the creature onto the rod. It went straight through the xenomorphs' body. With a sickening crack and twist of the wrist, Gene cut through the creatures spinal cord. The anatomy of Xenomorph's and Predators lectures that Malus had made them study was paying off. The central nerve sliced through and the legs and tail became useless, none of the nerve impulses getting through as the blade was pulled out, acid melting through it so it was useless.

And with a final push she kicked herself back off him and out of range of the lashing teeth and arms. Moving away at rapid speed to avoid anything the creature may spit, Gene ripped two termite grenades from her vest and tossed them down into part of the rubble so that it was impossible to be kicked away or swatted away without having to move several sizable pieces of rock.

Running across an open section, Gene rolled and collected her pulse rifle before bringing it to her shoulder ready to fire. The termite grenades exploded as she watched the creature trying to pull itself of the rod with nothing to grab onto and no ability to move it's lower body. Out of range of the explosions she waited for something to emerge from the flames. She knew that xenomorph's disliked heat, so two termite grenades at it's feet must do something. To an onlooker, Gene was a mess, her face had her own blood on it from constantly getting tossed to the ground, her stomach was bleeding, as well as scratched on her arms and a large gash in her back armor from Fires tail when she impaled him on the rod.

FireHunter bellowed, and crawled with his one working arm, bizarrely quickly with the force of his rage causing him to shrug off the pain.
He reached her and pulled her down, pulling her underneath himself, his slavering jaws bit down into her shoulder and broke the bone into something like dust, making her arm useless as his own at the moment, he looked at his own useless arm and started convulsing, he was doing something that didn't often happen with warriors such as himself, he spewed up resin that coated his arm and would heal it in about half an hour.
If he lived that long, she used the opening to make a feeble kick to his face and make a futile attempt at escape.
He plunged his claw into her wound, pulled her towards him, and growled in her ear, he bit into her other arm and crushed the bone there too.
He then tossed her away like a rag doll, she didn't fly high, as he was in a more snake like gait, and he roared for another drone to speed his healing, one arrived in about a minute, all the while FireHunter was lashing out at Genewells, who was kicking him.
The drone sped up the healing rapidly, and his arm became fully functional in another minute, which was also spent fending off Genewells, and he now was able to unleash his full power.

Malus had switched his radio to silent, and had lowered his signature HUD combat visor over his synthetic eyes, letting his HUD tell him what his comrades were saying, translating it from sound into words so that his position was not given away. The HUD visor had belonged to Malus for years, and it was still ahead of anything else that humanity had. This was because the origin of it's technology was not from mankind. A feral grin appeared on Malus's pale, battle-scarred face as he emerged from the muck of the sewer. He'd been under for about a minute, sure that whatever was in there would mask his pheremones and heat signature.

He was trained to be a sneaky bastard. He was trained well. He breathed silently, and the facemask he had put on made sure his breath didn't show. And kept the shit out of his mouth, which was always a plus. His M41S had been wrapped in water-proofed cloth before he had gone under, so it wouldn't be jammed. He knew how to look after his weapons. Years of war taught a soldier one thing. Look after your damned guns. And your feet. Malus knew all this shit would probably be giving him trench foot, but he didn't intend on spending days in the sewers. No fucking way. He moved slowly, making not a sound as he took a silent breath and submerged again. He'd heard the sounds of his comrades.

He was coming to help. This may actually turn out to be a bad thing, as Malus had a nasty habit of accidentally killing the very people he was attempting to save. In horrible, nasty messy ways. The Colonial Marine corpse that he had just bumped into was proof of this. A standard GI marine, looked like he'd been capped in the face by acid. Malus grinned. Who needed resupply when there were corpses to loot? Immediatly a gloved hand rummaged through the guy's webbing pouches, and Malus realized he'd lucked out. Type C Rations! He immediatly checked the waterproof seal on the chocolate and nodded in satisfaction. Good, they weren't shitstained. He pocketed them and moved on to take the man's ammo and grenades.

He then removed the bloke's leg armour and strapped it onto his arms. He had a feeling he would need the extra protection. The helmet wasn't worth keeping, it was acid-stained to hell. The man's boots, however, were Carmine's size. He immediately tied them together and slung them around his neck. Then he took what was left of the bloke's dogtags and moved off. Now that he had some gear, it was time to do that little bit of rescuing that he'd been intending on doing. He slipped back under the filthy water and silently made his way towards the signals on his motion tracker. Two groups of two. Harrows was in one of the groups, and so was Gene. Their vital signs weren't great, but they were alive.

Gene was in worse trouble, so rescuing her was the priority. Especially given the movement signature of her combatant meant it was an Alpha or something bigger. His weapon was loaded and cocked. As he rounded a corner he could feel the weakened acid blood slowly chewing at the exposed skin on his fingertips. Not enough to do any damage, but enough to be slightly uncomfortable to Malus's heightened senses. Yes. His enemy was here. "GET THE FUCK AWAY FROM MY TROOPER YOU MOTHERFUCKER!" He shouted as he burst from the water and in an instant took aim and fired his M41S Pulse Rifle.

Malus Jay Darkblade was the master of combat efficiency, and not a single bullet went to waste. He'd been practicing since Lost Souls. A lot. Malus was an obsessive kind of person. His obsession was being the strongest person alive. The most powerful creature in existence. And he was going to prove it right here, right now. There was no LED counter on his rifle, no way of telling how many bullets he had left. But he knew. He always knew. The Pulse Rifle was his soul. As he let a burst of ten bullets loose, the recoil taken easily by his trained hold of the weapon despite the rifle's lack of a stock, he growled like an animal. This was the life.

The bullets flew from the weapon at a speed faster than sound itself, and as he stood in the muck, water still flowing from his armoured form, the flash of the weapon lit the dark tunnel and added to the dramatic, sudden appearance. The first two bullets were headed for a hastily healed wound he had noticed on the larger Xenomorph's arm. The first bullet ripped clean into the wound, exploded, and sent a burst of acid spray into the filthy water. The second bullet hit the already weakened limb and exploded in turn with a dull, sooty roar. The creature's arm was separated from it's body, a grisly -crack- sounding through the tunnel, followed by a screech of pain as the monster was amputated.

Before the arm was even off, the third and fourth bullets had impacted with the base of the creature's tail, not in the armoured bones but in the relatively unarmoured joint between them, the tail's weak point. He didn't want to hit the tail near the tip or it could use it as an acid weapon. Better to take it near the base and give the fucker a useless stump. And that's what the fifth bullet did. The other two had already cut off the nerve endings and broken it's spine, paralyzing the tail entirely. The third one finished the job, and now the tail was hanging there by the slightest bit of exoskeleton, entirely useless and beyond any healing.

The remaining five bullets slammed into the creature's good arm. The first three hit at the shoulder and drilled straight through the bone to the joint. The last two hit the exact same point, drilling through the shoulder joint and given the angle of the shot, rammed into it's face. Into it's jaw, to be exact. The jaw fell into the water, and it's arm became dead and numb, unable to work.

"You think that you can come to our planet, impregnate our citizens, set up shop and then SLAUGHTER MY SOLDIERS? WRONG, FUCKER! NOW BURN!" As he said this, he racked the grenade launcher on his Pulse Rifle, and fired.

The incendiary grenade was a little-known M41A Pulse Rifle weapon. It burned, using white phosphorous. Banned by so many international human rights conventions, no such protection existed for Xenomorphs. Malus had nicked one from the Reaper as he'd jumped. Now the creature lit up, screeching in agony as the fire burned white-hot, slowly softening and melting it's hide.

Carmine now stood over a manhole that led down into the sewers, cursing whatever gods existed that he had to do this again. It wasn't anything new. But he didn't like doing it, because he himself had very heightened senses. It worked to his advantage usually, but not when it was going to overcome him. The motorbike was a few feet behind him, no longer in use. It'd be hard to use it in the sewers, after all.

The lid of the manhole refused to budge no matter what he hit it with, though, and he was not pleased with that. He'd already tried prying it open with his hands, feet, and shovel. He didn't even find something to get a kind of foothold with. But he wasn't in the mood for a manhole cover to stop him from helping his allies.

He pulled one of the remote-detonated bombs from his survival pack, and slammed it down on top of the cover. He then picked everything up and moved the bike away, ripping a detonator out of his combat webbing. When all else fails, start blowing shit up. He took in a deep breath, and hit the button to make the detonator go live... Then hit the next one.

The road in front of him lit up in a fiery blaze for a moment, raining shrapnel in all directions. A few pieces of shrapnel hit his armor, bouncing off harmlessly. He simply shrugged, and walked back over to what was now a gaping hole leading into the sewers. He hooked his grappling hook onto the ledge, and jumped.

He slid down rapidly as the mechanism let him delve deeper into the tunnel, until finally he was knee-deep in something that definitely did not smell like water. It was familiar to him, but it didn't stop him from feeling like he was going to puke. He just wished he didn't know what he was standing in.

He let the grappling hook release, and it retracted back into the box-shaped mechanism on his belt. He made sure he had the Grenade Launcher ready, then began running through the sewer tunnels, gritting his teeth as he did so. His leg was still busted, so it still hurt to run. Even if he had painkillers and morphine in his system.

The sloshing of the water was highly audible, but not as much as the sound of firing nearby. He was running as fast as his injury would let him. He frowned as he saw some of the damn hive nodes around him... That stupid resin-like shit that signified that they were in the Hive. That wasn't good, but he knew he was closer.

As he turned a corner, several lights on his HUD lit up. Three blues, and two reds. It took a second for him to take in what he was seeing. Malus, Gene, and Mark were in this area... As well as a few Xenomorphs. He let out a loud growl, taking aim with the launcher at the one Malus had yet to attack. The one that was attacking Mark. "Get the fuck away from him, grub!" he shouted at the top of his lungs, and pulled the trigger twice.

The first round was an EMP grenade, aimed right for it. This made direct contact, and proceeded to produce an extremely loud, deafening sound and blinding light. It wasn't useful against them due to them not being electronic, of course, but it still made a marvelous distraction... Because as it turned to see where the first shot had come from, the second ripped right through its left elbow, and effectively tearing the arm off, as well as sending shrapnel into its body.

As it let out a screech, he pulled the trigger a third time, ripping off the beast's tail right at the base. He pulled the lever that opened up the ammunition cyliner, and placed new shots into the chambers. He then pointed at the alien with his index and middle finger, letting out another loud growl. "Come get me!"

(Waralien, you're the one being engaged in this post, in case you couldn't tell...)

FireHunter howled as best he could with no jaw, he was now on fire, and had no form of movement.
Except writhing, he slithered into the water to douse the flames, and now he was swimming, using his upper body like a snake, he rapidly reached Malus and ripped into him with his mandibles, tearing open flesh and bone, tearing off an arm that now floated in the water, and dragging him under the water, attempting to drown him, FireHunter brought down his decapitated stump of an arm into Malus' open wound, and was rewarded with a grunt of pain, he lunged for the visor, and ripped it off, he was in a fury, doing so much damage with just his mandibles and decapitated stump-limbs, he started attempting to tear into Malus' neck, and was stopped about half a centimeter from reach my Malus' hand, acid poured out from where his jaw once was, spilling onto Malus' chest and searing the armor.
FireHunter was starting to move closer to Malus' neck.

Darkness consumed him, the oldest of fears cloaked and shaded him from the naked eye. He went into a trance, gazing through his Helljumper style helmet at his boots and the sticky resin underneath. He shook it off. Hell un-folded around him, Corporate, marines and Xenos fought. He suddenly was gripped with fear himself, his rifle feeling heavy and loose at his waist, feeling lost hope for humanity and its long struggle against in-human killing machines and dragon like creatures.

A scream, and he realised a nearby Xeno was fighting both his squaddie Mark and 'General Patton' Gene.
Taking aim, but was cut short as Waraliens long angular tail stuck with such a force through Marks shoulder. An grenade shot and then calling and more shouting. About to run to Mark and help, but wary of Waraliens choice to either chase Carmine or tear apart the wounded Mark. A crash again and Malus being thrown into water, a long trail of blood followed.
Running to help, dropping to one knee and firing, the 10MM rounds punctured through Firehunters thick skin.
He had thanked God that he had gotten in 20 shots from his mag, all hitting on Firehunters left ankle. Leaving it in a bloody heap, much harder for him to walk on it... Never mind running. The rsh and shock of the fat movement had left Firehunter stricken and dazzled as the beasts adrililine was properly sky high. Firehunter promptly dropped and Delta rushed to Malus' aid. He hoped to God he'd have a few more seconds.

Gene lay on the ground, on her back staring up at the ceiling of the sewer, her eyes blinking slowly as she waited for something. She didn't know if it was death or for the pain. Somehow all she felt was numbness, the bodies response to so much pain. Gene knew she had to force her way through the pain, to feel it to be able to use it and save herself from bleeding to death. There were still xenomorph's around, coming to the aid of their brothers.

"...six....minu....air...ike" Gene picked up as her communications crackled. Almost unable to be understood. It was a saving grace, enough for her to sit up with a whole lot of discomfort. Her left arm was bruised and crushed, and her right arm felt dislocated, blood coming out of both wounds.

"Comman..der....airstrike...six....*cough* minutes" Gene rasped through the pain.

Pushing with her legs, Gene got out of range of the fighting, and lent against a wall. Lining up her shoulder with the ceiling support she paused to compose herself before shoving her shoulder into it. The pain inflamed immediately and she fell to the side into the dirty rubble, several tears forming on her cheeks as she breathed in deeply. The pain soon dulled and she had movement back. Now it was just the slashes that caused her pain, as well as the rest of her body.

Sitting back up again she reached into her medical kit, giving herself a dose of morphine and then took out coagulant powder and several combined dressings. Tearing the packet with her teeth she tapped one packet into each of her major wounds. She couldn't help anyone if she was dead. The wounds stung as the powder slowed and clotted the blood almost immediately. But it did nothing for the damaged flesh and bone. Putting a dressing onto her shoulder she wrapped it up tightly under her and repeated the process for the other shoulder. Taking out another few packets of coagulant powder she poured some on any other open wounds, hoping they would hold until the drop ship arrived to evacuate them before the air strike.

Nearby, a dead Xenomorph lay still, it's acid blood long since corrosive. Crawling over to it on her knee's Gene took out a scalpel from her kit and dissected the creature. Removing it's tail and grabbing all the flesh inside. Shoving her good arm inside she felt it all squishy, but it didn't burn her at all. Now she had a blade that wouldn't corrode and she knew that Malus needed some help.

Walking over to the sewer water, Gene dived in past another W-Y member, not even really seeing them. She knew that she would need a good long decontamination shower, and a strong dose of antibiotics from Med bay during her treatment after this. She sunk deeper until the Xenomorph was in sight and immediately touched her feet on the bottom. Her gear helping to keep her down. Grabbing at it as it neared Malus, Gene pulled it's head back and removed it from her Commander's neck vicinity with a knee to it's chest. Difficult underwater. Plunging the sharp Xenomorph tail into it's head up through it's lower jaw she watched as the creatures secondary mouth was cut off and loose in it's main mouth. Before slicing at it and pulling the tail out the side of it's head before once again plunging it hard into the side of it's head and cutting in a ragged motion, now having a cleaner groove to do damage with.

FireHunter lunged out of the water, howling in rage, he used his mandibles to leave four bloody holes in delta-boy's armor, his legs were already useless and his tail was also from Genewells impaling him on a rod, so he felt no pain in his lower body. FireHunter dragged delta-boy under the water, raising his own body above him, in a wild attempt to drown him. FireHunter was rewarded with a kick to the chest, in which he responded by biting down into delta-boy's arm, puncturing the bones and flesh, leaving that arm to hang uselessly, then he lashed out at Malus again, and bit down into his shin, snapping it like a toothpick, and then rapidly swam back to Genewells, and decided to tear into her leg too, immobilizing two enemies movement and one's ability to wield his weapons of war.

The creature left her for a moment, then returned to the water as she surfaced for another large lung-full of air. It swam closer and bit her shin which was floating under her as she stayed afloat.

The air strike is coming... her mind alerted her.

As the beast bit into her shin, she brought the xenomorph tail down into the base of it's neck. Ripping out the side before stabbing up and down with rage. Several of the long deep stab wounds coming out the underside of the neck she put so much into them. As the beast released her leg she shoved the tail into it's mouth and cut off it's bottom jaw, removing one of the few remaining offensive things the xenomorph had. She knew Malus was resurfacing, and that Delta was now injured but from her own experience it was nothing.

Swimming away quicker than what the creature could even with a deeply gashed leg, Gene reached Malus's side and got to the dry land of the sewer, clawing at the sides before rolling out and standing up to help her fellow Corporation members.

The creature was busted up bad, no use of his tail or legs, his arms just stumps. Deep lacerations to it's head and neck and no lower jaw. Why didn't it just die, or run away. Either way, that's what Gene was going to do. She didn't want to die in this hell whole. Grabbing Malus and Delta they left the creature behind and got to Mark. He was in bad shape. She knew from training that whilst she helped him, the others would cover her. The EMP had distracted the creature, who was now facing away from Mark slightly.

"Air strike is fucking about to bring this place down, were getting out of here right NOW!" she told everyone before running past War's useless tail with a noticeable limp, and rolling to grab Mark who had since began to fall to the ground. A grunt of pain showed on her face as her shin contacted the concrete and sent a spasm up her leg.

"Fruck" she cursed, feeling a slight acidic feeling to her body. The sewer water had diluted the acid enough to just cause a serious case of sunburn, she hadn't expected that.

Carmine was back, and Gene almost couldn't understand why. But she knew somewhere under that helmet, that blocked everyone from seeing his face that there would be a sense of enjoyment. It was a worry, but a worry reserved for a later time.

Dragging Mark up onto his feet, Gene ran towards the remaining open tunnel, pulling Mark along with her. Inside the tunnel was a Marine pulse rifle, and she grabbed it as she jumped inside. Checking to see her ammunition count and that it was ready to fire. Crouching down hurt like hell, but Gene scanning the walls as she made her way out of there. She couldn't order Malus around, if he followed it was up to him. But Mark and Gene were beyond helping anyone, they were a liability, they would only slow them down.

((Retreat....retreat....the sky is falling, the sky is falling. XD

Edited: to include the leg wounds sorry.))

FireHunter made a final leap out of the water, landing with a thump and squirting acid at the marines, it just hit Genewells in the Achilles tendon, and she fell, it slowly used it's busted up head to move towards her, it squirted acid again, and this time hit her in the arm, it advanced, until eventually it reached her, bullets ricocheted around it as Mark opened fire, it rolled around, and eventually found itself next to Genewells, with a final burst of strength, it sank it's mandibles into her back, ripping her liver open and killing her, before it's dome was smashed open by a bullet from her weapon, it looked up.
And died.

Mark was battered, bruised, and shaken. The fight in the Queen's chamber went just as well as it had gone badly. He had to run, and he had to run quickly. He was lucky that Malus and Carmine had made their way in to rescue him and Gene, and they'd begun to fun through the sewers to get out when Gene was attacked and killed by Firehunter.

Now that he was in the sewers, and he watched Gene be attacked and ripped apart by the monster, unable to do much of anything to it, he was enraged. He realized that it was the same monster who had dragged him away before on the way in, and now it was attacking Gene. All he could think of was Alice, as she was ripped limb from limb by Xeno scum.

Even as he watched in horror, his bullets unable to do anything, he realized that the Xeno had died just after it killed Gene. He knew what he had to do. Her brain was still intact, and that meant that it would be possible to clone her so she could keep her memories. He called in over his radio,"Guys! Gene's dead! I'm grabbing her body and high tailing it out of here before the airstrike! We only have five minutes!"

He rushed up and kicked the xeno body off of the red headed woman's corpse, and awkwardly, picked Gene up, holding her in his arms and rushing down the sewers to make his way to the top side world and to safety. Hopefully, a drop ship would be waiting for him.

Gene's dead.

He'd failed. He had failed as a tactician. He'd failed as a leader. He'd failed as a soldier. He'd failed as a man. The main reason that he had left the marines in the first place was to avoid his soldiers dying needlessly. Still, a single Corporate loss so far, after destroying two of the enemy's leaders, and countless minions. That was far better than the already ridiculous losses that the marines had taken. All in the name of honour, of being a hero. The marines were like the preds. They wanted to die a 'good' death. To die with honour.

Honour is a fool's prize. Glory is of no use to the dead.

Malus had a different philosophy. He had no intentions of dying for ANYTHING. But he'd happily let his enemies die for whatever cause they wanted. As his arm shot out sparks, the electrical currents severed by the monster's teeth, Malus shrugged his good shoulder and looked around. The bug was dead. Gene was dead. A leader for a private. He was sure that some desk-jockey officer would call that 'acceptable losses'. But to Malus, no losses were acceptable. He noticed that Mark had Gene's body. He fished with his good arm for his visor, floating past him, and shook the water loose. Wiped it clean with his gloves. He then slipped it over his eyes, doing a quick diagnostic. The HUD was still working.

But there was his arm to attend to. There was no blood, no pain. He hadn't been able to save his left arm after the damage that the hybrid Shadowatching had inflicted on it. he'd actually lost both, but he'd had theraputic cloning for the bits to fix his right arm. His left arm was so badly damaged, again and again over a variety of missions, that not even theraputic cloning could save it. He'd tried cloning a new arm, but it didn't take, as his immune system had rejected the new arm. It'd atrophied and the arm had needed amputation. It was either spend his life as an amputee or get a mechanical replacement. Being a pragmatic man, he'd chosen the latter.

He'd overseen the design and construction himself. Made it as strong as he could. And easy to repair. For example, he'd designed the arm to disengage instead of break if something tried to rip it loose. He'd also put some attachments on it, ripped off from the predtech he'd gathered before he'd joined the marines. The construction was from a type of stone-like mineral unique to LV-474, the 'Acid Rain' world. It was therefore proof against most things, acid and heat being a couple. As it quickly sunk to the sewer floor, Malus grabbed it and inspected the circutry at the point of amputation for damage. It's power supply cut, it'd switched off the moment the Hybrid Xeno had pulled it loose. Thankfully, it hadn;t short circuted when it had hit the water, entirely because of the fact it had no power in it.

Malus shook the water loose from the arm's form. The skin covering had broken, and he was starting to bleed. No arteries went to the arm anymore, though, so he was in no danger of death. He held the arm up to the stump of his shoulder and twisted it. He felt the leads connect and a dull whine as the arm began to crackle to life. He flexed the fingers, testing the connection to the neural patterns. Good. "Gene's down. Roger. Well, we've taken down two of thier leaders and from what I can tell by that big ol' screech earlier, the queen is dead. We are done here. Back to the base." He said as he reloaded his M41S Pulse Rifle.

After taking the time to bandage the wound on his arm, and neutralizing the acid burns on his armour, he was ready to go. But Carmine was taking on war, and he knew that there was still a few important bugs left. "Mark, get Gene out of here. Delta, Carmine and I will clear out these sewers. These monsters will rue the day they set foot on earth." He called out as he racked the grenade launcher on his Pulse Rifle and looked around. Damn the airstrike, it wasn't stopping him from getting his revenge. Malus was out for blood, and blood would be paid. The Xeno that Carmine was now engaging would do.

Malus decided to do this the old fashioned way. He let the Pulse Rifle drop, the splash as it hit the water ignored as Malus drew a pair of throwing knives. The knives that Shadowatching had used against him. They'd stayed in him while he'd escaped into the dropship. Now they served a new master. Malus's mechanical arm was like lightning as he raised it, aimed it at the monster. A flick of his wrist and the knives flew at the target, thudding into the creature's neck. Arterial blood flowed from the wound, splashing harmlessly on the acid-proof weapons. Then he drew his own knife. Xenomorph-bone, it was a deadly weapon. And, it was a lot bigger than the other two knives that Shadowatching'd had. He'd used it to pin people to walls before.

He flipped it over in his hand -his left, mechanical one- and grinned. "Ah, and here's another one. Looky here, I've got me a knife. I'll give you one guess at what I'm going to do with it." He sneered, and threw the knife. The weapon whistled through the air, spinning end-over-end. It then thudded straight into the monster's hip, straight through the leg, the joint, and the hip itself, locking the leg into place. As the monster screeched, probably from rage more than pain, Malus turned his back and started to run towards the Queen's chamber. There would be more targets there. More things to kill. He fully intended on cleansing every bug from this world.

"Delta, help Carmine finish that fucker, then the two of you head to the Queen's chamber. I want to be SURE that bitch is toast." He said as he splashed off through the sewers.

Waralien turned to see the marine challenging him. War was now critically pissed. Both his arm and his tail were now useless. He had to rely on his one good arm and abilities.

Waralien cocked his head back and sent out several spurts of acid everywhere on to his new attacker. He had no room for escape. The acid hit dead on has he tried to evade it. The acid quickly tore through his armor.

War didnt even hesitate. Just as the new challenger was trying to get out of his armor, Waralien charged him head on. He sent his stub of an arm into his chest, the force combined with the weaken armor tore through easily and hit his chest. He yelled in agony as the acid tore into his chest, cutting deeper and deeper every moment. He tried bashing Waralien in the head several times, but to no avail.

Finally he pulled out a combat knife and sent it into Waralien. War had his moment. He tilted his head and bit into his arm. Then he sent his second mouth through the arm and punched a large size hole into it. War retracted from him and tasted the blood now seeping from his mouth.

(an eye for an eye, your move)

This felt a lot worse than when the Yautja decided to throw him out of a building. He wished he'd considered the acid blood before it had burnt the shit out of him. He didn't scream, but it hurt like a motherfucker. But pain was his long-term ally, and it just made him even more angry, and want to kill this fucker even more. Unfortunately, he now lacked torso armor... And his left arm wouldn't work.

And now Gene was dead. He'd come to help them, and failed. Mark was running away, though, so that made it worth something.

He pulled out his pistol with his good hand, still at point blank range, and proceeded to open fire with it... Directly into the creature's mouth. He watched as the acid poured out, and realized he'd destroyed the inner mouth before it could fully retract into its skull. As it let out a painful screech, he moved far back, he quickly went to find the flamethrower, the thing now hot on his heels.

He kicked the launcher up into his hands, and the second he turned to face the thing, it was right there. "AHHHH, FUCK! JUST DIE, WILL YA?!" He hated the thing, but yet he was finding a sense of enjoyment under it all. He was having fun killing these things. He pulled the trigger to the launcher, using his dead weight arm to absorb some of the recoil. It had been aimed at its torso, but his aiming capabilities were limited. So instead, it ripped through its right leg, right at the hip... Tearing it clean off. He didn't know how it would ract to that.

It went right down into the water. He'd forgotten Xenomorphs could swim like fish. He had no idea where it was... It was too dark to tell. And his HUD wasn't working right... It must have short circuited from some small amount of acid. He began backing away, but then the HUD came back up... And showed the Xenomorph approaching fast from under the water. He ripped the flamethrower off his back, and took aim fast. And not a moment too soon, because the thing was propelling itself at him from under the water.

"How about a little fire, scarecrow?" he said loudly. He pulled the trigger, letting loose a massive flame directly into the creature's face. Napalm was a bitch, and this stuff would keep burning until the fucker put it out. It also cauterized the wounds that had just been created, getting rid of its acidic capabilities for the moment. The thing seemed to catch on to this fast, because it dove back underwater... Extinguishing the flame. He officially had no idea where it went this time.

Sitting in the viewing deck Saysell felt like he was no longer alone, had done what he set out to do. He had found his way home, rescued a survivor and even killed a queen mother... The survivor.

Jumping from his seat Saysell ran down to the medi bay to find her in a stasis pod.
"What is her condition?" He asked in an otherwise empty room
"Stable." The Melanie’s voice replied
"Good, and what of the marines?"
"All stable and under anaesthetic."
"Good load them and their equipment into a escape shuttle, turn on its distress signal and fire them out. I don’t want them here longer than is necessary. Is Xeuss finished?"
"86%. He should be done within the next hour. One thing sir, it has been 21 minutes since you set your explosive device, and there has been no sign of any large explosion down there."
"I know" Saysell replied calmly. "It was never going to go off, it was mealy incentive for the marines to come with me and a kick up the arse for the Yutani."

Walking out of the medi bay down the adjacent corridor and into the flight deck, Saysell sat alone room built for a full team of flight crew, but the Melanie was automatic now, she needed need a crew.
"Get us out of here as soon as you have jettisoned the marines. Our part is played out." Saysell ordered as he sat back in the captain’s chair and for the first time in over five years relaxed.

DBO are out.

He re-surfaced. Gene was dead, a loss. But she'd be cloned back with the Navy Docs up top on the Goliath ships. Malus had ordered Delta to help Carmine, he would. His heart rate fell and the pain from Firehunters wound sweept in, the 4 madibles had piereced his armour and ripped off some flesh while his right arm was in bloody chunks... But the carapaced segmented shoulder armour had taken the brunt of it. Calling to Carmine that he was here.
He reached for his bandoller of Buckshot shells and began to load.