CHAPTER 4: THE SEEDING
Date: February 14th, 2230
Locale: Frontier World, Lv-642
A horseshoe shaped starship warps above the frontier world Lv-642. The U shaped ship slides beneath the clouds as it hovers high above the second settlement Thanatos Base. The colonists leave the confines of their vehicles and shelter as they point and stare at the jockey ship. The underneath of the ship opens exposing the interior to the planet's atmosphere. A lone pale marble skin man-looking alien stares down at the settlement, he gives the signal to the others. Rows and rows of black canisters begin to fly from their holsters down the hatch below. Once the payload of canisters reach a certain altitude the canisters explode into a black cloud before raining its dark rain on the settlement. Those who were caught outside immediately succumb to its effects. Some were reduced to base organic compounds, most were either petrified or had something erupt out of them, while a few were able to retreat indoors. Tiny white-transulecent creatures quickly overrun the base defenses, violently ripping apart security and civilian personnel alike. The creatures rapidly grew from the size of a kitten to the size of a large dog within minutes of their birth, when at full maturity they reached human size. Those that were unlucky to survive the black rain quickly began to exhibit high levels of aggression as their bodies were rapidly metamorphosing into something else. Receding gums, bulbous forehead, and high aggression these aberrations initially attacked the remaining garrisons like madmen or zombies. Though they were easier to repel then the neomorphs, the surviving aberrations began to grow longer limbs and bald elongated heads while growing stronger in the process. These newly matured aberrations resumed their attack on the remaining garrisons, fighting less and less like humans but more like xenomorphs.
Walking among the aberrations and neomorphs came a being dressed in black biomechanical armor. He pulls out a flute, he presses the flute into his helmet “trunk”, he blows in a few harmonic notes. Any neomorph or aberration in the vicinity would immediately cease from their previous actions. The black armoured warrior then blows in a soothing melody, the neomorphs and aberrations rally near the black armoured being in complete submission. The black armoured being walked amongst his creations showing no fear to them. They follow their master to the base command center, the black armoured being plants a device on the base’s servers. The device quickly downloads the entire colony’s database to its hardbanks. The engineer smiled beneath his helmet before blowing in an intense note to his creations. The neomorphs and aberrations quickly departed from their master’s sight as they now were given a simple order: Search and destroy all remaining life. The black armoured engineer began his trek back to his ship.
A Yautja clan ship warps above Planet Mala "Lv-642". The youngbloods fought each other over the “best” awu’asa (Armor), with the strongest laying claim over the best gear. Clan Leader Dou-dach-yeyin watches over the youngbloods arm themselves with wrist blades, plasma castors, burners, and combi-sticks. He spots his son among them, the elder yautja felt pride seeing his son arm himself with the best of such meager gear. Dou-dach-yeyin then returned to the navigation room, where Zerachande was staring at the holographic globe of Mala. The ship's sensors immediately pick up on the juggernaut, “Mala’kak,” Dou-dach-yeyin growls at the hologram projector. Zerachande exchanges glances with the elder, “Cloak” the clan leader clicking his mandibles. Zerachande taps at the ship’s controls while pulling down a lever. The clan ship is soon enshrouded by a light bending energy field.
Among the youngbloods were Swayande, Sarachande, Rouyeyin, and Tassa-dhou-di. These four young yautja were the cream of the crop among these youngsters. Swayande with his dexterity made him the most agile hunter of the group, Sarachande’s high intellect made him the most resourceful of the current litter, Rouyeyin was the strongest of the litter, and Tassa-dhou-di was the ballsiest of the litter. The youngbloods all race towards the clan dropship alongside their superiors as they board the craft. Zerachande was leading this hunting party in the clan leader’s stead. Zerachande gave the signal to the pilots to release the shuttle from the mother clanship. The smaller craft is jettison from the mothership before setting course for the planet below.
The yautja shuttle lands on the outskirts of Hercule Wells. The shuttle bay doors open as Zerachande takes point. The youngbloods and higher ranked warriors climb out of the shuttle as they monitor the surrounding area. Zerachande orders the ranked warriors to secure a perimeter as he begins the roll call. One of the perimeter warriors spots an unusually heat signature in his biomask, it resembled an ooman (human) but walked like a kainde amedha (Hard Meat/Xenomorph). “Zerachande. A lone Ooman spotted on the flat plains” Zerachande clicked his mandibles, “Is it armed?” Zerachande asked. “No, Ooman is not armed. This ooman walks with strange strides” Zerachande approaches the perimeter warrior, he too scans the plain flats before spotting the strange ooman. “Its heat flickers like a dying flame but yet its strides speak of no injury” Zerachande switches from his blue grade heat vision to the red grade bioelectrical vision. The ooman’s bioelectrical activity permeates its entire body rather than being isolated in the brain, spine, and scattered across a network of nerves. He switches to his metallic vision, the ooman is developing an exoskeleton underneath its skin. “Kill it” Zerachande commanded, “That is no ooman, it's an abomination” The warrior nodded before cloaking, he bolted down the hill onto the dusty flats. The ooman ceased movement as it raised its head to sniff the stale air, it turned its body to where the scent was the strongest. The Cloaked warrior deployed his wrist blades with confidence, the aberration peeled back its chapped lips baring its metallic teeth. The warrior lunged his wristblade at the ooman’s midsection but the aberration quickly dropped to all fours like a monkey, but quickly dashed away like a spider. The warrior snarls as he is thrown in the air by the mutant ooman, the warrior pulls out his combi-stick but the aberration closes the distance very quickly. The aberration widens its jaws as it fires out its fat tongue at the warrior’s biomask like a frog. The force of its tongue pinned the warrior to the floor.
The other warriors and unbloods watched the skirmish from a distance. The few female hunters in the hunting party wish to intervene but Zerachande shoots them with a glare. “Honorable Zerachande, shouldn’t we help him? The ooman will kill him at this rate” the young female growled. “No. It is dishonorable to interfere with a warrior’s battle. You may have saved his life but you would damage his pride as a warrior. Should he die at the hands of this abomination, then he shall do it honorably” Zerachande clicked his mandibles. The mutant ooman jerked his tongue pulling the biomask from the warrior’s face. The warrior’s lungs burned as he inhaled the toxic air. The warrior roared definitely at the abomination, the mutant ooman roared back before crushing the warrior’s head with its fists. The warrior’s body twitches as it slowly dies. The aberration then turned its gaze towards the rest of the yautja. Zerachande then bolted down the slope, the mutant ooman stared at the elite yautja with its dead milky eyes. It chatter its teeth as Zerachande calmly approached the thing. Zerachande drew his glaive, the aberration lanced its sticky tongue, Zerachande severed the mutant’s tongue with a stroke of his glaive. Acid blood spewed from the mutant’s mouth, the aberration skittered across the dusty flats like a fleeing lizard. Zerachande sheathed his glaive as he reached over for his smart disk, flared the finger slots to activate the disk. The biomask registering the smart disk’s activation began calculating distance and wind speed. A red bar dances across zerchande’s vision before forming into a triangle around the mutant ooman. Zerachande roared as he threw the smart disk at the fleeing aberration. The disk flies across the air spinning its razor sharp blade. The aberration screamed as the disk sliced into the pelvis, down its spine, then out of its elongated head; bifurcating it. The two halves separate from each other shortly after the mutant ooman realized it was already dead. The smart disk flies back around as it returns to its master’s hand. Zerachande catches the disk by the finger ports before returning it to its holster.
The other hunters roar in excitement as they dash down the hill to meet up with their superior. Zerachande pointed at the body of their fallen comrade. “Take him back to the ship, then we hunt” Zerachande growled. The females carry a stretcher to place the fallen warrior on, they nod to their superior before bringing the fallen back to the shuttle. In the distance not too far away from the yautja hunting party, was a small pack of fully grown neomorphs. The pack leader sniffs the air, catching the scent of blood in the breeze. It clicks its teeth to its subordinates to follow. The neomorphs charge across the salt colored flats, almost blending in with it. Sarachande heard a noise coming from the south. The yautja turned their gaze towards a pack of heat signatures that were shaped like kainde amedha but radiated heat like a poyade amedha (soft meat). The neomorphs stared at the yautja with cautious curiosity, the leader clicked his teeth, the neomorphs protruded their goblin-shark jaws as they lunged at the alien hunters. Rouyeyin stabs the first neomorph with his wrist blades in its gut, making a sawing motion before pulling the creature's guts out of its body. Tassa-dhou-di stabs the ground with his combi-stick before swinging around it to kick a neomorph in the sides, sending it flying across the flats in a broken state. The neomorph pack dispersed after suffering some casultities. Swayande bolted after a fleeing neomorph before stabbing it in the head with his wrist blades. Sarachande spotted the fleeing pack leader, he readied his combi-stick but realized it was too far away so he pulled out his burner. A crack shot, Sarachande caused the pack leader to explode.
Unbeknownst to the yautja, they were being monitored by the mala’kak, the dark engineer smiled as he caressed the head of a deacon. The pointy head creature cooed as it was caressed. The pale skinned engineer then looked over at another holographic image of the colony of Hercules Wells, the aberrations and neomorphs were slowly encroaching on their defenses. Then he glares at the underground city’s hologram, with a wave of his hand the city’s egg silos become active. Blue mist covered the dormant ovomorphs, the engineer tapped at the mist producing functions. A new signal is given to the eggsilos. The blue mist turns red, the eggs glow as they flickered to life. The apex of the ovomorph peel opens like a flower blossoming. The facehuggers escape from their ovomorph prisons as they wait for the harvester. A tall brown biomechanoid with massive long knuckle dragging arms plopped down near the hatched eggs, its head resembled that of an engineer’s mask and had a long segmented tail in place of legs. The facehuggers latch themselves on to the harvesters as the massive creatures begin to climb up to the egg silo’s ceiling. Once outside they climb down from the slopes of the silos into the ancient city ruins, searching for suitable hosts for the facehuggers.
