srogerscat
Mongoose
Extraction conclusions
The infodump implied in this post will follow later.
The tableaux is shattered by a sudden rustle to the left. A bug bursts into the clearing and tears off around the wreck towards the starboard side like a bugbat out of hell. Gren takes off after it instantly, Tess on her heels. Now Lynch starts wearing as he follows them. The bug zips through a hole in a... turret? ... about two thirds towards the front end. A big hole. Burned in, then blasted out from the look. Gren enters cautiously, the others covering her. Wrecked console, shattered chair, strong smell of burned meat. Somebody was in here, but there is nothing but charred splatter now. Front bulkhead, with two heavy sealed doors, U-shaed corridor connecting to another heavy door in the front bulkhead, with a third sealed door at the base of the U. The U encloses what look like personal quarters, a couple of offices and a sick bay. On the opposite side from their entry point, they find another room with what they suspect to be a weapons console. This one is undamaged but the occupant is obviously dead from a broken neck. Lynch frowns as the search proceeds. Somehow, he isn't getting a military vibe from this thing. Civilians? Explorers? Dunno, not enough data. Gren and Tess are eying the joint with professional calculation. Take only the good stuff, Gren advises. Good stuff, Tess snorts. These are spacemen, their fricking *toothbrushes* are valuable! Gren concedes the point. They head back towards the breach. Just as they round the corner the forward door opens, and a *very* surprised figure stares at them.
Meanwhile, Geiger, Hyland and the Air Force guys have returned to the tracks. Where are the civvies, Geiger asks. A gunner points into the opposite trees. Swearing about civilians and fools, the two non-coms head that way. A solder piles into them and hisses Sarge, you gotta effin see this! They stop dead when they catch sight of the wreck. Who the hell built you, Geiger murmurs. Another soldier joins them. The civvies went into the wreck through a hole on the other side. Hyland casts an imploring glance to the heavens. Then they notice movement on the wreck. The vessel is not level, it is nose down, tilted towards the port side. A humanoid figure slides out of a crack on the top, walks across the hull a short way, then stops at a hatch. After some apparent difficulty the hatch opens and the figure disappears. The hatch tries to close, but seems to jam. Hyland holds up a finger, dashes back to the tracks and comes back with a sawed off pump shotgun. Ready, he says. He and Geiger carefully approach the wreck and climb towards the hatch. It is only partially closed. Geiger is not a small man, but he has some difficulty forcing it open. He and Hyland peer down. Dim, but not dark. Emergency lighting, perhaps? There is a ladder, Geiger seriously considers dropping a grenade to smooth the way. He shrugs and with Hyland covering him, slowly descends the ladder, pistol in hand. Hyland hisses, Geiger freezes looking up. Hyland points to his ear and mimes shooting then points to the front of the ship. He hears gunfire from the front of the wreck.
There is an exuberant firefight raging in the midsection of the ship. The man - his visor is up, what they can see looks like a male face has franticaly unslung his SMG-looking weapon and is sending long bursts their way. Gren and Tess are alternately bobbing around the corner, enthusiasticaly returning fire. Gren is shooting with her usual cold intensity, Tess is burning whole clips at a time with whoops of barbaric glee. Lynch isn't gleeful. He is observing cautiously and has seen the man take several hits without obvious damage. He is starting to get severely worried when Gren puts a lucky shot through her opponent'sopen visor, right in an eye He drops like a brick, and the fight is over. Tess explodes through the door the man came through: Some sort of common are, twisted and crumpled. There is another heavy door forward. On the other side .. a command section. What is left of it anyway. Most of it is blown off, one station and part of another are left, but nothing but the smell of burned meat is left of the occupants.
Geiger shrugs and motions Hyland to come on down. If the civvies want to go off on their own, they can deal with what they find on their own. Hyland and Geiger sidle forward. They are in an equipment space, the way is cramped. They hear a metallic clatter ahead of them and freeze, then continue onwards. Much of the equipment seems crumpled, twisted out of true, this thing may have landed stern first. Geiger noses forward into a more open space and stops cold. He sees bare feet sticking out of a metal housing. He can hear metal-on-metal tool using sounds from inside the housing. Taking a closer look, he can see that the opening is twisted. He looks at the base of the housing and spots a neat pile of clothing, boots and helmet stacked beside a toolbox. Yep, the tech had to strip down in order to worm his way in. His? No. Hers. Even discounting the polish on the toenails, those are definitely girl feet, not guy feet.
Geiger slowly moves up and abruptly grabs the ankles and throws himself back, yanking hard. With a startled squeek and a couple of yelps of pain the female alien shoots out of the crawlway and bangs on the deck. This is disorienting enough, but Hyland's shotgun muzzle pressing against her nose focuses her attention. A grinding nise behind them... They spin abut, and see Lynch on the other side of a heavy door. He is staring in shock at their prisoner. They follow his gaze and are shocked themselves: In the better light streaming through the door they can see that their prisoner's skin is a flesh-tinted red.
Tess and Gren have been busy, stripping the central compartment of anything interesting with adventurous speed. They do a double take when they see the prisoner. Geiger shifts to the woman's legs. She stiffens with a little choking noise when he takes hold of her ankles, then almost collapses with relief when all he does is bind them. Then abruptly, she starts bolt upright and starts trying very urgently to talk through the gag. All stare a her in confusion. She pauses, twists around so they can see her hands and makes drawing/writing motions. Geiger frees her hands, he and Hyland cover her. Moving very slowly and cautiously the woman reaches into her tool box and pulls out a white block and a stylus. She draws for a moment and shows the result: A bug face on one side, Earth on the middle, a hazy scribble on the other. The bug face and the scribble are shooting at each other across earth. Holy shit, erupts from Tess, we're in the middle of somebody elses war! Another drawing: A broken wedge on the ground, a scribble above, ordnance falling from the scribble to the wedge. Everybody gets that one. A sanitizing strike on the wreck, from parties unknown. They pack up and move out in less than five minutes. They are less than a kilometer away when missiles slam into the wreck. But they do not come from above, they come from the east, from South Vietnam.
They stop for a break. Betting out to stretch their legs, eat, ad take care of business. The prisoner does not move. Geiger takes a closer look at her and notices a thin cable running from the white block into what seems to be some sort of jack in the back of her neck. He very nearly pulls it out bu,... she is trembling slightly, light tremors running the length of her boy in waves. Her eyelids are fluttering, and her eyes are rolled back in her head. God Knows what would happen if he pulled that jack out. Furious, he waits until the tremors cease. Weakly she pulls the jack free and opens her eyes. Geiger is just about to belt her one when she says in english, "You are all in terrible danger". Then she passes out.
After an hour or so, she rouses and is interrogated by Lynch. Deeply rattled by what he learns, Lynch orders the track radio operators to try and raise MACV, the CIA, hell, anybody. After almost another two hours, he raises his CIA contact. This transmission is not met with shocked disbelief, MACV and the CIA have already figured out long since that something crazy was going on. Lynch has proof for his claims? Perfect. Choppers are on the way. Destroy the tracks when they arrive. The team can hear the approaching choppers when one of the radiomen gets a clear signal from the BBC news service.
BBC news commentators are renowned for unflappability. But not this time. There is an undercurrent of panic as the man reads the news:
The United States is accusing the USSR of destroying Khe Sanh with a tactical nuke. North Vietnam has accused the USA of invading Laos and North Vietnam.
The USN has lost a carrier - the USS Kittyhawk, a cruiser - the USS Long Beach and between three and five destroyers off the coast of Vietnam.
The USAF and USN have reportedly lost almost three hundred combat aircraft in operations over Laos in the last three days.
Both NATO and the Warsaw Pact have declared general mobilizations. China has done the same. India and the non-aligned bloc are pleading for calm, but no one is listening. There is panic buying in every market and all across the globe governments are bolting for cover.
No one says a word while loading the choppers. The bodies, bug and humanoid, the weapons, tools, all the assorted items lifted by Gren and Tess, all go on the choppers. They also find room for the weapons and ammo from the tracks. They do find room for the recoilless rifle and ammo. Ya never know.
The infodump implied in this post will follow later.
The tableaux is shattered by a sudden rustle to the left. A bug bursts into the clearing and tears off around the wreck towards the starboard side like a bugbat out of hell. Gren takes off after it instantly, Tess on her heels. Now Lynch starts wearing as he follows them. The bug zips through a hole in a... turret? ... about two thirds towards the front end. A big hole. Burned in, then blasted out from the look. Gren enters cautiously, the others covering her. Wrecked console, shattered chair, strong smell of burned meat. Somebody was in here, but there is nothing but charred splatter now. Front bulkhead, with two heavy sealed doors, U-shaed corridor connecting to another heavy door in the front bulkhead, with a third sealed door at the base of the U. The U encloses what look like personal quarters, a couple of offices and a sick bay. On the opposite side from their entry point, they find another room with what they suspect to be a weapons console. This one is undamaged but the occupant is obviously dead from a broken neck. Lynch frowns as the search proceeds. Somehow, he isn't getting a military vibe from this thing. Civilians? Explorers? Dunno, not enough data. Gren and Tess are eying the joint with professional calculation. Take only the good stuff, Gren advises. Good stuff, Tess snorts. These are spacemen, their fricking *toothbrushes* are valuable! Gren concedes the point. They head back towards the breach. Just as they round the corner the forward door opens, and a *very* surprised figure stares at them.
Meanwhile, Geiger, Hyland and the Air Force guys have returned to the tracks. Where are the civvies, Geiger asks. A gunner points into the opposite trees. Swearing about civilians and fools, the two non-coms head that way. A solder piles into them and hisses Sarge, you gotta effin see this! They stop dead when they catch sight of the wreck. Who the hell built you, Geiger murmurs. Another soldier joins them. The civvies went into the wreck through a hole on the other side. Hyland casts an imploring glance to the heavens. Then they notice movement on the wreck. The vessel is not level, it is nose down, tilted towards the port side. A humanoid figure slides out of a crack on the top, walks across the hull a short way, then stops at a hatch. After some apparent difficulty the hatch opens and the figure disappears. The hatch tries to close, but seems to jam. Hyland holds up a finger, dashes back to the tracks and comes back with a sawed off pump shotgun. Ready, he says. He and Geiger carefully approach the wreck and climb towards the hatch. It is only partially closed. Geiger is not a small man, but he has some difficulty forcing it open. He and Hyland peer down. Dim, but not dark. Emergency lighting, perhaps? There is a ladder, Geiger seriously considers dropping a grenade to smooth the way. He shrugs and with Hyland covering him, slowly descends the ladder, pistol in hand. Hyland hisses, Geiger freezes looking up. Hyland points to his ear and mimes shooting then points to the front of the ship. He hears gunfire from the front of the wreck.
There is an exuberant firefight raging in the midsection of the ship. The man - his visor is up, what they can see looks like a male face has franticaly unslung his SMG-looking weapon and is sending long bursts their way. Gren and Tess are alternately bobbing around the corner, enthusiasticaly returning fire. Gren is shooting with her usual cold intensity, Tess is burning whole clips at a time with whoops of barbaric glee. Lynch isn't gleeful. He is observing cautiously and has seen the man take several hits without obvious damage. He is starting to get severely worried when Gren puts a lucky shot through her opponent'sopen visor, right in an eye He drops like a brick, and the fight is over. Tess explodes through the door the man came through: Some sort of common are, twisted and crumpled. There is another heavy door forward. On the other side .. a command section. What is left of it anyway. Most of it is blown off, one station and part of another are left, but nothing but the smell of burned meat is left of the occupants.
Geiger shrugs and motions Hyland to come on down. If the civvies want to go off on their own, they can deal with what they find on their own. Hyland and Geiger sidle forward. They are in an equipment space, the way is cramped. They hear a metallic clatter ahead of them and freeze, then continue onwards. Much of the equipment seems crumpled, twisted out of true, this thing may have landed stern first. Geiger noses forward into a more open space and stops cold. He sees bare feet sticking out of a metal housing. He can hear metal-on-metal tool using sounds from inside the housing. Taking a closer look, he can see that the opening is twisted. He looks at the base of the housing and spots a neat pile of clothing, boots and helmet stacked beside a toolbox. Yep, the tech had to strip down in order to worm his way in. His? No. Hers. Even discounting the polish on the toenails, those are definitely girl feet, not guy feet.
Geiger slowly moves up and abruptly grabs the ankles and throws himself back, yanking hard. With a startled squeek and a couple of yelps of pain the female alien shoots out of the crawlway and bangs on the deck. This is disorienting enough, but Hyland's shotgun muzzle pressing against her nose focuses her attention. A grinding nise behind them... They spin abut, and see Lynch on the other side of a heavy door. He is staring in shock at their prisoner. They follow his gaze and are shocked themselves: In the better light streaming through the door they can see that their prisoner's skin is a flesh-tinted red.
Tess and Gren have been busy, stripping the central compartment of anything interesting with adventurous speed. They do a double take when they see the prisoner. Geiger shifts to the woman's legs. She stiffens with a little choking noise when he takes hold of her ankles, then almost collapses with relief when all he does is bind them. Then abruptly, she starts bolt upright and starts trying very urgently to talk through the gag. All stare a her in confusion. She pauses, twists around so they can see her hands and makes drawing/writing motions. Geiger frees her hands, he and Hyland cover her. Moving very slowly and cautiously the woman reaches into her tool box and pulls out a white block and a stylus. She draws for a moment and shows the result: A bug face on one side, Earth on the middle, a hazy scribble on the other. The bug face and the scribble are shooting at each other across earth. Holy shit, erupts from Tess, we're in the middle of somebody elses war! Another drawing: A broken wedge on the ground, a scribble above, ordnance falling from the scribble to the wedge. Everybody gets that one. A sanitizing strike on the wreck, from parties unknown. They pack up and move out in less than five minutes. They are less than a kilometer away when missiles slam into the wreck. But they do not come from above, they come from the east, from South Vietnam.
They stop for a break. Betting out to stretch their legs, eat, ad take care of business. The prisoner does not move. Geiger takes a closer look at her and notices a thin cable running from the white block into what seems to be some sort of jack in the back of her neck. He very nearly pulls it out bu,... she is trembling slightly, light tremors running the length of her boy in waves. Her eyelids are fluttering, and her eyes are rolled back in her head. God Knows what would happen if he pulled that jack out. Furious, he waits until the tremors cease. Weakly she pulls the jack free and opens her eyes. Geiger is just about to belt her one when she says in english, "You are all in terrible danger". Then she passes out.
After an hour or so, she rouses and is interrogated by Lynch. Deeply rattled by what he learns, Lynch orders the track radio operators to try and raise MACV, the CIA, hell, anybody. After almost another two hours, he raises his CIA contact. This transmission is not met with shocked disbelief, MACV and the CIA have already figured out long since that something crazy was going on. Lynch has proof for his claims? Perfect. Choppers are on the way. Destroy the tracks when they arrive. The team can hear the approaching choppers when one of the radiomen gets a clear signal from the BBC news service.
BBC news commentators are renowned for unflappability. But not this time. There is an undercurrent of panic as the man reads the news:
The United States is accusing the USSR of destroying Khe Sanh with a tactical nuke. North Vietnam has accused the USA of invading Laos and North Vietnam.
The USN has lost a carrier - the USS Kittyhawk, a cruiser - the USS Long Beach and between three and five destroyers off the coast of Vietnam.
The USAF and USN have reportedly lost almost three hundred combat aircraft in operations over Laos in the last three days.
Both NATO and the Warsaw Pact have declared general mobilizations. China has done the same. India and the non-aligned bloc are pleading for calm, but no one is listening. There is panic buying in every market and all across the globe governments are bolting for cover.
No one says a word while loading the choppers. The bodies, bug and humanoid, the weapons, tools, all the assorted items lifted by Gren and Tess, all go on the choppers. They also find room for the weapons and ammo from the tracks. They do find room for the recoilless rifle and ammo. Ya never know.
