Red November Chapter 2
 
            Yards distant, Corporal Lewis was dodging sonic pulses while spraying the darkened alleys near the pier with ineffectual Bearcat fire when Tower four seemed to leap skyward before subliming into a glowing fireball. The black wings of panic enfolded the young soldier's heart, shrinking his words to a whisper, "My God, the chief was in there!!" Totally unhinged, the Corporal emptied the remains of his rifle's clip into the surrounding area, before running back towards the pier he had recently been patrolling. Shadowy movement followed him as he fled. Rain and tear blurred shapes coalesced into the form of another security trooper, firing out towards the advancing enemy from behind several stacked cargo pallets. Lewis reloaded his rifle, then dropped and rolled to a position nearby. Pausing to change clips, the other soldier gave Lewis a quick thumbs up before he resumed laying down suppressive fire on the pier. John couldn't have done a thing to prevent what happened next.
            The Tasoth's titanium hard claws buzz sawed into the back of the unfortunate soldier, ripping deep into his spinal column and slamming him to the ground under the weight of the reptilian alien. The victim's screaming was drowned out by the deeper howl of Lewis's rifle as he unloaded the entire new clip into the obscenely leering serpenoid and it's unfortunate prey, alien green spurted and mixed with darker human red. The Tasoth's hunting screech abruptly climbed to a hate filled shriek of mortal outrage as the rifle's breach locked open, signaling with a futile click, the soon to be departed life of one John Lewis. With a renewed rage filled bellow, the alien turned and reared, mortally wounded but still lethal.
            Sudden laser fire from the shadows center punched the creature, hammering it into the wall with an ultra precise three shot burst. The Tasoth slid to the ground while the characteristically salty smell of charred alien meat blossomed in the wet night air. Lewis stumbled, sliding back on his butt away from the smoking alien corpse as the squat, well armored, form of a Tank Laser Cannon HWP emerged from the night. "Enemy threat neutralized, Corporal." The voice was coolly unemotional as if the intelligent battle machine were commenting on the weather, "I request further advisory as contact with command authority has been cut off." "Jesus, Rusty, is that you?" the trembling human soldier was barely hanging on to the tattered remnants of his mind, he was totally unhinged. "Corporal, I detect no allied units or officer level units in the immediate combat zone, therefore, as per Platoon directive 510-A, I am assuming command." The voice was again totally emotionless as the mini tank's dun colored turret traversed, scanning for the enemy. "Rusty, you can do that?" Fear was joined by disbelief.
            The old HWP had always been treated as more of a curiosity than anything else, originally assigned at the end of the First Alien War to guard the supply depot as part of the XCOM force draw down of 2010, "Rusty" had remained in service ever since, patrolling the base, ready for anything. Even after the beginning of the Second Alien War when most of the remaining HWP AI's had been reassigned to Coelacanth's or later Disruptor SWS's, Rusty was left to guard the depot, apparently too old to upgrade. Lewis had finally managed to stand, using his expended weapon to lever himself up while the HWP moved forward to better scan the area. "What do we do, now?" Lewis asked dumbly, the night was alive again with sonic fire from the outskirts of the base.
            "Combined arms, Corporal" the tank replied as it's turret traversed to cover the southern seaward approach. "My sensor's detect two enemy OPFOR contingents, one attacking from the northern land perimeter, the other invading along the western cargo pier from the pilings at the mouth of the harbor." Rusty's analysis was briefly cut off as the tank blazed out two line straight bolts of laser fire, screams from the area near the pier were testimony to his accuracy. "I extrapolate a total of 110 possible scenarios as to the nature of the enemy force and it's primary objective, however, there is too little data to draw a conclusion, one or both of the enemy forces may be a diversion." The Corporal had pulled himself together enough to crouch behind the tank and reload his rifle as return fire from the alien's near the shipping terminal began to pound the un-armored warehouse's. "That's fuckin wonderful, but what the hell do we do!"
            "We will commit to an orderly tactical withdrawal to GRIDMAP coordinate block 12 and rendezvous with unit's Coelacanth Gas Cannon 38 SHARK and Coelacanth Gauss Projector 113 HAMMER, I have been in continuous communication with them since the attack began." Return fire from the dock area was becoming dangerously accurate as Rusty slewed his tracks sideways to avoid a concentrated burst of blasta fire. A near miss had already vaporized a swatch of armor off the tank's front ablative, leaving a molten runnel in it's wake. The HWP backed at a walking pace, laying down covering fire as it retreated, giving Lewis time to stay behind the shield provided by the vehicles armored bulk. Mini tank and soldier fell back into the maze of alley's leading from the storage warehouse's to the base armory.

            Just out of range of the tank's sensors, a green shadow stopped to make sure the enemy combat vehicle had actually retreated before moving on. The sapper squad of Aquatoids were already nearing their objective, the maximum security biological storage warehouse near the port shipping terminal. Suddenly, eight black shapes materialized from the direction of the pier edge, moving silently to intercept the alien squad. The Aquatoid Leader brought it's gun to bear on the lead soldier, ready to fire, until the device wrapped around it's neck again activated. The creatures visibly relaxed as the now obviously human team joined them at the warehouse security lock. Two five fingered human hands signaled to the alien all it needed to know and the creature handed over the electronic access card it had retrieved from the now lifeless sentry at its feet. Seconds later, the eight humans and four aliens were moving in modified diamond formation through the cold and dark interior of the Biowar vault.
            Alien corpses hung suspended in cryonic vessel's, every race of xenomorph ever encountered by XCOM was represented to some extent. Here a dead Floater again floated as it had in life in the viscous solution, there a Snakeman drifted, spilling loops of ragged intestine, the morgue was utterly still except for the muted sounds of the raid team as it efficiently proceeded forward in a carefully prepared ballet of death. Mounted lights played over endless rows of dead alien biology, the legacy of two successful wars waged by XCOM. The air became markedly colder as the raiders patrolled further into the shadowy complex. The Aquatoids were in general uneffected, used to the cold water of the deep ocean but the human warriors were slowed somewhat, whisps of condensate from sweating men drifted off and cooled on cold surfaces.
            Section 2....Section 3....Section 4, the team moved like a single organism hunting for it's prey. Finally, the apparent leader of the human's brought his hand up in a quick arc, halting the advance. Four feet ahead, red low watt bulbs illuminated the frost covered door of the warehouse's primary teratogenetic isolation block. A hurried consultation with another of the human's apparently confirmed their location as correct and the leader of the Aquatoid's was summoned. Using another hand gesture, the human made his intentions known, pausing so that the creature could assemble it's own troops at the lock, stacked in a line, weapons slung. Another stolen keycard was quickly slotted through the door's security reader, releasing the magnetic locks and letting the halves of the massive door part with a slight hiss of decompression.
            The first Aquatoid was already inside, while the supercool atmosphere of the isolation block would incapacitate an unprotected human, an Aquatoid would only be slowed slightly. The four creatures didn't even notice the security camera's staring down at them from the ceiling as they used their skinny arms to wipe the layer of frost off their objective, twenty cylindrical biohazard storage modules, each painted a dull construction yellow color and locked to the floor by armored storage clamps. Freeing the cylinder's was the work of seconds, and four of the units were on the way out of the cold-storage block, each clutched tightly by a worker Aquatoid. The humans were positioned farther back, keeping watch over the operation inside the vault and making sure the escape route remained unobstructed. As each cylinder was brought out, the squad leader checked the serial number and name on the unit on a small paper pad.
            Eight units out, now ten, the Aquatoids were showing signs of stress as they moved, they were not built for such taxing manual labor. Every other second, a pair of the human's came back from their sentry positions, lashing a cylinder to each other's back for transport, time was running out. The team's instructions had allowed them to temporarily disable the primary warehouse security systems but not to obstruct the security camera's, apparently the higher up's wanted the operation recorded for posterity. Twelve cylinder's were out now, as many as the combined force could carry easily, the weakened Aquatoids each strapped on a unit using the specialized clips built into their web gear. Operation complete, the hooded leader of the penetration squad smiled under the black balaclava he wore, like clockwork, exactly like the simulations. He was still smiling a moment later when he gave the hand signal to exfiltrate from the target site and the security alarms scattered around the warehouse went off in a deafening burts of light and sound.
            The alert was out, each human team member pulled two grenades from pre-positioned tabs on their harnesses and threw them in different directions, the squad leader's two went rolling merrily right into the cold vault. Running now as the massive vault door closed the strike team had just cleared the outer warehouse door when the grenades went off. Chaos flaring in their wake, the humans and aliens slipped quietly into the rough surf rolling up the nearby cargo pier, as if they had never been.