* (2:28) Chris meets a person and is impressed by the event.

* (8:38) Telling a story at varying levels of epic-ness.  What it means for a story to be epic.  The importance of the small stories, even when told in the context of larger events.  Keeping the players connected to the characters and not just the plot arc.  You can find the Dark Dungeons tract here.  And, finally, the Crest Kids versus the Cavity Creeps.

Hosts: Chad, Chris, Dan, Pat

* (2:03) A discussion about why Tex and Dan used to hate Chris leads into some insight on the work Chris did for FASA and the rejection letter he got for a Shadowrun adventure about Mars.  Yes, you read that right.

* (13:11) The distinction between writing a module and writing an adventure.

* (24:22) Player-characters getting taken into captivity.  Giving it the right context.  The opportunities it presents.  The stories that occur while people are in captivity.  Planning a plausible escape.  Data rapping about his cat to Dr. Dre’s The Next Episode.  Dan in the bad-GM corner so the group can do a double-blind plan.

Hosts: Chad, Chris, Dan, Pat, Wayne

* (0:57) Issues of responsibility.   Within a roleplaying group, who buys the books?  How do you fairly divide materials and labor?  Whether hosting the event or running the game should count toward those social obligations.

* (36:48) Handling mass combat in a game while still making the players feel like their characters are an important part of it.  Allowing them the most important tasks or a higher level of power.  Giving military context or emotional value to the smaller objectives of war.  Chad gave me two pictures from the D&D city battle we did.

Hosts: Chad, Dan, John, Wayne

* (12:04) The matrix and its way of breaking up the party.  The steps Catalyst is taking to make deckers a bigger part of the primary story instead of an isolated side game.

* (25:09) The organization of the team creating 5th edition.

* (27:06) The things coming up for Shadowrun, starting with an introductory box set.

* (29:17) A unified portal for Shadowrun, which you can find here.  Also Shadowrun Returns and  Shadowrun Online.

* (39:39) Mark will be running a Shadowrun game at FRAG Con.

Hosts: Dan, John, Julia, Wayne

Guests: Mark Dynna

* (1:43) You can find information on Fear the Con 6′s official charities here.

* (4:18) Introducing our guest, Mark Dynna.

* (5:54) What Shadowrun’s PACs are and why we love them.

* (8:26) Shadowrun 5th edition as a case study on how large and mid-sized game companies develop their flagship products.

* (10:55) How Mark got started in game development.

* (169:44) The motivation behind a new edition.

* (28:32) How the artwork of a game can help reveal or misrepresent a game’s intentions.  You can find the new cover here.

* (31:44) Planning the feel for 5th edition.  Immediate and measurable consequence for choices made in character creation.  Looking back to prior editions for inspiration.

Hosts: Dan, John, Julia, Wayne

Guests: Mark Dynna

* (2:38) The Kickstarter for Hyperreality.

* (6:05) Dan versus Grey Goose.  Dan wins.

* (9:38) Chris versus audio.  Nobody wins.

* (11:51) Giving players really advanced notice of a game session.

* (15:27) Chris invites someone to a game in all the wrong ways.

* (24:40) The surprising number of non-nerds in IT.

* (27:35) Colossus: The Forbin Project, Deus Ex, and Watch Dogs.

* (35:26) A question about standing in line in a video game leads to a discussion of the positive and negative impacts of video game achievements.

Hosts: Chad, Chris, Dan, John, Julia

Retired Military Working Dog Assistance Organization

http://www.rmwdao.org/

Retired Military Working Dog Assistance Organization (RMWDAO) is a non-profit organization based out of Universal City, Texas. RMWDAO is dedicated to helping our Nations retired military working dogs live a better, more comfortable life after they have finished serving our country’s needs.

RMWDAO’s long term goal is to be able to provide much needed financial aid for transportation and medical bills that become costly after adopting a retired MWD. Most MWDs are retired for medical reasons such as PTSD and require many veterinary visits once they have completed their service in the military. The majority of MWDs retiring are between the ages of 10 and 12 years old and have various special needs. With today’s economic financial hardships, it becomes an expensive responsibility owning one of these heroes. To help facilitate more adoptions of retiring MWDs, RMWDAO is here to provide support for medical bills and transportation to their forever homes.

Operation Freedom Paws

http://operationfreedompaws.org/

Leveraging the therapeutic magic of the canine-human relationship, Operation Freedom Paws empowers veterans and others with disabilities to restore their own independence.  Operation Freedom Paws trains veterans and others with disabilities to train their own service dogs. We leverage the ability of the canine-human relationship to help our clients regain their sense of purpose, worth and value to society and their community.

Founded in January 2010, Operation Freedom Paws is a 501(c)3 non-profit organization that matches dogs with individuals who have Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), Complex-Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (CPTSD) and/or Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) symptoms, or other physical, neurological, psychological or mobility needs.

We train the individual to train their own dog, and then certify them together as a service dog team in a 32-week program. Most of the dogs come from rescue shelters. This unique opportunity enables our clients to feel safe and secure, and to manage their day-to-day lives. The very special therapeutic canine-human relationship helps them get back out in their communities and begin to view their future with renewed hope.

At the convention, Derek will be running a raffle. Each ticket is $10, with all money going evenly to both charities.  There are going to be two prizes for the raffle. Each prize contains all the following items, barring shipping issues:

Bag of Holding
3 Black Dry Erase Markers
Eraser
Glow in the Dark D20 set
Q WORKSHOP BATTLE DOG TAG WHITE DICE SET D6 X10
CHESSEX RECON SPECKLED SPECKLED 10 X D10 SET
Set of Fudge Dice
Shower Shock Caffinated Soap
GameMastery Basic Flip Mat
Nom Nom Nom Lunch Bag
Dungeon Crawl Classics Role Playing Game Book
2x Decks of Cards with the Fear the Charity Logo
Tree of Life wood box to store both decks of cards
A titanium spork
A box of Ninja Pencils
4 Staedtler Plastic Erasers
Space Pen
Leather Notebook holder with a notebook
Car Lighter powered Retro Smart Mug
20 Medium Generic Pawns
10 Large Generic Pawns
5 Huge Generic Pawns

(There are some additional prizes that might be added as well, but confirmation is pending.)

* (1:29) Thoughts and prayers for Jake and his brother, Erick.  You can send wishes to his forum account, Pinofski.  (You’ll need to be logged in to our forums for that link to work.)

* (2:26) Registration for Fear the Con is still up and running.  Also Iron Man 3 and the Sober Driver Brigade.

* (7:17) The two kinds of failure in a roleplaying game: mechanical failure and story failure.

* (10:01) Handling mechanical failure.  Identifying whether the problem is a poor understanding of the game or just crappy luck.

* (14:30) The importance of perception.  How buy-in can make failure in an RPG so much harder to accept than failure in books or movies.  The degree of IC/OOC separation.

* (31:39) The role of the GM in mitigating feelings of defeat.

* (40:51) Games with an intentionally unhappy ending or multiple endings.

Hosts: Chad, Dan, Johann, Pat

* (9:14) A shout-out to the guys who have put out a Matrix RPG.

* (10:40) Sign-up for our own convention, Fear the Con, is still running.

* (10:49) If you’re interested in a convention on the east coast, be sure to check out 1d4Con in Winchester, Virginia, Friday, April 26th to Sunday, April 28th.

* (11:51) And it goes back there again.  The Ryan versus Chad sock puppet pony conversation can be found here.

* (13:19) If you’re interested in writing, stop by Fear the Boot’s own writers’ guild.  Their next online meetup is on Saturday, March 16th.  Check the forum area or send a PM to Sion for more information.

* (15:37) Why Dan can’t do his own game session reviews.

* (17:13) An object lesson on “forced success”, drawing from our most recent game.

* (21:16) Giving success to your characters as a way of keeping the game intact and the plot moving forward.  Balancing the value of internal consistency versus player enjoyment.

Hosts: Chad, Dan, John, Wayne

* (1:44) Introducing the one question personality tests.

* (4:32) People that don’t own TVs.

* (6:10) Red, green, or blue?

* (8:52) Protoss, Terran, or Zerg?

* (10:05) Dwarf, human, or elf?

* (12:15) Zombie apocalypse or alien invasion?

* (13:22) Summer or winter?

* (16:47) Fighter, wizard, cleric, or thief?

* (18:20) Fantasy, steampunk, or sci-fi?  Our Monsters Are Different.

* (23:50) Star Trek or Star Wars?

* (28:53) Elvis or Beatles?

* (31:09) MMO or single player?

* (33:27) Zombie, vampire, or werewolf?

* (39:33) In video games, male or female characters?

* (43:53) Rich or famous?

* (46:44) PVP or PVE?

* (51:08) Basketball, baseball, or football?

* (55:54) Sleek or clunky robots?

Hosts: Dan, John, Julia, Wayne

* (3:35) An update on the postcard contest.

* (4:17) Fear the Con is coming up.  If you’re arriving early for the tourism, please send an email to Dan with your contact information, arrival time, and method of travel, so we can keep you in the loop.  Failing that, we’ll also be updating our Twitter feed with event information as we migrate about the area.

* (7:57) Playing a character with a disability.  The motivations for playing such a character.  Handling it with dignity and sensitivity.  When it’s probably best to avoid the topic completely.

Hosts: Dan, John, Julia, Wayne

* (9:32) Choosing traditional publication versus self-publication.

* (18:08) Name placement on a list or bookstore shelf.

* (20:17) The importance of marketing your book and yourself as an author.  How name recognition led to the creation of Fear the Boot.

* (42:38) A few quick notes on Kickstarter and other methods of fundraising.  Monte Cooke’s book, Kicking It.  Joel and Tristan’s first interview with Postcards from the Dungeon.  (As of this release, the follow-up has not yet been posted, but be sure to keep watching their site!)

* (44:18) A wrap-up of what everyone is doing and where you can find their work.

Hosts: Chuck, Dan, Joel, John, Tristan

Chuck Wills’ Chronicles of Spire in ebook or print.

Joel Dalenberg and Tristan Zimmerman’s The GM’s Real World Reference on DriveThru.  You can also find Tristan over at Dragonlance Canticle.

John Grana’s Bloodmoon Goblins on DriveThru and Paizo.

* (11:18) What motivated each author to get started.

* (17:18) Tips for seeing a project through to completion.  Collaboration, accountability to an audience, and the danger of relying on a “future self”.  The importance of small, realistic milestones.

* (28:45) The closest they came to failure and what kept it from happening.

* (41:14) Setting a reasonable view of success.

* (49:08) Editing non-fiction.  The relationship between legends, history, and the cultural context of both.

Hosts: Chuck, Dan, Joel, John, Tristan

The discussion continues in part 2!  In the meantime, you can find the work of these fine folks at the following links.

Chuck Wills’ Chronicles of Spire in ebook or print.

Joel Dalenberg and Tristan Zimmerman’s The GM’s Real World Reference on DriveThru.  You can also find Tristan over at Dragonlance Canticle.

John Grana’s Bloodmoon Goblins on DriveThru and Paizo.

* (5:49) Fear the Fruit.

* (6:38) Boots the Pegasus t-shirt orders.

* (7:38) Signup for Fear the Con 6 rolls on, and tickets are now available for purchase!

* (9:45) The death of a bard.  Just how much a Game Master should warn a player about the risks they’re taking.

* (19:36) Why Pat should play Skyrim: naked mods.

* (21:09) Why cyberpunk isn’t as accessible as it used to be, and how Shadowrun bridges that by swapping out certain themes.

* (31:49) The persistence of roleplaying games when compared to other forms of entertainment.  Whether an RPG can feel too dated in its premise or setting to be playable.

Hosts: Chad, Chris, Dan, Julia, Pat

* (0:57) John makes a Shadowrun character.

* (7:26) The various models roleplaying games use for representing damage to your character.  Shaken, stunned, and otherwise losing control of your character.

* (11:49) What damage actually represents: injuries versus the loss of will to fight.

* (13:53) The relationship between damage, the duration of combat, and the feel of the game.

* (18:13) Accumulating wounds instead of losing health.

* (20:42) How a setting can make less descriptive damage more helpful to the feeling and flow of a game.

* (26:25) The models we each prefer and the reasons why.

* (35:10) How healers affect the way we view injuries.

* (41:01) Swapping out the combat system of a particular game.

Hosts: Dan, John, Pat, Wayne

* (5:37) Chad takes umbrage with Wayne’s comments about spelling errors in his games.  If you want to check out his free one-shotters, you can grab them right here.

* (8:55) The movies of 2013.  Django.  Trying to see movies when you have young kids.  Pacific Rim.  Oblivion.  All Superheroes Must Die.  Man of Steel.

* (28:05) Getting too into a character.  The baggage brought to a table, and the blurry line between character and player.  Compartmentalizing who you associate with.

* (54:55) Soap baby, round three.  Fight.

Hosts: Chad, Johann, Pat, Wayne

* (1:37) Gaming New Years resolutions for 2013.

* (22:01) The various approaches to personal wealth and the broader economy of a roleplaying game.

* (25:44) A quick update on the new things we’ve learned about soap baby.

* (27:14) Back to your regularly schedule episode…

* (29:17) The methods for determining a character’s starting cash and gear.

* (46:32) Wealth and economy during the course of play.

* (54:53) Character wealth from the standpoint of the GM.

Hosts: Chris, Dan, John, Julia, Pat

I’m one of these consumers. My budget for entertainment products is zero. Actually, if you do the math, it’s slightly less than zero: I’m an independent worker with an irregular income. After necessities, in a given month, most of what I earn has to be saved in case the next month I don’t earn as much. At some point I generally fall behind, meaning that at any given moment, my total entertainment budget has fallen into negative numbers. This is why I don’t spend money on video games. I play what I can get for free, when I have time to play at all. I play the version of Angry Birds with the ads on it. 99 cents is too much.

So how did I go from spending zero on entertainment to backing Goblinworks’s Pathfinder Online MMO project on Kickstarter bazed on Paizo Publishing’s Pathfinder at the $175 Crowdforger Buddy level? Well, I did get quite a bit of work this last month, so that definitely plays a role, although the smart thing for me to do would be, again, to save it for a rainy day. But the Pathfinder Online project speaks to me. Its value proposition is especially worthwhile to me. Why? Because the project as proposed is attempting to address everything I hate about MMOs and finally do it right.

I’ve played some (free to play, recall, entertainment budget = 0) MMOs that I won’t name here, but the theme park-style game is completely uninteresting to me. Sure, I’ve played hack and slash dungeon crawl video games before and had fun, but why would I pay a monthly fee just to play Diablo I on the same server where a bunch of other people are also running around playing Diablo I, possibly joining into groups that provide just about the same level of human interaction as hiring an NPC, except they don’t do what you say, and creating a situation where anyone who doesn’t play obsessively all day every day falls way behind the curve in PvE groups or PvP combat? It just feels like a fool’s errand. Why do I need to be online to do a dungeon crawl?

It’s clear when you hear them talk about their project that the designers at Pathfinder Online understand this way of thinking. It’s certainly up in the air how well they’ll do at it, but if they meet their design goals, they will have a very different kind of MMO. The goal of the project really appears to be to create a world that people collectively build and interact in, not a PvE shared waiting room with doors to different dungeons or a PvP free-for-all bloodbath where Scumbag John waits by your spawn point to stab you in the back.

This is actually one of the most controversial aspects of the game, based on the conversations I’ve seen on forums: the fact that there is only one big server. But despite the fact that being new at these games, I will be an easy target for griefers, this actually makes sense to me. If you have to choose a world with violence and a world without violence, only people who are planning to murder each other will choose the first world, where people who choose the second world will miss out on the point of the game, which is to live in a world where there is crime and punishment, war and diplomacy, building up cities and burning and looting them, the kinds of thing that make for story, plot, and meaning, especially when they happen organically, as intended by the designers of this game. And in order to make this work, the bloodthirsty and the innocent have to learn to get along in the same world.

In a system where you need certain resources to do certain things, a functional economy will be created in the game that will necessitate adventuring. So instead of the NPC tavern owner sending you down to his basement to kill some rats, a real-life tavern owner ($5000 on the Kickstarter) might actually have giant rats in his basement that he needs you to kill. Or more likely, a new settlement will need some recruits to go clear out some goblins, or an artificer will need someone to go kill some giant spiders because she needs their furry legs for some kind of potion.

In other words, you may end up doing similar things in this game that you might be doing as quests for NPCs, but you’ll be doing them for a real person who really needs those items to do what they want to do in the game. Or you’ll be engaged as a soldier in actual battle lines between two guilds that are really at war. Again, as the developers put it, this is meaningful interaction between human players, something I’ve always wanted in an MMO and something I don’t believe exists in most MMOs today.

This is the kind of thing you see in EVE Online, of course (although speaking of futuristic space MMOs, what I’d really like to see and would pay every dollar I can scrounge and every penny I can find in my couch for would be an Eclipse Phase MMO), but the design concept isn’t EVE with ElVEs. They’re proposing better controls on griefing, as well as real penalties for general bloodthirsty behavior. You will be allowed to take vengeance on your murderer, making more of their stuff lootable after killing an innocent player and being marked as an acceptable target without an alignment shift or reputation drop, even including safeguards against workarounds like having a friend kill them to have their curse lifted without getting looted, by connecting the curse system to the player who was killed and other players of their choice.

But most importantly, the level curve is not as extreme in other MMOs. The design concept is for someone who’s been playing longer to be more powerful than new players, of course, but nowhere near unstoppable. If they do it right, these will be interactions between more and less powerful people of the same species rather than one player being a bug to be stepped on by another player who is a god. This is an extremely important feature for me as a person who doesn’t have time to play all day every day. As an independent worker, I could spend a month with zero time to play (but my character will still be gaining experience) and then follow that up with a week of having nothing better to do than play, but I won’t fall too far behind.

Of course, being new to these games, I do understand that there will be a learning curve for me, but I’m hoping the system will make it possible to survive as a casual player and get something out of the game. I’m sure Scumbag John is itching to prove me wrong. But I’m glad that by backing the project, I get access to the Crowdforger early enrollment beta, which will hopefully make me powerful enough at open enrollment that experienced PvP MMO players coming in won’t terrorize me from the get-go.

John’s still going to kill me, though. I’m sure of it.

Of course, there are some things I would add to what they’re planning to include in this MMO. For one thing, I think they should incorporate secret societies in addition to guilds, an affiliation that you don’t wear on your sleeve. It would be sort of a Kobold Fight Club, or an Illuminati, or secret cults that you could join, but that other people can’t tell you’re in, unless, for example, they kill you and find a ring or other item identifying your affiliation. It would add an interesting level of intrigue. Another great feature in settlement building would be the ability to design your own structures. The building blocks of castle pieces could be individually purchased and placed to create the structures each settlement wants. It worked for Minecraft. But as this project is being crowdforged, hopefully ideas like these (and the idea that we should all be able to play lizardmen and kobolds and goblins) will be taken into account by the designers. Eventually. When they have time.

The best roleplaying game sessions are the ones in which a good game master can roll with what the players do, and provide realistic consequences to their actions in a realistic world. Based on the design concepts, this is the MMO that sounds like it will come closest to simulating that kind of GM experience, not by attempting to code realistic NPC dialogue or anything like that, but by actually creating a world where the roles usually filled by NPCs are filled by real people with their own goals and needs in a functional economy and a very real community, a complete online world.

So if this sounds like as much fun to you as it does to me, help Goblinworks meet their Kickstarter funding goal and make an honest gamer out of me. I don’t know if I’m representative of any kind of demographic, but if Pathfinder Online managed to get me to open my wallet for them, they must be doing something right. So look for me in the River Kingdoms when Pathfinder Online comes out. I’ll be the one with John’s dagger in my back.

* (1:23) You can find Chad’s free games through Morning Skye Studio.

* (2:29) Dan guest hosted on two other shows: Dragonlance Canticle and MasterCast.

* (3:17) Julia gets pantsed.

* (5:26) Dan goes to first grade with Dawn.  The many nations of Missouri and the misspelled town of Rolla.

* (9:22) Dan almost gets pantsed.

* (12:34) John and Pat go bowling.

* (16:38) Wayne and the bingo wand.

* (20:32) Wayne and the soap baby.

* (27:08) What an actual non-crush looks like.

* (30:39) The Hamburglar ring and an actual robbery.

* (35:28) Wayne ups the ante.

* (38:19) Julia loves America.  Pat attributes it to…something else.

* (40:40) The playoffs + Action Nerds: Go! + Dan’s house = damage to Dan’s house?  Aggression, sports, and the intersection thereof.  You can find Dungeon Crawl Classics here.

Hosts: Dan, Julia, Pat, Wayne

* (0:20) John’s Bloodmoon Goblins Pathfinder supplement is now available for sale as a PDF, with print soon to follow.

* (2:22) The  ecology and agenda of monsters in Pathfinder Online.

* (3:42) The nature of existing (and eventually expanded) “theme park” content as opposed to the “sandbox” content.

* (6:08) The reason we need to ask hard questions about this MMO.

* (8:06) Does the gaming world really need another fantasy MMO?  The historical context for Pathfinder Online’s creation.

* (16:29) The cash model for the game.  The points at which it will likely be subscription-based versus “freemium” or completely free-to-play.

* (18:02) Given the market climate — and Paizo’s obvious claim to fame — why not focus the resources into a high-end virtual tabletop instead of an MMO?

* (19:26) The graphical enhancements planned between the tech demo and actual game.

* (21:15) The purpose of the second Kickstarter, particularly in light of investor funding.

* (31:53) How is player feedback going to be gathered and used to alter the game world during the design process?  How is Paizo involved in the game’s development?

* (35:52) Balancing the influence of project backers when comparing the number of people on one side against the depth of pocketbooks on the other.

* (37:27) How Goblinworks is defining the game’s “beta” and why there’s a subscription attached to it.  Whether there’s intended to be any character-resource resets or similar setbacks during the beta.

* (45:58) Mark’s interest in seeing large-scale combat look more like authentic, Medieval warfare.

* (48:45) A round-up of the relevant links.  You can checkout the Pathfinder Online Kickstarter right here.  If you want to visit Mark’s blog, that would be here.  And finally, our postcards contest is up for voting over here.

Hosts: Dan, Johann, John, Pat

Guests: Mark Kalmes

Last year I ran a Kickstarter campaign to produce a Pathfinder supplement called “Bloodmoon Goblins”, which is a small campaign setting for goblin player-character adventurers. With the gracious support of our community, the project was funded. In the months since that time myself, Dan, Keith Curtis, and Ruben Smith-Zempel have written, rewritten, arranged, and pulverized my scattered thoughts and gamemaster notes into a polished product which is now for sale at the following link:

http://rpg.drivethrustuff.com/product/109300/Bloodmoon-Goblins

I hope you enjoy it!

-John

If you’re interested in backing the Pathfinder Online Kickstarter, you can do so here.

* (0:43) The postcards contest is ready for your vote to pick the grand prize winner!  Get your votes in here!

* (1:08) Some breaking news on the Pathfinder MMO: Mark tells us about the upcoming “Guild Land Rush”.

* (5:26) Introducing Mark Kalmes.  City of Heroes (and Villains), the Mastermind, and the game’s shutdown.  Asheron’s Call and Meridian.

* (11:49) Mark’s work in robotics.

* (14:12) The relationship between Goblinworks and Paizo.

* (15:58) How close will the MMO stick to the Pathfinder tabletop rules?  The nature of a class-less, skill-based system.  How characters advance, how they’re capped, and how new players can enter a world alongside well-established ones.

* (32:51) Player-versus-player combat in Pathfinder Online.  The reasoning behind the lack of PVE (or purely consensual PVP) options.  The role of NPC hirelings.  A player-based economy and the importance of inter-player relationships.

* (46:37) Breaking into an established world.  Finding a role for your character and a piece of land for your house.

* (51:09) The consequences of character death.

* (53:36) The relationship between the in-game and real-world economies.  We also talk about active subscriptions versus playing on a lapsed subscription.  The story of Second Life and the IRS.

* (58:41) The number and structure of servers, and the number of accounts per server.  Hurdles put in place to keep one guild from dominating the game world.

* (1:02:17) How the casual and solo players fit into the order of things.

Hosts: Dan, Johann, John, Pat

Guests: Mark Kalmes

* (1:50) You can find the details on Fear the Fruit here.

* (2:27) Voting on the postcard grand prize winner will begin soon!  I’m just waiting on one more show to get me their winning card.

* (3:28) Derpy Hooves, Bruticus, Orson Welles and the green peaness, the Pros and Cons podcast, the Dinosaurs boardgame, disgusting sodas, and a canoe.

* (22:12) Getting and maintaining a group’s focus in a game.  Allowing for reasonable outbursts of humor and socialization, without letting it disrupt play.  I couldn’t find a video for “the clown is down”, but I at least found the longer quote it’s from.

Hosts: Chad, Dan, Pat, Wayne

* (2:32) The existence or absence of critical miss rules in various systems, and whether they’re needed to add parity to critical hits.

* (20:18) Why GMs should not make obfuscation and frustration their go-to method of building a plot.  Times we’ve encountered this in the past.  Whether improv GMs are more prone to this particular mistake and some suggestions on a better way to structure even a “single-objective” plot.

* (45:39) Apparently game companies think Christmas is in March this year.  You can find Karla’s wish list site here.

Hosts: Dan, John, Julia, Pat

As a side note, while Pros & Cons has a similar “no politics, no religion” policy to our own, Saving the Game is a Christian podcast.  It’s not aggressive toward other worldviews, but consider this fair warning that it does carry an overtly religious perspective.

* (0:05) Chris demands the bonus episode disclaimer.  Johann delivers!

* (1:19) The premise (and ditched titled) for the episode.

* (1:33) The problem with Chris.

* (4:10) Back to the prior topic!  What Dan wants gone: the “traitor” mechanic.

* (7:33) What Johann wants gone: cursed items.

* (15:53) What Chris wants gone: a lack of time and rules lawyers.

* (26:29) What John wants gone: not being a kid, anymore.

* (29:03) Playing across the gender aisle.

* (32:58) Real-life versus your gaming life.

* (34:25) The one piece of equipment your characters always have.  Plus encumbrance, belladonna, and garlic.

* (42:29) Casting times, damage type versus armor type, and negative pressure.

Hosts: Chris, Dan, Johann, John, Pat

* (9:49) An update from Fear the Boot’s Election Center.

* (11:03) The second pitch.

* (19:58) Another update from the Election Center.

* (20:27) The third pitch.

* (23:56) Results just came from Iowa, and CNN is calling it for…

* (25:40) The fourth pitch.

* (29:06) Another few states reporting in!

* (31:45) The fifth pitch.

* (37:13) And back to the Election Center!

* (37:55) The sixth pitch.

* (43:35) A quick check of the ticker…

* (45:50) The seventh pitch.

* (51:01) A final check with our news desk.

Hosts: Chad, Dan, John

What surprised me even more was the positive response from people not involved in the story.  Quite frankly, I consider a story about Dan and his friends fighting aliens nothing shy of self-indulgent fantasy.  I’d try to guess why a sort of cult following popped up around the story, but I think to make such guesses would be the real moment of self-indulgent fantasy.

The entire story took about a month to do, and I really enjoyed doing it.  Playing a video game while getting buy-in from other people is hardly a torturous experience.  It’s also quite different than a normal play through, since the actions are being dictated by my interpretation of the individuals (which doesn’t always result in the best game decisions) and then hearing the people behind those names tell me what the situation looks like to them.

With the story now done, I’ve come to several conclusions…

1. I want to do it again.  The fact that other people enjoyed participating or consuming is certainly a motivating factor, but I had fun doing it purely for myself.
2. I’d like to keep the prior narrative moving.  As a result, the game I’m most inclined to use is X-COM: Apocalypse.  I have some ideas for bridging the prior saga into a story that takes place roughly 70 years from now.
3. Several of my “players” said they felt such strong emotional buy-in because they were asked to think about their real persons, families, strengths, weaknesses, etc.  So I don’t want to switch to having anyone play a created character.  Additionally, some of the people that were most eager to contribute to the RP side of things got killed.  As a result, Adam is likely the only person I will leave dead, since his death is a critical part of the prior narrative, and not just a random incident of war.  Anyone else that died will be hand-waved back to life.  Games are about fun, and I’ll never sacrifice that on the altar of perfect continuity.
4. If I do indeed use Apocalypse, that game gives scientists and engineers their own character sheets and presence on the battlefield.  So those roles can be filled by real people that are willing to contribute meaningful RP instead of the eye-roll-inducing commentary of Dr. Vahlen.
5. While I want to expand the RP side, I have to be careful about bringing too many chefs into the kitchen.  The story could easily slow to a crawl and lose its focus as I try to work through the gobs of RP contributions.
6. I also need to stick to people I know really well.  If I don’t have the right amount of firsthand knowledge (granting that some of it can be replaced by email inquiries and such), I can’t tell much of a story about what they’re doing in such a bizarre set of circumstances.

I apologize for the emotional distress my departure likely caused you and the team. If I had any less faith in our friends — or any less urgency about the task before me — I would have stayed behind to see everything through to the end.

Several months ago, I was possessed by an alien prophet. It was a traumatic event that lacks any parallel I can describe. However, it wasn’t that event that drove me down this path, but rather the realizations that came thereafter. XCOM wasn’t the solution to an alien invasion; it was the gateway for one. And by the time I realized it, the war was already lost.

A year ago, we were tasked with facing down an alien menace. By the end of the project, our science and engineering teams had over 400 of the brightest minds our race could offer, but our combat squad consisted of just 16 people, some of which had never fired a gun before. We were issued just one landing craft, and even when fully ugpraded, it could only carry six of us into a mission. At the time, I thought it was a frustrating reality created by an incompetent bureaucracy, but eventually I realized it was all quite intentional.

An alien race with so much technology, such vast intellect, limitless resources, and tendrils of corruption reaching into every level of our society could have just taken whatever they wanted from us. But they didn’t. Instead, they just harassed us with small craft, manned by minimal crews. They prodded and spooked our citizens, but always kept holding back. It was resistance, carefully measured to just keep frightening us into action. And after each battle, we walked away with insufficient resources to feel secure, but always enough to internalize some new alien technology. They were like cursed gifts that we blindly accepted in hopes of winning a war the aliens weren’t genuinely fighting.

It wasn’t long into the project before I noticed a trend in the alien autopsies. We saw multiple races that didn’t originate from a single world. Yet each of them had been modified through genetic engineering and implantation to be something new. Then I saw the inside of an alien saucer. There sat vats, filled with half-completed experiments on our own race. That’s the bigger picture. We were never meant to be conquered; we were meant to be changed. These same abductors likely held grays and hulks in the vats that now hold human beings.

When countless veiled and nonsensical missions came from the chairman, I knew something was amiss, but I felt that defeating the aliens was worth overlooking his indulgences. Dr. Vahlen kept insisting we change ourselves to be more like the aliens, and slowly the situation evolved until it really was our only way forward. We always had just enough alien technology to take one more, tiny step in that direction. We had sufficient scientists to unlock alien secrets, sufficient engineers to build them, and yet so few troops that we felt those advances were the only way to win. We created the very “solution” the aliens had been grasping for all along. We were like a group of lab rats, fighting to keep the doctors away as we shocked ourselves to death, exactly as they’d intended from the start.

The day we completed our research into transhumanism, we accomplished the aliens’ mission. And even if we had failed somewhere along the way, all of the technology we’d sold to member states to keep up our meager budget afloat meant someone else would do it eventually.

That’s entirely too complex to be coincidence. We were on their script, and the chairman was the director of the play. We can’t save the human race, because it’s already going extinct. Whether it’s from a desire to live longer or transcend human intellect and physique, we will end our species.

I know the team will defeat whatever is on board that giant alien ship. It’s been part of the script from the start. I’m sure they’ll put up a plausible fight, but you won’t see the millions of soldiers and thousands of attack craft that vessel should be carrying. But while you’re doing that, I’m going to take them a little off script. Maybe the age of humanity is over, but I’ll be damned if we become slaves in whatever happens next. And to guarantee that, I have to kill the puppet masters that have manipulated us from the start.

I got the chairman to begin sending messages via email, because it allowed me to track him over time. And then our satellites and hyperwave systems — gifts from the aliens I doubt he expected us to use this way — confirmed my work. In fact, I’m just down the street from the real XCOM headquarters. I’m going to give this letter to Dan Krenzke, so he can take it back to you. If you’re getting this by mail, then I suppose that means he followed me. Regardless, I’m headed inside to kill the faceless coward that’s been the real enemy this entire time. Whether he’s working for the aliens or just wanted this outcome for his own reasons, he will die by my hands. What happens to me thereafter doesn’t matter. It’s not victory, but at least it’s a defeat we designed.

Should I survive, I have to stay gone for a while. I need a quiet place to heal. Someplace very far away. I don’t know if the world will see me as a hero, murderer, or deserter, but I don’t care for the attention any of those will draw…particularly when the only phrase that really describes me is “useful idiot”. Just know that I love you very much, and I’ll be back as soon as I can. Failing that, I have no doubt God will help you find peace, just as He’s helping Beth.

Vigilo. Confido.
We are ever watchful.
We are ever relied upon.

If only I knew what that meant now.

Yours always,

Dan

• The Sky Ranger flies over the temple ship, the vessel stretching out as far as the passengers can see in every direction.
• Adam guides the pilot to a particular landing point.  When the Ranger descends, it doesn’t seem to be landing in a ship so much as the middle of a city.  Structures surround the landing pad, filled with countless windows that glow in eerie shades of purple and orange.
• Almost immediately, Adam hears the High Priest’s voice.  It doesn’t seem to intrude his mind, so much as speak to him by some shared mechanism, much like two people holding a phone conversation.  It welcomes him aboard the ship, expressing eagerness to see such a marriage of physical and mental perfection.
• A long corridor stretches out before the team, with pits, catwalks, and blind spots everywhere.  Tex orders a slow advance down the middle as a single unit.  Adam will lead the way.
• Ryan confirms a signal is getting back to C3.  He also suggests Adam repeat aloud anything the High Priest says, as it may give insight into what the aliens are planning.
• Tex asks if Dan is in the room.  Ryan replies that he disappeared from the base several hours ago.
• Trying to get the focus back on the mission, Ryan notes they’ll face exposure to enemy fire from either side, so they should be prepared to cross-cover their squadmates.
• As the first barrier opens, the walkway ahead can be seen dipping down into a larger room.  Two regular grays and a psychic commander are clustered there.
• Adam can feel the psychic’s mind in the gestalt, though it seems strangely weak.
• He opens a hand and tosses out a ball of energy toward the aliens.  On impact, it unfolds into a maelstrom that kills one gray and tears up the mind of the commander.
• Adam reports that the High Priest is congratulating him.  “It’s exactly what he was hoping to see.”
• The whole scene is baffling, but Ryan focuses himself of the task.  Noting a clean line of fire, he tells Jimmy to advance a short distance and down the surviving gray.  His heavy cannon does the job with ease.
• Several levels below the team, more grays can be seen scurrying about.  The High Priest informs Adam that they were the earliest effort, but the results were disappointing.  The species was too frail and cowardly to succeed.
• Our scientists noted that each alien race we’ve encountered has been genetically or cybernetically modified.  “But why give us the history lesson?” Tex ponders.
• Chris drops down to the lower level, killing one of the newly-spotted grays.
• Several levels above the team, two discs appear, each with their drone escorts, sitting atop structures that almost look like pedestals.
• The High Priest tells Adam that these were an attempt to create symbiosis between two forms, but doing so left them devoid of any useful intelligence.  Is that to mean they were once organic and have now been reduced to pure machines?  Or were they encountered as advanced machine races and then reduced to this slave role?
• As the discs are simply parked above us, the heavy gunners bring them down with ease.  The machines never even had the chance to fire.  While the aliens we encounter seem at least willing to fight back, their atrocious positioning and small numbers makes the hall feel more like a museum than a combat exercise.
• Tex asks Adam why the priest is playing the role of disappointed curator instead of aggressor.  Adam just gives a shrug.  He can hear its ramblings but not sense the thoughts beneath them.
• The next chamber is an intricate maze of walkways, pits, and energy lifts.  It’s almost impossible to tell how they’re even meant to fit together.  Ryan warns the team to stay highly vigilant, as aliens could come from anywhere.
• Cyborgs.  Only four or five of them, but this terrain is what they were meant to dominate.
• Reaching through the gestalt, Adam and Chris each manage to take control of one.  The High Priest is either unable or unwilling to stop them from subverting the aliens against each other.
• John takes up a firing position and kills one.  When Jimmy advances, his movements seem to spook another into jumping out of cover.  Tex quickly brings it down.
• The only surviving cyborg shoots and kills one of our mind-control subjects.
• All at once, a group of bugs are teleported into the area, spread out below us as easy targets.
• The High Priest tells Adam that these were barely sapient insects when their “uplifting” began.  But by the time the process was complete, they were nothing more than predators, fit only to breed and die.
• John notes that the priest is judging each of these races so harshly, but none of them did the re-engineering.  It sounds like the pinnacle aliens are in denial of their own, shoddy work.
• Chris manages to snipe off the last cyborg with his pistol.  The rest of the team opens up on the bugs, tearing them apart.
• Unsure what to do with our last mind-control victim, Chris has it drop its grenade at its own “feet”.  The bomb doesn’t kill the cyborg, but  at least it can’t throw the bomb at us anymore.
• Tex asks Adam if the priest has said anything about the cyborgs.  Adam replies that he hasn’t.  All he’s done in the past few seconds is congratulate us for defeating the bugs.  If it wasn’t for the whole global invasion thing, this guy would seem like humanity’s biggest fan.
• The next chamber uses a much simpler layout.  Two barfers are waiting for us.  To even call the fight “trivial” would be an overstatement.
• The priest informs Adam that this race showed more promise.  They were malleable and loyal.  However, they lacked the ability to accept “the gift”.  Given the importance placed on psychic powers at the top of the alien hierarchy — and the lack of psychic barfers — the team presumes that to be what the High Priest is referring to.
• The team opens the energy barrier to the next chamber.
• In front of us is a balcony.  Down below is a sunken pit.  There are four hulks and a bully waiting.
• The priest informs Adam that now we’re facing a powerful race, with unmatched brutality.  But they lack any strength of will, making them useful only to fight and die as foot soldiers.
• Happy to oblige the latter half of their appointed purpose, Adam throws out another psychic rift that tears apart the bodies of two of them.
• The other troops follow after him, taking cover and pouring down plasma.  One hulk dies immediately.  The other hides for a moment, then steps out and dies as well.
• With the bully now out of sight, our team holds position on the balcony.  Predictably, it rushes up the ramp and into our waiting firing line.
• Scott ponders if that’s part of the purpose of this display.  It’s not just showing us the history of these races, but why each one of them fails to live up to what the priest wants.  Once we learned how they operate, sending them off has become more of a procedure than evolving conflict.
• The path terminates in an overlook.  The only way forward is to go down to catwalks on the right and left.  Ryan recommends scouting the overlook.  If it reveals nothing interesting, the team should pick only one catwalk and stay together.
• Upon reaching the edge, we can see that the catwalks flank an arena-like area below.  Sitting in wait are two locusts.  Did this really have to be part of the history lesson?
• As the team focuses on a rapid response to these behemoths, the priest keeps on talking.  Apparently these machines were built — not found — and their purpose is just to supplement the combat abilities of the weaker slaves.  Yeah, we got that part down without the exposition.  Jerk.
• The first locust goes down easily enough to our heavy gunners.  The rest of the team tears up its buddy but fails to drop it.
• Seconds later, the much-feared beam cannon emerges.  The first volley blows apart the front of the ledge.  The second volley tears across Chris, Jimmy, and Scott.  None are killed, but all are seriously wounded.
• Seeing the locust is in bad shape, Tex orders the team to hold their ground and kill it.  There’s no other decent cover nearby, anyway.
• As our team opens fire, the High Priest tells Adam that it’s concerned by the injuries we just received, seeing it as a sign that we may not be as “worthy” as he had thought.
• Ignoring him for now, we blast apart the final locust.
• “Now what?” Tex asks Adam.  His brother-in-law replies that the priest is happy we won, since apparently it validates their faith in us.  More disturbingly, the priest said that our victory brought it one step closer to redemption.  “Redemption” implies a third party to which one must be redeemed.  Is the priest not the top of their hierarchy?
• Adam and John heal up the injured soldiers.  Unfortunately, it leaves them almost completely out of medical supplies.
• The team drops down from the ledge, into the arena below.
• An elite hulk charges into the room.  Combined fire from Jimmy and Tex cut up its armor and kill the alien inside.
• Those are the preferred guardians of the prophets.  Is this a sign we’re getting close to the priest?
• A second one appears.  Chris takes control of its mind.  Time to explore the craft a little more safely.
• Watching through the hulk’s eyes, Chris describes the next chamber.  A long hallway leads into a spherical room.  In the middle of the room is a ledge, almost like a pulpit.  Below, the craft seems to simply open up, and he can see the coastal waters of Brazil.  It looks like we’ve found the heart of the temple.
• As the hulk enters the room, Chris says he sees the high priest.  It’s standing atop the podium, with a circle behind it, filled with energy like that from the Gollop chamber.
• Adam says it’s speaking again, describing the prophets — and even itself — as the greatest failure, as they failed to ascend.  Instead, they were left behind to feed on the “gifts” of lesser creatures while seeking a race to prepare for ascension.  It’s unclear if they’re describing themselves as the failure of another alien race or simply more adept members of their own race.
• Several elite guards rush to the defense of the priest.  Knowing the hulk won’t last long, Chris has it toss a grenade onto the pulpit.  While it does little damage to the priest, it blows apart the walls around it, stripping it of its cover.
• Back in the human team, Tex looks to Jimmy and Scott.  “Now that we know where it is, prep your launchers.”
• With the psychics keeping close watch, the heavy gunners unshoulder their fusion launchers.  Chris points to a spot ahead.  They take aim, and the projectiles streak down the corridor and explode.  The High Priest stumbles from the blast, crippled and dying.  It tumbles to the floor, its shockwaves of mental energy killing the other aliens in the room.  But it sends Adam a final message.
• “Without us,” it says,” without our guidance, what are you?  You are nothing.” And then the ship begins to violently shake.
• The team flees the room.  With the High Priest gone from the gestalt, Adam suddenly feels the ship as if it were a living organism, its every machine explaining their final instructions.  The ship will soon implode with sufficient force to destroy the Earth.
• Adam stops.  He prays.  He blocks out the images of a dying Earth, picturing only his family.
• Realizing Adam has stopped, Tex turns to call for him.  But with no time to argue, Adam does something he has never even tried before: he uses his psionic gift to force Tex from the room and command the other soldiers to run for the Sky Ranger.  Then Adam tells the ship to close and seal the door.
• As the Ranger lifts off, Adam ascends to the pulpit once occupied by the High Priest.  The priest had told Adam we were nothing, but Adam refuses to believe that.  His wife, his kids, his family, his friends…they’re a lot more than nothing.
• He reaches out and takes control of the High Priest’s device.  Now with every system under his control, he tries to stop the implosion, but the process are too far along to reverse.  So instead he moves the ship into a climb, taking it higher and higher above the Earth.
• When the ship destroys itself, its death triggers a series of minor earthquakes, but the planet is spared.  And once the implosion event passes, the parts begin to expand again, showering the Earth in a brilliant display.
• On board the Sky Ranger, any sense of celebration is dampened by Adam’s loss.  As Tex looks out the window and sees the remains of the alien warship burning up in the atmosphere, he thinks back to Dan’s last words to Adam.  “His compassion really did overcome their evil,” he says aloud.  And then he returns to silence.

• As there’s no telling how the aliens will react to an assault on the temple ship, the entire base is put on high alert.  Every soldier is given their battle kit, and non-essential personnel are moved to secure areas.  Power is also cut to the alien device in the Gollop chamber.
• Dan meets the six soldiers in the bay, shaking their hands and giving them a final send-off.
• He tells Adam that he’s truly proud of him.  He’s been an excellent brother-in-law, husband to Christina, and father of Eli and Oliver.  It took no small amount of courage to do what he’s doing.  Dan tells him to remember his family and his God when he goes into combat.  He has to go on this mission, not just because of his new link to the gestalt, but because his compassion transcends any evil the aliens can muster.
• To Chris, he says that it’s been an unlikely friendship from the start, but he has few people he trusts do deeply.  That’s why he’s on this mission.  Dan has the utmost confidence that he’ll scrape and claw his way to the end, fighting until his last breath with an implacable dedication few human beings even possess.
• He thanks Jimmy for being there for him for so many years.  He also reminds him that there’s something more important than being a father: having a father.  Dan knows Jimmy has a strength Jimmy himself lacks the confidence to see, but that strength is the reason he got chosen.
• He asks Scott if he ever thought he’d see the like of all of this.  He asks him to recite the names of his wife and children.  Should the aliens try to harm him in mind or body, he’s to repeat those names again and again until he remembers why he’s fighting.  He’s needed on this mission because of his even keel and methodical mind.
• When he gets to John, he thanks him for being a loyal friend for so many years.  He then takes a piece of paper, colored on one side by Connor and on the other by Duncan.  Dan folds it up and puts it between the plates of John’s armor.  That’s the family he’s fighting for.  His intuitive reasoning is why he must go.
• Finally, he comes to Tex.  He shakes his elder brother’s hand, a tear finally forming in his eye.  “I’m sending you somewhere I cannot go, because you’re the only person alive I trust to understand every aspect of what we hold dear, so deeply as to stand in my place.  Come home alive.”
• Dan orders them aboard the Sky Ranger.  He stands in the bay as the troop ship launches, saluting them even after the bay doors have closed.  He then removes his armor and weapons, putting them back in their locker.  He puts on his earpiece comm, telling Krenzke to meet him outside of the base at his truck, ready for a road trip and a hell of a story.
• Dan stops by his quarters to kiss Karla goodbye, saying he needs to get away for just a little while.  He then walks through each chamber of the XCOM facility, pausing to say goodbye to the familiar halls, touching each picture on the memorial, and finally stopping in his office.
• He opens the desk drawer and takes out the advanced plasma pistol he’s been hiding there.  He pulls up his email and forwards thousands of documents to multiple email addresses.  Then tucking the pistol into his coat, he heads out to meet Krenzke at his truck.  A human era may be over, but today, the entire alien story will get its last chapter.

• The chairman relays a message from the Canadian government.  Rumors abound of aliens performing mass excavations of cemeteries.  They reports had been dismissed in favor of simpler explanations such as vandalism or insurance fraud, but Calgary police have just caught them in the act.
• Commenting he has to see this one for himself, Dan calls up Beth, Karla, Rachelle, Julia, and Krenzke to accompany him.  Ryan is given C3.
• Looking at the assembled troops, Dan wonders if XCOM could do a calendar to raise money for alien alloys.
• On the flight out, command reviews the police officer’s statements.  He’s observed strange “men” in dark suits.  Sounds like we’ve got barfers on our hands.
• By the time the Sky Rangers lands, police have cordoned off the area to give us a clean battlefield.  Unfortunately, it’s cold, raining, and the middle of the night.
• Kenzke gets eyes on several aliens rummaging through a mausoleum.  It is indeed barfers.  Julia drops one.
• The surviving aliens scatter.  One of them fires on Rachelle, damaging her armor.
• Julia fires a second time, killing again.
• Realizing he’s too far away for his shotgun to be effective, Krenzke switches to his plasma pistol and kills the third.
• Given the way barfers deploy, there are sure to be a whole lot more out here somewhere.
• The graveyard is terribly wide, so the team spreads out and begins a front-to-back sweep.
• Six more aliens scurry from the darkness.  We trade fire with them, killing several as their lighter weapons whittle away Beth and Julia’s armor.
• Another group is spotted beyond the prior six.
• By the end of the battle, we count 12 dead aliens.  No XCOM members were lost or seriously injured.  Though looking over the cemetery — now covered in shattered tombstones, collapsed mausoleums, vomit, dead aliens, and partially exhumed bodies — Dan can’t help but feel a little bad for the families whose loved ones are interred here.  He shrugs it off.  The duty of XCOM isn’t to protect cemeteries but reduce the number of people being sent there by alien hands.
• While the team flies back, Tex files an official inquiry with the council, asking if they have any theory as to why the aliens would be digging up bodies.  Their reply is predictably vacuous and evasive.
• On March 20th, Dan calls for Tex, Ryan, Adam, and Chris Mais to meet him in the lower levels of the base.  The time has come to open the Gollop chamber.
• Inside the containment center, a purple orb sits suspended above an alien device.  We have no idea what it does other than some form of telepathic communication that goes beyond their hyperwave devices.
• Only a psychic can interact with it, so Dan asks Adam and Chris if either is willing.  There’s no pressure, and declining will not be held against them, even if it means shopping around for additional psychics.
• Both are willing, so Dan takes out a coin.  He asks if they can predict the future.  The duo chuckles.  Dan repeats the question and assures them it’s not a joke.  Both of them insist they can’t, so Dan has Adam call it in the air.  He chooses heads.  The coin lands on heads.  Adam is sent into the chamber.
• As he approaches the device, he asks what he’s supposed to do.  Dan tells him that we have no idea; he’s going to have to figure this out on the fly.
• Adam puts his hands over the orb and clears his head.  As his fingers near a device that was a complete mystery to him just moments ago, he suddenly knows exactly how to use it, as if the machine is teaching him.
• The orb contorts.  Parts of it collapse while others extend.  Spikes of energy surge out in every direction.  While our eyes can’t perceive it, Dr. Vahlen believes it’s changing shape in more than three dimensions.
• Streams of energy course through Adam’s body.  His eyes goes wide as visions fill his mind.  Then he hears a single, clear voice.  A prophet is on board that giant ship, though his power is unlike any we’ve encountered before.  Rather than fighting Adam, it seems to invite his mind into the gestalt.  Then he sees its face, feels its presence, and hears its voice.
• “You have succeeded where we have failed,” it says.
• Adam recoils from the device, feeling a sudden burning sensation overtaking his body.
• Moments later he arises, insisting he’s fine.
• He tells us the aliens call their monstrous vessel the Temple Ship.  Our choice to call the most advanced race “prophets” isn’t quite wrong, as they have a nearly religious obligation to pass on the will of the gestalt.  But the alien on this ship is at the pinnacle of the prophets.  Lacking a name, we designate him the High Priest.
• Medical scans show that Adam’s implants — both genetic and crystalline — have evolved again, developing a complexity they didn’t have right before this experience.
• When Dan asks him what we’re supposed to do, Adam replies that he can control the aliens enough to lower their defenses and open up the way for an assault on the floating, alien temple.
• Seeing no value in waiting, command votes unanimously to launch the assault.
• As the leader of the XCOM project, it falls to Dan to pick the team.  Without hesitation, he names Tex, Jimmy, Scott, John, Adam, and Chris Mais.  He tells them they have two hours to resolve of any personal business, and then they’re to assemble in the launch bay.  Presuming we can maintain communication, Ryan will head C3.

• Nigeria has requested some of our nano-fiber armor for military research.  As always, we agree and ship out the samples.
• On March 6th, a well-armed and heavily staffed supply barge lands in Montana.  Dan insists on a very specific team to raid the vessel.  Tex will lead Jimmy, Scott, John, Adam, and Chris Mais.  He invites Ryan to take C3.
• The Sky Ranger deploys the team alongside the cargo ship.  Given the number of exits and ledges, it’s a terrible place to assault.  Tex orders the team to immediate cover as Ryan maps out an attack plan.
• As the entire team is wearing either Ghost or psi-amp armor, they’re fairly mobile.  Ryan, therefore, tells them to bypass the side of the craft and make a run for a rear cargo barrier.
• Bullies, hulks, and barfers are swarming all over the aft bay.  Jimmy drops a barfer with a quick volley.
• Dan requests Adam and Chris to advance carefully and see if they can take control of an alien soldier, though they are only to do so if it appears safe.
• Tex agrees, but only after the swarming ranks of aliens have been thinned a bit.  He sends more conventional troops into the fray.  John, Tex, and Scott all take shots and miss.  Seeing little alternative, Tex tells Chris and Adam to do their best to turn the aliens against each other.
• The two psychics intrude into the alien gestalt mind as they’ve done before.  But instead of planting nightmares or willing them to die, they pit will against will, subjugating them to our cause.  Though no instrument can measure their success, the sight of a bully and hulk turning their attacks the other direction brings out a cheer in the command center.
• A disc emerges from the fore of the craft.  It hovers toward Scott, unfurling its main weapon, and firing a barrage.  The ghost armor seems to work, as the alien can’t achieve a successful lock, even though Scott has no cover in that direction.  Scott’s retaliation is far more effective.
• Our friendly hulk kills the remaining barfer.  With no immediate use for the bully, we send it ahead to scout out the ship for us.  It it dies along the way, so much the better.
• Sure enough, the bully finds three heavy cyborgs in the next compartment.  It dies to their combined fire, but no one on our side mourns the loss.
• Our friendly hulk follows the same path, tossing a grenade into the room, wounding the aliens and blasting apart the consoles they were using for cover.
• The wounded cyborg falls to psychic attacks.  One of his friends is shot off the roof by plasma fire from John and Jimmy.  The final one is gunned down by Adam’s plasma rifle.
• After so much faithful service, our hulk finally breaks free of the psychic control and turns on us.  Adam and John bring it down with plasma fire.
• On the opposite side of the craft, a locust and two drones come online.  Now we’re on the opposite side of the prophet’s equation.  We can’t mind control their robots, so our heavy gunners are brought to bear.
• Dan tells Scott and Jimmy to go weapons free with their launchers.  There’s a moment of odd looks.  He reiterates that the upgraded launchers have never been tested on the field.  This isn’t a fevered request.
• Tex assents, and so the two rockets streak down the hall.  Their detonations deal serious damage to the locust, kill its remaining drone, and even blow up a disc we didn’t know was back there.
• The locust is wounded but still standing, so our team is told to activate the stealth devices on their Ghost armor.
• The alien machine activates a scanning mode but, seeing no targets, it fires no shots.
• Decloaking, Tex puts it down for good.
• Seeing the primary ramp ahead, he orders the team to start forming up to sweep the area.  Once that’s done, they’ll circle back for the command center.
• Weakened by the explosions and plasma blasts, parts of the cargo bay collapse.  No one is injured.
• The team encounters two heavy cyborgs by the loading ramp.  One is killed, but the other is taken under mind control.  Tex elects to use it as both a scout and bit of psychological warfare.  The alien is to be sent straight into the control room as the opening move of our breach.  The rest of the team follows right behind it.
• Tex’s plan seemed to succeed.  At the sight of a cyborg hovering into the room, both the prophet and its bodyguard flee the ship and jump overboard.  Unfortunately, now we have to find them.
• The bodyguard climbs onto the ship again, but Scott burns it down with his plasma cannon.
• The cyborg comes face-to-face with his master, now hovering atop a nearby hill.  It shoots him a few times before the prophet curls up its hands and throws out a ball of energy that blows the cyborg apart.  We were not previously aware of this power, and we’re glad the cyborg discovered it for us.
• Our psychics move into position to fight the prophet.  Lacking a clear line of fire, the psychic battle begins.  The alien leader cannot seem to ward off either of his opponents.
• For a brief moment, Chris Mais feels the tendrils of the prophet’s mind touching his own.  It starts to press against his psyche, seeking to push him aside.  But he resists with every fiber of his being, yelling, “NO!” as he forces it completely from his mind.
• Fueled by pure rage, he rushes up to the alien, puts a shotgun into its chest, and blasts its body apart.
• 18 aliens and 0 humans dead.  John and Chris will both spend a few days in the hospital, but they’ll recover just fine.

• XCOM receives an emergency alert.  London itself is under attack by alien ground forces.
• Tex will lead Chad, Chris Hussey, Scott, Beth, and Rachelle into combat.  Dan will run C3, though under Ryan’s observation.  Chris and Scott will be field-testing suits of Ghost armor.
• The scene is London looks like something straight out of World War 2.  Air raid sirens are blaring.  The streets are bathed in orange light as cars and buildings burn.  The sounds of panic are everywhere.
• Scott and Chris confirm the armor is much easier to move in.  However, the speed enhancers, grapple lines, and other mobility features will take some getting used to.
• Just ahead, the team spots a locust.  It raises its beam cannon, locking onto Scott.  Three shots tear through the night air.  The first strikes the engine block of the car he’s hiding behind, the second cuts through its passenger compartment, and the third passes through the wreckage to hit a car even farther back.  Fortunately, Scott is unharmed.
• The two escorting drones turn and fire at the locals, killing a civilian and then a cop who was brave enough to help with evacuations until the bitter end.
• Scott fires several bursts at the locust, but only one connects.
• Watching the satellite map of the action, Dan notes a bit of debris that would allow Chad to flank the robot and still remain in cover.  He asks Chad how confident he is about trying one of Tex’s trick shots.
• Chad answers his question by moving to the debris and destroying the machine.
• Tex urges his squadmates forward to dispatch the drones.  They succeed, but six bugs, a disc, and a drone can be seen having a heyday just down the street.
• Dan assures the team they have sufficient cover to make a rather aggressive run.  And given the number of civilians he counts ahead, they better take it.
• Tex keeps the team together, but they follow his suggestion of a rapid advance.
• Without their psychics to protect them, alien units designed to terrorize civilians find themselves quickly outmatched and eliminated.  Their few retaliations are against the hapless bystanders.
• 10 aliens and 0 XCOM members were killed.  Only 4 civilians died during our battle, but local government informs us the casualties from the larger course of the battle will likely number in the hundreds.  While it’s far below the casualty rates we saw in Melbourne, it’s still enough to dampen the spirits of the team as they fly home.
• After a conversation with Ryan about Dan’s performance, Tex returns command of XCOM to his younger brother.  Whatever trauma he’s struggling with seems to be something he can turn on and off, almost like he’s selectively mad.
• A medical research company in Brazil sends a request for hulk corpses.  They believe the alien physiology may provide some medical breakthroughs in cell regeneration.  Dan approves the order.  It’s the least he can do for the country that’s currently home to an alien ship whose mere presence causes earthquakes.  When checking the evening news a few days later, he finds out the research in question is meant to reverse aging.  Dr. Shen was right: an era really has ended.
• On February 24th, an alien scout is spotted over Canada.  A Firestorm is launched and brings it down with EMP weapons.  Dr. Shen confirms a prophet is on board, so a mixed team is ordered up.  Ryan, Adam, John, Chris Mais, Cape, and Krenzke are sent to the hangar bay.
• From the scarring of the terrain, it looks like the craft bounce and spun quite a bit on impact.
• The team quickly encounters several barfers.  Taking advantage of the change in gear for our psychic troops, one poisons Chris.  John kills the alien on a snapshot.
• Back at C3, Dan suggests sending the psychics up to deal with these weaker aliens.  They need the practice, and it will send a message to the prophet.  As there appears to be sufficient cover to do so safely, Ryan agrees and orders them up.  Seconds later, both of the xenos are dead on the ground, having never been touched by anything but thought.
• John is ordered to treat the poison coursing through Chris’ veins.  The rest of the team — now with eyes on the craft — begins reforming the line.
• Cape reports contact with two hulks.  As they try to spring their ambush, he kills one of the monsters and Ryan snipes the other.
• Three elites attack us from the right side of the craft.
• One of the hulks tosses a grenade, which lands right by Chris and Adam.  The blast rattles them both, but even their weaker, psi-amp armor is sufficient to protect them from the worst of the blast.
• As the firefight continues, one of the elite hulks attempts to break our lines.  Seething with hatred, Chris tells it aloud that it will die.  The alien soldier panics and runs back to cower behind a boulder.
• Conventional fire manages to bring one down.  Adam warps the mind of another, though it still takes a follow-up shot from John to finish the task.  Cape’s shots find their mark and kill the third.
• Back at C3, Dan makes a note of the current time on a piece of paper.  He tells Tex to remind him he wrote that down later.
• On the battlefield, Ryan gets his team reorganized and reloaded.  They’ll be breaching soon.
• The assault begins with the psychics leading the way, searching for the prophet.  The rest of the team is close behind them in case a more conventional threat should appear.
• The prophet can be heard muttering his inanities in a port-side room.
• As soon as we open the barrier, both the prophet and his bodyguard retreat to another room.  Our psychics seem to have made quite an impression.
• The bodyguard is behind excellent cover, and our few shots fail to find their mark.
• Chris reaches out and terrifies the creature.  It shoots wildly and then hunkers down.
• The prophet bypasses its guard and floats right into the midst of our firing line, but makes no hostile move.
• With his shotgun still cradled in his left arm, Chris simply redirects his rage to the prophet.  It contorts and then dies in a wave of energy that injures most of our squad.  Dan makes a note to tell the psychics to watch where they choose to kill things.
• With the way now clear, Ryan lines up his rifle and kills the cowering guard.
• 10 aliens dead, 0 human losses.  However, it looks like we have several troops headed to the infirmary with minor injuries.
• Dan sends the parts from the saucer to Dr. Shen, telling him to construct more suits of Ghost armor.
• When the science team examines Adam and Chris, the staff reports that their implants are growing in complexity and integrating into surrounding tissue at an unexpected pace.  Both of them now state they can occasionally feel the thoughts of nearby people.  When asked if they think they could control a mind, neither gives a definitive answer, but they feel there’s a good chance they could.
• Tex approaches Dan in the command center, reminding him of the timestamp he marked during the last mission.  Dan nods and pulls up Adam’s camera recording, forwarding it to a few seconds before that time.  Shots are flying between our team and several hulks.  A few seconds later, Adam rises up and attacks the mind of one just before John fires the killing shot.  Dan rewinds it, playing the clip again, and cutting out all audio except that from Adam’s comm mic.  When he makes the attack, he can be heard laughing gleefully, maniacally.  “He has no recollection of that,” Dan informs his older brother.  “What the hell have we done to him?”  (AUTHOR’S NOTE: The laugh really did occur in the game.)
• Another month ends and another email gets deleted.  Looking through the team inventory and readiness reports, Dan makes a decision.  Unless any noteworthy developments occur, one of the psychics will be sent to the Gollop chamber to attempt contact with the massive, alien vessel.  His goal is to bring it down before the end of March.

• A South African pharmaceutical company requests a sample of our combat stims.  They believe there might be some use for treating fatigue or even cardiac conditions.  Though the drugs have never been used by the team, Dan allows a batch to be constructed and shipped out.
• By February 7th, the third round of psionic testing is done.  Rachelle and Julia both fail, but Adam’s body accepts the implants.  Dan’s face turns stony, but he otherwise offers no reaction to the news beyond ordering a suit of psi armor to be built for him as well.
• When Dr. Vahlen asks for the next set of names, Dan tells her there aren’t any.  Within the hour, the psi-lab has been pulled from the power grid and its doors sealed.
• On February 13th, an alien cargo ship lands in Minnesota.  Dr. Vahlen is eager to see how our two psionicists will perform against actual aliens.
• Dan presents Tex with a simple plan.  Put John in charge of the ground operation.  Send our psychic troops.  Send Cape as well, as there’s no use in sheltering him from the absurdities of this war.  Tex and Ryan can both take C3, but Dan insists on being present to see the results of this exercise.
• Tex reluctantly agrees.  The team will consist of John, Dan, Jimmy, Cape, Adam, and Chris Mais.
• The Sky Ranger lands near the craft’s main ramp.  The aliens have offloaded many of the ship’s vats, but instead of human remains, they’re filling them with livestock taken from a nearby farm.  Apparently animals aren’t as easy to subdue as people.  Many of the containers have been smashed open from the inside.  The remains of dead horses and cattle sit half spilled from their broken vats.  Absurdities of war, indeed.
• John orders everyone forward to cover.  He then splits the team into two squads.  Squad A will consists of John, Jimmy, and Chris Mais.  Squad B will consist of Dan, Cape, and Adam.  The squads will move together and act as a single team.  The only purpose of the division is to make sure there’s a heavy gunner, medic, and assault soldier on each side of the team — and at least one of those is a psychic.
• Three bugs charge down the ramp.  Concentrated fire kills two of them.
• Chris locks eyes with the third.  For a moment, he can feel its every twitch and impulse.  He reaches out a hand toward it, suddenly flipping his palm over and snapping his fingers into a fist.  Green fluid explodes from the alien’s mouth and eye sockets as its brain ruptures.  The corpse skids several yards before coming to a halt.
• The moment is replayed several times on the monitors back at C3.  We’ve never seen the aliens do that trick, nor did it come up during training.  Perhaps he only realized he could do it when placed in proximity to the alien gestalt.
• A cluster of barfers tries to ambush us from the corner of the ramp.  Though there’s no outward gestures, Adam locks eyes with one.  It seems unable to look away as its blood vessels tear open and massive hemorrhaging leaves it dead.
• Showing he hasn’t forgotten the old way of doing things, Chris kills another with his shotgun.  The survivor retreats toward the cargo bay.  By now, the prophet has to feel what we’re doing to its minions.
• A group of elite hulks are sent to stop our progress.  One of them is so desperate that it wanders into the cloud over a dead barfer, gagging on the caustic fumes.  Chris Mais closes his hand again, and though the creature doesn’t die, its already inflamed respiratory system begins to bleed.  Jimmy finishes the job with a blast from his plasma cannon.
• As with other craft of this design, multiple doors and ramps lead off from the entryway, converging in the surgical theater.  John orders the squads to each take the closest loading doors, giving us good side coverage and an immediate flank on anything standing in the middle.
• An elite leaps onto a ramp on the right side of the bay.  So much fire strikes its chest that it falls onto its back and slides down to the floor of our level.
• Squad B can hear the barfer shadowing us from a nearby ledge.  There’s no easy way to get him down, so for now we just let him watch our advance.
• Both groups move ahead, linking up on the walkway over the surgical theater.  While cattle mutilation is a bit disgusting, it’s far less unnerving than defiled, human corpses.
• A cloud of gas strikes Squad A.  As if acting on reflex alone, Adam drops into the surgical theater, landing right behind the barfer we had yet to actually spot.  He simply wills the alien to die, and it obeys.
• Since the psi-amp armor doesn’t filter out foreign substances like our primary infantry armor, Chris finds himself choking on the cloud of poison still floating over his squad.  He drops down, and Adam pauses to administer an antitoxin.
• As we close on the command center, the prophet begins talking.  “It is not much that I ask.”  Dan asks Chris and Adam if the comments make any more sense to them, now that they can feel some degree of the alien gestalt.  They reply in the negative.
• John starts aligning the group to breach.  The psychics will be the first in the room, as they have the best chance of winning a battle of wills with a prophet.
• Squad B reports an aural contact from their left side, near one of the engines.  That means aliens are now behind at least two doors on this level.  Put more simply: we’re flanked.
• John guesses that the prophet won’t risk himself while his underlings die.  Squad A will cover the control center door while Squad B eliminates the engine room threat.
• Dan is the first through the door.  Two hulks and a bully are waiting for him.  In a rather uncanny display of skill, he kills one of the hulks and then deals a massive wound to the bully.  Adam successfully invades the mind of the bully and finds it surprisingly easy to terrify.  But before he’s done, Dan plants his third, rapid-fire shot, sending the bully over the edge of the craft.  After an exchange lasting only a few seconds, all that remains around the engine is a single hulk.
• With the surviving alien cowering below a ramp, it makes easy prey for Cape’s heavy weapon.
• No sooner than the two squads rejoin, John calls for the control room barrier to be dropped.  The prophet stands there, unflinching, while its two elite guards run for cover.  Back at C3, Tex and Ryan try to guess what would motivate that sort of behavior.  Is it panicked?  Putting away its conventional soldiers as a sign it wants to challenge our psychics?  Or maybe just resigned to its fate and waiting to die?
• Adam and Chris are first into the room.  Eager to see how vulnerable we really are, they both lock minds with it.  Chris finds himself unable to penetrate its defenses.  But Jimmy pours plasma into its side, disrupting its concentration.  Adam then breaks through, turning its own twisted nightmares in on itself.  The creature spreads its arms and screams before exploding in a wave of psychic energy.
• One guard remains in hiding.  The other attempts a shot at Adam but misses, blowing apart a nearby console.
• With the prophet down, John sends the team forward.  Dan deals a grave injury to the first guard, and Jimmy finishes the work.
• Chris Mais fires at the remaining alien, dodges a return shot, and then pegs it a second time.  The xeno falls dead.
• 15 aliens dead.  0 human losses or serious injuries.
• After the team is back at base, Tex asks Dan for his honest opinion.  Sidestepping the intended question, Dan replies, “The heavy armor is making us too slow.  I didn’t see it when I was leading teams, but you can really notice it from the back line.  If that inter-dimensional, cloaking…whatever…armor that our science team drew up actually works, we need to start switching the team to those suits, instead.”
• While Dan’s behavior still seems unpredictable outside of combat, he was calm, team-oriented, and skilled on the battlefield.  Tex signs off on his combat-readiness release.
• While we lack the resources to equip the entire team with “ghost” armor, Dan still has Dr. Shen begin construction of the first suits.
• Adam and Chris are summoned for an immediate examination by the medical and science teams.  Both of them can feel their minds expanding.  Based on a debriefing of the examination group, Chris seems to emanate an aura of fear, while Adam seems to emanate a sense of equally unnatural peace.

• As written by Dan Krenzke…

  Krenzke marched down the hall to the Colonel’s office. The door was opened with purpose and closed in the same manner. When Dan looked up, he met Krenzke’s eyes that were full of indignation.

  “How dare you believe what the enemy shows you,” Krenzke said as he closed the distance to the desk and slammed his fists on it. “You are falling for the oldest trick of warfare. They are collapsing your will to fight. You are choosing to believe the half-truth and outright lies they feed you.

  “Are the lives of Chris, Pat, and the others lost in vain? Have all we fought for been nothing but a higher level of slavery or worse? If there is even a scrap of hope, I will dare to trust in it. If I have to board that damn monstrosity and fight it down their throat myself, I will. If that is the only hope we have left, I will do it.

  “Now, are you going to believe there is a God in heaven and He has placed you here for a time as this? That He has given you the ability to adapt, improvise, and overcome. He has surrounded you with people that have the skills to think and fight. They have faith in what they fight for. You helped build that, and your current attitude will destroy it.

  “So, what will it be? Are you going to self-correct you anal-cranial inversion? Or do I have put my boot in your ass to remove the stink in your think? I’m growing old, Sunshine! What is it going to be?”

• As written by Dan Repperger…

  “When does a Marine stop being a Marine?” Dan mused aloud, turning off the console on his desk.  The last few work orders could wait a little longer.  “I told you I had some things I wanted to say.  I was prepared to tell you, because I trust you implicitly.  I don’t know you as well as many people in the base, but the unflappability of your passion is impossible to miss.  In return, I need you to trust that my thinking is sound, and I’m not parroting something I’ve heard from the aliens.  How weak do you think I am?  I bend and bend and bend, into a warped and unrecognizable shape, but I never break.

  “Do you know where I’ve been hiding when I disappear?  Alien containment.  The jar blocks telepathic attacks, so it’s the one place where I know my thoughts are my own.  And sitting in there, I’ve spent hours connecting and reconnecting the dots, reviewing months of project history.  No matter how I add it up, I keep coming to the same conclusion.  We never understood the war we were fighting, and as a result, we lost it months ago.  I only wish you had trusted me and waited for the invitation I promised back when you were in the psi-lab.  Instead, you’ve reinforced my truest fear: the team won’t have any faith in my state of mind and therefore won’t believe my conclusions unless they see them unfold firsthand.

  “Just please believe me when I say that I’m dedicated, heart and soul, to this project…the family I have here…the people that have died…the righteous cause we stand for.  I may not be the sort of leader you expected, but I’ll see this through to the end.  You’ll have your chance to take down that alien ship, and I absolutely believe we’ll succeed.  I also suspect you’ll soon understand why the prospect of that ‘success’ terrifies me more than the image of that vessel burning our world to ashes.”

• With only 17 hours left on the second round of psi-testing volunteers, a saucer is spotted landing in Washington state.  Dr. Shen indicates that a prophet is part of their crew.
• Tex will lead this mission himself.  The team will consist of Chris Ings, Beth, John, and the two LIGHTNING units.  Ryan will run C3.  If the previous mission was a club of brute force, this one will be a dagger.
• When the team hits down, no aliens are in sight.  Chris is told to put the new SHIVs through their paces.  These dogs come with new tricks!  After a few taps on the remote control unit, L1 and L2 both open up their underbellies, spreading out flaps that glow with otherworldly energy.  Then they begin to ascend, searching the battlefield from above.
• It isn’t long before they spot a trio of heavy cyborgs.
• Apparently accepting the challenge for air supremacy, one of the aliens takes flight.  It fires on L1, but the shots miss.
• Showing an incredible understanding of our technology, the remaining two cyborgs skip past the SHIVs and assail Chris.  Despite his cover, the first shot hits.  He howls in pain, and his vitals waver.
• Chris starts to call for support but is cut off when a second volley hits the exact same spot as the first.
• Tex tells Beth and John to move in to save him.  Ryan countermands the order.  “He’s gone.  All vitals are flat.”
• For fear of the situation careening out of control, Adam is summoned to C3 to take control of the LIGHTNING units.  The team on the field just hunkers down as Tex prepares a new strategy.
• While the SHIVs await a controller, they continue following their last set of orders.  As if avenging their creator, they strike down the two cyborgs that shot him.
• The surviving (and flying) cyborg retreats from the field, apparently no longer interested in an air duel.
• If Dr. Vahlen’s estimate of the cyborg’s intelligence is correct, then her understanding of alien field command must also be correct.  A precision kill that left our drones in an uncertain state could only come from an advanced mind, like that of the prophet.  But behind the organized attack, Tex sees fear.  It needed Chris dead, because it can’t fight mechanical opponents.
• Taking control of the robots, Adam brings them back down to the ground.  Tex consolidates the team into a better firing position.  Though everyone knows an ally is dead, only Beth can actually see the corpse.  Indeed, she has to pass over the smoldering body on her way back to the team.
• L1 spots the remaining cyborg and buries it.  But right on its heels comes three more cyborgs and then a trio of hulks.
• Ryan notes the shift in alien strategy: they’re hitting us with everything at once.  Tex calls for the team to pull back into a gauntlet of ambush positions.  Let’s see if the prophet can keep his charge in good order.
• One hulk takes the bait and falls to our concentrated fire.  The other aliens just hold their positions around the craft.  They’ve adapted their strategy again.  Ryan starts working out the best approaches for a run on the craft.
• Tex makes an observation: We’re hiding behind the machines, but the prophet is hiding from the machines.  He orders Adam to use L1 and L2 to hold the left flank — nothing more.  The human elements will advance on the right flank, keeping the robots in good shape for their confrontation with the alien leader.  Two medics and a sniper are hardly the ideal mix for this strategy, but you use what you’ve got.
• In a sign we have their attention, the previously bashful aliens suddenly turn up the heat on our left flank.  When we fail to respond as they’d hoped, a cyborg is sent to jump behind our lines.  Beth turns and strikes it down.  It’s beginning to look like they’re losing control of the battlefield.
• Another cyborg charges us, but Tex lightens its payload by one head.  We know the prophet has a limited force onsite, so this is a losing strategy for his side.
• As we get a little closer to the craft, the prophet is spotted right behind one of the doors, flanked by two elite guards.  He’s out of his usual position.  Tex manages to kill one of the guards, but those SHIVs have to begin their run immediately.
• Beth alone has eyes on the prophet, so she’s ordered to retreat from its gaze.
• The SHIVs race into the craft.  A second hulk is spotted, but Adam keeps the guns trained on the intended target.  Two shots and the prophet goes down.  As the xeno dies, it releases an energy wave that destroys a nearby Elerium stack, killing the new hulk.  C3 reports that all we’ve got left is one elite guard.
• John stings the elite, and Tex deals the kill.  Unfortunately, it gets off a shot first, destroying L2.
• During the flight back, Tex can feel the emotional pressure mounting.  His soldiers are seated around a body bag, holding the remains of Christopher “Kingpin” Ings.  His wife, Jennifer, is living at the base and will find out soon enough.  To compound the problem, the SHIVs no longer have a dedicated operator, the group’s rightful leader is still under psych eval, and three soldiers are locked up in in the psionics lab.
• A memorial is scheduled for Chris Ings the following day.  It only seems right to wait until the troops in the psi lab are out, so they can say their own goodbyes.
• When Tex arrives at the end of the testing cycle, Dr. Vahlen has assembled quite a team there.  Chad and Chris Hussey were both “ungifted”, but Chris Mais’ body accepted the biological and cybernetic implants.  When told about Chris Ings death, he replies that he already knew.  When asked how the implants are affecting him, he remarks that he no longer sees the world so much as feels it.  The science team seems ecstatic, but Dr. Shen is horrified.  He ponders aloud what we’ve sacrificed to gain insight about their technology and whether this means the end of an era, regardless of which side wins.
• Tex allows the scientists to continue their observation of Chris Mais, if for no other reason than to make sure he doesn’t go into shock or mass rejection of the implants.
• The memorial for Chris Ings is held hours later.  Dan agrees to speak.  Despite days of seclusion, he seems well composed.  He reads from Scripture and eulogizes his fallen friend.  He ends his remarks with the comment that Chris was a man who “saw the right way forward”, offering no explanation as to what that meant.
• That evening, the team gathers for drinks in the rec room.  Chris’ picture is added to the memorial wall, and the proper rites are held there.  By the following morning, Adam, Julia, and Rachelle are summoned to the psi-lab.  The vats are ready for them.
• After getting formal permission from Tex, Dan resumes his duties over the base’s supply chain.  He orders plasma pistols to be constructed as replacements for everyone’s laser sidearms.  He permits the construction of psionic-amplifying armor for Chris Mais.  Three SHIVs are started.  Two upgraded launchers are ordered for the heavy gunners, with two more planned should we get the necessary resources.
• Last of all, he submits a troop requisition.  Chris Ings has to be replaced, and Dan has chosen Cape Rust.  The engineering team is ordered to give him a crash course on heavy weaponry and SHIV operation.
• The council report arrives at the end of the month, but Dan deletes the email without even opening it.

• Lacking options, Tex opts for a brute force approach to the mission.  Chris Hussey will lead Jimmy, Chad, Rachelle, Adam, and Scott.  Tex will operate C3.
• The team lands right by a rail station.  Spotting familiar, green devices, Tex informs the team they’re priming mechanisms.  They can follow them to the bomb, disarming them as they go to slow the detonation.
• Chris rushes to the first one and turns it off.  Dr. Shen congratulates him, and then starts to add that we need still need to hurry.  Realizing he’s about to insult our intelligence (or “Vahlen”, as we’ve come to call it), he just lets his voice trail off.
• Adam spots the first aliens.  It looks like the area is swarming with barfers.  That’s great news, as they’ll be easy prey for our heavy-but-imprecise squad.
• The fight is simple in nature, but built on endless attrition.  There are more aliens than humans, but our gear and soldiers are of a higher quality.
• One after another, the barfers fall dead.  The armor on our soldiers is getting worn down, but they simply can’t stop our march toward the bomb.
• The fight shifts into a train.  Its cars are getting trashed, but at least the larger target — the rail network itself — will be saved in the process.
• Chris deactivates the bomb.  In either a fit of revenge or attempt to rearm it, a half-dozen barfers jump down from the train station’s rooftop.  Some of them hit the ground dead.  Those that survive begin another shootout with our team.
• With his armor finally wrecked, Adam’s vitals waver; the shots are getting through to his flesh.  He’s told to pull back and treat himself.  The problem is that barfers are fast and have us almost constantly surrounded, so it’s rather difficult to identify a “safe” location.
• 16 xenos dead.  1 human injured, but none lost.  And the people of Japan are grateful for our intervention.  Back at base, Tex can’t help but label the mission as “sloppy”.  But what choice did he have?  The combat team is too small to be down so many people at once.
• Shortly after the team returns, our first hover SHIVs come online.  Deciding they need a new name, Chris Ings calls this model the LIGHTNING.  L1 and L2 are sent for testing, after which they’ll be added to combat rotation.
• The first round of psionics testing ends.  None of the first volunteers were a match.
• Chris Hussey and Chris Mais volunteer for the second round.  Adam offers to go, despite Dan’s pleadings for him not to.  For better or worse, the medical team disqualifies him until his injuries are treated.  Chris Ings is also scratched from the list, as he’s needed for SHIV testing.  Chad agrees to take the final slot.

• As written by Dan Krenzke… 

  Krenzke quietly opened the door. Col. Repperger laid in the bed, conscious, but absorbed in his own thoughts as he looked away from the door. Krenzke grabbed the uncomfortable, metal chair found in every military hospital room. He plopped it next to the bed and sat, just looking at Dan.When the Colonel finally turned his head, both men locked eyes. Time didn’t matter as they sat there. It was Krenzke’s voice that broke the silence. “Afraid of the ‘what ifs’?” The question came out more as a statement. After another undetermined pause Krenzke answered, “Me too.”

  The want of an emotional release clung to the room as both men looked at each other. Krenzke’s voice again broke the silence, “If I had killed Karla, would you have forgiven me?” The question floated there as he left the room.

• As written by Dan Krenzke…After talking to Col. Repperger (the elder one) about the “tests”, Krenzke went back to his quarters and spent the next several hours writing letters and messages to friends and family…just in case. He checked his will and powers of attorney. All is in order. Rufus kept pestering for attention. He was nervous and scared about something.  He knows, Krenzke thought.

  When the last of the arrangements were made, he took the Rottie for a long walk in the crisp, winter air. When they returned, Rufus did not pace nearly as much. Dinner helped calm both man and dog. He grabbed his Bible and it fell open to Psalm 4, a Psalm of safety for the faithful. The last verse set a calm over him. “I will both lie down in peace, and sleep; For You alone, O LORD, make me dwell in safety.” No nightmare disturbed his sleep since the encounter with the gray.

• As written by Dan Repperger… From: dan@xcomops.com
  Sent: January-16-2016 3:48 PM
  To: krenzke@xcomops.com
  Subject: it feels easier to talk to someone that can’t reply

  As I’m writing this email, you’re in the psi chamber. I can only guess what it’s like to be in suspended animation for 10 days. I’m told they’re stimulating various parts of your brain, so I can only imagine the dreams you’re having.

  I’ve intercepted the early results. Though Dr. Vahlen isn’t certain of what success looks like, her notes imply you aren’t it. I don’t know what softer term she’ll use when talking to you, but her notes categorize anyone that doesn’t pass as a “failure”.

  Just after Christmas, you asked if I was frightened of “what ifs”. I’d be lying to say I’m not, but that’s no longer what cripples my mind and destroys my peace. After the prophet attacked me, I started thinking in new directions. I saw patterns and truths I’ve previously missed.

  I finally understand why that ship over Brazil hasn’t done anything.  I understand why the aliens won’t kill me.  I understand why the council neither lets us succeed nor fail.  They aliens have already beaten us. Hell, they did it months ago.

  I don’t expect any of this to make sense just yet, and it isn’t safe to explain what I mean. Just keep fighting as you always have. That ship must come down. Even if we can’t create victory anymore, we can at least determine what a defeat looks like. And I’d like it to be one that has the aliens off their script.

  As for me, I’ll tell the doctors whatever it is they want to hear to clear me for combat.  I won’t stop standing by my team…my friends…my family…until this is done.

  And by the way, while I’d never label you as a “failure”, I’m glad to hear Vahlen didn’t find what she wanted in you.

• As most of the base rings in the new year, Dan is still in the infirmary.  Karla remains by his side, and some of the party eventually migrates into his hospital room, despite the objections of the attending nurse.  Dan seems lost in his own thoughts, sometimes having to be addressed multiple times before he responds to even simple gestures.
• By the time Midnight has passed, the ball has dropped over Times Square, and the doctors have finally shooed away the small crowd, Dan asks Tex to stay.  He takes a stack of papers from the nightstand by his bed and hands them to his older brother.  Skimming the pages, Tex sees the Voynich and Rosetta documents, both of which now have “Approved” stamped across them in red ink.  “Because of what happened on the saucer?” Tex asks. Dan shakes his head.  “Only volunteers,” is all he replies.
• The following day, Dan is discharged from the medical lab, though he resumes almost none of his duties.  Instead, he just moves about the base like a ghost, regularly visiting the psionics lab as it’s being built.
• The lab is finished within a week.  When Tex goes down to inspect it, Dr. Vahlen and Dr. Shen are both already there.  Vahlen is eager to begin putting our soldiers through testing.  Shen is more reserved.  He informs the active commander that the test is conducted by attempting a change.  In other words, if a candidate is found to be a fit for the psionics project, they will come out with genetic and cybernetic work already performed on them.  There’s no other way to test whether a person is compatible with the process.  Anyone that volunteers must be committed to the change.  Suddenly Dan’s comment of, “Only volunteers,” makes a lot more sense.
• Tex assembles the combat team.  He shows them the chamber and explains how the process works.  Several people step forward.  John, Ryan, and Krenzke are chosen for the first round.  They’ll spend the next 10 days hooked up to machines as their minds are analyzed and genetics tested for compatibility with the tissue enhancements.  One at a time, they’re locked away in their sensory deprivation tanks as Dr. Vahlen gets to work.
• On January 10th, our alert network picks up a saucer landed in northern Canada.  It appears to be on an abduction mission.  The crew consists of 12 xenos.  Most of them are the various sub-species of hulks, but there’s also a prophet and something we haven’t seen in a very long time: the original model of cyborg.  A new mission objective is added to bring that alien back alive.  Everything else comes home in body bags.
• With Ryan in the psi-lab and Dan relapsing psychologically, Tex will have to lead this one himself.  He requests Chris Mais, Julia, Adam, and both of the SHIV units.  The prophet can play with the GOLIATHs this time out.  Chad is given C3.
• The team begins moving through the woods.  Several minutes pass with no eyes on aliens or the saucer.  It’s starting to feel like the squad is wandering around lost, but Chad keeps insisting the saucer is directly north of their position.
• At long last, Chris Mais gets eyes on the ship.  And right along its front are three cyborgs.  Two will die here, but one will die after a long chat in our holding facility.
• While the xenos put up a decent fight — and even manage to tear up G4 a bit — the obsolete designs are simply no match for our advanced weaponry.  Two are killed and the third is chased back into the ship.
• A bully and hulk try to dig the cyborg out of its quandary, but they fare no better.
• To avoid sending humans into the craft, thus risking an encounter with the prophet, Tex makes the call to use the SHIVs as bait.
• The plan seems to be working at first.  The cyborg comes rushing out for easy shots on G3.  But as Chris Mais is moving into position, three elite hulks emerge from the saucer.  Their heavy plasma weapons reduce G3 to a molten heap.  G4 has now become a very valuable asset, as it’s the one thing left on our team that can’t be mind-controlled.
• G4 avenges its sister, killing one of the elites.  Tex manages to bring the other two to heel before they can retaliate again.  And as the smoke clears, Chris is standing over a shocked and convulsing cyborg.  Now to just get the prophet on his back and head home.
• The surviving GOLIATH enters the craft.  The human soldiers gather outside the entrance, fixated on Chad’s play-by-play of Chris Ings’ progress.
• G4 spots a hulk and drops it.  Something else was with it, but we couldn’t get a solid ID on the species.
• It was a bully!  The monster rushes out and slams its body into the SHIV.  The drone shudders under the impact.  Back at C3, its system diagram is lighting up with a long string of failures and alerts.
• Given how much we need the SHIV for the prophet, Tex orders it to fall back.  The human ambush can deal with the bully.
• The bully refuses to follow.  Moving up just a little, the snipers get a bead on it.  Tex misses, but Julia is able to pop it in the head.  Annoyed and injured, it charges forward, and Chris Mais puts it on the ground.
• Back on the prowl, G4 finds the prophet and its elite bodyguard near the aft of the ship.  It gives the prophet a beating, but the xeno remains defiantly afloat.
• The psychic wanders the room, apparently unprepared to deal with a mechanical adversary.  Its bodyguard tries to chase the SHIV away but fails to deal any damage.  G4 keeps on its quarry, dealing another serious wound to the alien leader.
• C3 frantically reports a series of disturbing images.  The prophet locked eyes with its bodyguard.  The lesser alien’s body withered as the psychic seemed to absorbs its tissue.  Seconds later, the now half-decayed hulk was still able to destroy G4.  The human team is on its own.
• Tex manages to spot the hulk from afar and behead it.  It’s the lesser of the two evils, but at least the psychic’s life battery is out of play.
• Adam rushes forward a bit and spots the prophet in a neighboring room.  He manages to give it a chestful of plasma.  Putting on the hustle, Chris Mais comes in behind Adam and paints the walls with red robes and purple flesh.
• 11 xenos dead and 1 captured.  No human losses or injuries.  Both SHIVs are down, but they’ll be replaced.
• When the plane returns, the cyborg is thrown into the containment center.  It puts up a bit of a fight, but nothing like what we’ve seen from some of the newer aliens.  During the interrogation, our science team determines the specimen has almost nothing resembling sapience.  It appears that more “important” aliens chose to reduce it to an almost animal intelligence through genetic manipulation.
• Construction is started on two new SHIVs, though we decide to try out some hovering models that use technology we’ve gleaned from the aliens.
• After things have settled down a bit, Karla approaches Tex.  Near the tail end of their most recent mission, Dan said he could hear the prophet talking.  “Why was he in C3?” Tex asks.  “He wasn’t,” Karla replies.  “He was in our quarters.”
• The Egyptian military requests another sample of our simpler body armor designs.  We promptly send them some unused equipment for review.
• With only two days left before the new SHIVs come online and critical team members are released from psionic testing, the chairman sends an emergency request.  The aliens appear to be in the process of wiring a Japanese rail hub with explosives.  We can only presume this is meant as pure terrorism.  Looking over a roster of indisposed and fatigued soldiers, Tex starts making some hard choices about who to send.

• The whole world has watched the massive alien ship for days, but it still has yet to do anything.  No bombardments, no pollutants, no troops disgorged…it just hangs there, menacing but silent.  Dan stared at the image for nearly an hour, trying to put himself in the aliens’ shoes.  Why bring it here to just sit idly over Brazil?
• A scout saucer is spotted over Argentina.  While we have no way of knowing for sure, we guess it’s far enough from the mothership that it won’t receive any direct support, so we launch a standard jet with an EMP armament.
• Interception is successful!  Information decoded from the Hyperwave Relay suggest its crew consists of 10 xenos.  Most are variants of the hulks, but some barfers and at least one prophet are also aboard.  It’s good to go in prepared for the prophet, but it’s distressing to confirm our prior specimen wasn’t unique.
• Dan will lead Scott, Jimmy, Rachelle, Adam, and Chad on the clean-up team.  No live specimens are to be brought back this time — only corpses.
• We touch down on frigid, rocky terrain.  Several fires are burning from the crash.  The team is ordered forward to cover.  The prophet will likely hide in the control room, but we can at least strip away his more conventional support.
• The two barfers are waiting in ambush right by our drop site.  We’ve been told our new armor can filter out their caustic spray.  Fortunately or unfortunately, the theory isn’t put to the test; Rachelle and Adam each claim a kill.
• The saucer is sitting in a crater of its own creation to the northwest.  We begin spreading out to cover two of its sides.
• We reach the edge of the craft without encountering any additional xenos.  Dan begins to wonder if the plan of catching them in groups is a bust.  Just then, Scott radios back visual contact on three elite hulks in the nearby woods.  Two hulks and a bully immediately join the attack, emerging from the saucer’s entryway.  Our team is now flanked.
• Chad manages to drop an elite.  Shots light up the evening sky as both sides fire, but few plasma bolts hit home.
• The bully leaps over the ledge Dan was using for cover, and smashes him with incredible force.  His armor keeps bones from breaking, but the hit still jars his head.
• In panicked retaliation, the commander kills the massive xeno, a barrage of hardened, metal shards tearing through its armor.  The rest of the team continues their shootout with the surviving hulks, but neither side can seem to hit anything more than rocks and trees.
• A hulk shoots up Adam.  His armor holds.
• Dan isn’t so lucky.  Another alien opens up, blasting through his kit and burning his torso.
• The firefight continues for several volleys before the aliens finally fall.  Though only one human has taken damage beyond their armor, the prophet is still waiting ahead, armed with psychic capabilities more frightening than the biggest guns they’ve put on the field.
• The squad tightens up their ranks within sight of the craft’s main entrance.  Everyone pauses to reload while Adam and Rachelle tend to Dan’s wound.  Everyone tries to steel their mind, knowing that in a few seconds we’ll storm the craft.  After that, we may become just as dangerous to each other as we are to the enemy.
• And it begins.  Just as we’re about to move, the prophet yells something out, his words echoing from deep in the saucer, though none of us can make them out.
• It repeats the same phrase.  The squad members all give shrugs and “no copy” replies.  Is it even speaking English?  Is it addressing its fellows in their native tongue?  None of it makes sense, when our science team is so certain the entire alien hierarchy is guided by a psychic gestalt, negating the need to speak to anyone but the very humans that can’t understand the message.
• Dan, Scott, and Jimmy approach the door.  Chad gives them cover.  The medics are told to hold for now, since they may be needed to revive someone from friendly fire.
• We sweep through the front and middle of the craft, finding the compartments devoid of life.  Everyone but Adam is ordered up.  He’ll be our one prayer of medical salvation if we turn our guns on each other.
• At last we find it: a prophet and his elite bodyguard.  Chad tosses a remote sensor into their room.  We take up firing positions, but for the moment, it’s their move.
• The prophet floats into view, its four arms spread out in a languid pose.  Dan feeds it a round from his shotgun.  The alien winces, but then it locks eyes with the commander.  It forces him into a corner of his mind, overwhelming everything that was once the man.  His shotgun tracks back toward the rest of the team.
• Seconds later, the bodyguard rushes into view.  His shots injure Jimmy, and his sheer mass is now blocking the door.  It has to die before anyone can attempt to kill Dan’s mental captor.
• Jimmy retaliates, killing the elite that wounded him.  With the way open, the team moves on the alien psychic.
• Rachelle shoots the prophet, only to have her shot bounced right back into her armor.
• Chad attempts a shot but misses, blasting apart a wall of the craft instead.  Knowing he has to make his second shot count, he resettles his rifle and fires again.  This time the metallic mask explodes, and the burning robes of the alien prophet flutter to the ground.
• 10 aliens dead.  Several human injuries, but no one lost.
• The entire way back, Dan sits in a corner, alone.  He doesn’t respond to even the most simple inquiries, except to occasionally whisper that he can still hear the prophet’s voice.  Chad is forced to give C3 the mission report.
• When the team arrives back at base, Dan is taken to the infirmary.  His physical wounds alone will take four days to be treated, and there’s no telling what sort of psychological trauma the aliens created or exacerbated.  His existing brain injuries will only make the situation worse.  Tex again assumes full command of the XCOM initiative.
• Using the salvage from the recent outing, Tex puts through a few engineering upgrades.  But when he starts going through Dan’s paperwork, he finds Dr. Vahlen’s recent reminders of projects Voynich and Rosetta.  He puts them aside for now.  However, when Dr. Vahlen sends up plans for a purely external psi amplifier — worn like armor — Tex approves resources for the project.  It’s not until later that evening he finds out the armor would only be of any use if worn by a transhuman psionicist.
• The medical team provides a full evaluation for the wounded commander.  He’s not genuinely catatonic, as he responds from time to time.  But the combination of months of emotional pressure, brain injury suffered at the hands of a disc, and now this mental intrusion…it all may have been too much for him.  The chief physician urges Tex not to take any option off the table, including permanent discharge on medical grounds.
• Several days later, the council gives us yet another A-rating.  Tex is glad the reports are arriving via email, so he doesn’t have to explain his brother’s absence.

• As written by Dan Krenzke…

  The morning ritual of popping joints and stretching knotted muscles began as he woke up. Rufus popped up and shook. His collar jingled with the metal tags hanging from it.

  Forty-six and still playing a younger man’s game, Krenzke thought as his feet hit the cold, linoleum floor. Both man and dog moved with stiffness to the kitchenette. The popping of pill bottles began. Two Excedrin for the caffeine and minor headache that was coming on. Four Advil for the muscle and joint aches. Glucosamine/ Chondroitin to keep the arthritis in his hands at bay. The ubiquitous multivitamins. A glass of water was poured, the handful of pill went into the mouth, and then a swallow of water took it all in.

  The bottle of pills that “Lefty” brought remained on the shelf. The nightmare showed again last night. If not for the exertion of battle, it would have kept him up, again. He hated pills like that. It was bad enough to have the xeno in his head. Why muddle it with mind-altering drugs. He rubbed his scalp vigorously as if to erase the memory, then dog and man continued the rest of the morning routine.

  When finished and dressed in civilian attire, Krenzke asked Rufus, “Wanna go for a ride?” The 95-lbs dog leaped like a puppy and scrambled for the door. A reminder of who led the parade was given as they made their way to the old Ford pick-up. Rufus jumped into the cab at the first opportunity. It was a good jaunt into town. They went to various places pick things up. The chill of the December day showed no bother to either of them.

  The atmosphere in town was tense, but hopeful. More than a few displays of gratitude were shown. A wave of greeting. A handshake. A hug. A hearty ‘Merry Christmas’. All were received in stride. As man and dog fulfilled their personal mission.

  They made their way back. A couple of trips had the cargo unloaded. The rest of the day was filled with assembling and decorating a Christmas tree as well as wrapping gifts. He ate a bit here and there as the day went on. When finished, he went into the cupboard and pulled a bottle of Jameson Reserve and pored a measure over ice. He took to the laptop on the desk and sent and email to all: “If you want a Christmas present, be at my quarters on Christmas Eve, at 19:00. … Krenzke.”

  With that done he sat in the easy chair with Rufus coming along side for some well deserved ear-scratching.

• As written by Beth Roper…

  Beth tried as hard as she could to make Christmas festive for the boys. It was their first Christmas without their daddy and celebrated in a military bunker. The odds were not in her favor, but she did the best she could. There was a sad looking tree with as many ornaments as she could scavenge and a few wrapped presents that Connor shook 500 times trying to figure out what was in them. She took them to the kitchen and they made “fur balls” (orange cookies with coconut) and other Christmas cookies just like they always did with Daddy.

  On Christmas Eve, they went around the bunker caroling and passing out treats. The boys had made a card for each member of the team and hand delivered them with the seriousness of children. To their credit, even the most stoic managed a smile and “Merry Christmas” for the boys. They put out “fur balls” and milk for Santa, and she finally got the boys to bed. Santa wasn’t bringing much more in the way of presents, certainly not the puppy or the bike that had been promised. There would be other Christmases, she told herself firmly, without aliens and danger. One where they were in their own home, but never one with Pat again.

  She would not cry this Christmas, Beth told herself firmly. She glanced at her watch. She was late for Krenzke’s, and she put down an involuntary shiver. Pat used to call her the emotional barometer. If there was one thing she could do, it was read a room. There was something off with him and Ryan as much as it pained her to admit it. Whether it was stress or an after effect of the alien attack, she didn’t know. There could not be dissension in the ranks, they had to trust each other, but…everything felt wrong. If they were struggling against the aliens still, she wanted to help get them back. She didn’t know Krenzke as well, but he seemed like a good guy. Ryan had been nothing but good to her and the boys, and was now family. She wasn’t giving them over the the aliens without a fight. It was something to chat about with Dan, but not on Christmas Eve.

  A couple of her rookies came by to watch the boys while she stepped out. She gave them a plate of cookies and thanked them profusely. Now to see what Krenzke and the others had planned.

• As written by Dan Repperger…

  From: dan@xcomops.com
  Sent: December-25-2015 9:07 PM
  To: chad@xcomops.com
  Subject: the best present I can give you

  So I was trying to think of what I could get you this Christmas.  I contemplated alien alloy, but we’re fresh out.  Then I thought about a scientist that can make observations like “the crashed alien ship is made out of rugged materials” or “we’ve never seen that alien before”.  But word has it you’ve already got one of those.  In fact, I think we all do.

  With those scratched off, here’s what I came up with.  You hate your nickname, Cyclops, right?  I think the team gave it to you, because of the way you squint with one eye, even when you’re off the sniper rifle for a second.  Or maybe they just know how much you have that particular mutant.  Anyway, I’ve entered the following call signs for our new members, as picked randomly from a dictionary.  I hope their misery lifts your spirits.

  Rachelle Brandel – Stacks
  Dan Krenzke – Duke (ok, that’s no so bad, but I had to stick to the rules)
  Scott Bonner – Disco

  So when you go to bed tonight, just know that Cyclops has been beaten out by Disco.

  P.S. Please do not forward this email to Scott.  If you do, I will reenter you in the system as Scott Summers.  For your real name.  I’m not kidding.

• As written by Dan Krenzke…

  Krenzke’s small, one bedroom efficiency became a bustle of activity. Hors d’vours were set out. Beer and other drinks liberally dispensed. At the appropriate time, Krenzke got everyone’s attention and said, “Well, Santa Claus knows you’ve all been good boys and girls this year. Saving the world definitely puts you on the nice list. So, he asked me to go to town and rummage through Grandpa Jenkin’s General Store. If you can’t find it there, it ain’t worth having. Without further delay…”

  For Colonel Repperger:  It was a large box with a note attached: “For those high activity disciplinary counseling session.” The wrapping paper was quickly removed. Inside were two pair of boxing gloves and two of the training helmets.

  For Ryan:  The box was a standard size. The wrapping paper was Christmas scenes with Sesame Street characters. The note read: “Medicine for your next treatment.” Ryan shook the box and the laughter and giggling of a red, furry muppet could be heard. Yes, he got his own Tickle-Me Elmo.

  For Beth:  The gift was wrapped in typical Christmas paper (thankfully). It was the size of a CD case. The note read: “He’s one of your boys now.” She removed the paper to see a sterling silver, folding picture frame. When she pivoted the frames on the hinges the photos came into view, one of her two boys the other of Rufus when he was about a year old. The Rottie came over to her, sat down, and tapped her leg with his paw. She instinctively scratched his head.

  For “Lefty” and the medical staff:  The gift was not even wrapped. It was a pill bottle, full of drugs, sealed in a block of clear epoxy. The label showed it was the last prescription that they delivered for Krenzke three days ago.

  Other gifts were given. Most were pleasantly surprised. As the mess of wrapping paper was cleaned up, Krenzke got everyone’s attention again and asked all to get a drink in hand. “Most of us are celebrating the birth of Jesus. There is a verse of Scripture that is most appropriate for this company. ‘There is no greater love than for a man to lay down his life for his friends.’ A salute to fallen friends and their love.” He raised his glass in honor of their memory.

• As written by Dan Repperger…

  With the XCOM staff almost universally tied up with their celebrations, Dan slipped into the command center.  He sat down at the primary C3 console.  Glancing to make sure no one was nearby, he closed down the camera feeds and mission recordings, opening up the satellite interface.  After retrieving a device from his pocket, he connected it to the system and offloaded a message.  It had been highly encrypted and bounced all over the world, but it had been done with a particular level of technology — one that was below what XCOM now possessed.  After watching the system work for several minutes, he finally saw a single point of light appear on the continental US.  Smiling to himself, he unplugged the device and returned the computer to its prior state, leaving the room with just a few nods and holiday greetings to the skeleton crew stuck watching for saucers.  It wouldn’t be long before the first shot was fired in his private war.

• Any debates over the nature and sanctity of human life are cut short by a priority alert.  Aliens are attacking Bangalore, India.
• Ryan is given control of the mission.  He chooses Chad, Julia, John, Beth, and Krenzke to complete the team.
• Dan gives Tex C3 before retreating to his office.  With an alien craft the size of Virginia now parked over the planet, it’s going to take a lot to keep the world from panicking and its leaders from attempting a nuclear solution that could destroy South America when that much Elerium goes up.
• The squad puts down in a densely-populated neighborhood.  Apartment buildings and shops flank the street.  Many of the buildings are on fire, and crumbling brick walls are pouring into the streets.  With the heavy gunners on fatigue rotation, Ryan will have to make this work with his sniper-heavy team.
• As the team fans out, there are no immediate contacts.  However, sirens can be heard moving up and down the street.  Then a group of helicopters circles nearby, raining down machine gun fire.  Instead of just rolling over, the Indians are fighting back!
• Bugs and heavy cyborgs are swarming around the building.  They trade shots with our team, but given our better position and more accurate weapons, aliens alone pay the price.  Two cyborgs and a bug are down in seconds.
• Krenzke moves to scout ahead of the team, though never straying from the range of the snipers and medics.  Peering into a cafe, he spots a locust and its drones.
• Tex recommends the team fallback slowly, creating a gauntlet for the machine to run.  Since Ryan is near the end, he tells him to listen carefully.  Several missions back, Tex discovered a weak point on the locust, located just beneath its beam cannon.  If Ryan can recreate that shot, he might be able to cut it down to size without the benefit of heavy weapons.
• Krenzke runs forward just far enough to coax a civilian out of the impending line of fire.  He then retreats around a corner, ducking into a grocery store.
• A bug skitters toward Krenzke.  Chad manages a shot through the store’s window, putting it down for good.  However, it apparently already had some fun of its own, as a zombie is following the alien’s course.
• The locust smashes through the cafe’s wall.  Ryan attempts the shot, but its chassis is still closed, so there’s nothing vulnerable to hit.  The machine parks itself in a corner, starting its power-up cycle.  That leaves a very small window to either bring it down or flee the area.
• With the zombie on the flank, Ryan chooses the latter.  The team begins to encircle the locust, though each member is running for cover instead of firing.  Temporarily safe from the alien machine’s line-of-sight, Krenzke charges down the zombie and shreds it.
• Two bugs come through the same door the zombie just took.  They posture in front of Krenzke, but getting no reaction, they spread out in search of easier victims.
• The locust’s chassis opens and the beam cannon rises up.  Three deafening blasts split the air, passing within inches of Chad.  Though a bit startled, he’s unhurt.
• It’s only a matter of time before that cannon connects, so Ryan reverses strategy.  The team is to bring down the locust.  Let the bugs do their worst.
• Ryan manages the shot Tex described.  While it doesn’t drop the xeno, it does send an immense feedback through its systems, blowing out several panels along its sides.  Ignoring a bug only six feet away, Chad matches the shot.  The second one was too much to bear, and the machine blows itself apart.  Chad then turns his rifle around, sticks it through a rack of greeting cards, and beheads the bug.
• Seeing another bug closing on the shop, Krenzke doesn’t even wait for it to clear the door, killing it with a blast through the wall.
• With the main lines broken, the team is able to mop up the remaining aliens in short order.  Two drones fall dead in the cafe, as Beth and Krenzke team up on a cyborg that retreated to an alleyway.
• As our soldiers check through the wreckage, the report comes back to command.  11 aliens dead, 0 XCOM members lost or injured, and only 4 civilians killed.  The Indian government sends their deepest gratitude, but Tex is quick to reply that they should be equally proud of what happened there.  Their choice to stand up and fight kept the aliens battered and contained.  All we had to do was wrap up the work.
• Several days after our victorious team returns, the CEO of a Chinese company requests a shipment of bug corpses.  We have no idea what he intends to do with them, but as with every other request we can reasonably fulfill, we agree and ship off the bodies.  Word reaches us a few days later that they’re using the bug’s ability to manipulate human cells, not for military purposes, but rather as the basis for cancer treatment.  It’s nice to hear that not everyone is out of their mind.
• The engineering team reports the containment facility for the alien device is complete.  Dr. Vahlen corners Dan and reiterates that only a psychic can operate it.  Dan shrugs.  “Too bad we don’t have any.”  He then seals the door.
• The following morning, Dan sends out an email to the entirety of XCOM ops.  It’s the shortest he’s ever sent, consisting of only two words.  “Merry Christmas!”  Not that much of anything in this militarized bunker feels terribly festive.  But he knows there are countless households around the world still seeking a sense of normalcy, opening presents and eating cookies.  And it’s the sacrifices of this team that’s made their holiday possible.  Whether anyone down here receives a gift this year, they’ve certainly given the biggest of their lives.

• At 12:39pm, the team’s lunch is interrupted with news from the science and research departments.  Apparently the Hyperwave Relay went a bit nuts.  They argued over whether to unplug it or not, though before they could reach a decision, it registered its first contact: a medium-sized saucer over the UK.  Dan looks over the diagrams.  As best as we can interpret the alien transmissions, it appears to be an overseer of some kind, much like our own C3 center.
• Fascinated by the possibility of what might be on board, he orders a Firestorm to attempt an EMP take-down.  If the fight goes poorly, the standard jets will have to finish the job.
• In its first combat test, one of our human-piloted saucers chases down the alien overseer.  Despite numerous shots to its own hull, it keeps closing to EMP range.  At long last, its weapons begin to fire, and soon the enemy ship falls from the sky.  Now it’s time to see what an “overseer” does.
• Dan is about to name a team for the mission, but he’s interrupted by a comm from Dr. Shen.  “The craft has ten surviving aliens.  Species seem to include elite hulks, heavy cyborgs, drones, at least one locust, and a species for which we don’t yet have a designation.”  Dan pauses, giving the room a blank stare before he comms back.  “Doctor, how the hell do you know that?”  Shen replies that the Hyperwave Relay is doing exactly what it should: reveal alien communications.
• A little taken aback but pleased with the information, Dan names his team.  Jimmy, Scott, Rachelle, Adam, and Chris Ings will accompany him.  Tex will have C3.
• Before departing, he gives two additional orders.  First, the air battle was too close.  The Firestorms are to be refit with the fusion cannons Dr. Vahlen designed.  They’ll be sent after any larger craft, while our standard fighters will use EMP weapons against the weaker ships.  Second, he confides a new objective to Tex alone.  If they’ve got an alien we’ve never seen before on this overseer craft, he wants to get in close enough to bring it back alive for the tea-and-torture room.
• The overseer crashed in a wooded area.  Several trees are ablaze, serving as the only clue to the craft’s location.
• Dan orders the heavy gunners to become the front line.  Chris will holo-target the locust, after which Jimmy and Scott will bring it down.  Dan will flank to the right, though stay close by.  The medics are to hold back until the bigger aliens are down.
• Sure enough, footsteps can be heard crashing through the forest.  The locust is no less dangerous than before, but it’s nice to at least not be surprised by its presence.
• Jimmy spots two elite hulks to the north.  Dan moves to block their advance.  Several shots are exchanged, but neither side is hit.
• At the same time, Scott confirms contact with the locust on a hill to the west.  Dan orders Chris to get it painted so the heavy gunners can bring it down.  He calls the medics forward to help hold the hulks at bay.
• Adam injures an elite, and Rachelle finishes the kill.  The other retreats back into the woods.
• Scott moves forward but can’t seem to find the locust.  Its sounds are echoing everywhere, but the actual target is elusive.
• Two heavy cyborgs claw their way toward the team from the west.  Simultaneously, the elite hulk comes in for another swing at the group.  Tex estimates they’re either trying to confuse our lines or soften us up prior to the locust joining the fight.  Fortunately, we’re already setup to fight on two fronts.
• Chris bags one cyborg, and Scott slays the other.  Jimmy moves up to prepare for the still-unseen locust.
• Dan advances for a better shot at the elite hulk.  Clearing a few trees, he spots the craft.  It’s in absolutely terrible shape.  Systems appear to be sparking or completely offline, and bits of the hull are scattered everywhere.  The hulk guarding the entrance takes a long shot at Jimmy’s back, landing a hit that his armor barely absorbs.  Rachelle and Dan put an end to the xeno.
• Tex recommends the group hold position until the locust is down.  Whatever’s in the craft has to wait.  A divided force would just be fodder to their well-armed machine.
• Finally the locust shows its face.  But even this impressive bit of hardware can’t stand up to the concentrated fire of three heavy plasma weapons.  It crumples and falls before getting off a single shot.
• With the locust down, Dan checks one last time with Tex before beginning his breach.  Tex recommends a pause to reload and check gear.  After that, the heavy gunners will get ready for covering fire as Dan and the two medics breach.  The commander reaches down to activate his stunner.
• Dr. Vahlen radios something stupidly obvious and is ordered to clear the channel.
• Dan reports an aural contact from the saucer.  What he doesn’t report is a fact so disturbing he can’t bring himself to say it.  He swore he heard a human voice, whispering.  Is that the alien word we can’t correlate to our own dictionary yet?  Some form of human?
• With the team carefully arrayed around the front of the craft, Dan taps the button to bring down the main energy barrier.  It’s time to go.
• This craft may have a unique purpose, but its interior is familiar enough.  Knowing where the command center ought to be, he orders Rachelle and Adam to follow him forward.
• As he rounds a corner, Dan realizes he was wrong.  Where there should be a door into the control room, there’s just a blank wall.  He suddenly feels rather isolated from the heavy gunners.  “God forgive me if I’m leading these two to their deaths,” he whispers.
• Reaching the back of the craft, he spots the door.  It looks like it’s on the rear of the control room instead of the side in this particular design.
• Adam reports an aural contact, and unlike Dan, he describes exactly what he heard: a human-like voice whispering something, though he couldn’t make it out.
• Back at base, Tex immediately calls for the topic medic.  They begin checking vitals on all of the troops.  Tex radios to Adam, “Are you sure the voice wasn’t in your head?  Is the voice telling you to hurt people?”  Adam insists this is a real voice, and he can’t even understand what it’s saying, much less obey it.  The medics confirm his brainwaves look normal.
• Having reached the control room door and gotten his team into position, Dan takes a deep breath, his hand hovering over the console to open the barrier.  Only when Adam and Rachelle both nod does he do so.
• What should be a control center looks more like a place of worship.  Atop a dais stands a tall, thin form, its face covered in a mask, and its body hidden beneath a crimson robe.  Two elite hulks are with it.  Realizing this is more than his team can handle, Dan calls for everyone to pull back.  Having come to the same conclusion, Tex orders the heavy gunners forward.
• “Do you want to come with us?” Dan says into his comm, repeating what he just heard from their dark chapel.  “Are you feeling compelled to do that?” Tex asks, nudging the doctor yet again to check brainwaves.  “Hell no,” his younger brother replies.  “This thing really is talking to us!”
• Rachelle and Adam are ordered into a sprinting retreat toward the advancing gunners.  Dan holds the corner, ready to intercept anything that gives pursuit.
• The red-robed alien emerges from the control room, neither walking nor flying, but simply hovering above the ground as if physics simply didn’t matter.  This time, the commander pulls back until support arrives.  Being shot at is one thing, but being talked to by a gentle — albeit alien – voice has spooked him.
• With the team finally gathered, Tex gives out the assignments.  Rachelle, Jimmy, Adam, and Scott will take the elites.  Chris is to follow Dan’s lead on the alien prophet.
• They round the corner in an organized spread, but the aliens are nowhere to be seen.
• “What would you ask of me?” the alien inquires.  Or at least that’s what it sounds like.
• The tension finally breaks as an elite hulk moves into view.  It trades shots with Rachelle, reducing her armor to uselessness.  “Kill it!” Dan yells.  There are no special plans for these things.
• Dr. Vahlen cuts in to tell us she’d like a particular artifact recovered from their temple.  While it is an unusual bit of technology, she’s told once again to clear the damn channel.
• Four of the soldiers move in to eliminate the elite aliens.  Shots fly back and forth, some nearly striking the artifact Vahlen so desperately wants.
• One elite falls dead, but the other is still on his feet.  Even worse, the prophet is nowhere to be seen.
• Dan waves for Chris to follow him into the control room or temple or whatever the hell it is.  He wants to make sure everyone in there survives.  Some part of him also wants this prophet to feel alone and afraid on planet Earth.
• A single shotgun blast pins the hulk to the wall, bleeding and dead.
• “What would you ask?” the alien whispers.  This time Dan replies.  “Get off my planet.”  Noting where the voice came from, he motions Chris forward.  Seconds later, the gunner spots the prophet and has him painted for the SCOPEs.
• Chris’ brainwaves take on a completely different pattern.  His last comm is something about difficulty thinking, though only a few words came out.
• Dan turns to Adam, who’s crouched down beside him.  “You have to trust me.  Run around that corner and shoot the alien.  I’ll be right behind you.”
• Adam rushes into the hallway and shoots the alien, but some kind of field simply bounces the shot back at him.  His armor easily absorbs it, but no one was prepared for this trick.
• Dan waves Rachelle forward.  Whether she successfully wounds the alien or not, Dan resigns himself to personally ending this immediately thereafter.
• As soon as Dan hears the telltale sound of plasma fire, he doesn’t even wait for the report.  He rushes toward the alien, shotgun in one hand and stunner in the other.  Alive or dead, this nonsense stops now.
• Unsure what’s even under the mask or hood to be hit, he pulls the trigger on the stunner.  The alien convulses and drops to the floor, its body smoking just a little.  Chris falls backward, dazed but released from its grip.  Dan kneels down over the alien prophet.  “Do you want to come with us?” he mocks before asking Adam to help him drag it back to the Sky Ranger.
• 10 aliens and 0 humans dead.
• Whatever guard was kept over the psychic gray, an even tighter watch is kept on the prophet.  Indeed, the leads from a stunner are never removed from its body.  Each time it stirs in the slightest, it’s shocked again.
• By the time the Sky Ranger returns, Dr. Vahlen has assembled most of her science team along with sterile transport systems.  The prophet is brought forth, but much to the shock of the entire combat team, she shows almost no interest.  All of her gear and people are there for the tech relic we recovered from the temple.  Dan becomes furious, backing her into a wall as he screams about what was risked to bring home a living alien, which has been one of her personal crusades since the start of the project.  Tex and Ryan pull him back.
• Predictably stoic, Dr. Vahlen acknowledges the importance of the living creature, but feels more can be learned from the device it was working so hard to protect.  She points out this is the first such machine we’ve seen, and it was not only escorted by a previously unknown alien race, but also hidden on a craft we failed to detect until the Hyperwave Relay came online.
• Unwilling to back down, Dan orders the alien to be dealt with first.  After a heated exchange, she relents.  Her parting comment is something about all of the wonders we might achieve if we unlocked the secrets of the alien device.  As she walks away, Dr. Shen expresses his own opinion that her amoral fixation is dangerous.  His assent is appreciated, but the cracks forming in team priorities seem to be an even greater threat than her clinical approach to the potential of human extinction.
• The prophet is put into containment.  At first it seems completely unimpressed by its predicament.  When the various probes and shock pads begin to encircle it, four arms burst from under its robes, using telekinesis so incredible that it holds back servo-driven equipment even the bullies couldn’t overpower.  The same being that was so chatty aboard its ship suddenly has very little to say.  The interrogation is shutdown in favor of sedating the creature and using cognitive imaging to make some guesses about its thoughts.  Shortly thereafter, its remains are dissected.
• Beneath the robes and mask, we uncover an unimpressive figure: tall, sickly, and purple-grey in color.  It shows some signs of genetic modification, leaving us to wonder if this is truly the top of the alien hierarchy — as Dr. Vahlen believes — or just another step on the ladder.  At any rate, Dr. Vahlen insists their limited implants can be harvested for other uses.  For each prophet we bring back, the engineering team will be able to construct an externally worn device that will help shield against psionic attacks.
• No sooner than we finish our work on the prophet, an earthquake shakes our facility.  The ranking officers are summoned to command.  News reports are pouring in of tectonic events across the globe.  Then the Director shows us the current Hyperwave imagery.  An alien craft is hovering over South America.  We ask science and engineering to both confirm the contact.
• Soon, we don’t have to.  Civilian news crews are reporting the craft’s presence.  A ship hundreds of miles in length has entered our atmosphere. and no one even has a theory on how to bring it down.  Command is left in horrified silence.  So this was their trump card.  When we thought we had finally closed the technical gap, they bring out a ship so massive that its mere presence is disrupting the natural function of our planet.
• Dan comms Dr. Vahlen and clears her to begin work on the device from the alien temple.  But before closing the channel, he’s careful to add, “And please tell me it’s a bomb.”
• By the following morning, the science team presents their report.  While a new design, the device builds on concepts we’ve already seen.  A cross between their psionic implants and the Hyperwave Relay, it seems to communicate across untold reaches, linking the aliens together.  They don’t radio orders; they just conceive them.
• The team also presents plans for building our own chamber to harness the device.  Theoretically, it could be used to tap into their network and give us access to their floating behemoth.  The catch?  Only a psionic being can do it.
• Attached to the report are plans for armor that might enhance psionic ability, should someone possess it.  Written across those plans in red ink are two words: Voynich and Rosetta, the transhuman projects Dan had iced over two months before.
• Dr. Shen approaches Dan, noting that he has his own reservations about transhuman pursuits.  But as long as this alien psi-device is going to be in our base, we might as well create a clean room to secure it.  Dan consents and gives him the necessary funding to lock it away.

• With no other resources to manage, Dan begins reviewing the inventory of alien technology the team has collected.  He notes quite a few objects that have been categorized as “damaged” or “no project value”.  He forwards the list to science and engineering.  When Dr. Vahlen and Dr. Shen both respond with their concurrence, Dan orders the items to be sold to member states.  Perhaps they can learn something from this busted, alien tech.
• The following day, an alien scout craft lands in southern Texas.  Tex will lead this operation.  He calls up Jimmy, Scott, Chris Mais, Beth, and John to accompany him.  Dan will handle C3.
• The landing zone is littered, not with alien debris, but with human garbage.  Burnt out cars, old tires, trash bags, and even a rusted washing machine.  Crows are picking through the piles.  Perhaps the aliens just feel at home with the rest of the trash.
• Tex spots the saucer off to the right.  The team begins their approach.  Dan reminds his brother that they’ve got no SHIVs, so psychics will have to be dealt with using Tex’s Mind Control Math, which states that 1 victim + 1 alien + 2 non-victims = 0 aliens.
• Two hulks attack from the left side of the craft.  Tex drops one and Jimmy drops the other.
• Johns steps forward just a bit, drawing the attention of three elite hulks.  Tex orders him to hunker down while the rest of the team deals with the problem.  Medics are too valuable to risk this early.
• Three heavy cyborgs drop down from the treeline.  Beth and Jimmy trade shots with them, but no one on either side goes down.  Meanwhile, the elites send heavy plasma bolts flying past John, but his cover holds.
• Beth’s next shot is more accurate.  With John still a little far forward, Tex tells him to stay down until the aliens flanking him are thinned out a bit more.
• One the cyborgs tosses a grenade.  Scott and Beth are both caught in the blast, though despite being momentarily blinded, their armor seems to have left them unharmed.  The other alien rockets up into the air, disappearing from view.  “He’s landed behind you!” Dan calls out from C3.
• Scott opens up with his plasma cannon.  He kills the grenade-tosser.  His second volley misses the alien that leapt behind the lines, but he at least obliterates the tree it was using for cover.
• Chris rushes to a nearby rock, putting him right behind the line-jumper.  It doesn’t survive his attack.
• With the scope temporarily clear, John peaks over his rock.  No aliens in sight.
• An elite hulk peaks its head out from the craft, and Tex detaches it from the shoulders.
• One at a time, his buddies repeat the exact same mistake.
• From C3, Dan suggests Tex start selecting a breach team.  Based on previous encounters with craft of this size, there likely aren’t many aliens left.  Jimmy, Beth, and Chris are chosen.
• The plan is put on hold when two hulks and a bully race from the door.
• As further evidence of the closing technology gap, these once-feared aliens just don’t last very long.  All three are brought down without an injury to our team.  The breach team is put back on task.
• Jimmy is the first inside.  No aliens yet.  At least no live ones.
• Beth opens the control room door.  Two psychics inside, three of our soldiers outside.  In C3, Dan tightens his knuckles.  This has to go perfectly.
• Chris rushes inside, puts his shotgun to a gray’s head, and splatters it like a melon.  Jimmy follows right on his heels, burning down the second psychic.
• 13 aliens and 0 humans dead.
• Upon return, Dr. Vahlen suggests a design for a weapon she calls a “fusion lance”.  Dan doesn’t follow all of the technical details, but it could very well be the most powerful air-to-air weapon yet designed.  He approves a prototype, though he comments aloud that this seems to go against her prior interest in using EMP weapons to bring down the ships in one piece.  She retorts that it’s her job to present all options.
• Australia requests the wreckage of a locust.  The purchase order is simple enough, though the stated reasoning — reverse engineering it to create a police or civil defense model — is a bit disturbing.  Regardless, the wreck is loaded up and shipped out.  Perhaps they’ll see reason and put any new robots on the front lines, instead.
• On December 12th, the Hyperwave Relay comes online.  The command team is there to observe its activation.  Dr. Shen works furiously as data starts flowing in.  After a few moments, he’s asked what he sees.  “Nothing just yet,” he replies.  “But whenever the aliens dispatch a craft, this should instantly reveal its position, design, and purpose.”  If his predictions hold true, it will be a real boon to the team.

• Dan elects to lead the assault on the alien craft himself.
• Kenzke needs to get back in the field.  From his own recovery, Dan knows that nothing restores your sense of power over the aliens quite like killing a few.  Adam and Chris Hussey will complete the team.  Dan also asks for G3 and G4.  The alien psychics have shown no power over the robots or their remote operator, and he’s praying that won’t change today.  Tex is asked to take C3.
• Before leaving, he assures Dr. Shen that the highest priority for salvage is construction of the multi-dimensional communication device.
• On the flight out, Dan seems vaguely amused.  Fulfilling a dream that predates XCOM by many years, he finally has his own suit of powered armor.
• Immediately after landing, the team rushes for cover.  The SHIVs move down both flanks, bracketing the human formation as they search for xenos.
• Dan notes aural contacts to the left.  The aliens are making quite a ruckus, but still no sign of them or their ship.
• We get eyes on the craft.  We’re approaching a corner, so Tex recommends pulling toward the ramp to reduce our profile.
• Seconds later, two hulks and a bully go on the attack.  Our shots fly from cover.  It’s nearly impossible to tell who hit what, though both hulks go down.
• G3 levels its cannon and tears into the bully.  It beats its chest, trying to intimidate our robot.  Command notes something may have gone wrong when these aliens were “enhanced”.  They may have lost simple, social distinctions that would otherwise keep them from trying to scare a machine.  As the team academics ponder the development, G4 just finishes the job.
• Upon reaching the ramp of the craft, the SHIVs send back images of medical vats.  The aliens didn’t land here for supplies; they landed for processing.
• Realizing Krenzke has never seen these medical nightmares before, Tex radios a simple message to him.  “You see the green and yellow tanks in there?  Don’t look into them.”
• A trio of hulks — followed by a trio of heavy cyborgs — rush to the defend the craft’s entryway.  G3 guns down one of the hulks.  Its surviving allies send plasma burning into the SHIV’s armor.
• From his hiding place behind a rock outside the craft, Chris takes down one of the cyborgs.  Another falls to G4, though its shots split open a nearby tank, pouring out the partially-dissolved remains of a human abductee.
• As the humans hold back, the SHIVs methodically clear the craft’s main ramp.  With only one alien left alive, it flees back into the ship.  Our team quickly reloads and seeks better firing positions.
• Adam gets a look down one of the ship’s corridors and reports that it’s a fairly standard design.  A deceptive number of doors and ramps all lead to the same, narrow bay.
• Our missing hulk comes running along one of the interior walkways.  Chris gives him a very warm welcome.
• Dan orders Adam and Chris to hug a wall, while he and Krenzke follow right behind the SHIVs.  They’re heavily armed, heavily armored, mobile cover.  What’s not to like?
• Three elites move from inside the craft to stand atop the central walkway.  We’re below them and temporarily pinned.
• The SHIVs open up.  Their shots deal little damage to the aliens but melt away their cover.  Krenzke calls, “Left one!” and takes it down with a shotgun blast.  Following the plan, Dan deals a deadly blow to the one on the right.
• Adam reports he has no clean line of fire.  Tex tells him to hold position.  Running the only medic out into the open just to get a snapshot would be foolish at best.
• Fortunately, Chris can see the final elite.  He tracks the alien with multiple bursts from his heavy plasma gun.  The xeno stumbles along, its armor melting and then its flesh, finally succumbing to the assault.
• The SHIVs roll up into the next chamber: the operating theater.  Tex again warns Krenzke not to study the equipment until after the battle.
• The room is empty.  If the craft follows its sister designs, the only chamber left is the control room.  That could very well mean psychics.  Unwilling to tempt fate, Dan orders the squad into an ambush position, just in case something goes wrong.  Otherwise, G3 and G4 will finish the run alone.
• Just beyond the next energy barrier, our robots run straight into two psychic grays.  They deal terrible burn wounds to both, but fail to kill either.
• Chris reports he’s got eye-contact with one.  Tex curses from C3.  A clear line-of-sight means vulnerability to psychic attack.  He orders all human elements to retreat to the prior room.
• Lacking human minds to prey upon, the grays use their pistols to tear up the SHIVs.  While the weapons are effective against the already-battered GOLIATH units, it’s not enough to take them out of the action.  It’s the last mistake these aliens will make.
• 14 aliens dead, and 0 humans even injured.  The SHIVs were torn apart by repeated plasma shots they sustained throughout the mission, and they’ll be down for several days of repair work.  But at least there are no abandoned children, distraught friends, or psychological traumas attached to that process.
• Flush with resources from the alien craft, the engineering team is told to begin construction of the so-called Hyperwave Relay, based on the alien energy flower.  Estimated construction time is two weeks.  The science team is also cleared to start work on a host of backlogged projects.
• The first project back from Dr. Vahlen is an upgrade to the highly mobile Skeleton armor that we never actually built.  This model uses a weave that leverages the aliens’ hyperwave technology.  Put more simply, it exists somewhere between dimensions, leaving the wearer nearly invisible.  Command notes that this sounds really risky and orders more tests before any will be produced.  In the meantime, they’re free to begin another project.
• Vahlen’s next suggestion is an upgrade to our heavy weapon team’s missile launchers.  Just as the locusts seem to use vehicle-grade weapons, her proposed launcher is based on technology derived from weapons systems previously only used on aircraft.  Dan sends an order for Dr. Shen to begin immediate construction.  The idea of a locust sucking on one of these pleases him.  Once again, Dr. Shen replies that there are insufficient resources to fulfill the request.
• Another month wrapped up, another A-grade, and another PDF forwarded to the XCOM team.  More importantly, our social and news analysts estimate that worldwide confidence is at an all-time high.  Seeing aliens in the sky has been a difficult adjustment, but people honestly believe we can win this war.  When that particular report comes in, Dan wryly notes to Tex that he’s glad someone believes that.

• As written by Dan Krenzke…

  Ryan glanced up at the medical room ceiling.  The drugged induced haze began to wane just enough for clear thoughts. He glanced over to see Krenzke sitting at his bedside.

  “Welcome back,” said Krenzke, giving Ryan a knock on the forehead with his knuckles. “You need to keep your head AND butt down.” A smile of warm love and friendship passed over Krenzke’s face, with a hint of sadistic glee.  “Remember my third day of training?” Ryan’s eye grew wide at the reminder. “I suppose it hurts when you laugh, and paybacks are a bitch.” The smile grew broader. “And we all know laughter is the best medicine.”

  Dread passed over Ryan’s face. It hurt to breath. How could he endure humor?

  “A solider, sailor, airman, and Marine are the only survivors of a plane crash in the jungle…” and so it began, the ebb and flow of two hours of jokes, fun stories, and one-liners. He would let Ryan calm down and relax a bit before starting the next. “I am cruel, not inhuman,” he told Ryan.

  At the end of a good side-splitter, Ryan managed to speak just a little through the bouts of pain and laughter, “Fuck you. Go away.”

  Krenzke got up, leaned over him, and said, “Love you too, brother.” He kissed his forehead, then whispered in his ear, “The medical staff thinks I’m bat-shit crazy. And both of us know I have the experience to milk that cow for all it’s worth.  See you tomorrow for another treatment.” Another loving but devious grin spread over his face before walking out the door.

•  As written by Dan Repperger…

  Dan sat in his office, framed only by the pale light of a computer terminal.  Its screen showed footage taken by his helmet cam during the battle of Cape Town.  He let it play for a moment, rewound it, and then watched it again.  He’d studied these few seconds over and over, searching for some clue he’d missed in the dozens of previous viewings.  But each time it ended the same way.  There he stood, his shotgun and meager cover at the bottom of the scene while most of the screen was taken up by the locust, looming over him, discoloring the image with that orange light.

  According to the tape, exactly 2.4 seconds later, his shotgun put it down.  2.4 seconds is an eternity in combat.  Two aliens had the perfect opportunity to kill the commander of XCOM as he hid behind poorly built office furniture.  Yet the shot never came.  Even if the locust was in some kind of recharge cycle between cannon shots, there was no explanation for the cyborg deciding a civilian woman was a higher-priority target.

  He buried his head in his hands.  There was only one logical conclusion he could come up with.  For one reason or another, the aliens wanted him alive and leading XCOM.  Somehow that arrangement served them just as much as it did humanity.  And Dan couldn’t even begin to guess why.

• The council sends an urgent request to XCOM command.  The aliens are moving to intercept a military supply convoy in Pretoria, South Africa.  We’re being asked to save it.  South Africa, again?  Command starts to wonder if something more is going on there.
• Tex is put in charge of the mission.  He selects Chad, Scott, Karla, Rachelle, and Beth for his team.  Though still recovering from his prior injuries, Ryan insists on taking C3.  Dan agrees, though he’ll be joining Ryan to observe the operation…and take control if he breaks down.
• Upon touchdown, the team is informed the aliens are closing on the cargo.  The council won’t say what the cargo happens to be, simply assuring us that if the aliens want it, it’s in our best interest to keep them from getting it.  We aren’t so naive as to believe such a simple story, but lacking any options, the mission moves ahead.
• The combat area is a shipping yard.  The cargo must be on a truck somewhere in there.  The team fans out, searching for targets.
• Since this isn’t a training exercise, the fresh blood is mixed up with veteran troops.  However, the squad is kept tightly together with no one left more than a few yards from a friendly face.
• As she rounds a truck, Karla gets eyes on a gray.  She instinctively ducks down.
• Ryan recoils at the image.  Dan rewinds Karla’s camera footage a few seconds, pauses it, and puts his face inches from the screen.  It’s not psychic, he assures Ryan.  They might have some hidden nearby, but their front line in this battle are just the regular, sickly grays they first encountered so many months ago.
• Chad puts one down.  Scott sends fire tracing by the heels of two more but fails to connect.
• Karla slips forward and manages to stun our first specimen of this particular breed.  The nearby aliens retaliate, and bolts of plasma crisscross around her.  She’s unharmed, but the fuel tank of the nearest truck is starting to burn.
• The truck explodes, throwing Karla to the ground in a shower of metal shards and bright flames.  Apparently not satisfied with that, one of the grays shoots her fallen form with his plasma pistol.  Dan’s heart stops.
• Near the end of the street, Tex spots several grays moving among a gas station.  With his traditional precision, he beheads one.
• His eyes still fixated on Karla’s camera, Dan watches in amazement as the angle of her feed seems to elevate.  Surely the aliens are just carrying her off as a trophy.  He glances up to her vitals.  They’re stable!  Whatever Dr. Shen did with this armor, he got it right.
• Ryan orders the team to begin encircling the gas station while giving it a wide berth.  Surviving a truck explosion is one thing; surviving the underground tanks going up is another.  And if this is a trap, he’ll be damned if people are getting drawn into it under his watch.
• More grays appear.  Satisfied his wife is alive and well, Dan turns his attention to the other camera images.  “Regular, regular, regular,” he counts off as they scurry about, not a psychic among them.  Though seconds later he has to amend one from “regular” to “dead” as Tex cuts it down.
• Whether sadistic or thorough, Karla stuns the gray that shot her while she was down.  He’ll be joining his friend in the tea-and-torture chamber upon return to base.
• As Beth advances, a gray fires a burst of green energy at her head.  It misses; she doesn’t.  However, the tow truck behind her is set ablaze, forcing Chad to hold position until the fuel burns out.
• The team continues to advance.  One-by-one, little grays appear with their inferior plasma pistols and die to our superior equipment.
• The final cluster of aliens is found hiding inside the gas station’s convenience store.  Tex scales up the piping of a nearby building for a vantage point.  Once setup, he marks off another kill.
• The second fires on Karla from behind the cash register and goes down to a chestful of alloy shards.
• Finally reaching the side of the building, Rachelle breaches a rear entrance as Scott pins down the last gray.  She feeds it a bolt of plasma, bringing the mission to an end.  12 xenos, 0 humans dead.  And while Karla’s armor is a wreck, she didn’t receive a single wound that needs more than a kiss and Band-Aid to cure.
• As the team flies back, the council still refuses to disclose the nature of the cargo.  Even the cargo aside, nothing about the operation makes sense.  They flew us around the world to fight aliens we were dispatching with assault rifles and flak jackets months ago.  If not for fear of a psychic gray — which apparently wasn’t even present — the team could have run roughshod across the battlefield.  Was this some kind of joke?  Misinterpretation?  Distraction?  Stranger still, the council pays us in Elerium.  When asked where they got Elerium from, they give no clear reply.
• When the Sky Ranger arrives back at base, Dan inspects Karla’s armor, genuinely impressed by the field test it got.  He then turns his attention to the grays.  They’re short, weak, unarmed, and without psychic capacity.  As the team has become accustomed to seeing alien lifeforms, there’s nothing even vaguely frightening about this creature anymore.  Grabbing a laser pistol, he personally drags one of them down for interrogation, almost amused by the impotent fight it puts up.
• The interrogation and dissection are completed in short order.  The only thing gleaned from the process is that the grays — like every other alien we’ve encountered — appear to have been modified.  They show signs of cloning, genetic manipulation, and even minor implantation.  Whichever species sits at the top of the heap, they seem to have no reservations about changing the make-up of everything they encounter.  Is that their plan for humanity as well?  It would certainly explain the storage vats and surgical tables on so many of their ships.
• Five days pass in relative silence.  Then our satellites detect an alien cargo ship landed in the far north of Canada.  There can’t be too many people to abduct up there, so we have to presume they’re either gathering or off-loading supplies.  Whatever their mission, the end result needs to be the same: dead aliens.  But if tradition holds, then an undamaged saucer means either pilots or psychic grays at the helm.  Dan pulls Tex aside.  With our scientists still uncertain what mental intrusion can cause, who do we risk sending out?

• Dan visits Dr. Vahlen in the science lab.  He asks if there are any outstanding projects her team could pursue.  She didn’t get two syllables out before he added, “And I don’t mean the closed ones.”  She assures him that transhumanism isn’t her current passion but rather the flower-like device they recovered from the alien base.  Dan nods and leaves her to it.
• Before even making it down the corridor, an emergency alert summons him to the command center.  Aliens are attacking Cape Town, South Africa.  It’s another civilian slaughter, and intel from the local government estimates one hell of an alien force.  He summons Chris Mais, Julia, Ryan, Adam, and John to the launch bay.
• By the time the team arrives, the aliens have holed up in an impressive, marble building.  While the unfolding slaughter is beyond despicable, Dan feels just a little glad to see them there.  Aliens wouldn’t attack a government center if they were getting what they wanted from South Africa’s leaders.
• The team deploys just in front of the building.  Air raid sirens are blaring through the city streets.  Weapons fire, explosions, and screams can be heard all around.  Visibility is better than what we encountered in Melbourne, but the rest of the scene is about the same.
• As Julia ducks behind an abandoned cop car, she spots a locust inside the building.  The aliens have descended into dark comedy.  Do they really think it takes that much firepower to kill a human civilian?  Or is this their way of tying up XCOM troops while the slaughter unfolds?
• From his position in C3, Tex radios that the group is dangerously clustered.  Dan orders them to spread out before the locust remembers its missile racks.
• Bugs and heavy cyborgs start piling out of the building, obstructing our view of the locust.  The scene is a blur of plasma shots, smoke, and shattering stone.  Someone has to be dying, but neither C3 nor the ground team has a grip on the situation.
• The shots continue to fly.  Dan tries to get a sitrep from his team.  “Is anyone–” but his query is cut off when a trio of blinding, energy streams blow apart the front of the building.  The locust is on the move.
• There’s finally a pause in the chaos.  “All units, check in!” Dan calls out.  One by one, the other members radio back.  There’s little sense to the battle line, but everyone is alive.  Several members report having downed aliens, and Ryan alone appears to have taken a moderate wound.
• “Has anyone downed the locust?”  Negative replies across the board.  Dan orders Julia, Ryan, and Adam back to ambush positions.  John and Chris are to join him in a flanking breach through a side door.  With that many civilians still in the building, they have to flush the locust out to the street.
• Julia and Ryan spot a pair of drones moving across the roof.  Their shots fail to damage the alien machines, but they blow apart a portion of the second floor.
• The breach team enters the side door, finding themselves in a storage room, stacked floor-to-ceiling with boxes of records.
• A heavy cyborg cuts across the lawn.  This time the snipers are more accurate, bringing their quarry down.  Meanwhile, the breach team manages to catch the drones descending — or perhaps falling — from the upper story and put them out of commission.
• Apparently satisfied with the hole it made in the building, the locust struts through the destruction and into view.  It leans back on its legs, lining up its terrifying weaponry.
• The two snipers are told to take cover and prepare for the worst.  Adam tosses a smoke grenade to obscure them further.
• Dan sees two options before him.  He can either lead the breach team out front, putting them in the same line of fire as the snipers.  Or he can run through the building, risking new encounters but getting a guaranteed flank on the alien war machine.  Lacking much time to consider the choices before him, he orders John and Chris to follow him on a flanking run.
• The locust powers up its stabilizers.  Its upper chassis splits open and the beam cannon rises up.  Three low, deep booms echo out as its first volley cuts through a cement barrier and puts Ryan down for the count.  Apparently aware of the impending flank, the locust then wheels around and fires a volley into the records room.  The shots didn’t even come close, but the warning was received loud and clear.
• Back at C3, Tex checks the vitals.  Ryan is alive, but helping him would mean moving Adam out of cover.  He opens a private channel to Dan, telling him that locust needs to come down fast or the team will lose one of its most trusted leaders.
• Thinking fast, Dan radios Julia.  “I need you to run to the front of the building and go flat on your belly.  Don’t shoot, just tell me where the locust is.”
• She rushes from cover, sliding into the dirt behind the structure’s marble stairs.  She marks the locust, but it’s got a heavy cyborg with it.  This just keeps getting better.
• Dan sprints to a desk, lifting his gun over it to fire.  Hit.  Chris finds a spot behind a nearby row of chairs and takes his turn.  Another hit.  John is a bit slower on his feet, but he still manages to advance and shoot.  A third hit.
• The locust is smoking and stumbling, but still on its feet.  With no options left, Dan orders Adam to advance and take a shot.  No dice.
• Dan closes his eyes and waits for the response.  The heavy cyborg catches sight of a fleeing civilian and decides to shoot her instead.  A poor choice, given what a single grenade could have done to us.
• The locust — now only a few yards away — turns to face the commander.  Dan prepares himself to die, but all it does is bathe him in an orange light.  Something horrible is likely to follow, but  for the moment, it’s just shining some kind of harmless energy around him.  Unwilling to question luck or grace, he fires.  The locust is bathed in a very different shade of orange as it goes down in flames.
• The remainder of the breach team trades shots with the cyborg.  John takes a series of burns across his chest and left shoulder, while our attacks fail to connect.  Adam moves closer to Ryan but struggles to prep him for treatment.
• “How much time?” Dan radios Tex.  Repeating the words of a doctor patched into C3, Tex sounds grim.  The heart monitor is showing almost nothing.  Ryan may already be beyond recovery.  If not, he’s only got seconds left.
• Chris takes another shot at the cyborg, who now seems intent on a running battle.  The alloy shards tear up a cop car but miss the alien.
• Working frantically, Adam sprays salves across Ryan’s wounds and rushes to attach a cardiac stabilizer.
• As the remaining alien tilts back and forth on its thrusters, John gets the shot he needs and puts a hole straight through its torso.  Sparking wires and bleeding flesh hit the ground.
• 10 aliens and 0 humans dead.  Miraculously only 5 civilians died in the building and its surrounding alleys.  As the team retreats, Adam and Julia carry Ryan to the Sky Ranger for emergency treatment.  Dan calls ahead to have the medical teams waiting in the bay.
• On the flight back, the team works frantically to keep Ryan alive.  As the medics go through their procedures, the others pray, hope, or try to just talk to him, each as their faith dictates.
• When the plane lands, there’s a flurry of activity.  John is ordered to the hospital, though his superficial wounds will be patched up in no time.  Ryan is rushed away on a gurney, surrounded by doctors and life support equipment.  The team follows, waiting just outside of the operating theater.  When Dan is handed the clipboard, his mind is so fevered with anxiety that he can hardly read it.  The commander finally croaks out, “He’s going to live.”  The team cheers.
• Dan hands the clipboard to Beth, who seems all too eager to take it.  He then heads to his office.
• Adding up what they brought back from South Africa, it looks like the engineers finally have enough resources to upgrade the infantry armor.  The new suits will utilize the latest technological advances of the XCOM project, leaving them fireproof, sealed against barfer poison, and more than twice as damage-resistant as before.  If only it had been ready before the last mission.  Ryan might be in the rec room clinging to a pool score instead of the ICU clinging to life.
• The following day, the research team delivers a report on the alien “flower”.  Unsurprisingly, it’s a communications device.  What’s startling is that its energy patterns seem to simply disappear from our reality.  Not only does this mean the alien base was receiving orders from a higher power, but the scientists theorize it’s not even native to our dimension.  The good news is that its principles are similar enough to other technologies we’ve decoded that we can build our own version alongside the satellite uplinks.  Dan approves the funding.  The idea of listening in on alien chatter has incalculable academic and military value.
• Minutes later, Dr. Shen sends the order back with a request for more alien alloys.  Dan drops his head on his desk.  Why does everything keep coming back to resources we don’t have?

• As written by Dan Krenzke…

  Long before anyone heard the craft, Rufus perked up and his nub of a tail vibrated to life. He grinned as the craft came in for a landing. He popped up and bounded on his front paws as the door opened up, trying to get by the medical personnel as they brought out the wounded. The dog barked joyously when he saw Krenzke, bounding around as his pack leader walked to the locker room to return his gear.

  Krenzke stopped and looked directly into the Rottie’s eyes. “DOWN! I LEAD THIS PARADE!” The edge of anger and frustration in Krenzke’s voice might have been a fist. Rufus stopped bounding and turned his head away with ears plastered back, his nub seeking refuge in his backside. Krenzke walked toward the locker room with Rufus following submissively.  As he stowed weapons and other gear, the medics began to tell him what he needed to do and where he needed to go. Rufus looked at them like they were nuts and half-hid behind a row of lockers. When Krenzke closed his locker door, he stared at them blankly until they were quiet. “Where is the first place I need to be?” he asked.

  One finally found his voice.  “Medical Wing.”

  “I will be there in two hours. I need to shower and grab a bit to eat,” said Krenzke in even, firm tones. One tried to protest, but between Krenzke’s stare and Rufus’ whine, it ended.  “Come, Rufus.” And the pair went to their quarters.

  Krenzke stripped as the shower water ran. Rufus just watched. It was not long before he was in PT gear sitting on the rack. Sheepishly, the Rottie came up to him and put his chin on his pack leader’s leg. Krenzke’s eyes watered as he pet Rufus. “Sorry, buddy.” Rufus began to lick his face. “Thanks for the puppy kisses.”  It wasn’t long before Krenzke was on his knees in an attempt to pray. The only things that he could get out were low groans and silent screams in the Spirit. Rufus curled up and kept his vigil in stoic silence.

• As written by Beth Roper… 

  When the medics finally got the nerve to get Krenzke, Beth was with them.  He looked like he’d died a thousand deaths since the last mission.

  “The boys want to know if they can take care of Rufus.”  Krenzke nodded, and the dog looked up at him and then back to Beth.  She managed a smile. “I’ve got two boys who can’t wait to see you. Pat promised them a dog this Christmas…we’ll take good care of him until you’re back.”

  Krenzke still didn’t say anything, and Rufus looked back and forth between them until he received a permissive nod, at which point the Rottweiler padded after Beth to her quarters with a few backward glances and a whine.  “It’s OK, boy. It’s OK,” she said to the dog as much as herself.

  Rufus was a hit. The kids fought over who got to feed him, who got to get his water, who got to walk him. Finally, she had them settled down to homework while Rufus chewed on a leftover steak bone. When the boys went to bed, he placed himself across their doorway with the patience of a saint, his ears pricked for any sound of a door or footsteps.

  “He’ll be back soon. I know it’s hard to wait.” Waiting was always the hardest. Part of her was still waiting for Pat to come home. Every footstep, every time the door opened, she had to tamp down the ridiculous hope that it was him.  She gathered up the papers on the table. Connor was doing well with his reading and was learning math almost as fast as his brother. Duncan had flown through Algebra and was starting on daddy’s Batman proof. He already had questions that she couldn’t answer. Thank God Pat had written out the steps or she would have been screwed. Geometry had never been her strong suit. He’d have been so proud of both of them. She turned away quickly.

  Practicality. That and being busy stopped the tears. She began cleaning the bathroom. She caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror over the sink. Ha. She was the weight on her driver’s license now. Gaunt face. Deeply circled eyes. Glints of gray through her hair. Scars up and down her arms and torso, fading from angry red to silver white. That hurt what vanity she had left. Pat had always said she was beautiful. He said it when she was nine months pregnant with Duncan, weighing a thousand pounds and retaining Boston Harbor. He said it when she was puking out her guts, pregnant with Connor. He said it when she came out of every surgery. She was beautiful in his eyes because he loved her. No one would ever say that to her again. No one would love her like that again. Not a single soul.

  A ragged sob escaped, and Rufus looked up. Beth slid to the floor. Would it ever stop hurting so much? Rufus padded over and laid his head on her lap and looked at her with mournful eyes. She wasn’t sure how long they sat on the bathroom floor, united in sorrow.

• The first part of the month passes without incident.  Apparently the aliens learned we’re capable of dealing with a quick succession of attacks and decided to reevaluate their plans.
• On November 10th, a large scout craft is spotted over North America.
• With the Firestorms in transit to other parts of the world, we only have classic jets to scramble.  They’ve been outfitted with EMP cannons and are about to conduct our first field test.
• Our interceptor takes a beating as it closes to firing range.  But once the EMP weapon comes online, it doesn’t take much to bring down the ship.  Now to see what sort of shape it’s landed in.
• A small craft shouldn’t be carrying too many soldiers.  To give our new arrivals field experience, each will be paired with a veteran from their specialty.  It’s a controversial choice, but one deemed ultimately necessary.  We don’t have time for long training periods, as each and every one of these soldiers is needed right now.
• In the flight bay, Karla is paired with Dan Krenzke, Beth with Rachelle, and Chris Hussey with Scott.  Chris Hussey will be leading the team.  Tex and Ryan will serve as C3.
• Before the team departs, Chris is told to play it safe with the rookies.  Keep this slow and under cover.  Should he encounter any serious resistance, he’s to immediately pull back.  A second team of pure veterans will be sent in.  Trials by fire are inevitably dangerous, but his job is to make it as safe as possible.
• The team is kept together, though unlike our usual strategy of mixing roles in the firing line, each rookie is told to stick close to their “chaperon”.  Play-by-play advice is given from C3, and Ryan’s instructive voice is ever-present.
• It doesn’t take long before they get eyes on the craft.  It’s an absolute wreck.  Dan calls for Dr. Vahlen.  Wasn’t this EMP supposed to keep the craft together?  She replies, “Not exactly.  It preserves critical systems, but doesn’t stop the sheer force of the impact.”
• Rachelle reports hearing an alien.  Trying to sound as calm as possible, Ryan comms back that it’s just an “aural contact”.  Aliens love to make a lot of noise — and they’re strange noises — but it’s nothing we haven’t heard a hundred times before.  Just stay low and slow, and trust your teammates to have your back.
• Three hulks come rushing out of the craft.  The bad news is they’re charging the medical team, and three elites are right behind them.
• With our heavy gunners nearby and the assault team setup for a flank, Ryan gives instructions in his most confident voice.  Panic will be a far more deadly enemy than a few hulks.
• The heavy team sends a hulk to its grave.  Its closest ally flees back toward the craft.  More can be seen moving about inside, but reaction shots do far more damage to the fallen saucer than the aliens hiding there.
• Breaching the craft with such a mixed team seems like a bad idea.  So for the moment, C3 coaxes them into holding their position and letting the aliens make the mistakes.
• An elite runs across the interior of the ship, becoming visible just long enough for our team to pour in fire.  Once again, the shots blast apart the saucer.  Anything the EMP might have preserved is probably a lost cause, but command will take that over troop death any day of the week.  And to everyone’s pleasant surprise, once the smoke has cleared, Rachelle put a hulk down in her first kill.
• Knowing the alloy guns are of almost no use in a stand-off fight, Karla requests permission to breach with Dan Krenzke.  With any other rookie, the answer would have been, “No.”  But since he’s a veteran of human conflicts, they’re given clearance with the reiteration to be extremely careful.
• One of the elites pours plasma toward the medics.  The shots hit Rachelle.  She shrieks as it burns into her.  Beth tries to keep her calm as she applies the medical salve.  At least she’ll understand injury from the patient’s perspective.
• Realizing just how vulnerable the medical team is, C3 orders the heavy and assault teams to turn up the heat.
• Krenzke bursts into the craft.  His own shot misses a nearby alien, but he’s able to direct Karla to the target.  She moves just far enough to one side to negate its cover, shredding the hulk.
• Chris asks C3 for a best guess on what’s left.  The response comes back that there might be another hulk or two, and there’s certainly a pilot further back.  Karla and Krenzke are told to continue their breach.  The heavy gunners can’t be moved from their watch over the more delicate medics, so assault is now the crux of the fight.
• An elite ambushes Karla and Krenzke from behind the craft.  Its shot hits Karla.  She manages to kill the alien, but she’s left critically injured herself.
• Reviewing the options, C3 sees no easy way forward.  Pulling out Karla means Krenzke will complete the breach alone.  Sending in the medics means exposing them to a lot of unexplored saucer.  It’s a hard call, but the decision is made to have the two assault troops finish the breach.  Several members of command pray all that’s left is a pilot or two.
• The breach team opens the primary door.  It’s not pilots; it’s a pair of psychics.  Is that what flies their craft now?  Trying to stay calm, Ryan tells them they have to move in and finish this in record time.  One shot, one kill.
• With eyes only on one of the two grays, Krenzke and Karla rush it together, painting the walls with its innards.  Moments later, the second one scuttles out, apparently making a dash for a nearby exit.
• Both shots miss the fleeing gray.  Knowing we might have a mind control on our hands soon, Chris is told to rush in for support.  Scott is pulled back farther to cover the medics alone.
• The assault team flanks the gray.  Krenzke’s shot hits, but Karla’s misses its mark.  The wounded gray turns a corner and disappears.
• Seconds later, all expression drains from Krenzke’s face.  His eyes search the room with new purpose.  He raises his shotgun at Karla’s back and fires.  What would have surely been a killing blow just barely misses.
• Back at base, there’s a confused mixture of soothing messages and shouted commands for Krenzke to find himself and stand down, but he doesn’t respond.  If any part of him can still hear his friends, it’s unable to overcome the alien mind.
• Unwilling to kill her comrade, Karla chases the alien, pinning him against a corner.  Though well aware her stunner would be enough, she opts for the shotgun instead.
• As the alien slumps to the ground, Krenzke seems disoriented, as if coming out of a dream.  But at least he’s no longer menacing his mentor.
• 8 aliens and 0 humans dead, though Karla and Rachelle are both headed for lengthy hospital stays.
• While Ryan came close, Krenzke is now the first soldier to fall victim to a complete mind control.  He’s ordered to undergo extensive medical and psychological evaluation.  The stated concern is for his well-being.  The private one is whether the aliens have a way of permanently changing their victims.
• By November 14th, every fighter base has at least one of the Firestorm craft.  They have yet to see combat, but they promise to put on quite a show.  In case the design is a failure, a standard jet is being kept as a back-up at each location.
• Brazil requests a shipment of our heavy lasers.  As we no longer use those weapons, we’re once again happy to ship off old equipment, even if it’s only for modest pay.
• Dan doesn’t often watch the evening news, but tonight he decides to flip it on.  As he surfs from one outlet to the next, he can only help but feel a little pride.  Inspired by images and video of XCOM’s battles — now leaking out all over social media — anti-alien militias are springing up across the planet.  The technology his people have shipped to so many countries has led to armies fielding energy weapons and advanced armor in their own skirmishes.  And while the existence of the project still remains at least a little bit of a secret, it doesn’t stop a few crazy-haired conspiracy buffs from signing off their programs with, “I’m not saying it’s XCOM…”  All these months later, what started with a rushed satellite network has finally paid its dividends: a world standing united against the alien invaders.