Thirty-three: The Marines

I stood exactly where I was, instinctively holding Chelsea closer to my chest. I looked straight at Pastora and Sunghoon who had dropped their weapons and had their hands up.

"Identify yourself." The voice behind me growled.

"Kuk Chaeyoung." I replied and then rolled my eyes. "I mean Chaeyoung Kuk."

The man behind me pressed the barrel of his gun further into my back, causing me to cringe.

"The son of Yeon-Woo?" The man growled.

I sighed. "Look, I'm nothing like my father! And believe me, I'm just as shocked and angry about this as you are! I didn't want any of this to happen!"

"But it did." The man sneered.

"Please…" I whispered, closing my eyes. "We're trying to get rid of these monsters. All we're doing is searching for help. We want to end this."

The man went silent for a moment, another voice spoke behind him and it was a female.

"I think we should believe him, Frankie. They don't come across as a threat."

The man scoffed. "Don't be so sure, Summer. Nobody on this station can be trusted."

"You can trust us." Pastora reassured Frankie, looking him in the eyes, her hands were still up. "I was calling for other space stations or passing ships for help. If we're lucky enough to get it, you're all more than welcome to come with us."

"Yeah? How do I know this isn't some trap?" Frankie hissed, his gun still jammed in my back.

"Because…I wouldn't dare to mess with marine soldiers." Pastora replied.

Frankie lowered his gun from my back and let out a deep sigh. "Indeed, that would be pretty dumb." He reasoned. "You may turn around, Chaeyoung."

Slowly, I turned around with Chelsea in my arms to take a first look at the marines.

Frankie had messy black hair that curled and flipped up at the ends, his eyes were brown, and as weird as it sounded his nose was perfect. He was well build and dressed in a marine's soldiers uniform along with the other two besides them. The female, Summer, had striking green eyes and long black hair tied back in a ponytail, and the other man had short blonde hair and squinty blue eyes, he too was also very built. I noticed a younger girl hiding behind Summer. Her hair was dirty blond and fell to her waist in big curls. Her eyes were a soft green and she wore overalls that were damp and dirty, she looked around twelve or thirteen years old.

Frankie was looking at Sunghoon and Pastora.

"And who are you two?"

"Sunghoon Wi." Sunghoon replied, slowly lowering his hands.

"I'm Pastora Rubio." Pastora replied and then gestured over to Chelsea in my arms. "And this is Chelsea Vixen. She just had surgery."

"Whoa. Whoa. Time out." Frankie cut her off. "She just had surgery!?"

"Correct." Pastora nodded. "One of those things…" She paused to point at an egg nearby. "Latched itself on her face, fortunately, I was able to pull it off her in time before it implanted one of those…things you've all seen around here."

"If you got it off in time…why did you do surgery?" The other man asked.

"Facehuggers, that's what those things are called…. they release some sort of deadly chemical in the victim's body if they cannot proceed with implantation, think of it as a kind of threating manner. Fortunately, we were able to get her to medical, and I performed an open lung surgery on her."

"You look awfully young to be a surgeon." Frankie added.

"I'm not. I'm a biologist. I guess I was just lucky…" Pastora confessed modestly.

"She's incredible." Sunghoon said, beaming at her. "And she's my girlfriend."

"Congratulations." The other man said sarcastically.

Sunghoon glared at him.

Frankie looked at me. "So, where's your father now?"

"He's dead." I replied. "Pastora and I burnt his lab down. We had no other choice. He put Sunghoon and Chelsea in cages with the creatures trying to use them as experiments…he was going to bring these things back to earth!"

"Yeah we know." Frankie growled and then sighed. "Well, I suppose we should introduce ourselves. I'm Frankie, this is Summer." He paused to point at the girl with the striking green eyes and then pointed at the other man. "this is Adam…and the little one is Brook."

The young girl looked up at us and then hid behind Summer again.

"She doesn't speak much." Summer explained, adjusting the pulse rifle in her arms. "We found her all by herself in the first tower, she told us her parents have been eaten, she saw the whole thing, and was hiding, shaking like a leaf under her bed."

"I'm sorry." I said to Brook, who looked at me then hid behind Summer again.

A static buzzing sound came from the computer.

"Pastora!" A voice from the speaker whispered. "Pastora, is that you!?"

Pastora looked over at the computer wide eyed. "Yes…. who is this!?"

"It's Jiyong!" The voice rasped. "I'm in the fourth tower! The place is in flames!! There's no way out! Those creatures are everywhere!"

"Jiyong!" I cried, stepping closer to the speaker. "It's Chaeyoung! Have you tried the transmit station!?"

"It's gone now, Chaeyoung! There's nowhere for me to go!"

"Is this someone you know?" Frankie asked.

"Obviously." Sunghoon snapped.

"Is there any fire extinguishers in sight!? Surely there must be one in every lab and storage room! Can you find one? Is there one nearby you?" I asked, staring at the black speaker intently.

"Wait….shh…." Jiyong paused and there was a low hissing sound in the background.

There was more static before the connection cut out.

"He's In trouble, he's in trouble and it's all my fault…" Pastora cried, slumping against the desk.

"Pooch, it's not your fault." Sunghoon reassured her, stepping closer to her to rub her shoulder.

"I set the fire in that lab! He has no weapons and nobody there to help him from the xenomorphs! If what he said is true about the transmit carts, then we are all stuck here!! If those escape pods are in tower four than we're screwed!!"

"And Jiyong's the only one who knows where they are, too." I muttered, biting on my lower lip nervously.

"Let's try connecting with the other ships." Summer suggested.

"It's no use!" Pastora cried. "What other space station or ship will find our signal!? We're probably months away from the nearest space station! We're trapped!"

"Alright, alright, calm down." Frankie demanded. "Getting all worked up is going to get us nowhere."

"I can't take this anymore!" Pastora went on, tearing at her black hair. "I've seen things I'll never forget…I've killed people…I witnessed murtders…I performed a freaking surgery! I JUST WANT TO GO HOME!!!!!" she threw her arms around Sunghoon and started to sob, her entire body was shaking.

Sunghoon hushed her as he ran a hand gently through her hair.

"We all want to go home too. You're so brave, Pooch. It takes lots of courage to do all the things you've done, and you did it, not just to survive, but to protect us as well. Stay with me, we're almost there. We can't give up yet." Sunghoon spoke softly in her ear.

"He's right. We're not giving up now." Frankie said, stepping besides me.

He looked at me and then down at Chelsea, then back up at me.

"You have us on your side now. We're a team."

I felt my heart flutter with relief.

"Whoa, really?" I asked, widening my eyes.

"Really. It is our job as marine soldiers to protect others. It would be foolish of us to go our own ways, you three can't do this on your own." Frankie replied.

"Four." I corrected, jutting my chin toward Chelsea in my arms.

Frankie nodded. "Four."

He turned to face Pastora and Sunghoon.

"Pastora? You're very self-determined and wise. We will need your intelligence. Sunghoon? You're strong-spirited and fearless. We will need your courage." He then turned to look at me. "And Sunghoon? You're gentle and have great common sense. We will need your street smarts. And the four of you will need our protection. If we all work together, we can get out of this mess and go home.

"But that's just it!" Pastora said, pulling herself away from Sunghoon. "How are we going to get out of this!? When we have no clue where the escape pods are and with only limited ammo!?"

"We'll have to find another way to kill those…xenomorph creatures." Frankie replied. "You'll have to tell us more about them, so we know exactly what we're dealing with."

"Well for one thing, their skin…it has some sort of strong layer to it, their exoskeleton prevents severe damage…..they're vulnerable to fire, however it doesn't kill them. Pulse rifles do the trick, but we don't know how many of these things we're up against."

"I see what you mean…." Frankie replied, slowly nodding his head. "What do you think we should do?"

Pastora looked at the floor for a moment and went silent.

"They're not dependent on their hosts…" She muttered softly to herself.

"Come again?" Frankie asked.

Pastora looked up at him. "When the facehuggers implant a chestburster, the third stage in a xenomorph life cycle, the chestburster is adapted to what its host was."

"Yeah, so?" Sunghoon asked, his arms still around her.

"So, If a xenomorph was 'born' with the characteristics of their hosts adaptable environment…." She paused to look up at Frankie. "We must force it into an environment where their hosts were not suitable for."