Thread: Slave to the Swarm (Deviant Desires and 49_place_holder)

The SS Leviathan hung in the orbit around the small, red mood like a fly hovering around a ripe flower. It was a broad, long ship, home to a crew of thirty two research scientists 153 light years out from their home planet. In fact they would not have come this far had it not have been for the distress beacon. The colony was one of the newer ones in the quadrant, a small community of around 3,000 who had set up their homes here about 100 years ago. It had been remote and isolated, the intrepid explorers deciding to take their risks with a moon that had a volatile climate. Having recently entered the next phase of their orbit, the surface of the moon had shifted seasons, the small satellite enjoying summer for the first time in 1,546 years. It was then that the trouble had started. When first arriving at the moon, surveys had shown that it was uninhabited with no indigenous life. Many studies had taken place to make sure that it was fit for human life and none had shown anything living on the planet. Unfortunately, they hadnt looked too far under the surface. As the temperature rose, the hills surrounding the colony had become alive with activity. Strange, insect like creatures had emerged, stumbling into the sun for the first time since their long hibernation began and on discovering the new inhabitants of their world found them weak and delicious. The Bugs as the colonists liked to call them, were about six feet long and came in a variety of shapes and colours. The flying ones, dubbed The Swarm, were the most dangerous, able to attack from the air. Then there were the armoured ground troops and the scuttling, locust like beasts that crept up in the dark and the Weavers, with their paralysing venom and sticky traps. To a modern army, they would have been a formidable foe. To a group of farmers, they were death incarnate. The colonists made their last stand two weeks after they had initiated the distress call and took their final gamble on a jury rigged radiation weapon that irradiated the nearby hive. Against all odds, it worked and for a brief time, the attacks stopped. The colonists had about a month to rebuild, to fortify themselves before the raids started. The Bugs came from nowhere, stealing people away and flying them back to their hive. Where once they just killed, now they collected and it was not long before the colonists numbered in their hundreds rather than their thousands. In a final, desperate measure the remaining humans overloaded the radiation emitters and decimated the planet. Not one human or Bug remained alive. Such was the sight that greeted Lieutenant Melissa King when the landing party of the Leviathan touched down. The radiation had reached tolerable background levels as the teams shuttle docked with the colony space port, allowing them to walk on the surface freely. Within the hour, the colony site had been surveyed. Not a person remained alive, the distress beacon that had brought them here chattering its call across the universe with no-one left to turn it off. Despondent, the team sought out the records of the colony and saw for themselves the terrors that had befallen the people who had tried to make a new life out here. A small comfort was that they would have likely have been no help to the colonists, their ship decked out for scientific exploration, not war and it was that overriding mission that led to their next destination. Reading no signs of life from the hive, the team were beholden to explore. It was a rare opportunity to encounter intelligent life, even if it was deadly. There was much they could learn from this species through examining the corpses and they were damned if they were going to come all this way for nothing. A week after landfall, Melissa stood in the entrance tunnel of the hive, amazed at its bizarre architecture and excited at what they might find within. A complete alien community, hidden from us all this time, she whispered as the team entered. Document everything, take as many samples as we can, we wont get an opportunity like this again!