Tregear received a telephone call in the dead of night from a former colleague in the UR. His team have been harassed by MIBs and important work confiscated. The colleague, James Blain, thinks Tregear is responsible, and managed to track down XCom through contacts (in fact, Featherton Smythe of MI6)
The following day, Greer and Tregear accompanied by Harry Cheng (Now officially Greer's bodyguard) travel to England to meet up with Blain. They contact Featherton Smythe and make their way direct to Blain's house. They find Blain and his wife slaughtered in their beds and everyone else from the road missing, including the Blain children, Melissa and Toby (5 and 3 respectively)
A short while later, two Range Rovers full of MIBs arrive, claiming to be from Featherton Smythe. They begin to clean up the street, removing the two bodies. Greer and Tregear believe their story, but have a nagging suspicion, which is confirmed when the real MI6 team turn up. A firefight ensues. The Admiral is shot in the arm, and Cheng captures a MIB in a spectacular hand to hand fight. But unfortunately, the bodies of the Blains are lost.
Frustrated, the XCom team return with their captive, where they successfully extract his implants. He is little more than a vegetable at first, but following extensive therapy by Doc Johnson and Doctor Cheng, there are hopes for a full recovery.
Episode 6: The Devil and the Deep
A wedge is detected over the North Sea, heading towards the United Republic. Heedful of the possibility of allying with this race, Greer scrambles interceptors, but orders them to escort, not engage the target.
When the combined formation of wedge and Interceptors approach UR airspace, the British scramble fighters, which are effortlessly shot down by wedge missiles. The wedge then turns and heads over to the Baltic sea, where it drops its cargo capsule over a small island before going orbital again.
A VTOL assault team is landed on the island, and find it a war zone. The wedge has landed on a slug base, and disgorged golden coloured androids, which kill slugs and humans with equal abandon. The troopers find the machines very hard to kill, and suffer heavy casualties, before the island is liberated.
Episode 7: The Ceremony of Innocence
A lone saucer draws out the Swiss Base interceptors over the Atlantic. They bring it down easily, but discover that it is merely a ploy to divert them away from the real alien attack. A mother ship (estimated crew complement of about fifty) lands and attacks a Russian run research station in Tashkent, Uzbekistan. The station is dedicated to high energy weapon research, and although in Uzbek territory, is financed by and answers to Moscow alone.
However, unknown to anyone at XCom, the Usbeki government have been trying to infiltrate the facility for some time. The only thing stopping them from taking it by brute force is the company of Russian security troops guarding it. The Russians, by the same token, have been eyeing up their neighbour and former ally, and have been looking for an excuse to annexe them as part of a plan to create a larger 'Russian Confederacy'.
When XCom forces arrive at the station, they find the saucer virtually unguarded. They enter the ship and fight their way to the bridge, where they have their first face to face encounter with a 'Gray'. One team finds itself cut off outside the bridge while the other communicates telepathically with the alien. It tells them that the Gray plan is part of the war against 'The Enemy of the Helix' and that it is for the greater good of both races. While distracting them this way, the Gray takes control of one of the soldiers who runs amok. The second team blasts its way into the bridge and the Gray is killed.
While searching the ship, the soldiers make several gruesome discoveries. The half dissected remains of the Blain children (Melissa, aged 5 and Toby aged 3). They also find a bio-engineered creature resembling H R Giger's 'Alien' designs.
Meanwhile, an Uzbeki armoured column is detected heading for the landing site. Uzbeki officials contact XCom and demand that XCom operatives leave the area. They refuse to abide by the Helsinki protocols and refuse to discuss the issue further. Greer is then contacted by Prime Minister Groschenko of Russia, who offers help, but Greer refuses.
Shortly afterward, Uzbeki scouts attack the VTOL, at Tashkent, damaging its communications systems and cutting the team off from Swiss Base. Communication is re-established using the interceptors to relay communications. Greer orders the troopers to defend the VTOL with deadly force. They do so, and two Uzbeki BMP-1s are destroyed.
Groschenko contacts Greer 'offering' his help once again. When Greer refuses, he helps anyway. A unit of helicopter gunships is sent to attack the Uzbeki column, followed by the best part of a couple of motor rifle divisions, to help 'stabilise' the situation. This stabilisation later leads to the re-integration of Uzbekistan into the Russian Federation.
Somewhat taken aback, Greer agrees that a Russian team should accompany the XCom operatives in taking back the base. Within fifteen minutes a Spetsnatz team, armed with experimental particle beam projectors arrives, lead by Alexi Dinov (Dinova's brother). When the aliens leave the underground portion of the base with what looks like large wheeled skips, the combined force pounces. After a fierce battle, involving room to room fighting in the station's upper buildings, these skips are found to contain human genetic material, in varying states. Once entry into the station's underground section is secured, all the worst fears are confirmed, every living being on the base has been killed, and most of the research destroyed.
After the cleanup crews recover the mothership, and Dinova is informed of her brother's death, Greer receives another call from Groschenko. Greer is angry that the XCom operation was used as a front for the invasion of Uzbekistan, but is ultimately powerless. Groschenko pledges to support XCom operations in the future.
Doc Johnson comes across a report of an American woman who attended an expensive fertility clinic in Switzerland, who now claims to have been experimented upon by aliens during her stay there. He asks Greer to send an investigation team but Greer, who is feeling a little stale and shut in at Swiss Base, decides to lead the team himself. Lt Commander Dinova, who has just returned from her brother's funeral, and Lt Andrew Jackson, from the newly named XCom Ranger Division are to pose as a married couple seeking treatment, Greer and Private Harry Cheng are the backup team. Ironically, it is confirmed that this is the same clinic attended by Ms Emma Myers, Tregear's nemesis.
Around the same time, Professor Tregear discovered that scientist from his old research team in Oxford are being abducted. Assuming that this follows on from the murder of Jim Blain some months previously, Tregear leaves for England to investigate, accompanied by Agent Woodrow "Woody" Cooper, on special detachment from XIS Bureau XIII.
When Woody and Tregear arrive in the UR, their first port of call is to see Inspector Handley of Scotland Yard, who is investigating the disappearances. He suspects Tregear may be responsible, and poaching the scientists for his new, top secret job, and asks Tregear to report in regularly.
They try to contact Featherton-Smythe, their contact in British Intelligence, but he appears to have disappeared from the face of the Earth. No-one at his previous office admits to having heard of him.
Next they visit Dr Harriet Kramer, Tregears former colleague who now fills his job as head of the project team. She tells them that the research is nearing fruition, and that the teams goal of producing viable bioelectronics systems, is certainly within reach. She too blames Tregear, as his departure for XCom six months previously was sudden and unannounced.
Woody, paranoid as ever, tries a scan for listening devices and discovers that Kramer's office is well and truly bugged. Over lunch, in the crowded canteen, she tells them that research centre is managed by Harper Property Management PLC, and that since they took over the building has been prone to power cuts and breakdowns. Tregear sets up a quick trace on his laptop and discovers that Harper PLC's other customers include many other Government Installations, including Scotland Yard.
In Switzerland, Jackson and Dinova pose as a wealthy couple and convince the Kostler Clinic representative in Berne. She invites them to visit the clinic with her the following afternoon. The XCom troopers assess the office, it appears to be a perfectly simple front, no excessive security and no private sections. Greer and Cheng set off in advance in a rented Range Rover, so they will be in position near the clinic when Dinova and Jackson arrive.
Overnight in England, another scientist is abducted. His car is found abandoned in the middle of nowhere. Tregear and Woody decide that there is only one way to make the scientists safe, and that is to take them to XCom. Returning to their hotel they are pursued by a big black Range Rover, but a bit of sharp driving results in the MIBs winding up in the river. They blow up their own car rather than be captured.
Tregear and Woody pay another visit to Handley, who accuses them of responsibility for the abductions. Woody scans his office, and it too is very very bugged. They warn him of this covertly and leave.
Returning to their hotel room, they find an intruder. Featherton-Smythe, the missing MI5 contact. He tells them that he has noticed some funny things going on in the UR, and after questioning them he found himself discredited and shuffled into a no-where job. He has since been covertly investigating a suspected infiltration and subversion of the government, gathering a small cadre of agents and officials loyal to him. He agrees to liaise with XCom in future operations and agrees with the plan to extract the scientists.
The next day Handley calls the team and asks to meet them, on top of a deserted car park in London. He tells them he confirmed that the whole office is bugged and asks for advice. Tregear reports all he knows about Harper Property Management PLC and tells Handley of the plan to take the scientists to XCom.
Later, in Switzerland, Jackson and Dinova are shown around the Kostler Clinic, with Cheng and Greer on the other side of the valley watching the building. Unfortunately, unbeknownst to the infiltration team, the Clinic is heavily monitored by security cameras which feed into a small Slug spying post in an outbuilding. Jackson, who led the team that took the mothership (and who was filmed doing so by it's security devices, not to mention the telepathic Grey Alien) is recognised and a suitable fate for them is planned.
In the UR, a meeting is planned with all the scientists in a local pub. Once there, Woody and Tregear try to convince them to join XCom. There is resistance at first, but once Kramer goes over to side with Tregear, they are swayed. Only one or two die-hards still refuse.
As they are arguing the point in the pub's back room, Tregear gets a call from Featherton-Smythe. All he manages to say is "Get out! Get out now! They're on to you. They're going to....<click><BUZZZZZZZZZ>"
Seconds later, the police loudhailer from outside calls out "The building is surrounded, release your hostages and come out with your hands on your heads."
Things go no better in Switzerland. Dinova and Jackson, while finishing their tour, are shown to a door, but before they can react are pushed roughly through and thrown down a flight of steps into a darkened cellar. As they dust themselves off and try to make some light, Jackson is pounced on by a kicking, biting, spitting and hissing near human form. With some help from Dinova they subdue the attacker, who turns out to be a former patient of the clinic that has reacted badly to 'treatment'. She has been thrown down here out of the way and is nearly insane. Dinova presses her panic button, a concealed transmitter which alerts Greer that something is wrong. He calls an assault team from Swiss Base (mere minutes away) but since those minutes could cost Dinova and Jackson their lives, he orders Cheng to drive down the side of the valley and up the other, directly to the clinic.
Unfortunately Cheng's off-road driving skills aren't quite up to scratch, and the Range Rover winds up in a ditch on the clinic side of the valley. A guard approaches them, but he is quickly dealt with. The pair see the small saucer land at the clinic at almost the same time that Swiss Base detects it. The Osprey carrying the assault team arrives minutes later and Greer meets them. A sniper from the clinic takes a pot shot that would have killed the Admiral, but Cheng hurls himself at the Admiral pushing him out of the way. Cheng, however is killed instantly.
Back in England, Tregear and Cooper try reasoning with the police, but to no avail. Inspector Handley is one of the negotiators, but he is obviously one of the enemy as he now refuses to acknowledge he'd met Tregear and Cooper. Then Tregear hits on the idea of calling out every agency he can think of to confuse the matter. He calls the Fire department, the Gas Board, the Phone Company, the British Nuclear Fuels police, the Army and Air Force (he doesn't have the Navy's number). Soon they are all outside, arguing with each other over jurisdiction.
One of the scientists demands to be allowed to go. Cooper and Tregear have no option but to let him go. He walks out and is shuffled into a black Range Rover by Men In Black. He is never seen or heard from again.
As a last desperate measure, Tregear calls an Assault team, but before they arrive, the police leave, taking everyone with them. The street is deserted as if nothing had happened. A few minutes later, Swiss Base report a pair of saucers on a fast attack run, heading their way.
The interceptors, are on station in Switzerland, however, attempting to destroy the saucer there before it landed at the clinic. Both fail, but Hawk (XCom1) decides to try a cannon attack on the landed saucer. Unfortunately he misses and the cannon fire raked through one wing of the hospital, killing two patients and wounding several others. Greer orders the interceptors to withdraw, then leads the assault himself.
Inside the clinic, Dinova and Jackson find an air vent that Dinova can crawl through. She makes her escape that way, and Jackson rigs a tripwire on the stairs then calls for a guard. The guard, a big brute of a man, sees the tripwire and cuts it, then goes for Jackson with a knife. The resulting fight is brutal and bloody, but Jackson limps to the top of the stairs with the girl in tow, just in time to meet the assault team coming in. Greer retires to the Osprey while Jackson leads the rest of the assault.
The clinic's helicopter escapes, but when XCom2 intercepts it, Bowler reports that it's heading for base, with Dinova holding the pilot and a passenger at gunpoint. The saucer seems set to launch, but is brought down by heavy fire (and lucky shots) from the assault team's heavy weapons (including their newly issued LAWs).
In England the VTOL lands and Tregear and Cooper manage to herd the scientists out of the pub and to the VTOL just before the saucer flattens the building with heavy plasma fire. They remain in the aircraft while the assault team sets up an ambush for the aliens, who land and move in on foot to investigate the ruined pub. The resulting firefight ends with the aliens dead and no XCom casualties. The VTOL, slightly overloaded, returns to Swiss Base pursued to the Channel by UR fighters.
In the days that followed, the UR denounced Tregear and the scientists as traitors and began a campaign to have them extradited. They drop out of the Project and withdraw funding. Assessing the outcome, all the XCom command agree that they have won the battle, but definitely lost the war in the UR.
Episode 9: The Streets Run Red
Two mothership sized saucers attack Berlin, escorted by a swarm of smaller, fighter type craft. While the fighters fly patrol, the motherships land and the slugs proceed to kill every living thing they come across. By the time XCom operatives arrive, hundreds are dead and the rest have fled the city.
Admiral Greer ordered the first deployment of the XCom Harriers, standard McDonnel Douglas designs with some modifications, in an attempt to provide XCom with an air-to-ground capability. In the first wave of the attack, the Interceptors took out the patrolling fighters, with Bowler in XCom2 taking medium damage and is ordered to withdraw. Hawk in XCom1 is jumped by four fighters. Bowler, seeing his colleague in trouble, turns and re-engages, turning the tide. Unfortunately the motherships launch a further two fighters which pursue Bowler, and bring him down to a forced landing, before escaping.
With all the enemy fighters taken care of, the Harriers make their attack run on the motherships. Flying at street level to use the cover of buildings, they make hit and run rocket pod attacks on the motherships, ducking out before the aliens can return fire. One mother ship is destroyed, the other is badly damaged.
The VTOLS land and the mopping up operation is long and hard, with hand to hand fighting that's both bloody and decisive. Just when it seems that the battle is going XCom's way, Swiss Base detects three more traces in the skies over Berlin. They are identified as Wedges. Due to their angle and speed of approach (terminal velocity, straight down from orbit) they are almost impossible to intercept, but Bowler, who has now been joined by XCom4 and 5 from the US and China bases respectively, orders the attack. The Interceptors power climb at full thrust to meet the intruders, but only two of the ships are destroyed. Pushing their planes to the ultimate limit, the pilots wrench their planes around in a vertical stall turn, and begin a power dive in pursuit. The remaining Wedge is hit just before it drops its cargo pod and hits the ground out of control, but the Chinese interceptor pilot is unable to pull up in time, and augers in at Mach 3. He does not eject.