Alex and the Hunter prowled the grounds with darkness and silence through the night. The murk was all over and around but it didn't affect them at all. Alex had developed thermal vision and the Hunter had it equipped in his biomask so if anything they were ready and on point. They ran at a good pace while also keeping it quiet enough so that the prey wouldn't see them coming.

At times like this, they both felt right at home.

A small pack of xenomorphs were creeping in group, moving towards others without a right aim or direction. They were entirely oblivious to their incoming butchers, who already had a plan drawn and were about to execute it.

The Hunter silently motioned and signaled for Alex to get to the opposite end of the street, in order to block and take any runners who felt like fleeing. He silently complied. Now it was game on.

The Hunter drew his wrist blades and with some handy foot work of his, he moved right behind of a xenomorph drone, clouded in stealth. Hell, he didn't even need the stealth cloak for this one. Before the sound of metal shooting off even got to the drone's ears, the Hunter had already closed the distance and then his blades dug into the drone's neck. The cut and slash were hard enough that with a little extra effort, the Hunter had decapitated the drone.

Before the large odd shaped head could fall to the ground, the Hunter kicked it like a ball towards the other bugs of the kin. The Hunter was kind of a joker but Alex liked it. The guy rejoiced in a good hunt just as much as he did. Alex smirked at the distance.

The rest of the drones turned around and watched as the Hunter taunted them openly, ready to start a carnage against them. They hissed out loud, only for the Hunter to rush and hop on top of one's head, putting his legs against it's shoulders and burying a cold blade down it's mouth and throat.

In quick succession he jumped into another one with a tremendous force, knocking it off it's feet and pinning it as it painfully shrieked at the next move. With a strong slash, it's head came out rolling.

The Hunter ducked under some nasty claws coming at him and in response pierced his attacker's chest and ribs before busting them open and killing the fiend. Another two lunged at him so he swept one's legs and rocked the other one with a spin kicked that fell it on top of the other one. The Hunter cut their brains apart with the same thrust.

Many others tried to run wild away from their unfavorable slaughter seeing that they were losing, only for three of them to get flattened like bloody pancakes by the sheer force of Alex coming down from a rooftop on them. The next one took the massive Blade to the chest that was then lifted and used to slice it in half.

"Now you're fucked." Alex stated more than said. With the same Blade he cut off a pair off heads as he switched to his Hammerfists. He so typically brought them down with an incredible force that raised many of the preys ahead of him high into the air and then with his Breachers he violently yanked them back at the ground, collapsing them into mush and puddle.

Drones were much easier to squish than grunts so he used that to his favor.

He kept his frenzy going, punching and splattering any bug around him like balloons with his well charged punches. The Hunter caught up and launched his disc, slicing of many of their heads in a row until his projectile got buried into concrete, prompting him to go and retrieve it.

Alex called for his Whipfist and unleashed it against the incoming creatures called by the sound of the slaughter. With practiced ease, he raised it over his head and spun it around like a lasso, letting it soar and take out the enemy. Praetors all around got reduced to ribbons and disembodied limbs. Alex noted how much more deadly his Whipfist had become, sporting what seemed like some heavy barbed wire around it.

Alex then shot it off at the side of a building that was right above the crawling beasts. Without much thought, he yanked hard and witnessed with glee how a massive chunk of concrete was ripped from the main building to smash the bugs with it's weight and derivated force. There was a loud splat and Alex grinned at it.

The Hunter threw a praetor over his shoulder, crashing it hard on the hood of a car and then he brought down a fist on it's neck, snapping it apart with zane. Another one came along and it was met with a brutal spin kick that dislocated it's jaw, then a second one that split it's head in wet chunks. The Hunter kicked like a truck, Alex noted.

The Hunter ran forward against the opposing horde and cut his way through them to get his disc back. As he did, Alex made good use of his Hammerfists and weaponized a big truck parked nearby. A loud ruckus was heard as the vehicle was sent through the air at high speed, splashing the streets with acidic blood from the dead praetors.

The Hunter took quick aim with his shoulder cannon and blasted the truck into a glorious ball of fire that engulfed many of their foes. Whatever was left of them was soon consumed by Alex into his mass for good measure and refilling purposes.

More loud shrieks and hisses were heard across the street. He and the Hunter turned quickly to watch how a swarm of xenos plagued a building near them. Alex spat on their general direction and reached for another vehicle to weaponize and launch as a torpedo. His eyes caught a glimpse of a dump truck and that put a smirk on his face.

He got to work and the Hunter watched as his fingers dug into metal to get traction as if it was plastic. Then the whole mass was lifted and raised over his head. Alex' shoes dug into the asphalt, cracking it in many places through his sheer weight. The viral abomination motioned for the Hunter to move aside and he complied. Then there was the the toss. The vehicle crossed about a hundred meters in one second and crashed hard against the wall crawling horde.

"Care to give it some light?" Alex asked calmly, pointing at the massive damage produced by the truck entering into the building's offices.

The Hunter nodded after getting Alex' message and then fired a plasma round that instantly hit the projectile. The result was amazing, like fireworks. The loud boom and shockwave of the explosion rocked the whole building and was felt over their position.

That was just something else entirely. A sight to behold.

The bugs were all fried and scorched in a matter of seconds.

Alex and the Hunter shared looks for a moment and then they agreed to move on with their hunt.

Unknown to them, a newer and deadlier specimen made it's way through the ruins. One so different and cloaked it's mind did not respond to the same Hive as the xenomorph.

The Warrior sat comfortably next to the rest of the group, sharing more and more about his and the Hunter's life stories. He told them of many great hunts they had enjoyed that spanned across the galaxy. Some of them did involve the xenomorphs.

"But there we were, holding onto the beast for the life of us. It came down to who killed who and we had to be fast about it. So I held it even harder and told Hunter to go for it. He looked frozen but he got it. He got a rock, the largest and heaviest he could find and he put it down on the bug's skull. Then again. And then a lot more times just to be careful, because you can never be too careful. We know what we know and it's a fact that they are only good when dead. Ugly sons of bitches."

Dutch, Lynn and the squad of Alex' men paid attention to the words with legitimate interest, digging all the details. Each one of them had plenty of stories to tell, their eyes had seen some nasty stuff, that much they had in common but as eager as they were to open up about that, there was more appeal to hearing the tales of an elder inter-galactic alien warrior with a kill count good enough to back up his title.

"Hunter grew some guts over the years. He had to." The Warrior went on. "He learned a lot."

"Looks like you guys had hell of a story. More than one actually." Lynn remarked with her interest shown.

"I bet Mercer would have a couple of things to tell us too." Dutch said in a change of topic. Smee took a sip of his water before he spoke up.

"That he would. The boss has been a constant pain in the ass of both government and military alike. The kind of cash they spent in trying to fight him was insane." Ittin then joined the small talk.

"But it seems like it wasn't insane enough. He's always one step ahead, he's here and there, he could eat and impersonate anyone he wanted even in the cabinet or the White House. How he hasn't done it yet is beyond me."

"He is the man in charge. Hardly anyone crosses him without it coming right back to bite them in the ass." Hugh supplied.

"Tell us some more." The Warrior asked in his relaxed state.

"What's the story between him and you? Anyone he cares about or that he is close to?" Lynn asked too, to which Bill smirked.

"The five of us go all the way back. It's kind of a funny story actually but I won't let it drag for too long." Bill said, picking up where the others left off and going into more details about the start of their happy little family. "Not for the faint of heart but it's cool."

"You guys seem very fond of him." Lynn observed as they spoke.

"Must be our loyalty. Our story started long time ago in a godforsaken rectum of a land, pumping full of Infected." Wilkinson began telling.

"Somewhere down the war road in the middle east, go figure." Smee added as if he could relive the whole experience.

"He helped us against the slugs. He popped in the middle of the sand like a damn phantom and ate most of our enemies. He made it clear that he came in peace and we had no reason to think he was lying since he didn't move as much as a tendril against us boys." Hugh said, going on with their story. "Said he had to take care of a few stray dogs, you know what I mean?"

"We weren't as blind or dense as our bosses thought. An outbreak going up there couldn't be an accident or chance, them scientists and leaders were playing with some shady shit, trying to be God and then nature fired right back. Should have know all those little nightmares in their shop would come back to bite them in the ass. And it happened."

"So you say that you played along with Mercer?" Lynn inquired. They all nodded.

"With someone like him on our side, keeping the radio silent and our superiors in darkness seemed like a damn fair trade if you ask me." Smee stated. "Besides, we hated the fucks, this was a golden chance to hand them their own asses in a silver platter with no one knowing."

"We killed and shot our way through the horde for a few days and tagged along with Alex. He had made up this whole corporal Dunn persona to go unnoticed and it worked." Said Ittin as the explaination as to how Alex had covered his tracks.

"No shit." The Warrior mused. Ittin just smiled and continued.

"We got to the core, helped him put down the Hive and blow the freaks sky high and clean the scene. We made up some excuses, lied to cover Alex and then we even reported having found an M.I.A soldier from the last batallion sent, which was Dunn obviously."

"We could have stopped there after all the crap we saw and it would have been wise maybe but it wasn't for us. That was exactly the kind of shit we signed for and why were all pariahs amongst other recruits. They said some things about us being screwed in the head. " Hugh elaborated further.

"They were kinda right though." Wilkinson joked with a chuckle.

"What you see is what you get, a bunch of psychos following a bigger one's orders. And it felt right. Then we tried the private sector under Alex' orders and that led us to a whole lot of odd jobs, which brought us here." Ittin finished.

"Best job I've ever had." Hugh claimed with pride.

"Best job I've ever had." Said all others in unison, almost like robots. Dutch could really see now how they got along so well with Mercer. It was their call of duty.

"And they think my people are weird." The Warrior mused once more in supreme wisdom.

The Collector prowled the grounds all night, looking for good prey and cattle at his disposal. He had spent too much time in rest, sleeping to replenish his great force after the last drop he was given. The land in which he was now was so perfect to him that his whole mission felt just like a vacation.

Ever since the plane carrying him crashed down, he took it as a personal task to prey on whatever creatures the area had to offer. Xenomorphs of many kinds who shared a lot of the same blood and body parts that he had but not quite similar to him though.

As he moved from roof to roof his purpose was so clear to him. He had been made by the brightest minds that Gentek and the Company had to offer with the sole intent of ravaging infected lands, infected by his own makers to then feed on the weak minded organisms here and there. As of now he had killed and consumed hundreds of xenos in this city alone but he felt bad.

There should have been more.

The research team had assigned him to eat as many different branches of xenomorphs as he could, ones that they themselves unleashed upon the city just to test him even further. He got into their Hive mind, he could tap into it now freely and it helped him as a sort of radar to pin point other potential targets.

With each organism he took in he felt better progressively. Stronger, faster, deadlier and even smarter. A good boy had to eat after all and there were perks to it.

But there was something he found intriguing, earlier that day. When he tried to get into the Hive and feast upon the bugs there, he was taken back and surprised to see people getting ahead of him in his own hunt.

It was strangely familiar to the Collector. His makers had given him the knowledge of many of the previous strains or viral creatures they had engineered. Names like Redlight and Blacklight circled in his mind and led him to even more names. Elizabeth Greene, Pariah, ZEUS.

ZEUS.

Having focused enough to sense the living beings that were now part of the alien Hive mind, it didn't take him long to isolate and identify the little light of virus that had made it into their link. That was ZEUS that showed up in his radar now. The viral abomination represented the Blacklight, he was the runner and carrier, a force that nothing in Manhattan could manage to stop. So many groups were tasked with his capture and so many had failed because they didn't even come close.

The sad irony for him was that the government had found the solution to that, not in sending in a large amount of soldiers after him or even an army of them to neutralize the target, but rather in sending in one good asset for the job, one that was complete and treated genetically to compete against ZEUS. When the time came for them to clash and look into each other's eyes, the Collector could only hope that the runner didn't disappoint him like the xenomorphs he now found himself feeding upon.

The info he gathered on the subject of ZEUS should do, but that didn't top studying him closer and more personally. For short bursts he managed to look at his face and he felt his joy, the pride he took on the kills. He could relate.

It was almost as if the runner was challenging him to a fight without knowing. Like a contest, seeing who could take out and consume more prey, and the Collector stopped to think of it and he realized that ZEUS didn't even know he existed, which gave him the surprise factor to work with.

For the time being, he would let ZEUS free roam with his companions. In this game of wits he had been programmed to be superior and in the end it was the survival of the deadliest.

His attention went back to a lot other fresh specimens that had been lurking around in the shadows of the alleys. He jumped from his high point and let down his body's weight with acceleration, dropping on the cattle that were the xenos and reducing them to green paste. One of his key advantages was that unlike many other organisms, he could completely alter the chemistry and composition of his mass, rendering him a chameleon for others like him and even those with improved vision.

But despite how much he was enjoying his work, in order to keep an even lower profile he chose to go into hybernation mode, allowing him to lay dormant and rest his mind for further work. He would rather have ZEUS fight at his peak, having absorbed enough prey to be a bigger challenge for him. That way all the more power he would get off him when it was time to consume.

Once he woke up it would be playtime.

Sorry for the shorter chapter, had to get it out of the way and introduce some stuff, like the antagonist of the story which is the Collector, also have some team bonding for the crew and shed some light on the past of the taskforce and Alex. Also, Alex and the Hunter slaying xeno's for the win!