The Alien RPG is, like it sounds, a horror sci-fi roleplaying game set in the terrifying universe of the Alien movies. We played this game on 21/10/23, with a preset adventure and randomly distributed preset characters.
Dom was the Game Master. |
Kye was given the role of Janice MacWhirr, a strict union rep. |
Sam was given the role of Sonny Sigg, a curious lab technician. |
Paul was given the role of Hannah Singleton, a no-nonsense tractor driver. |
Hadley’s Hope is a small ‘shake-and-bake’ colony on planet LV-426, aiming to map out the world and terraform it into something more habitable for humans.
While out on a maintenance run to fix one of the atmospheric processors, the team's tractor breaks down. They call the colony for help, but only get some vague message back about the colony having their own problems to deal with, and they should just wait. After a day of waiting with no further contact, the team have to make their way back to base on foot.
As they arrive at the west entrance of the large metal complex, things are quieter than they’re used to. Janice taps the intercom at the door.
Janice: “This is the maintenance team, checking in. We’ve had to come back on foot because no one –“
Intercom: “Attention all survivors, you need to evacuate levels 1 and 2, and head to the sub-level housing quarters! I repeat, head to the sub-level housing quarters! You have one hour to get down here, then we’re barricading ourselves in!”
Janice: “What? Repeat again, why do we need to evacuate? What’s going-“
She’s interrupted by the sounds of gunfire and unholy screeches. That wasn’t on the intercom. That was somewhere inside. Somewhere close.
Sonny: “That sounds… fine.”
Janice spends a little longer trying to get a response out of the intercom, but to no avail.
Hannah: “I guess we’re going to the sub-level housing quarters.”
Sonny: “Do we really want to go… in there?”
Janice: “Well we can’t stay out here, we’ve used up all our rations.”
Hannah: “What do you think happened? Was there a mutiny or something?”
Sonny: “You didn’t hear those screams? Those weren’t human.”
Janice: “So it’s whatever they found in those alien eggs the explorers brought back.”
Sonny: “Probably.”
Hannah, readying a handgun: “Well, gear up then.”
Janice, fishing around in a toolkit: “I… I’ve got a nail-gun?”
Sonny: “I’ve got nothing.”
Hannah: “Don’t worry, we’ll go ahead of you.”
The team enter the base, resolving to stop by the armoury on their way to the sub-level. As they stealthily make their way through the base and up onto the second floor, Sonny wants to stop by the administration office to see if the computers there can access the security cameras. Entering the room, Sonny notices a woman sitting in a chair, facing away from him. From this angle, it looks as though she is simply asleep, but Sonny has a bad feeling. Especially as he notices the torn up vent above her head.
He grabs an empty bin (hoping to be able to trap anything that may jump out at him) and prods her with it. No reaction. He uses the bin to spin her around in the swivel chair.
Her face is gone.
Sonny: “Oh… oh god… yeah, that’s not the work of a human being…”
Hearing this, Janice steps in, and gets momentarily startled by the mangled head of the corpse as well. Sonny awkwardly pushes the body in the chair out of the way to get to the computers. He notices a blinking light on a communicator on the desk, and hands it to Janice to answer while he tries to get into the computers.
Female voice coming through the comms: “Oh thank god, you finally picked up! I’m trapped in the medbay, I need you to come and get me.”
Janice hesitates before answering.
Voice: “Hello? Miranda, are you there?”
Janice: “Hey – I’m afraid Miranda is a little preoccupied right now-“
Sonny, in the background: “She’s super dead!”
Voice: “What?! She’s de – who am I speaking to?”
Janice: “This is Janice MacWhirr, I was leading a maintenance run off-base yesterday. My team just got back and it looks like shits really hit the fan – do you know what’s going on?”
Voice: “Fuck. Look, I’ll tell you what I know when you come get me, okay? The short version is – we’ve got an outbreak of alien creatures. They’re spidery little monsters, and they are dangerous, you hear me? Be wary of the vents.”
Janice: “Copy that. It looks like the armoury is on our way to the medbay, we’ll go there first and be with you as soon as we can.”
Voice: “Good thinking. Please be quick.”
As Janice hangs up, Sonny gives up trying to get into the computer. They relay what they’re doing to Hannah outside.
Janice: “Hannah, you have a motion sensor, don’t you? Wanna give it a try?”
Hannah: “Oh yeah, I do.”
She takes out a radar-like device. Apart from the three green dots that represent them, it’s all clear. They make their way to the armoury.
Sonny spends a few minutes hacking the electronic lock on the armoury, but when they get it open, they see it’s been picked clean, only two weapons remaining. Janice takes the shotgun. With a clunk she pops it open. No ammo. Sonny takes the revolver. With a ka-click he checks the chamber. Two bullets. With a screech from down the corridor, they freeze. Something heard them.
Hannah checks the motion sensor again. There’s one green dot approaching.
Moving quickly and quietly, communicating with hand signals, they switch off the lights and each of them fade into the darkness, in different hiding spots around the weapon racks.
Time passes. They hold their breath as they hear a closer screech.
Time passes. A large shadow darkens the doorway momentarily. And then it skitters away.
Ka-klang. It sounds like it ripped open a vent and went in. It’s scuttling echoes metallically through the ceiling.
Eventually, they can’t hear it anymore. Another look at the motion sensor, and Hannah gives the ‘all clear’ hand signal. They breathe a sigh of relief, and venture out of the room. They start moving again, only daring to start speaking again when they start nearing the medbay, but even then, they only talk in hushed tones.
They reach the medbay. Through a window, they can see its occupants; a body on a table with a large spider-y creature latched onto their face, a long tail wrapped around the neck. The creature is still, dotted with bullet-holes. Between tables, they see another one of those creatures lying still on its back as well. On a worktop, a live one repeatedly slams against the wall of a cylindrical container, an unsettling orifice in its underside sucking at the glass. In a corner, they see a woman in a lab coat curled up against a wall, handgun in one hand, tears streaming down her face as she stares off into the distance. Sonny knocks lightly. Her eyes flick up, and her face lights up. She rushes over to the door.
Woman, muffled: “Hello? Were you who I spoke to earlier? You need to find a way to open the door from your side, there’s some stupid lockdown mechanism -”
Sonny hacks the electronic lock again, and the door shunts open with a rush of air.
Woman: “ -in place. Wow, that was fast.”
Sonny: “I’ve had some practice.”
Janice and Sonny move into the room, while Hannah stands guard in the doorway.
Janice: “I recognise you… you’re Dr Theodora Komiskey, right?”
Theodora: “Right.”
Janice: “So what happened?”
Theodora: “Yeah…”
She looks around at the unsettling scene.
Theodora: “…Aliens happened. They try and jump on your face and pump some kind of poison down your throat. We thought we’d taken precautions against them. Didn’t account for their acid protrusions that melt through anything that gets in their way.”
Hannah: “Is that the acid?”
Hannah points at the creature on the ground. Sure enough, its orifice is bubbling with a steaming, milky liquid that burns small divots in the ground wherever it drips. Hannah walks over and picks it up.
Hannah: “This might sound crazy, but I say we take this with us. Acid might come in handy.”
She folds the legs in so it's not dripping, and puts it in a bag.
Theodora: “It doesn’t hurt the creatures though…”
Hannah, looking at the corroded spots on the floor: “No, but it looks like it burns through metal. Might be useful if we have to carve our own exit out of here”
Theodora: “Right, speaking of exits – I don’t think anywhere on this base is safe. I think we need to get to the shuttle station. I have a keycard that can get us in there -”
Janice: “What about all the people down in the sub-level housing quarters?”
Theodora: “These creatures can melt their way through any obstacle, and I don’t know how, but they are multiplying. We can’t lock ourselves in an area and hope this blows over, we need to get off-planet.”
Janice: “…So we go down to the survivors in sub-level and we tell them that. Convince them to escape with us. Strength in numbers, right?”
Theodora goes to argue, but something accusing in Janice’s glare stops her.
Theodora: “…Sure. We’ll get out everyone we can.”
Janice: “Great. We were trying to access security cameras earlier, to get an idea of what’s going on - I think there’s a security office down the hall from here where we can actually do that now. All in favour of going there first, then sub-level, then shuttle station?”
Everyone nods. Janice turns to leave, but Sonny speaks up.
Sonny: “One more idea. I know how this is going to sound to you ‘non-scientists’, no offence – but I think we should take the live specimen with us as well.”
He gestures to the creature in the container.
Janice: “Absolutely not.”
Hannah, almost at the same time as Janice, voice raised: “Why? So it can kill and multiply back on Earth or wherever we’re going?!”
Sonny: “No! So our research on this location won’t be wasted! The only other planet we’ve found that has its own form of animal life! Think of everything we could-”
Hannah: “We’ve learned what we need to learn here – don’t colonise this planet! Cross this one off the galactic maps gang, here there be monsters!”
Janice: “It’s already too dangerous without that thing slowing us down. End of discussion.”
Sonny: “…Fine.”
Janice: “Fine?”
Sonny: “Fine!”
Janice: “…”
Sonny: “…”
Janice: “…Okay. Let’s move.”
Janice and Hannah leave the room. Sonny pretends to be about to follow, but then pulls Theodora aside.
Sonny: “You understand what I’m saying, right? An actual alien lifeform. We’ll never get this chance again. If we get out of here without it, we’re just the loose ends of a failed project. With it, we’ll be celebrities of the science world, we’ll be set for life.”
Theodora: “O-oh yeah. Of course. But your colleagues-“
Sonny: “Don’t have to know. You got a bag that can fit this thing?”
Theodora thinks. She nods. She grabs a duffel bag from under a worktop and opens it up.
The creature starts slamming against the glass more violently as Sonny picks it up.
It’s heavier than he anticipated.
He drops it. Smash.
There’s a moment where it feels like time has stopped. Sonny and Theodora are frozen, looking grimly at what they’ve done. All they can hear is their heartbeat in their ears. The creature is still. Then its limbs unfurl, and it stands.
Janice, reappearing in the doorway: “For fucks sake, Sonny!”
The creature leaps for Sonny’s face, its tail wrapping around his neck. He’s holding its legs back from latching on, but it’s stronger than it looks. Theodora rushes forward and tries to pull the creature off him.
Hannah reappears in the doorway. Her eyes go wide. And then she just runs.
Janice raises her nail-gun, waiting for an opening where she won’t hurt Sonny.
Janice: “Komiskey! Out of the way!”
Theodora complies.
Janice shoots the squealing creature in the side, and it drops to the ground, wriggling. She shoots it a few more times to pin it there. Its flailing limbs slow to a stop, but the nails dissolve in the acid that its bleeding.
It sinks into the floor, the acid eating through the ground at an alarming rate. And then it drops through completely. There is now a large, steaming hole in the medbay floor. They watch in disbelief as the hole grows to a size that a large person could easily climb through before the acid burns itself out.
Janice fixes the two scientists with a murderous glare.
Janice: “CONTROL ROOM. NOW.”
Janice, Sonny and Theodora run to the control room. The moment they enter, Hannah has a gun to Sonny’s head.
Hannah: “Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t blow your brains out right now.”
Sonny: “W-we’re in here to look at the security cameras, right? You think you know how to get into the system? I’m your tech guy, remember?”
Janice: “I don’t like it anymore than you do after what he just pulled, but he’s right. We need him.”
Hannah, lowering her gun: “Hmph.”
Sonny goes over to the computer terminal with screens all over the walls, and spends some time getting into the security systems.
Sonny: “Why are all the security cameras offline? I’ve only got three feeds I can access.”
Janice: “Where are they?”
Sonny: “A random A1 block corridor, sub-level housing quarters, and E1 block south entrance.”
Janice: “Let’s see ‘em.”
Sonny brings up the A1 block corridor. Everyone’s eyes are instantly drawn to the edge of the screen, where a silhouette of something big and humanoid with a tail drags a human body off-screen. It was too fast and grainy to tell if that was exactly what it was, but everyone knows what they saw.
Hannah: “That wasn’t one of those spider-y things.”
Sonny: “It’s figure looked kind of like some fossils that I’ve seen. It’s possible the creatures we’ve seen can undergo some kind of metamorphosis?”
Hannah, drily: “Fantastic.”
Janice: “Well. Steering clear of A1 then. Next feed.”
The sub-level housing quarters fill the screens. No sign of life. Plenty of gore and corpses. It's like the survivors barricaded themselves in, not knowing they were locking themselves in with something that tore through them like paper. Janice’s face falls.
Janice: “They’re all… gone.”
She pounds the console.
Janice: “DAMMIT!”
She regains her composure.
Janice: “Alright. There’s no one else to save. Just us four. Bring up the E1 block south entrance feed, that’s the closest route to the shuttle station anyway-”
Hannah: “Shh!”
Janice, hushed voice: “What?”
There are four people in the room. Hannah shows everyone the motion sensor, displaying five dots in the room.
In the quiet, ears prick up at the barely audible dull thuds of something moving in a pipe above them. Eyes wander up to it as the noises stop. Then there’s a sizzling sound, and the metal of the pipe begins to bend.
Sonny is the first to bolt out of the room, dragging Theodora out with him. Out in the corridor, they don't know which way to go as they hear more screeching from down the hall. They hear the clatter of something knocking over tables as it crawls into the medbay – up through the hole in the floor. Janice and Hannah race past them.
Janice: “This way!”
They sprint into the E2 block and take the ladder down to the E1 south entrance.
The E1 area is a passageway with a comms station, a few siderooms, a dark corridor where the lights seem to have blown, and the south entrance – an airlock that will require another few minutes to hack the lock.
Sonny starts working on the lock, but Janice notices a blinking light on the comms station and goes to answer it.
Janice: “Hello? Any other survivors?”
For a moment, the other end is quiet. Just the occasional sound of scratching and banging.
Janice: “Hello?”
Male voice on the comms, whispering: “There’s something trying to get in. Something big. Please send help.”
Janice: “Where are you?”
Voice: “Billy’s Bar.”
Hannah: “…That’s in A1.”
Janice: “How many of you are there?”
Voice: “…Just me.”
Janice, sighing: “We’ll try and get you if we can, but we’ve got our own problems to deal with. If there’s any way you can make it out on your own, we’re heading to the shuttle station.”
She hangs up.
Hannah: “We can’t go back for him. These things could be anywhere, and apparently they can get even bigger and more dangerous.”
Sonny: “I very rarely agree with Hannah, but she’s right. We took one risk and it almost killed us all.”
Hannah: “You took a risk. After we told you not to.”
Sonny: “Ehhh, semantics.”
Theodora: “I think we…” cough
Theodora holds up a finger to cough. And then her expression turns to pain as the coughing doesn’t stop. It’s stopping her from breathing.
Janice: “Komiskey? You okay?”
She starts puking blood. Janice and Hannah start backing away. Sonny catches her as she falls over and begins convulsing, her eyes rolling into the back of her head. He crouches next to her, laying her down gently and opening a first aid kit next to her head.
Sonny: “Theodora, can you still hear me? Try t-to breath. In through the nose, out through the-“
She convulses more violently. As if something is puppeteering her from the inside. Her chest bulges unnaturally.
And then bursts.
Everyone screams. Sonny falls onto his back, covered in a spray of blood, crawling backwards. Some kind of tiny creature, like a long, thin, piranha with limbs, wriggles out of Theodora, making an unpleasant high-pitched whine.
Hannah and Janice shoot it to bits.
There’s a moment of silence, to process what just happened. But they can’t. They can’t make sense of it.
Hannah: “Oh, fuck this.”
Not knowing where she’s running to or why, just that she needs to leave, Hannah sprints into the darkened corridor.
She slams into something. Something with thin, bony claws that grab her and lift her up by the neck. Trudging out of the darkness is a seven foot, jet black nightmare, somewhere between humanoid and raptor, with a long, smooth, eyeless head.
Sonny and Janice scream again. Sonny fumbles with his revolver and takes a shot. He misses. Janice scrambles back up the ladder. She’s gone.
The monster stares into Hannah’s soul with where its eyes should be, and bares its fangs. All she can do is fruitlessly pry at the claws at her throat and know it’ll all be over soon.
It opens its mouth. A spiny proboscis shoots out and punctures her skull. She falls limp. The monster discards her body like a ragdoll, and turns its attention to Sonny. Step. Step. It steps towards him curiously. As if it's testing him.
Sonny raises an arm to fire again, but he’s trembling too much. The monster's tail whips out, smacking Sonny to the ground. The revolver skids across the floor.
Sonny stares up at the beast and waits for the end.
He waits.
But it’s just staring back. Impossible to read.
He looks to the ladder. He darts towards it.
Up on the second floor again, Janice starts running – and bumps into someone. An old, but tough-looking guy in a janitor’s uniform.
Paul was given the role of Morgan Hirsch, the quiet old janitor. |
Morgan: “Oh thank god, I finally found someone else. What’s going on?”
Janice: “A-alien breach. Need to get to the shuttle. Now. But… Theodora had the keycard we need to… oh god…”
Morgan: “Slow down. Take a deep breath.”
Janice: “No time – we… I…”
Sonny rounds a corner, nearly crashing into them as well.
Sonny: “Ol’ man Morgan! The whimsical old janitor! Could really use some of your classic folksy wisdom right now. But not right now, we gotta get somewhere safe.”
Janice, staring blankly: “H-how did you get away? After what it did to Hannah, I thought you were gone for sure!”
Sonny: “So did I! But it just stopped in its tracks and watched me leave, I-I don’t understand-“
Janice: “Like it was toying with you?”
That thought visibly shakes Sonny to his core.
Sonny: “Yeah… yeah. It was toying with me…. It's toying with all of us. They’re toying with us. No telling how many there are.”
He starts shaking Morgan by the shoulders.
Sonny: “They can kill us in seconds, there’s no beating them there’s no way out there’s no escape we’re done we should just end it all before we-“
Seeing Sonny’s mental breakdown start to turn violent; she punches him in the face. He hits the wall and slides down it onto his knees, clutching his broken nose.
Morgan helps him back to his feet. They hear a screech right around the corner and quickly run back into the control room, which appears safe for now, and quietly lock the door. They hear something gallop by in the corridor outside, leaving them alone. They barricade the door, and check every inch of the room. Janice hands Morgan the nail-gun and he’s able to secure the broken pipe in the ceiling with another sheet of metal.
Then they’re alone, sealed in. Long enough to have some much needed rest, discussion and strategizing.
Sonny: “What the hell are we gonna do? Those things are born hunters. We’re just an unarmed technician, a salarywoman, and a janitor. We’re doomed.”
Morgan: “Hey - I know we’ve been dealt a bad hand, but we gotta make the most of it. And I’m not just a janitor, you know. I’m an ex-marine.”
Sonny and Janice look up.
Janice: “You were a soldier?”
Morgan: “Damn right. Thought becoming a janitor would be leaving the fight behind me for some peace and quiet. So much for that I guess.”
He stands up, putting the nail-gun in his tool belt, next to a cutting torch.
Morgan: “We’ve got to make a move soon before the situation gets worse. I can take the lead.”
So they go. They go back to the south entrance, pick up the shuttle station keycard off of Theodora’s body, and Sonny hacks the lock on the south entrance doors. As they get outside, it’s dark, and the air is thick, brown, and buzzing with particles kicked up in the screaming winds. A dust storm is starting.
They make their way around the outside of the building, turn a corner, and there, maybe two hundred yards away, between two of the buildings - one of those monsters. It’s already torn one of the exterior doors off its hinges and thrown it across the ground, and is now clawing at the edges of an interior door.
They duck back behind cover. Too scared to shout over the wind, they have to whisper in each other's ear to be heard.
Morgan: “Jesus, that’s what they look like?”
Janice: “That’s the one the guy on the intercom told us about, isn’t it? The one trying to get into Billy’s Bar? I can’t believe it's still there.”
Sonny: “Have we got something we can throw? Make a noise to distract it?”
Janice: “Winds too loud for that. Just gotta run for it.”
Morgan: “I’ll cover you.”
Janice: “You’ll what-?”
But he’s already running. So they run too.
The sound of the wind masks their sprinting by. Morgan stops when the monster is a decent distance behind him. He turns, points the nail-gun, and steadies his arm. It's constantly moving, slamming on the door like a beast possessed, but its oddly shaped head is a large target.
He fires.
The nail connects - and harmlessly bounces off. All he’s achieved is getting the creature's attention.
Morgan: “Shit.”
What Morgan thought was a fairly good distance, the creature manages to clear in a couple of bounds, and it knocks him over, pinning him to the ground, knocking away the nail-gun. It screams a long, bizarre, alien wail to the sky. He can hear more screeches responding in the distance, a cacophony of terror getting closer.
The creature looks down at him, and unhinges its jaw, a creaking moan escaping as it does so.
He is about to die unless he does something. So he does something. His cutting torch, ignited, burns like a holy blade in the storm. It carves a hideous gash through the monster's face, causing it to recoil violently.
Morgan's momentary victory is painfully undercut by the stream of acid blood that falls out of the alien's face onto his own. It feels like half of his skull is missing, and he can only see out of one eye - but he’s still alive, so he scrambles out of the creature's reach.
He rolls over to the nail-gun, and as the monster charges him once more - he plants a nail right in the hole in its face. He just barely manages to sidestep as the monster's momentum carries it through the space where he was standing, and it crumples to the ground.
Despite the echoing cries converging on him, he can’t help but wait a moment, breathing heavily. He has to be sure.
The monster isn’t getting back up. He actually did it. He actually fucking did it.
A screech right behind him breaks that train of thought. He doesn’t look back as he bolts for the shuttle station.
Running against the wind, injured, he shouldn’t be as fast as he is. He shouldn’t be able to outrun the silhouettes he sees coming out of the buildings to his left and right. But he does.
Hadley’s Hope disappears behind him, and the dark angular shape of the shuttle grows closer. As he gets close enough to see the airlock at its base, it shunts open with Janice and Sonny beckoning him in. He collapses inside, and Janice slams the close button. The doors shut.
Janice: “Are you okay? Your face… looks like third degree burns…”
Morgan: “Does it? Feels worse. You got the shuttle up and running yet?”
Sonny: “Not quite. Got another problem.”
Morgan: “Another one?”
Morgan gets up to see where Sonny’s pointing through a porthole in the airlock door. Wiping dust from his eyes, he can barely make out a dozen bodies on the cargo bay floor inside. All of them have spider-y creatures latched onto their faces. Dammit. Even the escape shuttle is a trap.
Morgan: “I can see the bridge up ahead. Looks empty. We seal ourselves in there and then depressurise the rest of the shuttle once we’ve left the atmosphere. Ready to go?”
Sonny: “Readier now that you’re here.”
Morgan opens the door, and leads the way, nail-gun in one hand, cutting torch in the other.
Three steps in, and three spider creatures drop from the ceiling.
Without looking, Morgan manages to tuck and roll out of the way. Janice bats hers to the ground with her empty shotgun. Sonny feels a tail whip around his neck, and the creature lands on his head - the only saving grace is that it's on the wrong side.
Morgan sprints far ahead, not looking back. Janice tries to follow, but is cut off by the creature that was aiming for Morgan. Sonny is screaming and hyperventilating, thrashing around. He throws his creature off and tries to run, but his legs stop moving. He falls forward and crashes to the ground. His body stops responding to anything he tells it to do. The stress is finally too much. He’s so close to escaping, and he is a brain trapped in a catatonic body. The creature crawls onto his face, latches on. It feels surprisingly nice. There’s a burst of warm oxygen in his system. And then he sleeps.
Janice sees Sonny fall. She stomps on the creature in front of her, swinging the shotgun wildly to deter the one behind her. She darts forward. Morgan gets inside the bridge, just in time to turn and see Janice right behind him - suddenly tripped up by a tail, she tumbles, and one of those creatures pounces on her face. She struggles, but it’s locked on. She goes limp.
Morgan, the only survivor, hits the button to shut the bridge doors.
He gives the room one last glance-over for any threats he may have missed, before he allows himself to slump defeatedly in a chair and rest for a moment. He then sets the controls for take-off.
As the shuttle bursts from the atmosphere, sailing away into the safety of the void, Morgan Hirsch sends a message back to Earth: Steer clear of planet LV-426.
The end.
Janice Macwhirr’s secret agenda was to murder Miranda Reynolds and Dr Theodora Komiskey because of a personal vendetta involving the deaths of other colonists, but they died before she got the chance. |
Sonny Sigg’s secret agenda was to escape with a live specimen of an alien. |
Hannah Singleton's secret agenda was to destroy the shuttle, to stop news of the alien outbreak from getting out. |
Morgan Hirsch's secret agenda, once aware of the alien attack, was to kill one of them to prove that he’s still a soldier. |
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