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CTD - Alien Origins


Breunor

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Hey Everybody, this is to discuss the specific entry for the X-Net, the short-and-sweet version of what the X-Corps researchers would find out. There are much more detailed versions of this concept in the Story Forum.

 

Previous discussion on this part of the backstory has the aliens coming here for whatever reason with the ability to take over without a problem. But something happens to the ship, and it crash lands on Mars. The aliens are in cryosleep/hybernation, and don't wake up for (hundreds?thousands?) of years. The ironic/funny point is when humanity starts sending out radio signals into space (as we all know, in real life these signals were sent to try and tell any intelligent life that we're here, give them the universal language of mathmatics, and to describe ourselves, etc). These signals are what "wakes up" the alien ship's computers, which then start the thawing process for the aliens. The aliens are revived, realise what happened, and build the Cydonia base since the mothership is scrapped (and could be the source of all the alien alloys and Xenium the aliens use if it was a monster ship. Imagine the size of a ship designed to come here and conquer an entire planet on its own). Once the base is established the aliens begin building ufos to send to earth and begin the invasion.

 

Our main inspiration/target for this particular entry is to suggest that the aliens are operating within this solar system, have been here for a long time, and that by researching a leader we might get more information. IIRC there are certain aliens which can give you this info, not all of them. If we know which it is, we could go from there. If only psi-capable aliens can do it, following the interrogation concept would be cool. Researchers might "stumble" into this entry when an alien MCs a guy in an attempt to escape, and after the alien is subdued the guy conveys what we learned during the link. If psi-capable aliens aren't required, then it might be best to focus on what the aliens are equiped with, and in general terms say "we're quite certain that an outfit such as this would need to operate in relatively close proximity to our planet, probably within our own system".

 

If people want to toss out some ideas or know for sure which aliens can give this entry, I'll edit this post to include an ongoing entry summarizing the various ideas.

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The alien origins is the first of 3 topics that you need to research to find Cydonia. Any living alien (soldier,medic,terror unit,hi-rank) can give this topic. Robot terror units cannot be captured alive, so don't worry about them.
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Here's a very quick writeup, that I didn't want to go to waste.

 

The aliens seem to follow a heiarchy system of command. Hi-ranking officers dispense soldiers to carry out their missions with great efficiency. The aliens direct themselves in many covert missions.

 

The UFOs are not equipped to supply the aliens for trips much further than our solar system. It's possible that they are operating from a home base, somewhere in our solar system. We need more information to narrow our search. An alien leader would probably have information regarding to the source of our invadors.

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  • 2 months later...

just found this topic, i don't think bumping topics is wrong in this forum. I got some ideas;

 

We have not been able to get any special important information from this alien. A alien higher in the hierarchy would be able to tell us more important information.

 

After interrogating the alien specimen that was taken live in the battlefield, we learned more about the aliens. The questions forwarded to the alien included where they came from, why they came, and what they are going to do. Other and less important questions were also added in the questioning.

 

Communication with it was a problem. Most of the research time went to finding a way to translate the alien language. Even though not terribly different then our own, they included a lot of long sentences (like our word “sun”, would by alien standards be “The big yellow ball of light shining in the middle of the sun system and the source of all life”), meaning that even the translated message could take hours decrypting.

 

The alien language seems to be a “general language”. The alien told us, that the alien horde consist of several different species of aliens (confirmed by reports by different witnesses worldwide), and these come from different planets, each having their own language. Therefore, the aliens have to get a common language, and it is this that we have translated.

 

It seems that the aliens have mastered cloning. The specimen we captured could only tell of first-hand experiences, and what he was programmed to know. It seems that their mind is completely empty, and the aliens have to “program” the soldiers to do their task. A medic only gets to know how to do surgery, and a navigator how to control a UFO. They remember very little of the time before the cloning, other then faint memory of their home, their language, and other important information. If the individual find the information important, it is not able to simply be deleted.

 

The alien chain of command, consist of a hierarchy. At the top of this is the “overmind” (which we at this point have no idea who or what is), and below this, an alien species called [TSHSHSTHAHTAHTCBHBEDA, real name of the cloaks]. Below come the rest of the aliens. Race does control their place in the hierarchy, but it is also determined by valour in combat (similar to our own ladder), and their status from birth.

 

Judging by the UFOs encountered so far, and also confirmed by the alien, is that the alien horde has a base in our solar system. They simply haven’t been build for interstellar travel, and such would take too much time. Our alien, though, have not been here, and has only been located on a ship in outer space. We need a higher ranked alien to give more detail of their position.

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Hey Mikker, the idea about "limited knowledge" during clone training sounds good. The less an alien knows outside its scope of operations, the less likely it will act out of step and thus be more compliant to orders. So we could say that all aliens seem to have basic fighting skills, some more than others. Those with other roles like navigation know little more than those 2 things. "We tried to get the medic to interact with the recovered navigation equipment, but it did not know what it was doing", etc.
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"But when we gave it a simple scalple and another alien (whom was injured during capture), the medic fixed the thing right up."

 

And "When we asked an engineer about the construction of an alien powersource, he at least knew what he was doing. When we asked him to explain the use of the alien probes found in the examination rooms, he didn't have the slightest idea how to use them."

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  • 7 months later...

nope nope nope!

The backstory I'm working on is something that the player is likely not to find out in the game itself(Oh the pain! The pain of not being able to show off my masterpiece! :Tantrum: )...

 

At the most, I think we should reveal at this point that although the various alien races came from seperate worlds in another galaxy far far away, the current raids and attacks seem to be coming from within our own solar system, and that we haven't pinpoint where exactly yet.

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It seems so, but don't worry about that, it is not going to be mentioned in Origins, I want to talk to tzuchan about that to see a few points I'm not sure about. Alien Origins should say that all aliens seem to be from planets outside our system and things like that
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oki, heres the first draft. its a short one, and it might not include everything you want in it. so im taking sugestions here. this is in no way a finished work.

-----

Alien origins

 

The capture and interrogation of live alien specimens has shed light on several enigmas concerning the alien treat. It has long been the belief of most members of the scientific staff; that the alien treat must operate from somewhere within the solar system. All the alien crafts so far recovered have been powered by the xenium reactor. The average crew, compared to life support suggest that few would have made it past Jupiter.

 

The aliens true origins where however a controversial topic, but with the information gained from the interrogation of live extraterrestrials, we have concluded that the aliens originate from several planets, spread across several solar system on the opposite side of the galaxy, about 60000 light years away.

 

The most remarkable surprise was the limited knowledge of the specimens. During interrogation, the captured aliens showed little understanding of subjects outside their function in the alien society. It is therefore the opinion of the research division, that X-Corp should make the capture and interrogation of an alien leader a high priority. The leader of a large UFO should suffice to provide information on the goal of aliens.

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  • 7 months later...
Guest Azrael

Since Qonfused has gone MIA, I'll take this one up. :)

------------

 

ALIEN ORIGINS

X-Net://Pegasus.Net/Alien/Research/Origins

 

Capture and interrogation of a live Alien specimen and observation of Alien activities has allowed us to shed some light over some of the Alien mysteries, namely, their origins. Though the information acquired was very limited, it has allowed us to come to a conclusion: the Aliens operate from within our Solar System.

 

Interrogation proved much more difficult than we could have expected, if we could truly have anticipated anything from our Alien adversaries. The subject showed an uncanny resistance to race-specific interrogation procedures, result of the live study of the creature, enduring extreme methods with a determination that could almost seem unnatural, interrogators claimed that at moments it would seem as if the creature actually wanted to answer, but any attempt to reveal any information, strong convulsions would assault the being, not allowing it to respond; this is, however, speculation and has not been confirmed, it is assumed that the cause of the convulsions was the result of our lack of expertise when interrogating Alien creatures and the resistance to interrogation; the product of special mental training.

After both extensive and intensive application of special persuasion procedures, our interrogators managed to come up with small pieces of the puzzle.

 

Apparently the Aliens are launching their attacks from an undisclosed location within the Solar System, as the creature revealed that the "small vessels", as he denominated what we call UFOs, are not Faster-Than-Light (FTL) capable, meaning that travel from the nearest star of Alpha Centauri would take several years, and is thus not the source of the enemy's attacks. This, however, has left us with another mystery, the Alien claimed that the "small vessels" are not FTL capable, which could indicate that there is a "big vessel" which might be able to achieve FTL travel.

 

We have given our first step into understanding the Alien threat, we know the main attack force is staged in a local planet, which one specifically remains unknown. We are, however, still clueless on the matter of the true Alien origins.

 

"At this time we only have uncertainties"

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ALIEN ORIGINS

X-Net://Pegasus.Net/Alien/Research/Origins

 

Capture and interrogation of a live Alien specimen and observation of Alien activities has allowed us to shed some light over some of the Alien mysteries, namely, their origins. Though the information acquired was very limited, it has allowed us to come to a conclusion: the Aliens operate from within our Solar System.

 

Interrogation proved much more difficult than we could have expected, if we could truly have anticipated anything from our Alien adversaries. The subject showed an uncanny resistance to race-specific interrogation procedures, result of the live study of the creature, enduring extreme methods with a determination that could almost seem unnatural, interrogators claimed that at moments it would seem as if the creature actually wanted to answer, but any attempt to reveal any information, strong convulsions would assault the being, not allowing it to respond; this is, however, speculation and has not been confirmed, it is assumed that the cause of the convulsions was the result of our lack of expertise when interrogating Alien creatures and the resistance to interrogation; the product of special mental training.

After both extensive and intensive application of special persuasion procedures, our interrogators managed to come up with small pieces of the puzzle.

 

Apparently the Aliens are launching their attacks from an undisclosed location within the Solar System, as the creature revealed that the "small vessels", as he denominated what we call UFOs, are not Faster-Than-Light (FTL) capable, meaning that travel from the nearest star of Alpha Centauri would take several years, and is thus not the source of the enemy's attacks. This, however, has left us with another mystery, as the Alien talked about "small vessels". This could indicate that there is a "big vessel" which might be able to achieve FTL travel.

 

We have given our first step into understanding the Alien threat, we know the main attack force is staged in a local planet, which one specifically remains unknown. We are, however, still clueless on the matter of the true Alien origins.

 

"At this time we only have uncertainties"

 

Comments: Weeell... How do you know the aliens have their main base at a planet?! 1) They could be hiding at a moon, 2) They could be hiding in a stealth mothership, 3) other scenarios.

 

This text can't convince me why their are at a planet :OhBrother: :unsure:

 

And, if we are uncertain about the true alien origins, why is this CT called "Alien origins"?

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"Greetings humans! This is the first experimental test of the Hyperwave Decoder Device, whose blueprint is going to be uploaded to your FTP server real soon! We have a secret base at Cydonia, Mars. You are invited to have some tea with us, but please, don't tell anyone about its existence! Thanks!"

 

:NyaNyaNya:

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1) That was no sarcasm, it was just a joke

2) Well, it may have a tiiiiiny little bit of sarcasm, because I actually made comment and you just said that "the aliens told us", without further elaboration : P : ). Something like "fight cure sarcasm with cute sarcasm"

3) I think that you were just irritated because I posted emoticons with my post (once again : P : D)

 

Anyway, the text seems nice, but:

 

A) It seems we aren't gonna give away any other information except "They are somewhere around here, on a planet"?

B) Indeed, why would someone think about " planet" around our solar system and not just Mars?

C) And why a planet an not a mothership or a base at the Asteroid Belt?

 

I hope a,b,c will speed us up :rolleyes:

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Guest Azrael

I am not irritated, simply state that improving the text is very hard when comments are in form of a joke.

I'll look into moons, but a base on an asteroid field seems inviable, about a mothership... I think it'd be better if the Alien revealed it's on a planet (or moon, maybe).

And yes, that's all the info we're going to give away at the time, the Humans may never know where did they ever came from, at least not in V1.

Also, do live Aliens disappear after you've researched them?

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And yes, that's all the info we're going to give away at the time, the Humans may never know where did they ever came from, at least not in V1.

I have the power... the KNOWLEDGE!!! :Drool: :devillaugh:

 

Also, do live Aliens disappear after you've researched them?

I think not. They stay in AC for further tests, for biological experiments, for interrogation... That's why you have to build multiple ACs ;)

 

I can't wait for your next draft :Hyper:

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  • 2 weeks later...

Out of curiosity, why are the race-specific interrogation procedures ineffective (paragraph 2)? One would think that race-specific procedures would be more effective than generalized procedures, right? Maybe "specialized procedures" might be better?

 

If I recall correctly, some of the other Alien mission/Alien background CTs involve interrogation of live aliens. And if I'm remembering rightly, extracting information wasn't as difficult as mentioned in this text? Az (or anyone else), can you remember if this is the case?

 

The way the Alien's reactions are described appear to be very leading to me. There's a definite idea that you're trying to work towards (which is fine), but it seems almost as if you (the writer) are deliberately withholding information rather than the unsaid Overmind. Instead of "as if the creature actually wanted to answer", maybe something along the lines of "information extracted during the interrogation progress was limited; the subject would invariably lapse into severe convulsions before critical intelligence was divulged. Because these convulsions would consistently occur at key moments during the interrogation process, it would appear that some prior conditioning or perhaps even intervention from an outside entity, as amazing as it would seem, is preventing the Alien from fully answering our queries." This is a bit wordy, though.

 

In paragraph 3, the Alien is referred to as "he"? This seems really odd; imho, the Aliens would be more, well, alien if they were gender neutral or unspecified. Or is this a typo?

 

Also, how are the human interrogators communicating with the Aliens? Psi, or have they learned Alien language? How is the fact that "Aliens are based in the solar system" communicated by an interrogated Alien to X-Corps scientists?

Edited by Astyanax
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Guest Azrael
Out of curiosity, why are the race-specific interrogation procedures ineffective (paragraph 2)?  One would think that race-specific procedures would be more effective than generalized procedures, right?  Maybe "specialized procedures" might be better?

It's like this, they research the live Alien, and as a result of that study, they come up with special interrogation methods for that particular creature, but remember that Alien Origins is the very first interrogation of the entire game, so its bound to be more or less of a failure :)

 

If I recall correctly, some of the other Alien mission/Alien background CTs involve interrogation of live aliens.  And if I'm remembering rightly, extracting information wasn't as difficult as mentioned in this text?  Az (or anyone else), can you remember if this is the case?

Because they are latter in the game, and the X-Corps have more experience and information to gather the data out of the buggers :)

 

The way the Alien's reactions are described appear to be very leading to me.  There's a definite idea that you're trying to work towards (which is fine), but it seems almost as if you (the writer) are deliberately withholding information rather than the unsaid Overmind.  Instead of "as if the creature actually wanted to answer", maybe something along the lines of "information extracted during the interrogation progress was limited; the subject would invariably lapse into severe convulsions before critical intelligence was divulged.  Because these convulsions would consistently occur at key moments during the interrogation process, it would appear that some prior conditioning or perhaps even intervention from an outside entity, as amazing as it would seem, is preventing the Alien from fully answering our queries."  This is a bit wordy, though.

I don't see how it is leading, but your wording could work better.

 

In paragraph 3, the Alien is referred to as "he"?  This seems really odd; imho, the Aliens would be more, well, alien if they were gender neutral or unspecified.  Or is this a typo?

Ooops :rolleyes:

 

Also, how are the human interrogators communicating with the Aliens?  Psi, or have they learned Alien language?  How is the fact that "Aliens are based in the solar system" communicated by an interrogated Alien to X-Corps scientists?

That's a very interesting question, maybe the Aliens are taught some terrestrial languages? :P, not sure.

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I have just had a thought. Just a subtle hint. There are pyramids in Cydonia, right? Ergo, show them a picture of Egypt, and they'll get excited! A hint of things to come, eh?

No, in my eyes that won't work, because there are pyramids in Cydonia, but not in Thanatos. "Indeed, on the surface the whole installation looks like a normal crater, explaining why we couldn’t ever find proof of the Aliens’ existence." ( http://www.xcomufo.com/forums/index.php?sh...35entry129996 ) Plus, I think this idea is more than used up by "Stargate" (which I like, but we should avoid copying this.)

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Guest Azrael
You just need some time, Blood Angel, read around the texts, we are writing them inspired by X-Com, but it's just that, inspired, we are not remaking the game, so a lot of things will be different, like the location of the Alien stronghold. Thanatos is not precisely a real region of Mars, but rather the name of the stronghold (hmmm, maybe the name of the Ship that crash landed on Mars? :hmmm: ).
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I didn't came up with Thanatos :)

Anyone has an idea of how could X-Corps interrogate an Alien without psi? Do they know our languages?

Edited by Azrael
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Nevermind :Coffee:

---------

ALIEN ORIGINS

X-Net://Pegasus.Net/Alien/Research/Origins

 

Capture and interrogation of a live Alien specimen and observation of Alien activities has allowed us to shed some light over some of the enemy’s mysteries, namely, its origins. Though the information acquired was very limited, it has allowed us to come to a conclusion: the Aliens operate from within our Solar System.

 

Interrogation proved much more difficult than we could have expected, if we could truly have anticipated anything from our Alien adversaries, an extensive period of the research time was spent trying to decipher the creature’s language, to a moderate success we managed to do it, but most of it remains obscure to us.

 

The deciphering of the language was not the only obstacle in our research; the subject showed an uncanny resistance to race-specific interrogation procedures, result of the live study of the creature, enduring extreme methods with a determination that could almost seem unnatural, information extracted during the interrogation progress was limited; the subject would invariably lapse into severe convulsions before critical intelligence was divulged. Because these convulsions would consistently occur at key moments during the interrogation process, it would appear that some prior conditioning or perhaps even intervention from an outside entity, as amazing as it would seem, was preventing the Alien from fully answering our queries; this is, however, speculation and has not been confirmed, it is assumed that the cause of the convulsions was the result of our lack of expertise when interrogating Alien creatures and the resistance to interrogation; the product of special mental training.

 

After both extensive and intensive application of special persuasion procedures, our interrogators managed to come up with small pieces of the puzzle.

 

Apparently the Aliens are launching their attacks from an undisclosed location within the Solar System, as the creature revealed that the "small vessels", as it denominated what we call UFOs, are not Faster-Than-Light (FTL) capable, meaning that travel from the nearest star of Alpha Centauri would take several years, and is thus not the source of the enemy's attacks. This, however, has left us with another mystery, as the Alien talked about "small vessels". This could indicate that there is a "big vessel" which might be able to achieve FTL travel.

 

We have given our first step into understanding the Alien threat, we know the main attack force is staged in a local planet, moon, or unlikely, in a large asteroid, where specifically remains an unknown. There is also the matter of the varied Alien species that comprise the invasion force, it seems highly unlikely that numerous intelligent species would share a homeworld without falling into wars, given the aggresive nature of the creatures. We are, however, still clueless on the matter of the true Alien origins.

 

"At this time we only have uncertainties"

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ALIEN ORIGINS

X-Net://Pegasus.Net/Alien/Research/Origins

[...]

Interrogation proved much more difficult than we could have expected, if we could truly have anticipated anything from our Alien adversaries, an extensive period of the research time was spent trying to decipher the creature’s language, to a moderate success we managed to do it, but most of it remains obscure to us.

 

The deciphering of the language was not the only obstacle in our research[...]

You are using "decipher" at two relative adjacent phrases. Maybe you could use "decode", "analyze", "interpret", "translate" or "understand" instead.

 

For the green part maybe: "[...] what we achieved with moderate success, but still most of it reamains obscure to us." Thus avoiding the double "to".

 

[...]

We have given our first step into understanding the Alien threat, we know the main attack force is staged in a local planet, moon, or unlikely, in a large asteroid, where specifically remains an unknown.

Maybe you could explain a little more why an asteroid seems to be unlikable. (Not stable enough, high risk (of beeing hit by a smaller asteroid) for the UFOs etc.)

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I didn't came up with Thanatos :)

Anyone has an idea of how could X-Corps interrogate an Alien without psi? Do they know our languages?

 

I didn't mean YOU exactly, I meant "How we, as a project, have come up with that" :P

 

Know, about the language issue:

1) We don't have psi, but THEY have psi, and they also have medical rooms :P. I guess neural scans are piece of cake for them :P

2) The interrogation teams may learn their language. But then we may have a problem... Do Snakemen have a language? :P

3) They may use patterns and pictures in order to gain information. You know, these pictures that are used in phychological tests...? Crazy idea, I don't know how it could be implemented, but I am brainstorming right now

4) I know that the Voyager spaceships had some plates with encoded information on them. Unfortunately, I don't remember if it was magnetic storage, "well-ed surface" or whatever... Anyway, BINARY must be a common way to encode information. The problem is... translation :P

 

And, you can't really say "de-cypher", because these informations aren't really "encoded", and you don't need a cypher-key in order to decode the message. So, Translate, interprate or something similar sounds better IMO

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Pictures? A picture says a thousand words. I'm sure that in Xcom the real breakthrough for Cydonia came when someone showed them a picture of the pyramids.

 

And anyway, they'll have a problem when they come to the Mutons, who communicate through a form of intricate dances, jumps and twirls. Hire some ballet dancers?

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  • 2 months later...

It'd probably be a good idea to make a new requirement in Alien Origins not to capture any live Alien, but to capture an intelligent live Alien; like a Grey, Cloak, Morlock or Viper (maybe not Viper), cause you can't really get useful information out of Silabrates or Ventriculants, that are little more than biological machines.

------------

 

ALIEN ORIGINS

X-Net://Pegasus.Net/Alien/Research/Origins

 

Capture and interrogation of a live Alien specimen and observation of Alien activities has allowed us to shed some light over some of the enemy’s mysteries, namely, its origins. Though the information acquired was very limited, it has allowed us to come to a conclusion: the Aliens operate from within our Solar System.

 

Interrogation proved much more difficult than we could have expected, if we could truly have anticipated anything from our Alien adversaries, an extensive period of the research time was spent trying to interpret the creature’s language, with moderate success, but most of it remains obscure to us. What has been obtained so far, however, will undoubtedly be of great help in our research.

 

The deciphering of the language was not the only obstacle in our research; the subject showed an uncanny resistance to race-specific interrogation procedures, result of the live study of the creature, enduring extreme methods with a determination that could almost seem unnatural, information extracted during the interrogation progress was limited; the subject would invariably lapse into severe convulsions before critical intelligence was divulged. Because these convulsions would consistently occur at key moments during the interrogation process, it would appear that some prior conditioning was preventing the Alien from fully answering our queries; this is, however, speculation and has not been confirmed, it is assumed that the cause of the convulsions was the result of our lack of expertise when interrogating Alien creatures and the resistance to interrogation; the product of special mental training.

 

After both extensive and intensive application of special persuasion procedures, our interrogators managed to come up with small pieces of the puzzle.

 

Apparently the Aliens are launching their attacks from an undisclosed location within the Solar System, as the creature revealed that the "small vessels", as it denominated what we call UFOs, are not Faster-Than-Light (FTL) capable, meaning that travel from the nearest star of Alpha Centauri would take several years, and is thus not the source of the enemy's attacks. This, however, has left us with another mystery, as the Alien talked about "small vessels". This could indicate that there is a "big vessel" which might be able to achieve FTL travel.

 

We have given our first step into understanding the Alien threat, we know the main attack force is staged in a local planet, moon, or unlikely because of the inevitable instability and high risk of being hit by other planetoids, in a large asteroid, where specifically remains an unknown. There is also the matter of the varied Alien species that comprise the invasion force; it seems highly unlikely that numerous intelligent species would share a homeworld without falling into wars, given the aggressive nature of the creatures. We are, however, still clueless on the matter of the true Alien origins.

 

"At this time we only have uncertainties"

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  • 3 months later...

Changes in blue.

 

 

ALIEN ORIGINS

X-Net://Pegasus.Net/Alien/Research/Origins

 

Capture and interrogation of a live Alien specimen and observation of Alien activities has allowed us to shed some light on some of the enemy’s mysteries, namely, their origins. Though the information acquired was very limited, it has given us one important fact: the Aliens operate from within our Solar System.

 

Interrogation proved much more difficult than we had expected.  An extensive period of research was spent trying to interpret their language, with moderate success, but most of it remains obscure to us. What has been obtained so far, however, will undoubtedly be of great help in furthering our research.

 

The deciphering of the language was not the only obstacle; the subjects showed an uncanny resistance to race-specific interrogation procedures, enduring extreme methods with a determination that seems unnatural.  Information extracted during the interrogation was limited; the subject would invariably lapse into severe convulsions before critical intelligence was divulged. Because these convulsions would consistently occur at key moments during the interrogation, it would appear that some prior conditioning is preventing the subject from answering our queries fullyHowever, this is speculation and has not been confirmed, it is assumed that the cause of the convulsions was the result of our lack of expertise when interrogating Alien creatures and their unknown mental training techniques.

 

After both extensive and intensive application of special persuasion procedures, our interrogators managed to come up with small pieces of the puzzle.

 

Apparently the Aliens are launching their attacks from an undisclosed location within the Solar System, as the subject revealed that the "small vessels" (what we call UFOs) are not Faster-Than-Light (FTL) capable, meaning that travel from the nearest star of Alpha Centauri would take several years, and thus is not the source of the enemy's attacks. This, however, has raised another question.  The Alien talked about "small vessels". This could indicate that there are "large vessels" which might be able to achieve FTL travel.

 

We have taken our first step in understanding the Alien threat.  We know the main attack force is based on a local planet. A moon is an unlikely possibility because of the inevitable instability and high risk of being hit by other planetoids. A large asteroid is also a possibility. There is also the matter of the varied Alien species that comprise the invasion force; it seems highly unlikely that numerous intelligent species would share a homeworld without falling into conflict, given their aggressive nature. We are, however, still clueless on the matter of the true Alien origins.

 

"At this time we only have uncertainties"

 

---Edit by Mad---

Please people! Start using quotes... This would make my work a little easier. Thanks :)

Edited by Mad
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Guest Azrael

I agree with all your changes, except this line

some of the enemy’s mysteries, namely, its origins.
, enemy in that sentence is singular, meaning it's "its" origins, and not "their".

 

ALIEN ORIGINS

X-Net://Pegasus.Net/Alien/Research/Origins

 

Capture and interrogation of a live Alien specimen and observation of Alien activities has allowed us to shed some light on some of the enemy’s mysteries, namely, its origins. Though the information acquired was very limited, it has given us one important fact: the Aliens operate from within our Solar System.

 

Interrogation proved much more difficult than we had expected.  An extensive period of research was spent trying to interpret their language, with moderate success, but most of it remains obscure to us. What has been obtained so far, however, will undoubtedly be of great help in furthering our research.

 

The deciphering of the language was not the only obstacle; the subjects showed an uncanny resistance to race-specific interrogation procedures, enduring extreme methods with a determination that seems unnatural.  Information extracted during the interrogation was limited; the subject would invariably lapse into severe convulsions before critical intelligence was divulged. Because these convulsions would consistently occur at key moments during the interrogation, it would appear that some prior conditioning is preventing the subject from answering our queries fully.  However, this is speculation and has not been confirmed, it is assumed that the cause of the convulsions was the result of our lack of expertise when interrogating Alien creatures and their unknown mental training techniques.

 

After both extensive and intensive application of special persuasion procedures, our interrogators managed to come up with small pieces of the puzzle.

 

Apparently the Aliens are launching their attacks from an undisclosed location within the Solar System, as the subject revealed that the "small vessels" (what we call UFOs) are not Faster-Than-Light (FTL) capable, meaning that travel from the nearest star of Alpha Centauri would take several years, and thus is not the source of the enemy's attacks. This, however, has raised another question.  The Alien talked about "small vessels". This could indicate that there are "large vessels" which might be able to achieve FTL travel.

 

We have taken our first step in understanding the Alien threat.  We know the main attack force is based on a local planet. A moon is an unlikely possibility because of the inevitable instability and high risk of being hit by other planetoids. A large asteroid is also a possibility. There is also the matter of the varied Alien species that comprise the invasion force; it seems highly unlikely that numerous intelligent species would share a homeworld without falling into conflict, given their aggressive nature. We are, however, still clueless on the matter of the true Alien origins.

 

"At this time we only have uncertainties"

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Hey Az, long time no see. I hope you're doing ok.

 

As usual, I have...some... comments. These are just some thoughts that popped up when I was skimming the text:

 

Interrogation proved much more difficult than we had expected.  An extensive period of research was spent trying to interpret their language, with moderate success, but most of it remains obscure to us.
...how about: "Interrogation proved much more difficult than expected. Moderate success was achieved in translating and interpreting the Alien language only after lengthy and extensive research, but the subtler nuances of the languages remain beyond our grasp."

 

The deciphering of the language was not the only obstacle
...maybe "Language translation was not the only obstacle" or even "Translation was not the only obstacle"?

 

Because these convulsions would consistently occur at key moments during the interrogation
... maybe "Because these convulsion would invariably occur at key moments of the interrogation"?

 

it would appear that some prior conditioning is preventing the subject from answering our queries fully
... maybe "some prior conditioning seems to prevent the subject from answering our queries fully" or "some prior conditioning seems to prevent the subject from being completely forthcoming"?

 

However, this is speculation and has not been confirmed, it is assumed that the cause of the convulsions was the result of our lack of expertise when interrogating Alien creatures and their unknown mental training techniques
... maybe "Because this theory is completely unsubstantiated, the failed interrogations are commonly thought to be the result of the untested and unstandardized techniques used on the prisoners."

 

After both extensive and intensive application of special persuasion procedures, our interrogators managed to come up with small pieces of the puzzle.
... maybe "After both extensive and intensive application of special persuasion procedures, our interrogators have deciphered several small pieces of the puzzle."

 

Apparently the Aliens are launching their attacks from an undisclosed location within the Solar System, as the subject revealed that the "small vessels" (what we call UFOs) are not Faster-Than-Light (FTL) capable, meaning that travel from the nearest star of Alpha Centauri would take several years, and thus is not the source of the enemy's attacks. This, however, has raised another question.  The Alien talked about "small vessels". This could indicate that there are "large vessels" which might be able to achieve FTL travel.
... maybe: "Apparently the Aliens are staging their attacks from within the Solar System, because the interrogation subject revealed that their "small vessels" (what we call UFOs) are not Faster-Than-Light (FTL) capable. The nearest star to Earth, Proxima Centauri, is several years distant under non-FTL conditions- far too restrictive for military timetables. However, has raised another question; the Alien subject mentioned only "small vessels"... might there be "large vessels" capable of FTL travel?"

 

We know the main attack force is based on a local planet.
I don't think this is necessarily true based on the interrogation results... it doesn't have to be a planet; it could be a planetoid or an some orbital station, or a behemoth mothership."
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