USS Melville

"Good morning, Gentlemen. Welcome aboard the Melville."

―Lt. Joseph Henry (from Aliens: Colonial Marines)

The USS Melville registration number STS-469, was a Conestoga-class troop transport ship in service with the United States Colonial Marine Corps. It was manned by Marines under the command of Lieutenant Joseph Henry. It was charted by Alphatech executive Beliveau to convoy toxic waste to their SunGun for disposal and haul replacement labor to a deep space communication array.

History[]

Stationned at Frontier Mobile Base 82, the USS Melville was hauled by Alphatech for a conveying mission to one of their communication array in deep space, however it will reveal that Beliveau's real mission was to discover the identity of a religious zealot named "Father". Lieutenant Joseph Henry was assigned to this ship, as a sentence for assaulting an officer, as were the rest of the Marine crew considered as a bad bunch except Sergeant Nyland, an Alphatech executive named Beliveau, six security officers and one synthetic named Liston.

After a small "briefing" everyone goes in hypersleep to reach their first stopover, the SunGun Waste Disposal Facility to deliver toxic waste, however once arrived the ship was unable to get in contact with the station, Beliveau sent his security team on the station despite Henry's disapproval as his wake his marines just in case. After some exploration, the security team discovered a hive and all were wiped out except the security chief Vormitag, Henry then deployed his men in the station and found the only survivor from the station, the SunGun operator Dinkel and faced a heavy Xenomorph infestation, they suffered three Marines KIA (one unidentified, Bateman and Koo) and one MIA (Berganza) during the firefights but managed to expulse them in space, capture one Bug-Man and rescue Vormitag before heading to Bracken's World.

During the trip to Bracken's World where Henry wanted to dump Beliveau, the BugMan and Vormitag intoxicate with Royal Jelly a Xeno-Zip addict Marine named Beech that will share it with Chen and Rosemas two other addicts, all Marines, except Beech that stayed on maintenance duty on the ship descend on the planet one team with Alphatech members to the city and the other to investigate a rogue signal on an Alphatech abandoned outpost and were attacked by Bug-Men, they fought their way through them to be stucked on a kelp farm and undergo an attacked by aquatic Xenomorphs during which Carrano perished until they were rescued by the other team. Soon after the main colony was the target of the same aquatic Xenos, Lt. Henry and his marines managed to repel the attack with the help of Herk Mondo but not without destroying most of the kelp farms, after the battle Lt. Henry managed to inject to all his mens a microbomb in their neck wired to his heart to ensure their loyalty for an all-out assault on an Alphatech research lab and the said comm array that have been taken over by Bug-Men. In orbit Beech falling short on Royal jelly suffered a massive drug withdrawal and failed to maintain the Melville, the ship's orbit decayed sending in the planet's upper atmosphere, after suffering a structural failure the ship desintegrate in the atmosphere leaving the crew stranded on the planet.

Thanks to Beliveau who stashed a weapon cache on the planet's mining facility, after putting a fierce fight in the factory they managed to secure many weapons and a FTL ship for Henry's mission. While in route to Alphatech's research station #2378, Henry asked Rake to hack and modify Liston to serve his purposes, Chen and Rosemas suffers too from Royal Jelly withdrawal, Beliveau get get executed by Vormitag, who was working for the "Father" all along since the SunGun, when he was about to explain the situation to the Marines, Vormitag get on his turn blunted to death by a frenzied Rosemas and the Marines attempt a mutiny against Henry which was foiled by a reprogrammed Liston. Arrived on the space station, their ship was hacked by a Bug-Man who power down their ship to allow Xenomorphs to fetch the captive now Bug-Woman onboard, however her loss of consciousness disorient the Xenos that allow Henry and his team to come back to the ship, just before that Nyland separate from the group to find the source of the power loss and desactivate it allowing the ship to take off. But Henry didn't any risk and abandon Nyland on the station heading to the Comm Array converted into BugMen's father's base, the distance between her and Henry detonate her bomb and blowing her head off, once they forced their way into Alphatech's massively infested Comm Array and launched an all-out assault to the father's chamber, Rosemas still onboard the FTL ship get executed by Corchiani, the former head of the SunGun turned into a Bug-Man, coming to rescue his sibling. During the assault many Marines lost their life, leaving only an Henry, Liston, Rake, Forsythe and Maryland alive, in the chamber they confront the "father" who revealed to be Ernst Kleist who survived the destruction of Charon Base who is ultimately killed by Henry having totally lost his mind triggering the base's self-destruct system, in a last momentum of lucidity Henry told Liston to save the remaining marines which cause it to rip his heart to defuse the detonator. The remaining Marines fought their way to their ship trying to escape the doomed station, unfortunately they couldn't make it in time and were killed when the station explode, leaving only a disemboweled Liston drifting in space confirming Father's identity.