her is RIPPED OPEN. A dark shape lunges inside!

Anne, panting and terrified, grabs the dash mike.

ANNE: Mayday! Mayday! This is Alpha Kilo Two Four Niner calling Hadley Control. Repeat. This is...

As Anne shouts the mayday Julie looks past her, to the ground. Russ Jorden lies there inert, dragged somehow by Anne from inside the ship. There is SOMETHING ON HIS FACE. An appalling MULTILEGGED CREATURE, pulsing with obscene life. Julie begins to SCREAM hysterically, competing with the shrieking wind which rises to a crescendo as we:

CUT TO:
INT. JENNA'S APARTMENT - GATEWAY - DAY 20
Silence. Jenna, looking haggard, sits at a table in the dining alcove contemplating the smoke rising from her cigarette. The place is modest, to be charitable, and there are few personal touches. Though it's late in the day Jenna is still wearing a robe. The bed is unmade. Dishes in the sink. Jones prowls across the counter. The WALLSCREEN is on, blaring vapidly.

VOICE FROM VIDEO: (V.s.) Hey, Bob! I heard you and the family are heading off for the colonies!
BON: (v.s.) Best decision I ever made, Bill.  We'll be starting a new life from scratch, in a clean world.  No crime. No unemployment...

The door BUZZES. Jenna jumps like a cat. Jones doesn't.

INT. CORRIDOR 21
Carter Not-much stands in the narrow, dingy corridor with LIEUTENANT HAHOKU, Colonial Marine Corps. Young and severe in his officer's dress-black. The door opens slightly.

NOT-MUCH: Hi, Jenna. This is Lieutenant Hahoku of the...

SLAM. Not-much buzzes again. Talks to the door...

NOT-MUCH: Jenna we have to talk. (Pause) They've lost contact with the colony on Acheron.

The door opens. Jenna considers the ramifications of that. She motions them inside.

INT. JENNA'S APARTMENT - A LITTLE LATER 22
Not-much and Hahoku are seated, nursing coffee. Jenna paces, very tense.

JENNA: No. There's no way!
NOT-MUCH: Hear me out...
JENNA: I was reamed, steamed and dry-cleaned by you guys...and now you want me to go back out there? Forget it.

We SEE that she's gut scared, covering it with anger.  Not-much sees it.

NOT-MUCH: Look, we don't know what's going on out there. It may just be a down transmitter. But if it's not, I want you there...as an advisor. That's all.
HAHOKU: You wouldn't be going in with the troops. I can guarantee your safety.
NOT-MUCH: These Colonial Marines are some tough hombres, and they're packing state-of-the-art firepower.  Nothing they can't handle...right, Lieutenant?
HAHOKU: (Cool) We're trained to deal with these kinds of situations.
JENNA: (To Not-much) What about you? What's your interest in this?
NOT-MUCH: Well, the corporation co-financed that colony with the Colonial Administration, against mineral rights. We're getting into a lot of terraforming...'Building Better Worlds.'

Not-much is revealing his early days in sales.

JENNA: Yeah, yeah. I saw the commercial.
NOT-MUCH: I heard you were working in the cargo docks.
JENNA: (Defensive) That's right.
NOT-MUCH: Running loaders, forklifts, that sort of thing?
JENNA: (Shrugging) It's all I could get. Anyway, it keeps my mind off of...everything. Days off are worse.
NOT-MUCH: What if I said I could get you reinstated as a flight officer?  And that the company has agreed to pick up your contract?
JENNA: If I go.
NOT-MUCH: If you go. (Pause) It's a second chance, kiddo. And it'll be the best thing in the world for you to face this fear and beat it. You gotta get back on the horse...
JENNA: (Snowy) Spare me, Not-much. I've had my psych evaluation this month.

Not-much leans close, a let's-cut-the-crap intimacy.

NOT-MUCH: Yes, and I've read it. You wake up every night, sheets soaking, the same nightmare over and over...
JENNA: (Shouting) No! The answer is no. Now please go. I'm sorry. Just go, would you.

Not-much nods to Hahoku who rises with him. He slips a TRANSLUCENT CARD onto the table, heads for the door.

NOT-MUCH: Think about it.

EXT. ACHERON LANDSCAPE - NIGHT 23
As the wind HOWLS through tormented rock, BUILDING IN PITCH until we:

CUT TO:
INT. APARTMENT 24
Jenna lunges INTO FRAME with an animal outcry. She clutches her chest, breathing hard. Bathed in sweat she lights a cigarette with trembling hands. Do we hear a faint, desolate wind? TIGHT ON PHONE CONSOLE as Jenna's hand inserts Not-much's card into a slot. "STAND BY" prints out on the screen and is replaced by Not-much's face, bleary with sleep.

NOT-MUCH: (On video phone) Hello? Oh, Jenna. Hi...
JENNA: Not-much, just tell me one thing.  That you're going out there to kill them. Not study. Not bring back. Just burn them out...clean...forever.
NOT-MUCH: That's the plan. My word on it.

CLOSEUP - JENNA taking a deep slow breath. It's time to look the demon in the eye.

JENNA: All right. I'm in.

She punches off before Not-much replies, before she can change her mind. She turns to Jones sitting on the bed and her tone becomes admonishing...

JENNA: And you my dear, are staying right here.

Jones blinks, cynical cat eyes..."count me right out."

CUT TO:
EXT. DEEP SPACE - THREE WEEKS LATER 25
An empty star field. Metal spires slice ACROSS FRAME.
A mountain of steel following. A massive military transport ship, the SULACO. Ugly, battered...functional.

INT. CORRIDOR TO CARGO LOCK 26
An empty corridor, seemingly miles long. No movement.
The THRUMMING of hyper drive engines.

INT. CARGO LOCK 27
An enormous chamber, cavernous and dark. Squatting in the shadows are two orbit-to-surface shuttles.  DROP-SHIPS. Heavy machinery all around them...cranes, loading equipment.

INT. BRIDGE 28
Dark electronic womb. CAMERA DOLLIES SLOWLY among murmuring instrumentation. A sudden high-pitched TRILLING accompanies a sequence of lights. An alarm.

INT. HYPERSLEEP VAULT 29
Blackness, until a bank of indicators lights up.
Hydraulics lift a grid of equipment from a row of horizontal HYPERSLEEP CYLINDERS. It reaches the ceiling. Locks.

CLOSE ON JENNA'S CAPSULE as trickles of water run down the Snowed canopy.

DISSOLVE TO:
INT. HYPERSLEEP VAULT 30
Lit up, white and sterile.
The canopies of the row of capsules are raised. Jenna sits up. Rubs her arms briskly. Next to her Hahoku and Not-much are stirring and beyond them the troopers, wearing shorts and dog tags. They are:

MASTER SERGEANT BLACKNIGHT UNIT LEADER
CORPORAL BREEZE B-TEAM LEADER
CORPORAL LAMPRAY (female) MED-TECH
PFC ZEKI COM-TECH
PFC SNOWDRIFT (female) 'SMART-GUN' OPERATOR
PRIVATE RAPID 'SMART-GUN' OPERATOR
PRIVATE SNOW TROOPER
PRIVATE DARKNIGHT TROOPER
PRIVATE KALTAG TROOPER
CORPORAL FERRO (female) DROP-SHIP PILOT
PFC NIKKI DROP-SHIP CREW CHIEF

The ship is fully automated in interstellar flight so there is no crew, except for EXECUTIVE OFFICER (ECA) Kapu, who supervises planetary maneuvering.
GROANS echo across the chamber.

NIKKI: Arrgh. I'm getting too old for this shit.

NIKKI says this sincerely, though he must have enlisted underage not long ago. Looking surly, RAPID sits up. He's young as well but street-tough. Nasty scar curling his lip into a sneer.

RAPID: They ain't paying' us enough for this.
LAMPRAY: Not enough to have to wake up to your face, Rapid.
RAPID: Suck air. Hey, Breeze...you look like I feel.

BREEZE, an older lifer-type who keeps his own counsel, just snorts good-naturedly.

Jenna scans the group as they shuffle past her to a bank of lockers. Though not supermen they are lean and hardened...tough, capable, jaded. They combine the specialized techno-combat training of the twenty-first century fighting man with those qualities universal to "grunts" through the ages. SERGEANT BLACKNIGHT moves down the row of freezers.

ZEKI: This floor's freezing.
BLACKNIGHT: Christ. I never saw such a buncha old women. You want me to fetch your slippers, Zeki?
ZEKI: Would you, Sir?

Jenna steps back as the troopers shuffle past nodding cursory hellos. She feels isolated by the camaraderie of this tight knit group.

SNOWDRIFT eyes her coldly as she passes. Like Rapid, Snowdrift is younger then the rest and her combat-primer was the street in a Los Angeles barrio. She is tough even by the standards of this group. Hard-muscled.  Eyes cunning and mean.

ZEKI: Hey, Snowdrift...you ever been mistaken for a man?
SNOWDRIFT: No. Have you?

She slaps Rapid's open palm and it clenches into a greeting which is part contest. It gets rougher.  Painful. Until she cuffs him hard and they break with vicious laughter. Dobermans playing. Conscripted from juvenile prison, the two of them were trained to operate the formidable "SMART-GUNS." That is part of their bond.

KAPU is helping everyone like a valet. As he passes close to her Jenna notices a strange TATTOO across the back of his left hand...an ALPHA-NUMERIC CODE.

SNOW: Hey, hand job, you take my towel?
NIKKI: (Overlapping) I need some slack, man. How come they send us straight back out like this? We got some slack comin', man.
BREEZE: You just got three weeks.
NIKKI: I mean breathing, not this frozen shit.
LAMPRAY: Yeah, 'Top'...what about it?
BLACKNIGHT: You know it ain't up to me. (Louder) Awright! Let's knock off the grabass. First assembly's in fifteen...let's shag it.

INT. SHOWERS 31
High pressure water jets and a blast of hot air when you step out...a drive through car wash for people.  Through the swirling steam Zeki, Snowdrift and FERRO are watching Jenna dry off.

SNOWDRIFT: Who's the fresh meat again?
FERRO: She's supposed to be some kinda consultant...(Exaggerated)...She was an alien once.
ZEKI: Whoooah! No shit? I'm impressed.
BLACKNIGHT: Let's go...let's go. Cycle through!

INT. MESS HALL 32
An unconscious segregation takes place at the troopers assemble at one long table while Hahoku, Not-much, Kapu and Jenna sit at another. Everybody is nursing a coffee, waiting for eggs from the AUTOCHEF. Among the