Final level, final assault. Trivia note: neither the minimap nor the save feature work here. The Ultimate Alien is a metagaming bastard.
The greeting party is a single Lobsterman with a Disruptor Pulse Launcher and a lack of the will to use it. He gets killed by one of the tanks. More troublesome is the likelihood we'll have to blast out paths for the Tiger Sharks again.
Note that this place looks like nothing else we've ever seen.
Sonic weapons are ineffective in blasting out a path for the Spoonzers, so it's time to go to the bigger guns. Once that's done, the tanks advance into the next room, confronting several Lobstermen with a mix of DPLs and stun launchers.
The DPL Lobsterman is taken down at once as a priority target. Stun bombs are not effective against Displacers. At least one Sectoid stuns itself firing on the lead Tiger Shark, while other Sectoids and Lobstermen are dispatched by the guns of the three Spoonzers as they push forward. The aliens put up a stalwart resistance, but without the proper weapons to harm armor it is futile. The last standing Lobsterman flees, but is trapped by one of the Tiger Sharks before he can reach the temporary safety of a door the Displacers can't pass through. It turns for a final stand, firing its ineffective weapon one more time...and stuns itself, while the tank watches in silence.
This spasm of resistance over, Disruptor Pulses are used to clear the way for the advance of HLPX-COM armor. I should note that the last two levels, M.C. attacks have been completely absent. They were dirt common on the first, but nothing stuck.
The grim black Tiger Sharks push on. Two Deep Ones fall to one of the tanks, while another spots one of the Nautilus creatures that killed Mongoose. Again a single round was not sufficient to dispose of the creature, but it did not return fire this time.
It returns fire on its own turn. Damage is severe to the Tiger Shark, but not enough to stop it, and it kills the alien creature.
These guys really, really do not get it about stun bombs not stopping tanks. They keep trying and keep dying for their troubles. Neither do the Tentaculats get that tanks are immune to them.
More DPL fire to clear the way for the tanks. At this point the only real threat to the mission appears to be that we might run out of Disruptor Pulses. In counterpoint to that, we still have nine people with Sonic Cannons that haven't even engaged the enemy on this level yet.
We eventually break out into this large open area.
It's empty. We haven't encountered any hostiles in some time now.
More Disruptor Pulses to clear out doorways. We're getting close to the end of our stock by now, and the end of that we've grabbed off dead aliens.
Fortunately we're also getting close to the end of this maze. One more long hallway; one more set of doors. Through them, one of the nautiliod creatures attempts to bar the way, but it is no match for three Tiger Sharks. The tanks spread out, scouring this room. No other enemies present themselves.
The last door falls before a Disruptor Pulse launched by Hades. A wall of mobile black metal and Aqua Plastics fills the entrance.
Lovecraft was wrong!
No force more terrible, no force more powerful, than the works of human hands.
Mission...Complete.
Munitions Expenditure: 17 Disruptor Pulses, 35 Displacer/Sonic shots. Casualties: One Tiger Shark seriously damaged, one Tiger Shark lightly damaged.
A few aliens escaped T'Leth while it was in its death spasms, via UFOs. Most of them were shot down by member nation naval units on the scene, the Leviathan, or Avenger 1, which was reactivated in anticipation of this very thing. Some had space-capable craft and managed to make it offworld, preferring to face the Ethereal Empire rather than a vengeful HLPX-COM. They carry with them tales of huge, jet-black monsters that can not be stopped by any craft of mortals and terrible human implements called "spoons".
