"Weyland Yutani has been busy trying to create bio weapons for the weapons department," she explains, "They don't even need Congress's approval for this project since they literally have bought each member. It wasn't a surprise that, after my trial, one of their assholes sent some colonists to look into the Derelict's location. I'm currently checking up on who this idiot was, at least for evidence. If we get out this place, Dwayne, we're going to need all the evidence we need to prevent the company from creating a bio weapon of these things."
"What?" Hicks' voice grows hard, eyebrows raised. "Bio weapon? The company wants to make a bio weapon of these things? That's crazy!"
"Exactly, which is why we have to stop them. It doesn't end here. It ends with them too."
Jesus... Hicks sits uncomfortably in his chair. He's heard of the company pulling some crazy shit before. Being in the Corps for a while, you get to hear the stories. But this... this is fucking lunacy!
"I tried to warn them. I tried to tell them about these creatures but they obliviously looked the other way." She stops, running a hand across her hair. "And now we've got a colony infested with these monsters."
"Then that explains why they decided to send only my squad in," he says uneasily to himself and looks toward a logo on the wall across him representing the company. He feels like spitting at it but can't conjure up enough saliva since his mouth is dry now. "They wanted us to deal with this problem in a quiet manner. Christ, they're practically going to pull the lid over this once they're through."
"Yeah, and now I'm worried about this rescue team you talk about. What guarantee do we have that they're coming to rescue us and not clean up their mess by killing us all?"
"Because, if what you say is true, then they'll want us alive for reliable information. They want field experience, Ellen, something they can't get anywhere else. At least not yet, anyway."
They stare at each other for a long time, thinking about this notion. Basically, it means that they're going to be somebody's lab rat. They're going to squeeze the juice off of each and every one of them until they're satisfied. Jesus, Hicks thinks, so this is what it's like to be a pawn of some madman's game. He always figured that being used wasn't a problem for him. After all, he's a marine and being used came with the territory. Yet, this sort of using isn't what he expected. Even if he's a soldier, he's just as liable to be shitted on. He's even worse off than Ripley because he'd be breaking his code of honor if he refused to cooperate with his officers. There's no denial that soldiers who have miraculously pushed up a rank or two were friends of executives of Weyland Yutani. No, having him talk would be no problem for them. This leaves him with one question: is he strong enough to fight back? Is he prepared to undo all the work he's done up to this point at the price of treason, or whatever the want to call it? He's a soldier for Christ's sake. He's only human. Then again, what sort of life would he be living, knowing that he took part in the company's grand scheme?
Ripley turns her attention to him. Her face shows him nothing but a blank stare. In a toneless voice she says, "I don't ever want this to happen to Earth, Dwayne. I don't want the things anywhere near it."
Hicks looks at her in surprise, a thought coming across his mind that causes Ripley to become agitated.
"I'm no hero, Dwayne, if that's what you're thinking. I'm not doing this to be noble either. I'm doing this because I lost my entire life to them. I lost my little..." she stops and clears her throat before she can finish this sentence. She resumes talking, her voice fiercer than before. "Now that I'm alive and breathing again, facing them, I plan to do all that is necessary to put a stop to these fuckers once and for all. Can I count on you? Can I trust you?"
Dwayne only stuffs his cigarette with the heel of his foot. Leaving it on the ground. "Semper Fi."
Ripley nods in silence, apparently grateful that she's found someone she can trust. If only he could tell her the truth. Because the truth of the matter is, he's just like her. He ain't no hero. He'd really like to help, there's no mistaking that, but he's only a soldier, remember? What the fuck can he do to stop this from happening on Earth or any other place?
The door leading to the monitor room parts aside. Hudson stands at the door's entrance, yawning and stretching his arms out. He appears to be half alive and half dead at the same time. Hicks moans when he suddenly remembers that his shift is over and that he's being replaced by Hudson. He stands up the moment the Private takes a step into the room.
"Yo, Hicks," the ComTech mumbles very tiredly and scratches his groin. "I'm here. Time to bail, amigo. I've got this covered."
The Corporal cocks an eyebrow just at the sight of him. "You sure you're up for this, Will? You look like shit. I can stay here longer, y' know."
"You kiddin' me, man?" Hudson grins as he walks down the small flight of stairs. Some color fills the Private's face. "You've been here for hours. Let ol' Will do his magic. I'll watch these monitors carefully. I've got the sight of a hawk, remember!"
Right as he nears the row of monitors he notices Ripley standing at a corner of the room.
"Oh, hey, Ripley. I didn't see you there," Hudson replies quietly. He abruptly stops talking as if something just hit him. The cocky ComTech glances at Hicks for a long time. And then at Ripley. And, finally, at Hicks again. A goofy grin slowly curves on his lips as a nasty thought comes across his mind. Playfully, he slaps his Corporal on the shoulder. "Oh! I get it! You want a little more... time here, Dwayne. Yeah. I gotcha. Time. Heh."
Hicks rolls his eyes, "It's not like that."
"Uh-huh," Hudson chuckles, not believing him for a second. "Hey, man, nothing to be ashamed of. It's times like this that people tend to find stress-free activities to get them through the day. Always happens. It's in human nature. Y' know what I mean, Rip?"
"It's Ripley."
"Whatever," he shrugs, "By the way, the kid's been lookin' for you. If you and Hicks want to be alone, I'll just tell her that you two are busy making little brothers and sisters for her to play with."
Hicks' eyes turn narrow. Before he can mutter a word, a shot is fired from one of the sentry guns shown in the monitors. Quickly, all three check the surveillance cameras. The third camera reveals some movement among the pile of alien corpses. Immediately, Hicks takes a seat and uses the keyboard before him to increase the size of the image. One of the aliens is trying to crawl its way from its dead siblings.
"Fuck!" shouts Hudson, "I thought it died!"
"It didn't die," Ripley realizes, "It was wounded. It must've... healed itself."
"Healed itself?" screams the ComTech, "Am I missing something here? How in the hell can anything heal that fast! We just wasted these fuckers with a shit load of bullets! How can that be! Tell me!"
The sentry gun fires another round. Hicks scans the number counter on his laptop. Two bullets have been wasted, leaving only eight more left. Worse, this is the only sentry gun that has any bullets remaining. The rest are all dead. Like them if they don't figure a way out of here soon.
The injured alien continues to move. The sentry gun fires again and again. Five left. All three hold their breaths, hoping to spare those remaining bullets even if it won't really matter in the long run. However, the cunning alien resumes its struggle, scraping the gated floor with its claws as it pushes itself forward. Half of its right arm is torn off. Several holes can be seen across its chest. It's severely injured yet able to summon whatever strength left within to move away from the stack of dead siblings. No doubt, it'll recover fully if it gets away. Shit, if it could still be living and breathing after all those injuries, it can practically heal anything!
Four more bullets are fired from the mini sentry gun, directing its aim at the alien's chest. Hicks stares blankly at the number that now shows on his laptop. Last one. For some reason, his eyes find their way to the crumbled cigarette on the ground. Last one.
The alien makes one more effort to flee until the remaining bullet penetrates straight into its thick and deformed skull. The capsule explodes and cuts the creature's head in half. With a jolt, the headless alien slumps to its final resting place.
The room is quiet as Ripley closes her eyes, feeling helpless and hating every minute of this hell. Hudson, on the other hand, continues staring at the monitor, watching the acid blood eat through the walls and floor. His eyes are a mix of confusion and insanity. He's a bomb, that's for sure, ready to go off at any minute now. The fact that he's already on the edge doesn't help much either. But Hicks doesn't concern himself with these matters. At least not yet. Instead, he continues looking at that crumbled cigarette. Watching it. Last one, he thinks to himself again. Last one...
Entry 269:
The day has come. Tonight, we're going to test the newly developed instruments on Xenomorphis Terribilis, as Darwin has officially named them. The tension among her staff is omnipresent and has been building up gradually for days. I'm surprised to find that even I'm affected by it. I shouldn't be. Even though I witnessed firsthand what the creatures can do, I should be able to just erase the thought from my mind and concentrate on the task at hand. I'm not. Throughout the last week, I have found myself wondering time and time again, my thoughts straying off to what's going to happen tonight. We're going to strap one of these things down onto the table with ties of specially designed Titanium-Adamantium alloy. In addition, it will be held down by a stasis blanket. It won't be able to move at all while Darwin will be poking around with the new instruments in its body. At least that's what we hope. There's no telling what the thing will be able to do once we sadistic humans put it through hell for the benefit of science. I hope she doesn't select the killer as her guinea pig. There's no way of telling. All three -- yes, we've got three adults now -- biomechanoids look exactly the same: Same built, same height... there's no way of telling them apart. Darwin thinks of simply painting numbers on the front of their skulls. I wonder if it will be that easy. Will it interfere with their orientation system? Will it even hurt them? Drive them crazy? Who knows? We are stepping onto new territory every single day now. Nobody knows what's going to happen and where this project is going to land us. It could bring the greatest progress in history, the medical as well as the military aspect. It could be a breakthrough of unimaginable proportions... or the biggest failure ever. We could create a killer virus with the potential to destroy mankind. We could build indestructible monsters we can't control, which will take over the station and... stop it, Isis! Yes, it is dangerous. This is why Phooka's so far out. One reason of course being the absence of all the laws and regulations that would hinder our progress in the more civilized and better monitored parts of colonized space. The other reason is that if something really happened... something bad... Weyland Yutani could deal with it here themselves without having to wonder about anybody's reaction. They could blast Phooka to kingdom come if they felt it were necessary... Let's face it, everybody is aware that a project that harbors such great opportunity must be dangerous as well. It's an ancient truth. So ancient, the old Chinese even have a word for it containing that double meaning. We'll see where this will lead us.
I don't discuss these things with my boss these days. I have my reservations about messing with the xenomorphs, but I know nobody will listen to me, least of all Darwin. She's obsessed with these things. I even find her watching them in her spare time. If that accident in Lab 4 had one effect, it's that she's even more intend now to unveil the E.T.'s secrets... all of them! She's alienating her staff with this herself, even me. So far, I always felt some kind of kinship with Darwin, having thought of her as some kind of soul mate, even though I don't have a soul... or at least I think I don't. Is there space enough for a soul on a microprocessor? Darwin, yes... the distance between us has grown ever since that meeting with Rosselli and Vox. She's already acting on her plan, treating me like just another part of her team and not somebody she has been sharing secrets with for quite some time now, even though the Marine is not even present! She says that's to get me into the proper mood, whatever she means by that. She says its easier for everybody to behave one way rather than to constantly change their behavior towards me. After all, we don't want to blow our cover, right? So just like that, I slid down the food chain all the way to the bottom... almost. Suddenly, everybody thinks he/she can mess with me. I can't say I like it. I'm playing the part, sure. I give them the machine: bland face, Sorry here, Sorry there, and not one aggressive or smart-assed word ever. It must be some people's wet dream! Seems like just when I learned the niceties of sarcasm, I've got to forget about it again.
By the way, as far as I heard, Kurtz virtually ripped off Darwin's head for the Lab 4-incident. The result is that he wants to be asked for everything now. She won't even be able to waste a single one of Skin's albino rats without asking the big man's permission. This of course pisses her off to no end, but what can I say? She's had it coming? Oh, how it must stink for her to be dependant, to have to chase him down for the one signature nobody will move a finger for her without.
What else? Our two patients are still in recovery, but greatly so. The girl has already left Sickbay and is staying with Dr. deJoria. It makes sense. We'll need to proceed differently with the child. It will be easier to attain her trust if she accepts the doctor as maternal replacement. They seem to get along with each other quite well. I'm surprised to see that tight-assed bitch acting out compassion so convincingly. Maybe I should ask her to give me classes. I sure could use some. But then of course, deJoria's relationship with the child is based on a lie. The girl has been told that her adult caretaker is dead. It's making things easier for us. If they knew of each others existence, they'd just complicate everything. I'm sure the Marine would have told her to shut up, to not give us anything and not co-operate with us, just as he's doing. He even has his plausible reasons: USCM regulations forbid for him to spill even one word about what happened on Hadley's Hope to us. So unless he'll be officially debriefed at Gateway Station Headquarters, he'll play mute. The girl, on the other hand... Without him telling her to shut up, we've been able to get at least a few clues about the occurrences in the station after the Sulaco's crash. Of course, the vocabulary and accuracy of a six-year-old can't suffice in filling us in on all important events, but it was enough to understand why the two arrived the way they did, and certainly enough to understand why the Corporal hates us so much. Lots of blood, sweat and pain, betrayal and drama, by the sound of it. Kinda interesting to ponder what's going to happen if they ever find out about our little lie... but am I thinking? It can't happen. They'll never meet again -- at least not in this lifetime.
Today I'm going to bring Mr. Dwayne Hicks down to the Zoo, his permanent new address. Hikahi thinks it's still too early, but Darwin and Kurtz are impatient. They want the project to start: They want interaction. They want to study the Corporal's behavior in the presence of others... and Raven's, as well. Yes. That's the big news for today: Raven's going to be a Zoolander. I wonder what they want to achieve with this idea? Of course Alexander's right when he says you can only study sociopathic behavior if you give the individual a chance to actually interact with others. So far, the guy has been constantly in single custody and behind a stasis shield during his session with Alexander. Nobody else has even talked to him, not even Darwin. And now they want to drop him among the local wildlife and see what happens? He'll make confetti of them, that's my guess. And -- if we are really unlucky -- he might just choose our valuable Marine for dinner, who knows? The man wouldn't be able to fend him off, no matter how much of an elite soldier he was before he got here. Wouldn't that be a riot? Our project on hold, because our guinea pigs terminated each other? Darwin says that when push comes to shove in the Zoo, they can always switch 'em off. I hope she's right.
This leaves me with just one more thing to mention: Alexander. I'm really worried about him now. He's losing his grip on reality. Last night, I hid the little squeeze bottle he was sure I had no clue about... and he lost it! Completely lost it! At first I pretended to ignore him while he was frantically searching the room for it, but then he started accusing me, and then -- finally -- he attacked me! Yes. He grabbed me by the shoulders and threw me against the wall, yelling into my face and forcing me to look into his blood-shot eyes that give his weakness away for everyone to see. I was stunned at first, too stunned to remember that I am in fact much stronger than him... but then I fought back and held him to the wall, and we stared at each other for more than ten seconds... before I released him. He didn't continue. I guess it dawned on him during those moments what has become of him. He tried to explain and apologize, but I didn't want hear it. I've got so much shit going on myself, I don't need his in addition. So, I showed him the door... at least for that night. The look he gave me when he left was this of a wounded animal... like one of Skin's rabbits during an experiment. I almost felt sorry for him... I think. I don't know what being sorry feels like. I didn't want to throw him out. I didn't feel great doing it. And now I'm sitting here on my bed and stare at the door, almost daring it to open and spit Alexander back into the room. I don't know what's going on, both with the station and with me. Things are about to change, I can feel it. Where to? The better? The worse? I can't tell. All I know is that I've never felt like this. Helpless. Frustrated. I don't like where I am right now. I don't like where Alexander's and my relationship is right now. Right now, all I want do is go on mental standby and not wake from it until everything is back to the way it was before.
"So, what kind of place is this I'm being moved to?" Hicks sits on his bed, for the first time since he can remember not dressed in one of those embarrassing ashen-colored hospital gowns which -- in addition to offering unexpected insights to others at the most impossible times -- make one look even deader than if one had suddenly gone flatline. He doesn't look at Keisha, who is sitting on the chair next to him, checking her watch for the umpteenth time in just a few minutes. He's tugging at the blue shirt that still too big for him and gives him -- in the combination with the same-colored pants -- the impression of having been snatched off an unsuspecting construction worker someplace. He finally turns his attention back at the young nurse. "Another part of the hospital? Like a ... sanatorium? Or more like a prison?" He sees her flinch and opens his hands questioningly. "What?"
"I can't tell, Dwayne." Her warm, dark and usually compassionate eyes are strangely unreadable today. A once clear sky that's now overcast with thick clouds. During the past week, he had learned to read in her face more than she had been willing to let him read, but today she's behaving strangely. Guarded. As not to give him the slightest clue about her true feelings. Damn, this is making him more nervous than Isis' announcement earlier that day that they wanted to move him out of Sickbay by evening.
"Can't tell because you don't know, or because you're not supposed to tell me?" Finally, a spark of guilt. He's not sure this is what he wanted to see. She shakes her head slowly, biting her lower lip as if searching for an evasive answer. "Kee... come on, look at me." He sighs. "What is it?"
"I don't know the place, okay?" With a little more force than necessary. "It's... I think it's a neutral part of the station. Guest quarters or so."
"Neutral?" he repeats, unable to actually attach a meaning to the word. "What do you mean, neutral?"
"Not in the research area." She inhales deeply. "Look, I can't tell you about it, okay? I've never been there myself." Feeling his dissatisfaction with her answer, she adds with a slight nod towards his leg: "At least until now. Rehabilitation's still far from over for you. Hikahi told me to help you with this for as long as you need to work on it. So... you aren't rid of me, yet."
His lips smile, but his eyes don't participate:
"And you're not of me. The patient from hell is still in the neighborhood..." The remark earns him a shy laugh.
"You're not the patient from hell. You're a bit grumpy on occasion, but I'm sure you have your reasons... even if you're not telling me." She sees his bemused look turn serious.
"I told you why I can't."
"Military rules, yeah." She can't help it, some of the anger she's feeling comes through in her voice. He must have noticed it -- but before he can react, they both hear the door opening behind them, and the strange moment of intimacy is over as Hikahi and Isis enter the room.
Hicks can't help but notice the changed expression on the synthetic's face. Seven days ago, when she entered his room for the first time he can actually remember, both her expression and behavior had been marked by pointed irony and an undisguised display of superiority. There's nothing left of it today. If anything, her face resembles the one of his young caretaker in its guardedness. It's absolutely void of any tell-taling expressions, and the tattoo only adds to masking her true emotions. If she even has them. Does an android have emotions? She's looking so darn real! If Keisha hadn't told him, he would have been fooled himself, even though he has been around synthetics throughout his professional career. Usually he had been able to tell them apart even without having to see their white blood or scanner codes. They are simply... different. Innocent somehow. You knew after the first words you exchanged with them that nothing bad would come from them your way. Just like Bishop, his thoughts turn back to the Acheron-mission together with the sour taste in his mouth that usually accompanies his spontaneous flashbacks. Bishop had kept the Weyland Yutani forces at bay for him and Ripley and Newt to escape. He doesn't know what happened to the loyal synthetic. Whether he was shot on sight, or vanished in the following inferno. Or maybe they took him with them, and he's even here, on the same station... reprogrammed and not knowing him any longer, a characterless slave to Weyland Yutani's purpose...He shudders at the thought and forces himself to shove the mental picture back into his subconscious from where it popped up uninvitedly. Androids... or artificial persons, as Bishop always preferred to be referred to... they're built and programmed to serve mankind, and their purpose is out on their sleeves for everyone to see. This is, however, not the vibe he's picking up from the dark beauty. She's different somehow. More complicated. More... human. A new prototype maybe? He watches her approach, but it's the doctor who first addresses him.
"Corporal Hicks? You feel good enough to exchange these unpleasant surroundings for better ones?"
So he's back on the military track now, too, Hicks notes. Strange, how people everywhere tend to reduce his kind to his profession, only. Now that he's finally feeling better, he's not a person anymore, he's just a soldier to them. He's made this observation before in his life, but it never bothered him before. Why does it now?
"Are they?" he asks back, glancing over at the android, but there's still no expression in her features. Hikahi furrows his brow.
"Are they... what? What do you mean?"
"Better. Are they better than this here?" An all-encompassing gesture. Hikahi frowns, still not understanding. His artificial companions rolls her eyes. At Hikahi? At him?
"Why... of course they are. Isn't everything better than a hospital room?"
"Not necessarily..." Hicks shifts his attention to the A.I. and finds her locking eyes with him. Not challenging or amused as before, but simply observing. "If you dropped me into the dungeon, I would rather prefer a hospital room. Even this one." Finally, he sees the spark of amusement in her dark eyes.
"Dungeon, huh?" She shakes her head and points at the wheelchair that's stands at the wall behind her waiting to be used. "I won't ask you what you dreamt of last night..." An inviting gesture towards the chair. "Speaking of nights -- it's getting late. We should really go."
He doesn't want the chair.
"Can't I walk?"
She changes a questioning glance with the doctor, shrugs.
"It's a long way," Hikahi states. "I seriously doubt you're up to it yet."
"Why don't you take the wheelchair along, Isis, and let him walk for as long as he wants to? He can always change his mind and sit down if he doesn't feel like it anymore," Keisha suggests, not caring about drawing the A.I.'s attention to herself she's usually eager to avoid. But where there would have been a sarcastic remark from Isis just one week earlier, she's cocking an eyebrow in appreciation at the young nurse now, before she turns her attention back at him, studying his appearance as if she were dubious of his ability to follow his wish through.
"You sure about this?"
"Yeah." He slips from the bed and takes the crutches that are standing by the head-end, placing his weight on them and his left leg. She shrugs, then moves to take a hold of the wheelchair.
"Okay... then let's go."
"I am going to visit you tomorrow morning and discuss the further measures with you we'll need to take for your full recovery," Hikahi announces to his back. "And don't forget the diet! If you eat anything that-"
"I know," Hicks interrupts him without looking. All of a sudden he can't wait to leave this room. The door parts when the sensors pick up his appearance, and he's hasty to step outside. Funny, how it feels like he's entering an entirely new world. He's almost exhilarated. "I listened. I'm not stupid. No coffee yet, nothing heavy. Nothing but your wonder stuff. Hell yeah, I got it."
"Bye, Dwayne," he hears Keisha's voice, and her strange tone makes him stop and look back at her. There's something in her face he doesn't like, even if she's trying to keep it covert. What exactly is it? She smiles, waving at him briefly. "We'll see each other tomorrow." He nods and feels his lips contort to one of the falsest smiles he's ever put on. False, because he's suddenly identified the thing on her face, and it's making his stomach flutter as if he swallowed a flock of butterflies: It is fear... fear for him...
What do you know?
One moment, the question lies on the tip of his tongue, half-uttered -- and then the door closes, and he's left standing in the brightly illuminated corridor with the worst premonition he's ever had. Mesmerized by the feeling of something bad coming his way, barely able to breathe. He can almost smell it. Taste, even feel it: a dark pulsing that enters his body from the toes, climbing up his nerve-ends all the way to his arms, his fingertips... into the pit of his cold stomach... synchronizing his breathing, his heartbeat , the rushing of the blood in his veins with the dark, foreboding, hypnotizing throbbing... It's only the generators! No need to go all into hysterics! Only the generators!
"You coming?" the A.I.'s voice comes to him from a far-off universe. It takes supreme effort to turn his head in slow-motion and look at her. With all distinctiveness, Hicks feels the tendons in his neck creak. Hears himself swallow air, since his mouth is so dry all of a sudden, there's nothing else left to swallow. A long, awful moment of super-reality and the feeling of watching himself under a powerful magnifying glass... and then, with the next heartbeat, it's gone. Just like that.
"Huh?"
There are lines on her forehead, and he sees her narrow her eyes questioningly.
"Are you okay?"
"Yeah..." He tightens his grip on the crutches and takes the first step, shaking off the last remains of the premonition like cobwebs. "Let's go."
The way down to his new home becomes a voyage through the land of Oz for Hicks. Sure, he's seen enough of W.Y. architecture in his life to recognize fundamental elements of their work, but even so, this place is reeking of the newest technology. While the corridors of Sickbay are still looking reasonably familiar with their cold neon lights and sparse, functional decoration, the wonders begin at the elevators: The design is modern and unobstrusively pleasant and distinct with only few buttons, a noble-looking counter over the door... and a small scanner-booth for retina-scans that makes Hicks recall the seemingly top-secret status of this facility. Obviously, you can't even use the elevators without the proper identification. Looking around, silently observing, he steps into the cabin after his caretaker.
"Level 5. No music." the A.I. steps in front of the scanner and endures the short procedure, whereas the cabin starts to drop imperceptibly. It's only the counter that's telling Hicks they're moving. "You okay?"
What? Does she think he can't take a little ride on the elevator?
"Sure." He shifts his weight on the crutches and decides to try for an answer again. Keisha for some reason didn't want to tell him, and neither did Hikahi. What about her? "So, what is this place you're taking me to?"
"Just your apartment for the next few months," she says without looking at him. As before in his hospital room, she appears to be somehow preoccupied with her unreadable thoughts. "Living quarters we're keeping ready for guests. Since Phooka is a top-secret research facility, we can't very well have people running around on the station as they wish for security reasons. So we created a compound consisting of several corridors with modernly designed apartments, a canteen, Media-Library and even a gym. It is quite spacious and luxurious, and I'm sure you won't miss a thing."
He swallows that and chews on the information for a long, quiet moment while he feels the cabin stop under his feet.
"But I'm essentially being locked up, ain't I?"
She doesn't answer, and before he can press the issue, the door opens and the wonders continue. The soft, warm, orange light of a summer-sunset greets the Marine as he steps out into the broad corridor, and he is astounded to see the orange ball of a holo-sun sink down behind an artificial horizon in the form of a peaceful meadow to his right. Nothing moves except for the branches of the projected trees and bushes on the walls in the non-existent breeze. There's even the chirping of blackbirds, giving a last life sign before they're settling in for the night. The illusion is breathtakingly realistic and leaves him gaping in wonder at the walls. There's even a trace of the sweet odor of fresh grass in the air and the gentle, hardly perceivable humming of insects- and all of a sudden, out of the blue, it hits him: A terrible flood of homesickness he's totally unprepared for, so violent and heavy, it's robbing him of his breath, cutting into him like a knife without meeting any defense mechanism. It aches, hurts more than anything Hikahi put him through; a long, barbed thorn right through his innards. Home... he wants to go home! Back to Earth and the three islands of New Zealand he's been calling his home ever since he left his little, boring home-planet known as Alpha-Ceti Reticuli to join the Corps and the Gateway-based regiment of the Northern Territories. He wants to feel the sun on his face again, and the wind in his hair. Rain hammering down on him, he doesn't care what! Just something real, something that's not make-believe! Not this artificial, aroma-scented lie that dissolves to nothing when he wants to touch it! It's a desperate cry in his mind -- that's stunned into silence with the realization that not only he is not going to have it for the next eight months... he's not going to experience the feeling ever again! They won't let him go! Dammit, he keeps forgetting it! Somehow his stupidly optimistic and still slower-than-usual working mind keeps on falling for their blunt lies again and again and again, whenever he's not watching. But the fact is that he won't leave this place... ever... at least not alive. Because there's this nasty little story he'd have to tell... about Weyland Yutani's hidden agenda... about their being responsible for the death of those colonists... and an entire squad of Marines. About their being responsible for the loss of an expensive Conestoga-class warship... No. They can't let him go. The enormity of this realization hits him like a baseball club over the head, and the little strength he's got left vanishes into thin air. He starts to shake, unable to make even one step further. Gulps. His eyes start to sting, and he's squeezing them shut, feeling lost in this sudden maelstrom of despair that's sucking him in like a giant black hole. Oh fuck... the crutches clatter to the floor and he loses his balance, takes a hasty step with his weak leg which gives in -- and all of a sudden, he finds himself in the wheelchair.
"Hey, you could have said something, you know?" he hears Isis voice next to his left ear. "I knew it was too far for you. But you guys always have that stupid pride thing going on, right? If you had hurt yourself again, Hikahi would have ripped my head off!"
Hicks feels her pushing him forward and stays quiet, attempting to look through the breathtaking illusion of summer grass they're wading through. Don't feel this place, he repeats, mantra-like, in his head. You're going to get off this station somehow. It will all come together. Things have looked bad or even worse before. What kind of a sissy are you to give up just now? He recognizes the mental drill-instructor in his head from various other occasions. He's always been helpful and definitely the one secret of his that kept him alive thus far... Whenever he had been ready to wallow in self-pity and despair in the past, a good, hard, self-inflicted kick in the butt had done the trick, even on Acheron, where he had been ready to give up on several occasions. He hadn't thought he'd ever see daylight again while he was lying in that darn tunnel, feeling his strength pour out of his body through the gashes in his leg. But he did. He sure as hell didn't expect for anyone to come back for them after he had activated the automated distress-signal from the next atmosphere processor either. And now he's here. What makes him think that this is the end? Why shouldn't he be able to turn it all around? There might be a chance if he's just patient enough to wait for it. His priority right now has to be to keenly observe, to find out as much about this place as possible - and to recover and keep his hopes up.
Mulling this over in his head, Hicks leans back in the wheelchair and takes in his surroundings, trying to see through the fake clone of nature to the technology below. The first thing he picks up is the absolute desertion of the place. It's a broad corridor, one that looks like a main walkway and shouldn't be as vacant at this time of day. It's not that late, after all. But still, there's no trace of any other human soul. No shadows moving in front of or behind them, no muffled voices anywhere. No hint of a human scent, no trace of perfume in the air where somebody maybe just somebody went the same way two minutes ago. No doors opening or closing. In fact, the atmosphere down here resembles the one on Hadley's Hope so much it's giving him the creeps, and he can't help tensing in the chair, halfway expecting the next door or ventilation grille to fly out of its frame and have a double-jawed, black nightmare jump at him. If the A.I. notices his unusual timidity, she doesn't say anything. Maybe her mind is in her own world again, just like his. They pass a long row of doors in silence, and Hicks can see the corridor opening to a big hall at the end, but before they reach it, they stop at a door to his right and enter the room behind it.
Hicks inhales deeply, bracing for what's to come. So this is going to be his place for months to come, huh? He takes it in: the hotel-room-like living room they're standing in features a comfortable looking, gray bed/ couch and a medium-sized plasma-screen on the opposite wall, which is a part of a standard entertainment center with illuso-programs and disc-player. Behind it is the door to a small bathroom, as it seems. Nothing else. No kitchen, no sleeping room. Just like a hotel. The walls are not hospital-white, but shaded a nice, sunny yellow which diminishes the sterile effect most Weyland Yutani-facilities usually exude, and sport two framed pictures -- again nature motives, done impressionist-style. Nice. Cozy. A somewhat acidic smile tugs at Hicks' mouth when he sees the curtains that frame the plasma-screen, which is switched to window-mode and shows a pleasant beach scene, breathtakingly three-dimensional... but fake nevertheless. As he turns his head, he sees another holo-window with a corresponding scene on the wall that leads to the corridor... but... He narrows his eyes, and makes a discovery that causes his heartbeat to accelerate. He can't help it. It is indeed a window... from the outside! Like a one-way mirror, only that it shows the-- Inmate. I'm an inmate. -a beach-scene instead of his own image. Holding his breath, he looks up to the ceiling... to the corners... and tightens when he sees the observation camera in the far end of the room. Firmly planting his feet on the ground, he forces his caretaker to stop.
"Okay, time-out; Isis! Hold it right here, and no more games: Just what the fuck is this place? And don't give me this shit about my apartment for the next months! I've seen the camera! And I know this window back there --" he points his thumb over his shoulder -- "is a real window! What are you going to do? Study me? Why? What for?" He gets up on one leg and sits himself down on the couch. It's difficult leading a heated discussion without seeing his opponent. But even though he's searching for a guilty expression on the beauty's face, he can't find it. Her features remain maddeningly bland behind those symmetrical black lines on her face, and she doesn't even appear to be shamed enough to avoid eye-contact.
"I can't tell you."
"This is-"
"I don't know, okay? I'm just an assistant. Not even a live one, just a dumb machine. You really think I would have brought you down here if I were one of those big bosses? Hell, I'd have other stuff to do, I tell you! I can't say what they want from you. You'll need to ask that of someone else."
"Who?"
"They're going to introduce themselves to you soon enough. Look, life's hard enough for me these days without you giving me hell too, okay? I'm sorry they're moving you around like a chess figure. I'm sorry I can't tell you what they want from you, but I can't change it... and I'm sorry for that, too." She breathes heavily, but of course it's all make-believe like everything else here, too. Even if she's easily the most realistic synthetic Hicks has ever seen -- she's a synthetic, period. She doesn't even need to breathe at all for all he knows. Her being upset over him is just another part of this strange drama he's having a major role in. So he doesn't relax when she continues, but rather stares at her with narrowed eyes, angry and frustrated. "So, do you want me to show you the essential things you need to know about life down here, or would you prefer to be left alone now?"
He can't figure her, dammit, he just can't! If she's only playing a part here, she's really good at it, because for the life of him he doesn't know what to make of her. Hicks inhales deeply, feeling torn between wanting to squeeze the truth out of somebody and the knowledge of his inability to do anything about his situation at all. He slumps his shoulders, shrugs indifferently.
"And what do I need to know?" His voice is back to flat. He doesn't really care for her lecture, but he's going to get it anyway. "What's the number for room-service?" He notes the communicator on the table next to the couch. "Or do I lip-synch it to the camera whenever I want something, or what?" She ignores his sarcastic tone.
"You will be able to get everything you need yourself. If you turn your head and look over to your right, you see the autochef. It's for drinks, only. You'll be able to take your meals in the common room down at the end of the corridor along with the others. This is also where-"
"The others?" Hicks interrupts, alarmed. "What do you mean? Which others?"
"The people sharing this compartment with you."
He stares at her, chewing on this exquisite bit of information. Just like he thought from the get-go. He's a prisoner. This is some kind of jail... or worse. His mouth feels very dry all of a sudden.
"The other inmates, you mean."
She rolls her eyes.
"If you want to see it like that..."
"What other way of seeing it is there?" He props his hands against the couch and seats his behind more comfortably. "We're being locked in here. We're prisoners. Or am I wrong?"
"I'd rather call you a guest," she replies evenly. "You know, I don't have to tell you this, but just for your information: The others are a group we salvaged when their ship was about to blow up. They were all deep in cryo-sleep and would be intergalactic instant powder now if it weren't for us."
"How noble of you."
"And they are just like you: They complain and bitch about not being able to roam the station as they want. They don't seem to be able to get it into their heads that they can't just run around in a top-secret research-base as they please! It's not just because of the confidentiality issue -- it's simply, plain dangerous! We don't want any accidents to happen -- neither to them, nor to our staff. Why is this so hard to understand?"
"Maybe it would be easier if there weren't all these observation cameras and one-way fake windows and all this other shit," Hicks sneers at her. He points towards the corridor. "I bet you even lock us in, right?"
Isis takes a step back and leans her back against the wall. There is an expression on her face now -- one of slowly vanishing patience. She crosses her arms under her chest.
"For the night, yes. For your own safety. But you'll be able to move around as you like during daytime. Like I said, we've got-"
"You can say whatever you want, it's sounds just more and more like a prison to me."
"You know what?" She props her hands against her hips and stretches her chin out in a demonstration of genuine human anger. "I don't have time for this. If you want to complain, you can get on the keyboard and send an email. The line goes straight to my boss. But don't bother me with your whining anymore. I'm going to give you the most important information about this place now, and then I'm off. It's up to you whether you'll listen or not, because I don't care."
"I know you don't."
"Fine. You know something else?" Her tone is sharp, and her eyes glaring at him. Impressive, really. "Find out for yourself. I'm way past my regular shift, and I want to go home now. If you think sarcasm is going to help you deal with the situation, suit yourself. But I've had it with you tonight. If you're healthy enough for smug replies again, you're probably smart enough to find what you need by yourself. Good night."
And with that, she turns her back on Hicks and makes for the door with long, determined strides which clearly show her suppressed anger, pushing the wheelchair along in front of her. The door parts for her, and when it slides shut again, Hicks hears its mechanism cycle... and knows he is now in fact a prisoner. The sense of dread which he felt earlier comes back with a vengeance, filling up his entire being with the feeling of painful helplessness and despair, a dark gray spiral of doom dragging him down towards a bottomless black hole he won't be able to climb out of again. It takes real effort for him to breathe as his glance glides up towards the observation camera, one thought bouncing around in his head: His military days... are over. From now on, his new job will be that of an official lab rat at Weyland Yutani, Inc... He doesn't know what it is they want from him, but whatever it is, he's got the distinct notion that his new career will be a short-lived one.
"So," Darwin begins while she's fiddling around with the new instruments she's about to test in half an hour. She's not looking at me, and her tone is neutral, detached. "How was your today's encounter with the Corporal? Any improvements?"
"Ha!" I make, a dry, humorless sound. My fingers play with the stasis remote I'm already familiar with. Today I'm going to need perfect handling skills, or we'll have the next catastrophe on our hands, and this time it might just cost our own heads, in a very literal sense. "He hates my guts, I'm sure. He left little doubt about it." My reply causes my boss to look up briefly. There are creases on her brow.
"Did he attack you? Or-?"
"No. Nothing like that. After all, he's not yet in the condition to try anything funny ... but he noticed right away that the flowery guest-stuff I told him was crap. He's a soldier, after all. He knows what an observation camera looks like or a one-way window. And he knows what they're there for. After all, he wouldn't have qualified for this project if he were dumb, right?"
She looks me over in silence for a few, brief moments, and then agrees and puts the long, shiny tube she's holding in her hand down onto the tray.
"Right." She turns on her heels and eyes the operating room of Lab 1. Everything's set for the test that will determine how soon we'll be able to get to work on our real project. The long, customized metallic table in the middle of the room should be big enough for the alien, even if we stretch it out to the last possible inch of it's tail. The stasis caster which will envelop the creature with an impenetrable, invisible energy blanket works, we've already tested it a hundred times in the last two hours. The bastard won't be able to fight its way out of it. The Titanium-Adamantium ties which will likewise hold it to the table, are functional, too. It shouldn't be able to move even a millimeter. Once we have it in the secure room -- ha! Anybody remember the security glass in Lab 4? -- it will be sealed off and Darwin will slip into the in-built gloves and be able to use the new equipment that's lying on a tray next to the table, within easy reach. Even though we're not even in the same room with it, we'll be wearing new frocks which have been treated with a substance that at least seems to have a delaying effect on the acid blood. So in case anybody -- or all of us -- should be splashed with it despite all the safety precautions we've taken, we might at least have a chance to slip out of it before the acid eats through to our skin. Darwin takes it all in, momentarily seeming to have forgotten me. I wait, indifferently. I'm not looking forward to what the next hours will bring, and behind my -- hopefully -- void face I'm recalling the encounter with the Marine once more. I don't know what I did wrong. I was trying to be friendly with him, I really was. I didn't make any snide remarks, kept my facial expressions in check and tried to come off as sympathetic -- yet he didn't buy it. Was it me, or does he simply hate us all for locking him in? Either way, something's telling me we're a long way yet from becoming friends. A classical case of theory and real life -- do something by the book, and the outcome might still surprise you. I guess another date with Alexander's detailed files on human behavior is in order. Maybe even a conversation... provided he has a lucid moment while he's around me.
"-ready?" I hear Darwin's voice close to me. She looks at me inquiringly, then at something -- or someone -- behind my back. I nod.
"Sure. Let's do it." I see the head-guard -- for a lack of names -- expecting us at the door with a look on his face that's telling me Leary didn't keep his mouth shut about the Lab 4-incident. Four more guards await us in the main room, and they are clearly nervous, too, even though they are heavily armed. Skin's also there, looking sicker than ever. I assume it took Darwin massive threats to convince him to come here tonight.
"Mr. Sanchez?" She eyes the guard next to her, her blue eyes piercing like lasers. "Do you have any further questions? Or are we on the same level concerning the proceedings? You are not allowed to fire until I say so. "
"I understood that, Miss Darwin."
"These specimens are priceless. We cannot afford to waste them just because we might not have the nerves to pull through." Her gazes wanders from guard to guard, leaving absolutely no doubt about her seriousness. "Do we have an understanding about that?"
"We do, Miss Darwin," the man -- Collins, his name-tag says -- assures her. "But what if-"
Her raised hand stops him dead in his tracks.
"There are no what-if's. You won't fire until I say so, period. Anyway, I'm convinced my assistant here," -- her hand lands, to my astonishment, on my shoulder and gives it a light squeeze -- "-will be perfectly capable of keeping the creature in check. You know about android reflexes. We humans can't even begin to compete."
I furrow my brow at her, feeling the men's probing eyes on me. What the heck was that? Why did she have to emphasize the fact that I'm not human and make me an outsider in this room? Even if what she said was probably meant as a compliment -- I take it as an insult. I'm different. It's that fact she's been meaning to point out. But before I can even begin to ponder whether it's her behavior that's changed or my sensitivity, the group of humans -- hell, I can differentiate, too! -- step forward towards the corridor which leads to Xenomorph City. We better get going, or we'll be standing here the entire night! While I'm following those superior beings, I wonder where Kurtz is. He said he'd grace us with his presence for this vital experiment... but I guess, after what happened just last week, he'll wait to do so until the wild beast has been secured. Although what the alien will do once Darwin starts torturing it, will be anybody's guess...
"Wait-" I start, having thought the whole scenario through. They stop and turn their heads with a look of puzzlement on their faces which is almost funny. "I think it would be better if I did it alone."
"You're kidding, right?" the giant guard to my right says, sizing me up with a glance that's telling me clearly that Darwin's remark's had its effect. I feel inclined to answer to his challenge, but hold myself back at the last moment... but how about a little dose of sarcasm?
"I'm a machine," I state evenly, looking at him without blinking. "I don't have any humor. The ability of kidding you is completely beyond me." The man draws his bushy eyebrows together, but before he can utter something, I turn to my boss and continue, stupefying him even more: "I really think it would be best if I did it alone. We don't want the creature to become even more agitated than necessary, right? So why don't we spare positioning our heavy artillery around it?"
There's a trace of a disbelieving smile on Darwin's face.
"You are serious about this, aren't you?" She turns her head into the direction of the compound and licks her lips, obviously thinking about my offer, which would mean taking her out of the immediate danger, too. "You've got guts, Isis, I give you that."
"Mechanical guts," I can't help add. "They're tougher than human guts by nature. It's the material. No offense." Surprisingly, the upward curve of her lips becomes even more prominent. I would have thought she'd bark at me, for sure. When she finally shifts her attention back at me, I see consent in her eyes.
"Fine. If you say you can handle it -- we'll do it your way."
"I handled it before," I remember her from last week's precarious situation. "And I don't have any nerves that might quit on me the moment it counts." Eat this, Hulk! I think, feeling satisfaction over the guards' frown even though I'm hardly looking at them. I can't tell though why I'm suddenly so eager to impress my boss in spite of her treating me so badly these days. "So?"
"Good." She motions for the others to follow her back to the laboratory complex without further ado. The head-guard -- Sanchez -- shoots me another angry glare that's telling me that he's just keeping his mouth shut because of Darwin's presence. Like I care!
"I don't think this is a good -," he begins to air his concerns, but her raised hand cuts him short.
"Believe me, Mr. Sanchez, Isis is capable of more than the five of you combined. She has my full trust. Let's get into position, gentlemen."
Sanchez draws his eyebrows together doubtfully, but remains silent as he gestures for his men to follow him back. I'm somewhat surprised by Darwin's unexpected show of affection. They stomp off into the opposite direction, noisy like a troop of early synthetics -- the kind that was still made of metal, back in the good old days. I turn around and brace for the task at hand. This is going to take perfect timing... and it's good that Darwin's back in the operating room where she'll have the additional monitors and a better overview than I'm going to have. The heavy door to the high-security compound parts to let me through, and I step up to the huge panoramic window-pane that grants me a generous view into -- very likely -- some sick mind's idea of hell: Glistening, shiny organic structures we didn't build cover the walls, the floor, the ceiling, making the room -- the hive, I correct myself -- look like the inside of giant heart... The only reason why I'm still able to see into it is the thin stasis layer between the security glass and the aliens. They can't attach anything to the energy shield. I step up close and search for Xenomorph City's inhabitants. It's hide & seek for pros. Nothing moves in the blue twilight of the hive. I switch my visuals to infrared, knowing I could well spend an hour looking for them, while looking straight at them. It's fascinating how seamless they're able to blend into their room decoration.
On infrared, however, the bright silvery images stick out of their surroundings like pockmarks. There's one directly opposite me, rolled together in a mock-fetal position, its elongated head turned in my direction. Watching me, likely. Or sensing me some other way. The other two are further back, motionless like the other, but also looking at me. Their arrangement makes it easy for me to pick my potential victim. I raise the remote, and a split second later a stasis barrier cuts the single alien off from its brethren. They don't react. Do they sense the barrier? I'm sure they do. Yet, they remain calm... but it won't be long until the specimen in front of me will go berserk. I can't help asking myself whether it's the one that already helped itself to a taste of human blood a week earlier. Maybe it wanted to be selected... maybe it wanted to have another go at me, daring me to try the same thing twice. Save it, Isis!' I order myself to concentrate.
Leaving the first barrier where it is, I create a second one around myself -- the bubble-function I discovered by accident -- and deactivate the stasis shield that's sealing off the compound to enter. A silver spark with teeth and claws erupts towards me faster than the human eye could see -- but I catch it in mid-jump and force it to the ground with just a tip of my thumb by casting the protective bubble around it. Ducking, its elongated head bowed to the ground because there's no more room, it shrieks in uncontrolled fury, and I can't help asking myself whether it is indeed the same specimen we already put through the shark-experience. If it is, it must be pissed at me to no ends for having defeated it twice! With the utmost caution, I move the thing towards the door like a puppet master in the most dangerous staging ever. I make it move on all four, the bubble so small it can't even swish its tail around. Hissing and spitting, it claws its way down the corridor, leaving bright shining scratch marks and glistening pools of saliva on the metal. I pick up the squealing of the other two behind me, which gets cut off by the reactivation of the stasis field and the closing of the door into the compound behind me, but I don't bother to look. My full attention is directed at the deadly being before me, as I'm steering it to the right side, into the operating room. Darwin lets the door part for us, and as we enter, I see that the sinkable operating table has been lowered all the way to the ground for me to direct the ET on to it. The rest is easy: I make it crawl onto the rectangle and wait for Darwin to activate the stasis-caster on the ceiling, the beam pressing the alien to the ground with a force of 15G. The metallic ties slip out of the table and around the creature's wrists, elbows, head, neck, between the horns on its back all the way down to the last inch of its tail, it's knees and ankles. It can't move an iota... at least it shouldn't be able to. But I'm still hesitant to let the remote sink.
"We've got it, Isis," I hear my bosses' voice over the headset. "It's under control."
"You want one final test?" I don't know what's gotten into me as I deactivate my stasis beam and step up directly in front of the alien on the table, my shins 30 inches away from the deadly double-jaws. And sure enough, the tongue-like inner jaws come crashing out and graze the steel plate its lying on... but nothing else happens. I see its claws clench and dig into the table, leaving shiny marks, but otherwise the strong body has been all but glued onto it. With a hydraulic whine, the table begins to rise. "It can't move," I state the obvious, turning on my heel slowly to cast a look through the window into the instrument room where Darwin and now also Kurtz watch me with a mixture of amazement and disbelief. "It's secured," I state matter-of-factly and cause the young genius to shake her head with the hint of a smile.
"Okay, Isis, we already know you've got nerves of steel," Kurtz begins, but he interrupts himself as his chief scientist rolls back in her seat, and then thinking twice, grabs the microphone to tell me I should stay where I am, she'd be coming in. I shrug, silently asking myself what she wants here. A moment later, the opportunity to ask her myself presents itself to me, but by then I don't need to ask -- the excited sparkle in her eyes is answer enough as she steps up to the strapped-down extra-terrestrial. For the first time, she's got the opportunity to see it up close, or -- even as I start thinking it, she stretches out her hand.
"Skin? Can you open a window for me, please?"
"Just a sec..." The scrawny scientists looks down on to his console behind the window, hacking away, and in answer to his efforts, the rooms starts to fill with a slight mist, which makes the stasis blanket which envelops the alien visible... and the hole in the shield.
"Now."
"Uh, Darwin, I don't know-" I begin, but stop when I see her sticking her arm into the opening and placing her palm on the creature's elongated skull, a dreamy, far-away look on her face. And sure enough, the thing's tongue comes crashing out again, but since she's standing on the side, there's nothing it can do to escape my bosses sudden burst of affection.
"Come here, Isis!" she beams, never having appeared more like the 21 year old she actually is. Yes, she is still young. People keep forgetting in the light of her fearsome, sharp intellect. Even I tend do... but then again, I wouldn't know about people's progression from youth to adult to old age from the start. I could tell their age based on appearance alone, but as for their state of mind... I couldn't begin to guess. Hesitant, I step over to her, seeing her slender fingers caress the crested dome and slide down to the smooth front just short of the deadly double-set of teeth. It's as if she doesn't even hear the creature's angry spitting and hissing as her smile broadens in amazement. "Here! Put your hand here!" She taps her fingers on the alien's... brow... impatiently waiting for my reaction. I follow her example... and look down in wonder. The skin under my palm is cool to the touch, and hard. Very hard. Hard enough to withstand my fingernail as I rake my index finger over the smooth surface to see whether I can gather some samples that way. And it feels strange, not organic at all. Not even chitinious... rather... metallic. Like the chassis of a sleek race car. But that's all nothing against the sensation of the gentle humming against my skin... together with a rhythmic throbbing that doesn't invoke any associations of biological life in me. It doesn't feel like a pulse. More like... a generator. The realization hits me with the force of an epiphany as I lift my head to meet Darwin's expectant gaze. "You're feeling this too?"
"Could it be... that... this thing is a machine?" I ask, realizing fully how entirely stupid this sounds. But from the expression in her eyes, I can see she's been thinking the same thought.
"It certainly feels like it, doesn't it?" She shifts her attention back to her object of curiosity, running her hand back over the entire length of the alien's skull, caressing it with her fingertips, exploring the tubular appendages on the creature's back in an almost obscenely intimate way. "But it procreates biologically." She draws her arm back and tells Skin with a brief nod to close the window in the energy blanket. "We'll see about that very soon. Very soon! Come on. Let's go get us some answers." She storms out of the room, making it hard even for me to follow her down the corridor, to where the guards are positioned right in front of the door. When I enter the observation room, she's already slipping into the in-built gloves, seemingly hardly able to wait even another minute. Kurtz looks at me questioningly as I claim the last unoccupied seat.
"What did you feel?" he asks, and from the way he's ignoring Darwin -- he could have asked her that and get a probably more satisfying answer -- I can tell they must already like each other very much tonight. Skin's looking at me, too.
"Some kind of humming and throbbing," I try to describe the strange sensation. "As if the thing were powered by generators."
"You mean -- " I see Scylar's eyes widen -- "it's a machine?"
"I don't know what I mean," I state calmly, watching Darwin's gloved hands take the first instrument from the tray. Soon we all will be much smarter... or not. "It doesn't add up. Darwin's right -- their procreation is strictly biological. So they can't be machines. At least not according to our definitions."
"Skin?" Darwin's impatient voice makes him remember why he's here. His fingers dance over the keyboard and open another small window for the tube-like laser-saw next to the dome of its skull. Developing this instrument was a bitch! We had to make the operating part insubstantial in order to avoid it being dissolved by the molecular acid, and had to integrate some sort of vacuum-pump to suck out as much of the highly corrosive liquid from the hole as possible. Stasis, laser and vacuum technology all working hand-in-hand. It's never been tried before. Maybe we'll blow ourselves up in the process and vanish in a green mushroom cloud after having unleashed the greatest power in the universe? How funny would that be?
"Careful," Kurtz whispers to my right, mesmerized by the proceedings. The alien shoots out its tongue in fury again, but remains immobilized. At the tip of her finger, a narrow, blue tube of light emits from the instrument's point... and starts eating through the xenomorph's natural body armor in a tight little circle. Its screeching performs a quantum leap. It hurts. I'm sure it hurts. This is no mere fury. The long claws rake the table it's strapped to, leave deep scratches, and the inner jaws open and close furiously, spitting saliva, searching for something to tear apart. There's nothing. And it can't escape Darwin's newly developed drill from eating a hole into its head. It's a tiny hole, not even half a centimeter wide, so it's only a small gush of acid that erupts from the wound... and gets sucked away by the vacuum pump to the basin next to the operating table, where it leaves the system and drips into the water harmlessly, causing no aggressive fumes, no holes in table or floor... nifty. I'm proud of us. Looks as if the drill-pump is our first success -- and as Darwin straightens in her chair to finally take her eyes off the display, I see satisfaction written all over her face, too.
"Et voila, Dr. Kurtz," she beams. "A window to the xenomorph's soul. Do you want to take a look for yourself?"
"Look!" I point out. My eagle-eyes picked up something alarming. "It stopped bleeding! It's already starting to heal up."
"Just go ahead for now, Darwin," Kurtz suggests smartly. "I can always watch the footage later. Proceed."
"As you wish." She turns her attention back to the instrument, activating the drill again despite the alien's shrieks, and adjusts her chin on the rest, looking through the objective into the alien's skull. We all hear her surprised gasp simultaneously. "I'll be damned!"
"What?" our three voices answer her in unison.
"There's a second... call it hull. Just like the outer skin." She turns the objective around. There's a thin space between the two, where the acid is." A huge smile forms on her lips as she continues to explore the ET's inside. "If we're lucky, the acid is just a defense mechanism and its blood will be much easier to work with." She turns the micro-lens around again, ignorant of her victim's shrill shriek. "I'm almost sure of it! It's a classic system -- some animals use poison to do it, this one uses acid. The high-pressured liquid circulates in this ... inner chamber, and if the outer hull is punctured, it sprays out and kills the potential enemy. What is this?" She attempts to twist the tube, but it won't move.
"It healed up," I state the obvious. "The tissue has grown back around the drill-pump, and now you're stuck."
"Very well," Darwin replies. "We'll leave it in then. And now, Ladies and Gentlemen, let's wish us luck! I'm going deeper." The creature's screams tell us she's triggered the beam again. Smoke rises from the tiny hole.
"Don't kill it!" Kurtz voices, sounding worried. "You know how valuable-"
"I won't. I seriously doubt I could kill it with this drill -- even if I drilled right into its brain... if it has a brain, and not a CPU or something like it."
"Please," the station manager groans, but he hasn't felt what we both felt. There's something about these creatures that's unsettling familiar, and at the same time not. If it really is a machine -- it's sort of an animal brother to me, right? Part nature, part science? The best of both worlds? Inwardly I'm shaking my head over myself and tell myself to keep my mind on our dangerous undertaking right here. Yes, I do believe we still have to be careful. Even though the thing is strapped to the table and under a stasis blanket and all, I've seen too much of them to take any chances. I don't even order the guards in the corridor to relax, or to put their safeties back on. The moment we underestimate those things, we're dead. It's a lecture that's going to stick with me for as long as we will be handling them.
"Bullseye!" Darwin yells, uncharacteristically excited. But hell, she's been out of character ever since Carter Burke brought us these aliens. On the monitor that allows us to follow her progress, I see dark gray well up inside the tube. Is that its blood? From the way the thing's freaking out before us, it must be. "Look! This must be its brain!" We all stare in amazement at the high-definition picture the mini-camera inside the protective tube delivers. To an outsider, it would be an undecipherable mishmash of different shades of gray, white and black, moving, pulsing and throbbing in a steady rhythm. To us, it's a two-dimensional map to one of the greatest treasures in the whole wide universe. "Dammit, there must be a way of-" Darwin turns and twitches the drill-pump until she's able to move it around a few degrees further. The dark tissue she means stretches on over the edge of the little camera's horizon. I blink, trying to get a clearer visual. For brain tissue, this looks strange. Very regular and hard, not like soft human gray matter. And aren't those little sparks I see? Like... electrical sparks? It's impossible to tell.
I take my headset off. The alien's shrieks are so loud, I can't hear anything over them. I could reduce my audio-input, but then I wouldn't be able to hear my group of humans here anymore. It's better this way.
"Discovering your heart for animals, Isis?" Kurtz teases me tonelessly, probably to divert us from drawing our own conclusions about his stone-set features, while his protégé presses her face against the objective as if she wanted to climb inside.
"I can't go in further," she announces reluctantly. "I'm releasing the probe now. Is it ready, Skin?"
"Probe #1 online and ready for action," my colleague reports dutifully, pressing the Record button. Kurtz narrows his eyes, and I see him tightening. Everything's going so well... could it really be this test will supply us with everything we dreamt of? I see Darwin's grip grow stronger on the joystick .
"Releasing probe... now!" She leans back and shifts her attention towards the monitors, where we can see the probe's progress in the alien's body. The newest in nano-technology, and it too performs outstandingly! I can't help but smile in deep satisfaction, and from the expression in those fair blue eyes I can tell, the young genius is satisfied with my work, too. The probe was my project, after all. Her glance stays on me for a few moments longer, before it goes up over my shoulder to the readouts the little internal spy delivers. "Its body has room temperature," Darwin states cooly. "And we're picking up electrical emissions.
"From its... CPU?" Kurtz asks, entirely serious now. She shakes her head.
"It's way too early to say." Visibly forcing herself to take her eyes off the monitors, she spins around in her chair to look at the station manager. "I'd like to record its vitals over the next 12 hours at first. It will be easier to draw conclusions if we accumulate more data." Her gaze finds the alien again. "I also want to plant further probes in its body. Let them do the work. And I will secure some tissue samples of both the inner and outer hull, the... other liquid from inside, which I believe will be their real blood, and maybe some of the other tissue like muscle, bone or ligaments I will come across when I'm planting the additional probes. Do you agree with this procedure, Dr. Kurtz?" Her voice is so neutral that he can't hear how much it takes her to ask him for his permission. I can't detect it in her voice either, but I know... Anyhow, her plan sounds so reasonable, he can't help but nod.
"Good. You collect the data, first, and we all meet in your office tomorrow, 10.00 a.m., and see what we got."
"Splendid."
But there's still something that bothers him. A curt nod towards the alien.
"Do we keep it strapped on the table like this? Or are you going to release it into the hive? The probes will record no matter what we'll do... and the data might give us a bigger spectrum if its able to move around."
"I know." She inhales and follows his pensive gaze. "But for now, I would like to keep it handy like this. We can always release it later tomorrow, but if we find something of interest, I would like to be able to do additional tests on it without delay. Let the guards watch it for the night. They can do shifts - two of them at once in the room should be enough. The other three could sleep in the guest office and relieve them of their duty in about 5 hours." A doubtful glance from Kurtz.
"Only two guards? Isn't that a bit-"
"We're going to keep it under the stasis blanket and strapped to the table," Darwin assures him. "It won't be able to do anything. You know yourself it would have done so already if it could. It wouldn't have let me drill a hole into its head like this if it could have prevented it. And even if it should develop additional powers in the night, we'll instruct the guards to fire as soon as it tries something. I don't see any risk there at all." Kurtz looks at me.
"What do you say, Isis?"
Funny, I feel flattered. He's asking me for my opinion! I shrug.
"I agree with Darwin. It's secured. It won't be able to give us any nasty surprises."
Now all four of us stare through the window. It looks harmless enough, lying on the metal plate with all those ties strapping it down. Some long seconds of expectant silence pass, until Phooka's landlord finally gives us his approval.
"Fine. We do it your way, Darwin." A quick glance at his watch. I don't have to look to know it's 9.55 p.m. My inner clock tells me so. "You release the other probes, and then we'll continue tomorrow at 1000 hours. Until then, see that you get some rest. All of you. I need a staff that knows what it's doing tomorrow." We all nod dutifully and get up from our seats, ready to leave the room in his wake. Interesting, how not one of us is able to go without one last look over our shoulders... time for a short coffee-break before we will further invade alien territory and deploy our espionage unit into its veins. Another half an hour, and we should be done.
Hadley's Hope, Day 9, 2100 hours
Hicks' gaze follows Hudson as the ComTech settles down on his mattress in Operations. He watches his comrade putting down his pulse-rifle which has to be empty for sure. Mixed emotions of anger, frustration and worry battle behind his non-telling features while he's recalling the incidents of the last half an hour... the single alien that attempted to pry open the deactivated doors into Operations. The empty RSS canons' alarm and Newt's high-pitched scream as he ran through the room, readying his shotgun without looking. Everybody screaming, and then the view of the ugly silhouette standing in the opened door, ready to pounce -- the explosion of the 12-gauge's shot, the burnt stench surrounding him, and the alien flying backwards, being hit square in the head. Another shot from Vasquez, just to be on the safe side, as she met him at the door to see whether it had been the only one -- and then the burst of bullets from Hudson from behind straight through them, the angry bellow of his pulse rifle even drowning out his panicked yelling. If it hadn't been for their trained reflexes, they would have gone out together with the alien that exact second. They had both dived to the floor, practically feeling the pellets grazing their backs. Just a moment later, Hudson had stopped firing... but not because he had regained control, but because he had run out of ammo, his finger on the trigger still twitching, his mouth shooting forth a gust of unintelligible walla consisting of an assortment of curses, eyes bulging in naked, sheer panic.
Hicks hadn't thought it possible, but the sight of his long-time brother-in-arms completely over the edge had scared him even more than the alien at the door. It had taken Hudson at least another ten seconds before he had noticed he had run dry. And yet another 15 to realize everybody had been staring at him.
"It's dead," he had mumbled to himself then, slowly letting the weapon sink. Meeting the other's eyes. "It's dead. We killed it. Nothing to worry about." Louder, explanatory, but sounding hollow and numb. And with a short nod, he had made his way over to his mattress.
Hicks inhales deeply, feeling awful. They're looking at him now. Waiting for him to do something. Waiting for him to make a decision he hates to make, but there really is no other way... is there? Giving himself a mental kick, he steps up to the Private's lair, biting his lower lip and feeling sick to his stomach for having to do this.
"Will?" Maybe addressing him by his first name will do some good here... because he already knows it's bound to get ugly. The ComTech cranes his neck back to look up. "I need you in MedLab right now. Come with me?"
"But --" Hudson starts, but interrupts himself. Yes, it is the middle of his downtime. His shift won't begin for another 3 hours... but the shadow that starts crawling onto his face tells Hicks rationality's finally caught up with his friend again. It's the unmistakable look of a bad conscience he's seeing on his comrade's face as he gets up to follow him down the corridor. Hicks doesn't have to look back to feel the others' gazes on his back. They pass the length of it in silence, and when they reach MedLab, he hits the switch and lets Hudson pass through the door before he enters the room himself.
It shuts behind him with a pneumatic hiss, and the silence becomes leaden for an almost unbearable moment before he turns his gaze to Hudson, summoning all his remaining coolness and restraint to master this bitch of a task, but even before he can open his mouth, Hudson cuts him off.
"I know what you're about to say, Hicks. I know. And you're right."
A good start. Maybe this will go better than he thought.
"Good." Hicks crosses his arms under his chest and holds eye-contact with his trusted team member of many years. Seems as if Hudson's back from the brink of panic.
"I know I've been... not quite myself lately."
Excuse me? He remains calm, and comments dryly: "That would be an understatement."
"Damn, Hicks, look..." Hudson rings his hands and begins pacing the room like a tiger on Ecstasy. "I know I fucked up, okay? I know that. But I'm working on it, man, really. Just- just give me a chance! It's just that..." He fights for the right words and finally shrugs. "I'm scared shitless, okay? There, you have it. That's all."
"That's all?" The two simple words make Hicks' blood pressure rocket. Okay, it's not going to go well!
"Yeah, man. You know... it's a pretty fucked-up situation we're in. And yeah, I'm scared."
"So this is your excuse?" All of a sudden the expression of mere concern on Hicks' face shifts into open anger, something that's a rarity for the always controlled and reasonable Corporal. "Dammit, Will, you waste a complete clip on an already dead enemy even though we're extremely tight on ammo, you just let loose even though Vasquez and I were in your direct field of fire, you don't even stop when you see us going down, you don't stop when you're out of ammo, yelling like a madman and scaring the living daylights out of everybody... and all you can say is you're scared?" Open disbelief stands in his eyes. " Shit, Hudson, we've been over this before! We're all scared, every single one of us, but you're way over the top! Even the girl handles this better than you! You're in hysterics! You lost it completely back there, and it's about time you recognize it and start cleaning up your act like you promised, 'cause if you don't, I'll have to do something about it!"
"Really? Like what?" Hudson's eyes narrow, and Hicks feels an icy chill trickle down his spine. He doesn't like the look on his comrade's face. It reminds him of a cornered animal. Beneath his anger he can sense an alarming uneasiness, common sense warning him to be careful. To stay calm and not let the situation escalate any further. Something's very wrong with Hudson, and he needs to keep his cool here. Isn't this what the others admire him for so much? Raising his voice will simply freak out Hudson even more... if that's possible.
"You don't want to know, Hudson. I don't want to think about it myself, and I don't want to have to think about it - but I'll have to if you continue to go apeshit on every crisis. Come on, think about it. Chill out. Pull yourself together again and start dealing with the situation. We need you. We have to work together. It's the only way to come out of this situation in one piece."
Hudson studies his hands as if they were very interesting all of a sudden. He doesn't look at his superior.
"Do you still believe in Santa, Hicks?"
"What?" The Corporal lifts his eyebrows in disbelief.
"Do you actually believe we'll get out of here alive? Come on! Who's not in touch with reality here?"
Before he knows it, Hicks takes one angry step in the PFC's direction. A white-hot burst of anger threatens to overwhelm him, and it's only with the last reserve of his patience that he manages to reply with bitter sarcasm: "It's funny you should say that, Will. My definition of sanity doesn't exactly include your behavior back there!"
"Fuck it man, I told you! Are you deaf? I was aiming for the alien! Not for you or Vasquez!"
"The alien, Hudson, was dead already! And Vasquez and myself almost, too, even though you didn't mean to! I practically felt the wind from the bullets on my back! Vasquez, too! In fact, one even grazed her arm! Thanks to you!"
"I knew what I was doing," Hudson stubbornly insists. Hicks stares at him, and his lips become a thin, bloodless line:
"Just a minute ago you admitted fucking up. Which of the two is it, Private?" His stare becomes icy. "I can't figure you, Hudson. I don't know what's wrong with you. We've been through a lot of shit together in the past, and yet I've never seen you like this. What is it? What's so special about this situation that you can't deal with it?" He sees the unbelieving expression in Hudson's features, then surprise..
"You're not seriously asking, right?"
"You bet I am."
PHOENIX
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