The storm raged, and redoubled its efforts, and raged all the more. Merrilyn could swear that she felt the solid concrete comms tower sway in the wind of knives that assaulted the colony. She had never known a storm this bad in all her time on LV-187. It was as if the planet knew it harbored death of the most final sort, and wanted to mark the occasion with all that it could muster.
There were seven of them now, including the dog. Her and Therese, Moran and Bromley, and the newcomers—Chad McLaren, Cher Hunt, and Davis, who was sitting patiently while Therese petted him and whispered to him in the corner. At least the animal gave her daughter some respite from the horror, distracted her from what the grown-ups were talking about.
“Tell me again,” Moran said.
Chad took a breath and repeated his story for the entire group. They had a name, the monsters. Xenomorphs. They existed merely to kill and to reproduce. The longer any humans stayed on LV-187, the more Xenomorphs there would be. They would eventually be overwhelmed; either slaughtered outright, or worse, become breeding vessels for the beasts.
“Where are they from?” Bromley demanded.
Chad shrugged. “Extraterrestrial in origin. We think. We don’t know where their homeworld is. We also don’t know what part, and to what extent, Weyland-Yutani has had in their development and evolution.”
“They’ve killed three of my crew,” Moran said, “and all the colonists, apart from her and her kid.” He pointed at Merrilyn. “But they’re not indestructible, are they? She killed one.”
Chad looked at Merrilyn with interest. “You did? How?”
“I put a gun in its mouth and blew its head off.”
He nodded, visibly impressed. “That takes guts.”
“My daughter was in danger,” Merrilyn said with a shrug. She looked over to Therese, who was whispering in the dog’s ear.
“You won’t tell, will you? It will be our secret?” Merrilyn wanted to ask, but held back. The girl had seen so much. So many things no child should see. If—when—they got off here, she was going to need to have therapy, counselling, to get over what she had been through. So was Merrilyn. She was keeping it together for the sake of her child, and because to fall apart would mean certain death.
“So, what do we do now?” Moran said. “Your ship is a bust. Mine’s got a bloody Xenomorph in it. Not that we can take off in this storm, and we’ve no idea how long it’s going to last. Help is on its way from New Albion, but if we can’t get off, then they can’t get down.”
“I don’t think help is on its way,” Chad said, and Moran and Bromley stared at him.
“What are you talking about?” the woman said. “Of course they’re sending someone.”
Chad looked at his companion, Cher.
“We think it’s possible this whole thing was orchestrated by New Albion,” she explained. “These things hatch from eggs. A trader ship carrying such eggs was recently boarded in the planet’s vicinity. Everyone on board was killed, and the vessel crashed in a remote area of New Albion. The Ovomorphs—eggs—were taken. We think New Albion deliberately placed them here to kill all the colonists, so that they could claim the deserted colony for themselves.”
“Is this true?” Merrilyn glared at Moran. “Is this why you are here? Is this why everyone is dead?”
Moran held up his hands. “Lady, look, three-fifths of my crew is dead, too. You think I’d come down here if this was true? Which, incidentally, I don’t think it is.”
Merrilyn believed him, at least about the part of him not knowing about it. She was quite certain that New Albion was more than capable of such a plot, was sure that any government would be.
“Thing is, I don’t really think New Albion knew what they were playing with,” Chad said. “They might have heard whispers about Xenomorphs, and put two and two together with the rumors about the border bombings, and come up with the notion that they had some kind of bioweapon on their hands. But I don’t believe they knew the full extent of what they were unleashing on LV-187. They’ll be keeping a watching brief to see exactly what happens here.”
“But they sent us down…” Bromley said doubtfully.
Chad shrugged. “They needed to raise the flag. You got the job. You’ll be remembered as heroes of the new British Empire. Probably posthumously, I’m afraid.”
“Chad,” Cher said quietly, motioning to Therese.
“It’s fine,” Merrilyn said. “She’s seen what everyone else has seen. She needs to know the facts about what we’re facing, as much as everyone else does.” She looked at Cher, who had said she was a journalist on Earth. “So you do not think anyone will come to our aid? Nobody cares about what happens here?”
“Everybody cares about what happens here,” Cher said. “According to the news feeds just before we made planetfall, LV-187 is at the center of a major interstellar incident. Since New Albion announced its secession, the Three World Empire has formally cut all diplomatic and defense ties with the colony. That goes for any colonies that support it, too. According to unsubstantiated reports, there are a number of them in the Weyland Isles—with a variety of allegiances—who are sympathetic with New Albion’s move.
“The ICSC is being more aggressive. They’ve made a formal declaration of war against New Albion over what it says is the invasion of LV-187. That said, the ICSC declared war on the United Americas after the Hasanova incident. Whether they have the balls to follow it through remains to be seen. They haven’t with the UA.”
“And what are the United Americas doing?” Moran said.
“Like New Albion, keeping a watching brief,” Cher said. “There were some who thought they might move against the ICSC, given their state of war, and support New Albion. But they’re twitchy about some of their own colonies who are making noise about secession in the wake of Maurice Pepper’s announcement.”
“So the best we can hope for is that the ICSC sends a ship to retake LV-187,” Chad said. “And that they can get us off-world before we all get killed.” There was silence while they all thought about it for a moment, as the storm howled outside.
“So what do we do in the meantime?” Moran said.
“Try to stay alive,” Chad said. He looked at Merrilyn. “Are we sure there aren’t any more surviving colonists?”
“There was one, but they shot him,” Merrilyn said, gesturing toward Moran.
“Hey, that was an accident!”
Chad looked around the comms room. “This isn’t a bad defensive position. Minimal roof space above us, which is good. We need to secure every single hatch and duct vent in the room. What about supplies? And weapons?”
They all put down their guns and rifles on the central counter. Merrilyn hesitated, then laid down her kitchen knife.
“We have supplies in the ship,” Moran said, “but that’s off limits unless we can kill that critter.”
“We have some,” Chad said. “Kitchen and food stores?”
“Far side of the colony,” Merrilyn said. “We were holed up there before the New Albion ship came. There are tinned goods and water.”
Chad nodded. “Let’s try to avoid leaving here unless we have to.”
“These things,” Merrilyn said. “These… Xenomorphs. What will they be doing now?”
Chad glanced at Therese, then back at her mother. “They’ve probably formed a hive. There might well be a queen. There’s a very good chance not all of your fellow colonists are dead… yet. Some of them might be incubating Xenomorph embryos. But don’t get up any hope; if they’re not dead, they soon will be.”
“They’ll be coming for us?” Bromley said, picking up the pulse rifle.
Chad nodded. “They’ll be coming for us. We have to be ready.”
A crack of thunder sounded right above them, shaking the comms tower, and the lights flickered. Merrilyn beckoned Therese over to her and held her very tightly.
* * *
Frank Priestley wasn’t dead. For the first six hours he’d wished he was, but not now.
His body was a symphony of agony, every nerve ending singing a torturer’s lament. He could only see through one eye and his face was raw and stinging, his throat as dry as a desert. He was in darkness, save for the thinnest of lights emanating from he didn’t know where. Suspended, trapped against the wall by a resinous spider-web of hardened fibers crisscrossing him like scar tissue. He didn’t know where he was, other than it was hot, unbearably hot, and he didn’t care anymore.
He had been chosen.
When the creature had taken him in the corridor, he had thought he was in the presence of the very devil himself. But as it dragged him along the access tunnels in the ceiling, he realized that it wasn’t the devil, it was merely one of the foot soldiers of Hell. The true devil was waiting for him in the hive.
She was magnificent.
He had lost consciousness for a long time, and when he awoke there was something covering his face, something soft and pliable yet hard and skeletal at the same time. It had put something down his throat, which allowed him to breathe in a raspy, labored way, and he felt something happening to him, deep inside. While he was unconscious the thing covering his face must have fallen away. It was gone when he awoke.
There were others, too—other humans, spider-webbed to the walls just like he was, covered in a goo of cells and protein and bile from the guts of the monsters themselves. At first it made him retch, but then he realized what it was, and why it covered him.
It was mucus, it was meconium, it was the slime of rebirth. Frank Priestley was being changed, he was shedding his old self. He was being remade. He was being reborn.
He had been chosen.
Some of the other people moaned faintly or, in more lucid moments, screamed and begged. Frank Priestley did not beg. He was not weak like them. He recognized that whatever was inside him was changing him. Altering him. Improving him.
All his life Frank Priestley had longed to be a part of something bigger. That was why he had emigrated to New Albion. That was why he had signed up with the trade corps. That was why he had applied to join the Duke of Wellingtons. Frank Priestley felt safety in numbers, preferred it when he was part of a consensus, liked it when he didn’t have to think for himself.
This was better than any army or brotherhood. Frank Priestley felt a part of something, felt it growing within him. He hadn’t had to beg to join them, he had been chosen.
Through his one good eye he saw movement in the wide, subterranean space. There were moans of fear from those still alive around him, the stench of terror, but Frank was not afraid. He rejoiced. His heart sang. He felt joy flood his very being as the shape rose, rose, rose, filling the cavernous space.
No, more than joy. Love.
She was a thing of beauty, a goddess, a being of ineffable purity and truth. She was a queen, and a queen deserved pomp and circumstance when she chose to move among her subjects. Huge and magnificent she shone blackly, moving fluidly like the River Styx flowing through Hades. She drew herself up to her full height and turned her huge dome of a head, inspecting those that belonged to her. A snatch of poetry from his school days flitted through his head.
She walks in beauty like the night
Of cloudless climes and starry skies;
And all that’s best of dark and bright
Meet in her aspect and her eyes
She seemed to test the air, the very pheromones on the still, hot, heavy breaths of her subjects. She deserved more than this mewling and moaning. She deserved music and song.
Frank opened his mouth and gasped, then tried to maneuver saliva around his sand-dry mouth. Eventually he began to croak a paean of honor to her.
“God save our gracious Queen,” he grunted. “Long live our noble Queen. God save the Queen! Send her victorious, happy and glorious, long to reign over us, God save the Queen.”
Her huge, bulbous head paused in its sweeping of the hive, cocked to one side, as if considering him. She drew closer, her fetid breath anointing him with foul spittle. He reveled in her attention.
The queen lifted up a massive claw and drew its sharp point down the raw, ragged flesh of his ruined face. He gasped in agony and ecstasy at her touch. Then she presented her hand to him, and he leaned forward as best he could, and kissed it.
She hissed and screeched, and drew back.
At first he thought he had offended her, and awaited her righteous rage. Her claws outstretched, she paused in front of his face for a moment, then slashed at either side of him. He felt the resinous bonds weaken and stretch, and then snap as she raked her claws over him. His helpless body sagged, and then fell to the floor at her feet.
Frank looked up at her. Was she about to deliver a fatal blow? No. She regarded him silently, waiting. He realized what was happening. She had a design for him, a plan. He was to do her bidding for the glory of the hive. Among all the chosen, Frank had been elevated, had been doubly chosen.
“Thank you,” he gasped. She hissed at him. She did not want his gratitude. That was a human thing, a failing, a weakness, and there was no place for that in the hive. She merely needed his complete and total obedience.
A colonist stuck to the wall beside him opened her eyes.
“Aidez-moi, s’il vous plaît,” she whispered. “Aidez-moi.”
Frank could not help her. Could not help anyone. Could not even help himself. He was in thrall to his queen, and he could do no more or no less than what she demanded. As if to prove his point, the queen bent low, hissing at the colonist who had spoken, and raked her claws viciously across the woman’s face, silencing her with finality. Then she brought her head close to Frank’s, and bared her teeth.
“Yes,” Frank hoarsely said. “I understand. I won’t fail you.”
Then, adrenaline flooding his ruined, battered body, he spun around and half crawled, half ran away from the charnel house of the hive and back to the land of the living.