"So that's the predator home world?" He breathed a finely rolled cigar after his question. Tall for a human, with straight black hair and a distinctive chin. He had no name, this high up in his section of the Weyland corporation you couldn't have one, he was simply the New Exec. Heck, he didn't even know his name anymore (the corporation had made sure of that. He looked down at his cigar, direct from earth. But then again, when you could afford to smoke thirty thousand Weyland Credit, worth on average twice an American dollar, cigars who needed a name?
The only other person who occupied the room, and in fact the whole ship besides the pilot, nodded. He was simply known as the Old Exec. The main difference between the two of them was that he wore baggy clothing while the new exec was in a very nice suit, similar two the one the old exec had worn when he first arrived. It wouldn't last two hours, but his predecessor hadn't warned him of the climate so why should he? The new exec would figure it out. But,
besides the clothing, they could have been twins, or clones, or androids. This high up in their section of the Weyland corporation it was quite possible. "Or so they say. By the way,
get used to calling them Yautja. Most of them don't speak human languages."
"Yautja." said the new exec, testing the word. The old exec nodded. "So now that your term here is done where are they sending you off to?" asked the new exec. "Alpha Centuri. Been dome unrest problems there. Seems some of them don't like us draining their oceans for export." "Been there a few times, beautiful beaches there." The old exec grinned. "Not anymore." he said as he began typing something in the computer terminal. "But that's nothing compared to what the corp is doing here. This position and whatever information we can glean here in exchange for access of Weyland chosen colony worlds for their hunts." The new exec took another puff of his cigar. "Do you think that Alpha Centuri might end up on their list?"
The old exec, still typing away at the keyboard, shrugged. "It would sure make things easier for business if they all disappeared, but it's pretty close to home." The new exec put out his cigar in a nearby ashtray and tossed it into a trash receptacle. "Do you think they know that Weyland doesn't speak for the whole of humanity? That we don't have the authority to say where they can hunt?" "I don't think they really care actually." With a flourish, the old exec punched the final key. "There! All access to this project is transferred to you for the next term." The new exec sat down in a chair on the other side of the terminal and crossed his legs. "So when's your mind wipe scheduled for?" "One week from ten seconds ago." "Do you think you'll regret not knowing what you've been doing for the past years?" "Hey, when your this high up in our section of the Weyland Corporation..."
Using one hand, the old exec brought up a holographic display between them. "I guess I'd better get you up to date on what we've been doing here." "Has it been worth it?" The old exec gave a chuckle. "Where do you think all these technological breakthroughs have been coming from? Weyland stock is up five percent from what it was last year and one hundred and fifty percent from when this project began. From the trinkets and beads we have acquired!
From the Yautja's point of view we are bigger fools than the indians. They sold land on a continent, but we sell whole planets!" The old exec immediately calmed after his outburst on the irony of their situation. "You can read that in the files. What I want to talk to you about is their history."
"History huh?" said the new exec, taking a small flask full of wine (60,000 WC per liter) from his pocket and taking a sip, savoring the exotic flavor before swallowing. "Don't look so impressed." commented the old exec with a wry grin. "Stories are a lot easier to get them to talk about than technology. A lot easier for the translator too. They're almost neurotic about them even, getting all slobbery and stinking up the room as they describe how they came to their greatness. Plus, you can gain a lot of insight by listening, if you can stomach the smell."
The new exec nodded. "Alright, hit me with it." The old exec was already bringing up the file as he said it. A two dimensional picture appeared in between them. It showed a towering, pyramid shaped building made of some glistening material. It was badly scarred in places and there were clearly weapons emplacements covering it in places, though they looked unoperational at best. Surrounding it were numerous smaller buildings. There didn't seem to be any sign of a roof nor doorway with a way of shutting on any of them. "This is where you'll be staying. It's the city farthest away from the equator and the only one cool enough to support humans, barely. You still have to take a puff of imported air now and then though, and I wouldn't recommend running."
The new exec studied the picture. It was the first time he had seen his new home, Weyland wouldn't allow things like this to be sent through even on the most secure channels. "That big buildings is where you'll spend your time, wouldn't recommend traveling into the city"
The new exec raised an eyebrow. "Natives not very friendly?" he asked. "On the contrary, they'll totally ignore you. And I mean TOTALLY. Walk right into you and step on your face if you aren't quick enough. Some of the younger ones might watch you, and hunt you if you are the unlucky type. It's the animals you have to watch out." "The animals?"
"Yep, vicious things. They steer clear of the Yautja, but you'll look mighty tasty to them, two people have been eaten so far, make sure you aren't the third." The new exec shuddered slightly but suppressed it. "Why in the world do they let dangerous animals run loose in their city?" he asked, taking another sip of his drink to bolster his nerves. "Two big reasons actually. Sometimes they hunt them when they're planet bound, but it seems to me that the main reason is so only the strongest survive. The animals eat the young who are too stupid to stay by the adults or too foolhardy and try to take on something better than them and the old that are two feeble to fight them off. I have yet to see a Yautja die of old age, aint many cripples around either. It kinda of works out for the animals and the Yautja in the end actually. The Yautja keep the population under control and they provide the animals with their main food source other than each other while the animals make sure only the best survive. Quite a twisted symbiotic relationship really. There aren't many land based herbivores on the planet anymore."
"Which is why?" asked the new exec, leaning back for the explanation. "Right, that brings us back to history." said the old exec, tapping a key so that the picture zoomed onto the pyramid. "You see, ninety percent of the land animals on this planet are imported. Some of the deadliest creatures in the galaxy that they could find. All the others died off except for the very small ones." "A disease?" "No, a parasite, but that's getting ahead of the story. You see, the Yautja haven't always been the way they are today." "You mean hunters?" "That too, but also physically. Have you ever heard of the race of aliens called the space jockeys?" "Of course, a ship of theirs was eventually salvaged from a piece of crap planet. Took three salvage attempts, the last one with a hundred marines. The first two disappeared, one survivor. I've heard rumors from high up that there was something else than a mangled corpse. Living eggs." said the new exec with a wave of his free hand.
"You're right, this high up in our section of the Weyland Corporation everyone's heard of the rumors, except they aren't just rumors and you know that and more than you'll say." The new exec simply grinned in response of the accusations. The old exec typed in a command and brought up another picture, a picture of a snarling black alien with deadly extremities. "If you won't say anything else, I will. Getting wiped in a week anyways. Species linguafoeda acheronsis, commonly called aliens. Deadly buggers in tight spaces. You see, once upon a time there was a species called the Yaut, what we called the space jockeys." The old exec said, pressing a key to show another picture, a rather crude drawing of said alien. "So you're telling me that the Yautja were once these guys?" The old exec nodded. "Indeed, ja roughly translates into new, glorious, and about a trillion other ego boosting adjectives. This is one of the oldest pictures on their planet. Took me a long time to find it too. You see a long time ago the Yaut were just like earth was. Dozens of countries fighting to be top dog. They were a lot more advanced than we are even now, including in genetics."
"One group came up with the clever idea of a weapon which could adapt its genes to what it infested. A weapon that was deadly and couldn't be killed easily. They made it too. And they did a hell of a job. Too good of a job. They couldn't control it any more than we could and it got loose, infested the entire planet before too long. Billions of these suckers swarming around. One by one, the Yaut cities fell to these buggers. Pretty soon there was just one fortress that remained and a couple of space stations that had been smart enough to keep the aliens off. Some fled to other planets, most had unwanted hitchhikers and the rest didn't even make it to their destination. Hence the derelict ship." The old exec brought back the picture of the pyramid. "This was the fortress. Wasn't the biggest or best of the time, but its where the whole thing started. Mainly scientists. Lucky thing for them too. Now its the holiest place on the planet. They call it the Birthing Place."
The two of them sat in silence looking at the picture for a moment before the old exec continued with his story. "Anyways, those scientists made the perfect weapon. If anyone had a chance of making them perfect defense it was them, since they had all the info. Problem was that they were mostly geneticists, so it couldn't be a material weapon. They first tried making a virus, but they were too thorough in making their weapon, it was impervious to infection. About the same time the last cities were being torn to bits, they found the only answer they could. If they wanted to survive, they'd have to fight genetic manipulation with genetic manipulation, using themselves. They knew a way to change genetic code after DNA had been merged, the aliens were their best example after all, so they didn't have to wait for another generation."
"So you're telling me that they changed themselves to survive?" asked the new exec. The old exec gave a nod. "I've heard it wasn't pretty, lost a good number of people before they got it right. Increased strength required them to limit their diet to meats only for protein. They also had to change the way their blood circulated to make them quicker and faster thinkers, making them dependent on very warm weather for the extra heat. Hell, to live in that city now is torture, but they do it because of the significance.
Very traditional people they are. The biggest advantage they gave themselves was their very blood, had to change what they use for respiration and everything. Made it so it could neutralize the alien blood. Have you ever seen that stuff? It's crazy, only thing we can tell is it has like two dozen hydrogen atoms per molecule just beggin' to react with something. The pH is so low that it doesn't even register and we don't have anything strong enough to experiment with it. Oh don't look like your getting bored, I'm getting back to the story."
"Throw in some claws, razor teeth, and you've got your everyday yautja, every bit of a match for those alien buggers." The old exec stopped and looked at the new exec. "Well" prodded the new exec. "Well that's as far as I got with them. You want more? Go find it. The only other thing I can say is that they now keep them for hunting. I don't know why. All I know is they are one of the most prized hunts in the galaxy." "One of the most" "I know its hard to imagine, but there are some things that are more dangerous than the aliens." The new exec was a bit skeptical. "Name one thing." he challenged. "Us." replied the old exec. "And aliens spawned from us. They take the best from our genes, our cunning and maybe a bit of intelligence too. But in the end, we're better and we're getting better. Maybe that's the real reason they're throwing us a bone or two. The better our weapons, the closer it gets to a fair fight."
The new exec closed his flask and stashed back into his jacket. "If you think about it, we're kind of betraying our race. Money in exchange for letting monsters killing us like deer. If people heard about this..." The old exec shrugged. "When you're this high up in our section of the Weyland corporation, money is all that matters."