>Wait!>

But the silhouette didn't wait. Spiketail dived after it, around the corner.

Another long corridor of pristine metal lay before her, and disappearing at the far end into another side-area was her target.

>Stop running! Where are you going?>

The silhouette made no reply, but rounded the junction.

>Did I do something wrong? Come back, please!>

Spiketail switched to all fours to go faster, and reached the junction. Ahead of her lay another, eerily similar corridor. But instead of a corner at the end, there was a door, just closing.

She flung open the door, and found herself in an immense room. The walls were close together, but the end vanished into the darkness. And it was dark, far darker than the dimly lit metal behind her.

The walls themselves had changed; they were covered with Alien resin.

A few metres ahead of her, a neat little desk with a computer on it lay. Working at the computer was a figure that she knew.

>Haines?>

The figure straightened, and looked at her sideways. "Good morning, Dr Kail. How are you today?"

>But… you died. Months ago.>

"Yes, I did, didn't I?" said the scientist. "At your hands, too. Or should I say teeth? That tongue of yours can make quite a mess, as you can see." He turned to face her head-on, and Spiketail recoiled.

Blood was spattered over the man's face, and just above the brow was a ragged, bloody hole exactly where her inner jaws had smashed through. Jagged fragments of bone and brain tissue were just visible.

"Funny how fragile the human body is, isn't it?" he said with a sad smile. "I suppose I should be grateful. You killed me all in one go. But I mustn't keep you to myself. There are others who want to meet you." He gestured behind her.

She spun to face her blind spot, and found that the door and corridor had vanished. Five men and women in various military uniforms stood watching her silently. All were horrifically mutilated beyond any possibility of living.

"You remember me?" said one of the men. Blood and entrails dripped from his back. "I never even knew you were there. All I felt was claws ripping through the driving seat and disembowelling me backwards. A painful death, even if it was quick."

"How about me?" said a woman with a Private's uniform and a gaping wound across her stomach. "I'd unloaded all my ammo, and was down to a pistol. You let me empty it against your armour before you ripped me open across here and left me to bleed to death."

>There were others attacking me! I didn't have time to finish it!>

The other three said nothing, just stood looking at her. They weren't accusing. There wasn't any emotion there. They just looked.

"And we're only the beginning of the list," said Haines. "Here's another already."

With a certainty that she knew what she would see, she turned to face Haines.

A man stood next to Haines. More she couldn't tell, as the figure had no head.

"You killed him on the Queen's orders, I believe? But why did you choose to simply pull his head off? Quick, certainly, especially with your strength. But not the cleanest way to do it."

"But mine wasn't quick," came a child's voice.

Again Spiketail turned. A small boy stood there, countless claw marks running through his flesh.

"You toyed with me." The voice was calm, emotionless. "One rip at a time. Nothing fatal. Just enough to cause pain and fear. It was ten minutes before you tired of the game and ended it. But even that was slow. You ripped out my heart, and watched as my body shut down."

"A game that you played with us, as well." Standing with Haines were another twelve people with the same, horrific claw-marks. "Something you enjoyed doing. A way of relieving stress, to use the words you said to the Queen to explain your habit."

"And what about us?" Three more had appeared, once again behind Spiketail. Their only injuries were a huge hole in their chest, the bones snapped outwards. "You may not have done the deed yourself, but you took us to the hive for implantation. You watched as our 'children' emerged with satisfaction."

>It was for the hive! All… for the hive!>

"And that was the reason for our deaths as well?" Two men in the uniforms of spaceport workers had appeared, both with necks at unnatural angles. "Our only fault was to be occupying the cargo bay when you brought the stasis cage into the loading area for the Charon."

>That's all of you! I remember your deaths, and I don't regret them! Leave me alone!>

There was silence.

"Are you sure? Why did you come here?" asked Haines. "Is that Kail speaking, or Spiketail?"

As one, her victims began chanting. "Spiketail! Spiketail! Spiketail!"

>Spiketail, wake up!>

Spiketail snapped back to conciousness. >What!>

Shadow backed off, sensing something wrong. >We need to start moving again. I thought you'd been dormant for long enough. Are you all right?>

>I'm fine! Fine. Just… forget it. Are we going or not?>

Shadow looked at her carefully, and then moved to wake up the other sleepers, leaving Spiketail to her thoughts.

She hadn't dreamed for… well, since before the retrovirus. Sometimes there were… visions during dormancy, but they were always a direct result of the Queen. There were no hives anywhere near, and even if there were, what would be the point of creating that sort of vision? True, they sometimes used their abilities to influence other species – back at the facility, everyone had had dreams about the Queen that prompted them to release the hive. There had been some close calls until the locking system had been personalised to only three people.

Humans could find these dreams disturbing to the point of nightmarish, but they were not intentionally so. No, this was no matriarchal vision.

"I do wish you wouldn't do that. Seeing a kainde amedha looking you in the face as you wake up is a sure way to cause heart failure."

>How else would you like me to wake you?>

Spiketail tuned out the chatter between her five companions, and fell into her usual position at the rear of the march.

What was it that she had been chasing at the beginning of the dream? She strained her memory, and saw glimpses of dark skin and a long tail. A xenomorph drone.

Talon.

She steeled herself for the inevitable flood of emotion. Apart from the one flare of anger immediately following Talon's death, she had remained outwardly cold for the half-day since the fiery destruction of the Asphodel, and intended to remain that way.

She hadn't seen eye-to-eye with Holly Chance from the moment that they had met, and that had not changed much with the change into Talon. That last argument, if nothing else, proved that!

But there had been a kind of bond. They both had the same, straightforward approach to life. And if nothing else, Talon had been her protégé! She had been responsible for that drone.

And 'that drone' had died when the last real conversation they had had was a bitter argument. Without her being able to do a thing.

Except, perhaps, be more cautious about Vathris. She'd had all the clues, dammit! Talon herself had explained about T-T. The attacks had been too regular, too patterned. The destruction of the attacking hive too convenient.

And if she had put it all together before sending Talon off so blithely to meet with Vathris, she wouldn't have been on the Asphodel when it had been destroyed by Tartarus.

Hell, if Talon hadn't met with Vathris, the hive probably wouldn't have been destroyed. Asphodel would still be on the ground, and life would be vaguely normal.

Instead of tramping along with Shadow, a couple of humans, and two aliens that considered xenomorphs to be merely challenging prey. And they were going to see more of them. A full shipload, in the faint hope of persuading them to lend a hand in destroying an insane supercomputer.

Thank you for that bright idea, Shadow, she thought acidly.

She liked Othar'a and her brother. They had a certain simplicity in their world that she could associate with. But when it came down to it, the Aliens and the Predators were mortal enemies. Shadow had been remarkably reticent about his encounter with the 'Space Jockey', but she had guessed as much from what little he had said.

Something probed her mind gently, and she started before realising that it was Shadow.

>I told you, I'm fine!> she snarled.

>You've been quiet since the Asphodel went down, but not as much as this. Something happened while you were dormant. Come on, you can tell me. It's not as though there's anyone else. I'm beginning to understand what the old Queen said about loneliness.>

>'The ultimate curse for any of our kind.' Look, I think it's something I need to work through on my own. Please?>

She could tell he wasn't convinced, but he withdrew back into the verbal banter.

It was true, they were alone. Two drones. Not enough to create a Praetorian egg. One of them would have to Transform.

'One of them'. It would be her, of course. Shadow had never shown even remote interest in climbing the xenomorphic hierarchy. Besides, it wasn't exactly as though she didn't want to Transform.

Or was it?

If you're the one who will take over the Hive, why haven't you done it already? Talon's accusing voice echoed through her head as though she were hearing it right then.

She shook herself. She wouldn't get any answers by letting her problems bury her.

"…so what sort of welcome can we expect from these friends of yours?"

Othar'a clattered her mandibles in a dry laugh. "Not a very warm one. Secrecy is one of the first lessons drummed into any would-be Hunter. You may know that we exist, but we like to keep anything more than that to a minimum. We don't even like other races knowing that we exist – it was unavoidable with oomans. Two warriors Hunted on Earth approximately five hundred of your years ago, and both died as a result. We had no idea how far the knowledge of our existence had spread, so short of exterminating your entire race… something worthy of the Old Ones in callousness."

Shadow briefly translated this, and then turned back to Othar'a. >'Old Ones'?>

"A myth," explained Kal'Arak'e. "It tells of gods that ruled our people with an iron fist, until they faced another race of gods. They fought each other, and were weakened. Then new gods arose, and freed our kind. Just a tale for sucklings now. No-one really believes it."

Shadow considered again his decision not to reveal what the Pilot had told him of the common heritage of Yautja, Xenomorphs and the Space Jockeys. This myth of the 'Old Ones' matched what he had heard pretty closely.

>You never know,> he commented lightly. >There might be a grain of truth there. Even myths need a basis.>

"Perhaps," said Othar'a doubtfully. "As I was saying, you oomans are unlikely to get a warm welcome. And as for you and Spiketail… where the kainde amedha are not used for the Chiva, we do our best to destroy them. Your race is destructive to all life. It is hardly your fault; you can't help the way that you evolved."

"Or were created," put in Kal'Arak'e. "More than a few of the I'ka'ga'ku – the researchers – have suggested that the kainde amedha could not have evolved naturally, and were created by some race. Although we have never met a race that seems to have that sort of skill with biotechnology, to my knowledge."

Shadow relayed that one as well.

"You don't hear much when you're raw recruits on a warship," said Elysa thoughtfully. "But some of our scientists have suggested something similar. Some arms companies have tried to 'tame' Xenos in the past. The results haven't exactly been good."

"I can imagine," said Othar'a dryly. "Even with the many precautions we take for the Kainde Amedha Chiva, the times it has gone wrong are beyond count. We usually manage to bring the pauk-de zabin under control, but there is at least one planet where they managed to erase all native wildlife before more Yautja arrived to investigate the disappearance of the party."

>Good description for Aliens,> laughed Shadow, >and one that humans have used on many occasions.>

Othar'a clicked embarrassedly. "My apologies, Shadow. I'm not used to speaking with kainde amedha."

>None necessary,> he replied. >Most of the hive has a low opinion of 'normal' xenos. Had.> He sighed. >I keep forgetting.>

"It is small comfort, I know, but it is more likely that the Tjau-ke Thwei will accept you if they have our word that you are alone, with no hive for backup."

Spiketail snorted mentally. >Small comfort is one way of putting it. Tell me, Othar'a, have you ever been completely alone with only your thoughts for company?>

The others looked at her, startled at the sudden entrance into the conversation.

"Yes," Othar'a replied. "It is part of the training to become a Hunter. You have to go out into the deserts of our world for several days, and ponder the nature of life, and what it means to take it." She paused. "I think I see what you mean. But loneliness is not something we feel easily. We are naturally a solitary race."

>In that I envy you now,> said Spiketail sadly. >Even human loneliness, which I have experienced, is nothing compared to the emptiness in the mind of an Alien with no hive. But when you compare the feelings of being in company as a human with the sensations of being in a hive as one of us… it almost makes this worth it. The constant feel of other minds brushing past yours, the knowledge that you are never alone, never unsupported, part of something greater that unites a swarm of the ultimate killing machines into something more than the sum of its parts… that makes it all worth it.>

Othar'a was silent, and then clicked understanding. "My link with Shadow was brief, and I did not appreciate it at the time, but I have a sense of what that is like. And from that, a faint idea of what you must be feeling now. I am sorry for your loss."

They walked in silence for a while.

And then all hell broke loose.

With a scream of pain, Elysa fell as a long, root-like thing snapped up from the forest floor and wrapped around her leg, spearing it with the many vicious spines on it. More roots sprang from the ground, but missed and waved violently.

With a roar of challenge, the Predators snapped out their wristblades, and hacked at the appendages. Two were sliced to ribbons, and the rest raised themselves completely from the ground until they were hovering in the air, trailing back into the foliage.

Spiketail leapt for Elysa, who had been dragged into the air and was being pulled away with frightening speed. Shadow was too busy fending off more of the strange roots from himself and Tyrion to join her.

"Thwei-Dt!" roared Othar'a. More of the things dropped on them from above, to reveal themselves to be vines of some sort.

Elysa yelped in shock as she was abruptly hoisted even further. Her vine was now near to a huge tree with wrinkled bark. Spiketail shrieked in fury, and began climbing the tree.

Shadow spat acid at a vine, and it retreated, wriggling as it dissolved.

"Here!" called Kal'Arak'e, and tossed his ki its-pa to Tyrion.

A vine snapped towards the human, he frantically tried to get the combistick to extend. Just as it looked like it was about to coil around him, the weapon extended and sliced through the vine's tip.

Elysa squirmed against the vine holding her captive, and wincing as the spines cut deeper with every movement. As it raised her to the top of the tree, she saw how it had got its name of Thwei-Dt.

Instead of a canopy covering the entire top of the trunk, leaves only extended from several outer branches. In the middle was a massive hole, and it was lined with teeth-like thorns. Some strange process made the entire chamber pulse every second or so.

A strange squeaking came to her ears, and another vine appeared from the other side of the Bloodtree, a full-grown Squealer in its grasp. The vine moved its captive over the hole, and then unravelled. The creature dropped into the tree's maw, and the pulsing became more violent. With a horrible screech of pain, the Squealer was impaled by several thorns, and a strange sucking noise filled the air. Blood trailed from around the thorns, and the body was jerked off to lie at the bottom of the Bloodtree's maw. Strange roots extruded themselves from the bloodstained pit, and ripped the still-struggling Squealer apart. There was another pulse, and the bottom of the pit folded over the dismembered creature.

This was carnivorous flora on a grand scale.

Elysa reached for her pulse rifle, hoping to fire a grenade inside the monster, but realised in horror that she had lost it when the vine had first grabbed her.

And now it was her turn. Her vine moved over the Bloodtree's gaping maw, and unwound itself from her leg. She frantically grabbed for the thing, gasping in pain as the spines dug into the palm of her hand.

The Thwei-Dt was not to be foiled so easily. The vine jerked like a wildthing, and even with the spines embedded in her hand, her grip loosened.

She fell – and was intercepted by a black missile flying across the Bloodtree's mouth.

The tree seemed confused for a moment. Its vine no longer held its prey – yet there was no living flesh to consume and drain of blood inside its 'mouth'.

>Get on my back!> snarled Spiketail. >I can't climb down if I'm carrying you like a stung host!>

Elysa did as ordered, gripping the Alien's spines and biting down a scream as the carapace rubbed against her wounds. And then they were moving.

It was like something out of a thrill ride. They were moving almost vertically downwards at terrifying speed, and the Bloodtree had obviously worked out what had happened, as vines slipped out of its trunk everywhere, lashing to find its errant prey.

Tyrion yelped in surprise and pain as a vine lashed itself around his waist from behind, and he clumsily sliced it with the combistick.

"We need to move! There's no way we can kill a Thwei-Dt without more weaponry!" roared Othar'a.

>What about Elysa and Spiketail!>

>We're here!> said Spiketail. >Let's move!>

No matter how many vines they sliced through, two seemed to replace each one. The Bloodtree was persistent, you had to give it that.

And suddenly it was over.

The vines retreated back into the foliage, concealing themselves in the ground to await the next victim to enter their snare.

Tyrion slowly breathed a sigh of relief. "What the hell was that? I didn't see what they came from."

"I did," said Elysa, gritting her teeth against the pain. "Some kind of tree that sprouted those vines, and chucked its victims into a mouth of some sort. It looked like it sucked blood, and then ripped apart the bodies to absorb the rest."

"Yes. One of the more unpleasant lifeforms on this planet," said Othar'a darkly. "More so because its bark is tough enough to repel most attacks, so without a plasma caster it is impossible to destroy one. We were lucky we were in a group – the number of vines they send out can overwhelm even a levascara if it is alone."

Shadow dutifully translated this, and then gave a sigh of irritation. >Maybe it would be simpler if I linked with everyone so that we can share languages. Repeating every word is getting to be a pain.>

"A good idea, but not now. Elysa's injuries must be treated, and then we must move on. The ship is a matter of minutes away." Othar'a pressed several controls on her wrist computer, and a panel on her armour opened to reveal a set of medical instruments.

"I'll be fine, I'm sure," said Elysa hurriedly. She got off Spiketail's back, and promptly fell as her injured leg collapsed. "Or maybe Spike could carry me the rest of the way…"

>Could do, but won't,> replied Spiketail. >What's wrong?>

Elysa grimaced. "I've heard stories about Yautja medicine before."

Othar'a clicked in amusement, and bent forward with a large injector in each hand. "Unpleasant as it may be, Thwei-Dt vines have a mild venom on their thorns. I wouldn't let it heal by itself if I were you."

Shadow repeated this, and Elysa sighed. "Make it quick, okay?"

The Yautja pressed the first injector against Elysa's thigh, and pressed. She shrieked as the device flooded her leg with the regenerative fluid. She was expecting it when Othar'a repeated the process with her arm, but she couldn't restrain the cry as the second injector activated.

"That's not something I want to do again," she said weakly. "But I do feel better. I could probably hobble along now."

>Lean on me,> offered Shadow.

"So tell me," said Elysa as they set off again. "How come your medicine is advanced enough to regenerate those sort of injuries, but hurt like hell while they do it?"

"Not my field," said Othar'a, stifling a laugh. "I have heard the Chi'de'a say that they do use anaesthetics in these devices, but since most Chi'de'a have a rather twisted sense of humour I doubt it. Ah, that's where we left the ship. I appreciate that you can't see it, but – oh."

>I can certainly see it,> said Spiketail. >Is that a Xenomorph thing?>

"Nope," said Elysa. "It's visible."

The two Predators looked at each other ominously. "The Elder would NEVER leave the cloak off on the ship," said Kal'Arak'e tersely. "It's just asking for trouble on any planet, let along this one."

At an unspoken agreement, they both broke into a run, closely followed by Spiketail.

As they drew closer to the Man'Daca-class ship, they saw the many charred sections on its hull. Next to the ship's main entrance, three Yautja bodies lay. Two had huge sections of armour and the flesh underneath burned away by some powerful force, while the third had massive claw marks running across his eviscerated corpse.

Othar'a kneeled down to get a better look at the bodies, and swore. "This was our pilot," she said. "Something must have gone very wrong."

>You don't say,> hissed Spiketail. >I can tell you that this isn't Xeno work – I know what sort of marks our claws make, and those aren't them. Not to mention we can't do anything that produces that sort of charring.>

"No. In fact, they are like nothing I have ever seen."

"Come! There is no time!" barked Othar'a, and leapt inside the ship, snapping open her wristblades as she did so.

The interior of the ship was blackened from weapons fire, and more Yautja bodies were scattered here and there with a mixture of wounds from burns, claws, and some sort of explosive force. Most of them were the Youngbloods, but there were a few full Blooded Warriors.

They finally reached the bridge, and Othar'a pressed the control to open the door, dreading what she might see.

I could have gone on… but I didn't. I'm part Xeno (mentally, at least), I like being nasty… those who have read the Edge Chronicles will recognise the Bloodtree as a Bloodoak, with a few refinements.

So who's been killing Yautja? What's on the bridge? And what's the root behind Spiketail's dream? All to come…