Once the hatch slid open from her little prison, D16 merely peered towards the opening. The gas had some effects on her, making the images of her surroundings way foggier than they should be. Naturally this disturbed her greatly, so she resorted to crawling out from the small room slowly.
Once she realized she was still stuck in the larger room she had been in all of her adult age, she paused in the middle of the dark room, turning her head towards the window. Even with the window in the way, she could smell the humans on the other side just fine.
None of them seemed to be the human that normally was in there. It was unusual and unusual things usually weren't good. Once she realized this, she quickly went down on all four and backed away into one of the corners of the room, away from the window.
It wasn't the first time she entered a rest, where she'd end up sitting down with her arms wrapped around her legs along with her tail. There wasn't much else to do in this confined space. She had already tried to escape in all manners she could think of. But despite the faint calls from the Queen, it wasn't possible.
So waiting was her only option.
In this state, time wasn't really a problem or even something that really occurred to her. She just sat and waited, until something different happened in her surroundings.
The familiar scent returned, making her move ever so slightly, her tail lying across the floor around her instead now. With the scent nearby she wanted to be fully aware and prepared. Things always seemed to happen with that human nearby. Sharp lights or other things she didn't understand. She just knew this human was more dangerous than the rest.
However, the human had changed. There was little left of the nervous and scared scent she had sensed when newly hatched from the host. For a while, it had turned to a more normal state that she felt with all the other human 'workers'.
But now the human's scent was… strange. Unfamiliar, twisted and disturbed. It was new to her and she didn't like it at all. It was as if he was jumping from being nervous to aggressive. As in fact all the humans inside the small control room were jumping in scents and their emotions. Most of them seemed angry.
Slowly she moved away from her previous place, crawling up to the wall before pausing by the window there, keeping herself hidden in the shadows well enough.
The human she recognized seemed to be the one who was the most stressed and agitated of them. The other two were the aggressive ones. Whatever was going on, it was causing internal fighting in the group. Internal fighting she was well aware of, even if, when it did happen among her kind, it was usually controlled and for very good reasons.
She cared little for the reasons of this argument, but she did know one thing. Internal fighting could cause chaos and disorder if not properly controlled. It could be a possible way to escape this confined box.
Her captor must have panicked because out of nowhere he punched one of the more aggressive ones, acting on the sudden fear that was radiating off him like a beacon. The Xenomorph had issues to try and work out how the fighting was going; all she could really pick up through the window was that the three humans were in fact fighting each other rather violently.
At some point her captor managed to struggle loose, as he nearly landed head first onto the control panel by the window. He reached out with his hand somewhere to the left, lifting one of the hatches that protected the most dangerous commands the control panel had.
D16 twitched at the sound of the pressure door opening with a loud hiss, her whole body tensing at this sudden revelation.
"Are you crazy, Matt!" one of the humans screamed, the fighting pausing as they had heard the door opening.
"You forced my hand!" Matt cried out, sounding as terrified as the other one. But he had the sense to move, as he kicked the second scientist in the head, before rushing towards the door that led out to the main corridors. As soon as he was outside, he shut the door again, punching in codes at the control panel.
Covered in sweat and with wide open eyes, he quickly locked the door under his own command, before he continued to run down the corridor like a madman.
One of the scientists had rushed after Matt, but hadn't been able to stop the door from closing, as he hammered helplessly on it by now. He looked towards the door into the Xenomorph's pen before turning to the other scientist.
"Shut the damn door!" he roared. He was late though, as the other young scientist had been punching the button a few times already now and the door was starting to slide close again.
D16 moved fast from her perch, as she landed in front of the door. Upon seeing it close, she quickly grabbed its edges with her hands, using her superior strength to stop the door from entirely closing, growling the whole time. Not until she had managed to fit half her head and shoulder into the opening did the nearest scientist react beyond staring in complete shock.
"Gas her!" he shouted to the one at the control panels, causing the later to try and check through every button in panic.
"I can't! The gas would reach us. It'd kill us!" he screamed back.
"Better that than it escaping!"
The younger one stared at him, clearly not agreeing to that noble self-sacrifice. Instead he punched in a few other codes, alerting the security. As if hoping they'd reach them in time.
D16 didn't really understand the conversation but the rising alarm that echoed through the corridor and room told her that she was in a hurry now. No doubt the actual soldiers would respond to the cry of alarm from the workers.
The nearest scientist had suddenly decided to try and do something about her escape, as he kicked her stomach area once. It surprised her, since she was struggling to keep the door opened, but it didn't mean she'd take on attacks from a weakling like himself.
Fear and desperation was oozing from him so when the second kick came she was prepared. Her free hand clutched around his shin, before she yanked him towards her, quickly placing him between the closing doors.
The sound of the man screaming in pain and his chest being crushed by the doors, didn't startle her one bit. As in fact his body worked as a perfect lever, stopping the doors from entirely shutting close. It gave her the chance to put her focus elsewhere, as she gripped one of the door panels with her hands, before pulling backwards, yanking the entire door off its grid.
With half the door gone, it didn't matter that the other closed itself. It was enough space for her to squeeze through, as soon as she pushed the dead scientist away from the door.
The young man by the controls stared in horror as the Xenomorph made its way through the broken door, coming to stand in front of him. The sound of someone suddenly banging at the door caused the alien to hiss loudly as she turned towards it briefly. There were angry voices outside; no doubt the soldiers had arrived.
By now the scientist collapsed either out of shock or outright fear as he landed flat across the floor. D16 looked around, unable to find any other ways to escape even in the control room. Not directly anyway.
A part of the wall at the side of the control panel had a weaker structure. Acting only on instinct, she slashed the meter wide panel open, revealing what had to be a part of the ventilation system only it was shut off so it didn't lead anywhere.
It was a temporary hiding place nevertheless, as she squeezed her body inside the dark hole, even if her hands had to be placed on the outside, along with a bit of her head.
The doors to the control room were suddenly opened, followed by a cascade of fire from the flamethrower wielding soldiers outside. They were only three, but with fire as their weapon they were extremely dangerous on their own. D16 even twitched at slightly increased temperature in the room, along with the indirect smell of fire.
Clearly there had been no concerns for saving the workers, in case any of them had been standing by the door. The man lying on the floor had barely avoided the fire, just because he had in fact been lying on the floor.
"Where is it?" one of the soldiers asked, as the leader of them stepped inside the control room. He shot the dead man by the door a quick glance before spraying fire through that door too just in case.
"It's somewhere…" he said darkly, as all three stepped into the control room. One of them looked through the window, before turning to the others.
"It must still be in the pen, sir," he said, as he looked around in the room. The tiny flame on the weapon, plus their previous use of the fire had revealed nothing weird in the control room.
"James, you're with me," the leader said, as he gestured for one of the others to follow him inside the pen. Both of them opened fire already by the door, aiming it to two different areas in the pen.
D16 had sensed them leaving the room and now she crawled out from her hiding place, seeing the soldier with his back to her. She stood up on full length, before she threw her hand across his face, stopping any screaming before using her second hand to tear at his throat, killing him fairly quickly.
As he was dropped to the floor, she turned towards the control panel. After having been gassed so many times by Matt, she had learned to recognize the button that caused the discomfort followed by utter blackness. She quickly opened her jaws, before striking through the weak hatch with her secondary jaws, hitting the button.
Despite being a room away, she could already sense the effects of the gas, beyond hearing the soldiers inside drop to the floor. So she moved quickly down to her four, before running out from the room.
The brightness outside temporarily blinded her senses as she hissed loudly. After a few second she managed to get her bearings again, as the vibrations and scents returned to normal. The alarm was still going strong, so she knew the importance of moving away from the room fast.
It was just a matter of minutes to locate the nearest vent and escape through it, even as more soldiers swarmed to her previous home.
