Chapter summary: Life as a new worker of the Hive is so much fun! ... Yeah: 'fun.'


The larval form returned soon enough to feed. Growth and transformation occurs rapidly in the Xenomorph to fully-functioning adult, and with that rapid growth, with the constant molting of its soft outer shell, ... well, how could that be supported? Nothing comes from nothing, so the larva's hunger overcame its instinctual need to shy away from anything until it hardened into a fully-grown killing machine.

It returned to its food-source: its host.

Braving the other huge creatures present, it went right up to the remains of Gunny Sergeant Johnson and went for the richest source of energy a human had: his brain.

Imagine the calorie count of a quarter-pounder (or «un Hamburger Royale»). The human brain, weighing in at more than two pounds, or at least eight times the weight of one burger, and with the very high density of gray matter, makes for quite the power-lunch for a Xenomorph.

The little monster clambered up Gunny Sergeant's body and smashed right through his skull to get right to the good stuff. Then feast, it did!

And this is how a Xenomorph ate: ravenously, messily, greedily, and very, very aware of its surroundings. In its present state, smaller than a half-a-meter in height with a flexible, not hardened, outer shell more pliant like rubber, it knew it was very vulnerable. Certainly, it had a vicious bite, but to land a killing blow, a host would have to be stupid enough to lift the Xenomorph to its own head, and even then, from its small mouths, it would need to bite multiple times to land anything severe.

The most dangerous enemy to a Xenomorph was not a host, however: it would be another Xenomorph, and a fully mature one, like the three now observing it, could just pick it up, slam it down, and squash it underfoot without effort.

What kind of defense was possible against that? Babyish charm? No. Xenomorphs were not nurturing. The best defense against other Xenomorphs was to stay out of the way and to mature as quickly as possible. That's why the larval stage was a mere six cycles: the larval form hid and fed and grew as quickly as it could.

Until it could join into the hive a fully productive worker ... or fight its way free and try its luck elsewhere.

The success rate of going rogue was approximately zero percent.

'Approximately,' because there had been one exception: the queen herself had been a worker, and had rejected her own queen, her own hive, and it was all because of one frail, little human: Newt.

Freed from her own queen, the suppressive pheromones no longer were there to stop her development from an asexual worker to a queen that grew and grew until she was now an impressive seven meters, befitting a rogue queen, rival to the very hive she helped build from nothing.

This larval form didn't know all this, not at all. But it did know the hunger gnawing away at its insides, so it fed.

"Bring it to me," the Queen commanded, her voice reverberating throughout the ship.

Second sighed, but did her duty. It was always tough and tiresome work: the upbringing of the newest members of the hive. This was the shit job usually relegated to the lower workers, but there were none lower: just her and One Arm.

They all had to do their part: even if it were chasing down wild, bite-y little larvae.

Fast as lightning, Second launched itself at the body and the larval form, grabbing it by the back of the neck before its feeding mouths could disengage to bite back. Second pulled it from the body, and, grabbing the thigh, pulled the left leg clean off the corpse. She brought both to the Queen.

"Good!" the Queen exulted. Grabbing both presented gifts from Second, she immobilized the newest member of the hive in one claw and began feeding it Gunnery Sergeant Johnson's leg with the other. The larva, after a second's struggling hesitation, returned to feeding with gusto.

It did not know, nor did it care, that the Queen was imprinting it. Slowly but surely as it fed, it breathed in her Queen, impressed with the scent of the Queen as its leader, its all.

The larva made quick work of all that meat of Johnson's leg, bones and all. Waste not, want not, and the Xenomorph was a very efficient consumer of energy, allocating every joule to some end.

So unlike humans.

The foot was the least fun, or the least productive, part of the leg that the larva ate, but eat it it did. It was so hungry! Or, more correctly, so full now, but so driven to eat, and to grow and to grow, and to grow. The biological imperative drove the larva in its single-minded purpose.

Its meal done, the Queen loosened her grip. The larva bit the Queen's claw, in spite, and scuttled off to the nearest ventilation shaft as the Queen howled in rage.

It was a fake howl: the Queen didn't even feel a twinge from the underdeveloped jaws, but it was coded into the Queen just as the need to feed was coded into the larva: everything was dedicated to the continuance of a thriving, terrifying, deadly hive.

"So," the Queen declared, pleased, "it begins."

...

Training the newest member of the hive for Second and One Arm was ... 'fun.'

'fun,' adj.: see sucks.

'Fun' as it was, and inasmuch it took them away from all their other duties, it was a thing that the Second and One Arm needed to do, the Queen monitoring everything they did.

Combat/play, when to work, when to rest, when to tend, the first week after the larval form had quickly grown into fully mature Xenomorph were hard, and for all the members of the hive.

"Something's wrong with it," the Queen remarked to Second after the newest member went to its rest cycle.

"Uh," Second replied noncommittally.

"Why is it so small?" the Queen demanded.

At just over two meters, the 'runt' wasn't small ... for a human. But it wasn't being measured by human-standards.

And, to the point, it was small.

Second pondered this, then offered: "The gravity here on ship is twice that of that rock we abandoned, maybe it's-... more compact?"

"'Compact'?" the Queen hissed, not satisfied. "So it should be twice as strong, then? ... or twice as fast?"

"Uh," was Second's intelligent reply.

The runt was neither stronger nor faster than her sisters. In fact, she was the opposite: both slower and much weaker, laughably so when compared to Second.

But neither Second nor the Queen were laughing now: to both, this was a very serious issue. Second was wondering if her training was failing her Queen, somehow.

For Second, a displeased Queen was not something she needed to deal with.

The Queen, for her part, was wondering, since this was her first hatchling, did she do something wrong? She wasn't hatched as a queen, herself, fed Royal Jelly from the larval state, but instead transformed from a worker to Queen when freed from her own Queen's dominance.

Her own Queen had ordered Newt be implanted, and 'First' as she was known, did something incomprehensible for a worker: instead of taking Newt to the incubation chamber as commanded, she instead escaped the hive to LV-624's surface, and then started eating... and eating, .. and eating.

Her Queen's pheromone inhibitors no longer affected First, who was now no longer a repressed little obedient worker, but a fully-grown Queen, in her own right, and now an enemy to the very hive she had created, human by implanted human.

So since she was 'unnaturally' selected to be Queen of her own Hive, were the workers she produced to be small and ineffectual like the runt? Would they even be able to take on humans one-on-one?

This was very worrisome, indeed!

So, the Queen was pensive, and for a Xenomorph, 'pensive' is neither a natural nor welcome state.

And so the Queen was angry.

"Find something good to tell me about this hatchling, Second," the Queen snarled a dismissal.

"Yes, my Queen," Second acquiesced and backed away to her cowl, leaving her Queen to stew in her own 'thoughts.'

Sometimes it's best just to leave the Queen be, Second though as sleep took her.

...

"Again!" Second commanded.

The runt threw herself at Second, claws extended, mouths parted to rip and to rend.

Second's claw flashed out and knocked the runt away before she was within even a meter's distance from Second.

The runt slammed into the bulkhead, ... hard. She squealed in dismay.

"Again!" Second commanded, mercilessly.

The runt, stunned, shook off the miasma of pain circling her like thick fog, and charged her elder, again, claws out to strike. She successfully ducked under Second's haymaker and rocketed up to snap through Second's exposed neck.

Instead, Second's other arm came right up, grabbing the runt by the neck, shoving her up, then slamming her down, ... hard, into the deck.

The whole ship seemed to shake with the blow. The runt squealed in dismay, furious at being so easily tricked.

"What are you doing?" Second screamed down at her pinned opponent. "Did I tell you you could stop? You fight or you die! You fight until you die!"

Second flung the Runt from her in disgust.

Thoom! The bulkhead had another new dent where the runt's body, a missile, connected with it.

"Take over!" Second snarled at One Arm, and she stalked from training area to make her report to the Queen.

"On it!" One Arm shouted at Second's retreating back, emoting encouragement to her sister, as if to say: Don't worry, I'll make good with this one; I've handled the like before.

One Arm had trained many new hatchlings. This one would be a challenge, yes, but One Arm liked a challenge.

Second didn't.

...

"Give me some good news," the Queen growled softly to Second's lowered dome.

Second remained silent, facing her Queen.

"Anything?" the Queen demanded.

Nothing from Second.

"Fuck," the Queen muttered, dispirited.

"This is my fau-..." Second began.

"Second," the Queen snarled, "just shut the fuck up."

Rage was boiling over in the Queen, and she was afraid of taking it out on Second, her most trusted advisor, on the ship, on the whole cursed solar system. This was not the time to be rash for the Queen.

But it never was.

She hated being Queen, being responsible for her whole Hive. In fact, she was responsible for her whole species now, as every encounter with the humans had ended up with catastrophic losses for every hive, but she did not know this fact, and knowing it wouldn't have helped any, anyway.

No, she wanted to act, to do something reckless and impulsive, but instead she was forced to sit here and watch others do her bidding, and not the way she would do it, either, if it were up to her. She hated this sitting and waiting, and that's all a Queen ever did.

"How many cycles has it been since it hatched, Second?" the Queen asked quietly.

"Ninety-three cycles, my Queen," Second replied.

"Ninety-three cycles," the Queen echoed, "and it's won how many matches against you? against One Arm?"

Second was silent.

"Second?" the Queen demanded.

"Not one of them, my Queen," Second admitted.

"Not ..."

The Queen was stunned by this fact. Not even one? That was ... a worker could win squabbles, could lose squabbles. Hell, two workers bump into each other and the whole hive would be humming with snapping, snarling workers as a confrontation escalated.

But losing every single encounter?

"Fuck," the Queen muttered.

The Queen mulled over this situation. How the fuck were they going to take on a planet if this were the first of the new wave of workers? What if they were all like this?

"How many cycles until we reach the planet again?" she asked.

"More than nine hundred cycles still to go, my Queen," Second replied.

"FUCK!" the Queen screamed. "Why is this taking so damn long?"

Second just let her Queen scream. Explaining things wouldn't help.

The Queen tapped her chest plating, a nervous tic of hers.

"My Queen, ..." Second began.

"Shut up," the Queen snapped testily. "I'm thinking!"

'Wow, she's thinking,' Second thought. 'Hooray for us!'

Second hated it when the Queen got to thinking: the Queen thinking meant that they were going to storm the Hive, and all die, or storm a human vessel, and mostly all die.

"How is the hatchling doing in its duties?" the Queen asked.

Second shrugged an 'eh,' back to the Queen. There was really nothing to distinguish it as outstanding out here in space: one worked and tended on a ship that took care of itself.

The Queen resumed tapping her chest-plating.

Then she came to a decision. "Fuck it," she said. "We have ... two other humans in cryo?"

"Yes, my Queen."

"Okay," the Queen said, "Uh, does the hatchling show any signs of ... brilliance?"

Second just kept her dome to the deck, trying not to laugh. The question was hilarious to Second, because the runt was just ... young. Her attacks were laughably transparent, and 'brilliance'? She showed eagerness, yes, but impulsiveness. The runt was young, and nothing else.

"Anyway," the Queen continued, ignoring Second's constrained twitches. "You are going to teach the young one how to pilot this vessel."

"Uh ..." Second offered, stunned. "We are going somewhere else now?"

"No, stupid!" the Queen retorted angrily. "One of us has to ensure we land on the planet, intact, even in any emergency that'll be sure to happen."

"... but you want the hatchling to do that?" Second countered incredulously.

"Yes, I do," the Queen said firmly, "for I have plans for you and for Eighth." The Queen still referred to One Arm as her Eighth. "So the runt has nine hundred cycles to become the best damn pilot this vessel will ever have, and you, Second, my little alien tech-genius, will make sure that she is. Do you understand me?"

Second sighed. Her wretched life just kept getting better and better, didn't it! "Yes, my Queen."

"And get the other two in here, now!" the Queen ordered. "I was going to wait a bit, well ... a lot longer, closer to planetfall, for this, but I'm bored as fuck. We're going to see how the hatching holds her own, but it's not going to be play, not this time."

"Uh, ..." Second offered, not liking the sound of where this was going.

"Now, Second," the Queen ordered.

Second's tail swished in annoyance. "Yes, my Queen," she snarled dutifully, and backed out of the mess deck.

...

Her three subjects arrayed before her, the Queen looked over her Hive.

What a sorry lot it was, she thought disparagingly. Second was a prize, but could she use her in combat? No! Second's first duty was to guard her Queen. That left One Arm and a runt.

To take on a whole planet.

Not good, the Queen thought darkly.

"We are going to have a little ... fun," the Queen announced. "You," she directed to the runt, "you've had enough time playing with your sisters, now you are going to go up against something for real: your first human opponent, their warrior, but this time: fully armed, and fully prepared for battle."

The runt gasped, beside herself with joy. At last! she crowed.

One Arm burst out in dismay: "My Queen! This little one will not last two seconds against their warrior, she will ..."

"Oh," the runt interrupted her elder, squealing gleefully. "I will! I will take it down! I will show ..."

"SHUT UP!" all three screamed at her as one.

The runt nearly fell over in surprise, stunned into silence.

"She won't even last two seconds," the Queen agreed with One Arm, "that is why you are to go with her and instruct her in this engagement every step of the way. You are to present the human to me, disarmed, but whole and unharmed, at which point ..."

"Will it be implanted?" the runt jumped in again, excited. "Will it host a new member to strengthen our mighty Hive?"

Stony silence greeted her.

She shut up again.

"Listen, little one," the Queen growled softly, "you will be lucky to be here in that moment, but only if you listen to every single word of your sister and you obey her without question. You don't think, you don't suggest, you don't fucking breathe without her say-so. You don't move in on the human, unless your sister so orders, otherwise you will be lucky if the human kills you, and kills you so fucking fast you won't even have time to wonder how the fuck she just killed you. Your tail so much as twitches without your sister's permission, you'll fucking face me. Clear?"

"Yes, my Queen," the runt squeaked.

"You," the Queen turned on One Arm. "Revive the warrior. Let it arm itself. Show me you can take her down on her own vessel and on her own terms. Do not disappoint me."

"Do you need six cycles to prepa-..." One Arm began.

"Now," the Queen said. "Revive her now."

"Yes, my Queen," One Arm complied, not understanding.

It wasn't One Arm's role to understand; her role was to obey.

"Let's do this," she said grimly to the runt.

"Yes!" the runt said. "You'll see! I'll be good! This'll be fun!"

One Arm observed the runt, vibrating in place: a happy, little puppy dog.

One Arm just wagged her head in disgust. "Yeah," she said. "It'll be ... 'fun,' all right."

But inside, she cursed bitterly as she took the runt with her to cryo.

The little shit had no idea what she was about to go up against.