Lex clung to Iversson's arm like a life preserver all the long cold way up to Island South. The Professor didn't say anything, just held onto her tightly. She steered Lex into her office and asked the guards to wait outside.
The moment the door closed behind them, Lex sat down on one of the chairs with her head in her hands and started to cry, for real this time. Iversson watched her cautiously.
"Alexa?" She said finally "Is what you told Ms Weyland true; were you really a prisoner?"
Lex took a deep breath, her chest heaved helplessly as she tried to regain control "What do you … care?"
"I'm worried about your state of mind." The Professors's face registered surprise and hurt "I admit I thought you were lying but you seem so distressed… I thought perhaps…"
"How can you pretend you give a damn?" Lex said fiercely "When you're holding me and those two boys on this floating prison and those things are here?"
Iversson looked taken aback "What things?" She said.
"The serpents! Alien monsters!" Lex threw back at her "You brought them back here from Antarctica, didn't you?"
"I don't know what you're talking about."
"He told me so don't bother to deny it. You brought the hunters most dangerous quarry here, you and that Weyland bitch!"
Iversson took a deep breath "I don't know of any non-human presence here, Alexa, apart from the two children and their father. I'm not sure what you're talking about."
Lex dragged her hand roughly across her face and fixed Iversson with a piercing black gaze "You know." She said, her breath still miserably ragged "I was actually beginning to like you Professor… it's a pity that I'm never going to be able to trust you, because I could never trust somebody who's willing to let those monsters near those boys! Your little project is going to wind up wiping out all life on Earth!"
Iversson laid her hand on her chest "Alexa, whatever the exotic has told you I swear on Isaac's life I don't know what you're talking about."
Lex raised her head and fixed the Professor with a long hard look "Then one of us is being lied to. If you're telling the truth; that means it must be you."
"Are you sure you trust the word of that creature? I thought you told Diana you hated him?"
Lex took a deep breath, pressed her knuckles to her eyelids for a moment "He wouldn't lie to me about something that puts his offspring in danger. Either it's true or he believes it is, and if those creatures are here he'd know - he's got a kind of sixth sense about them..."
Iversson looked at her doubtfully; then she called the guards in from outside.
"Take Ms Woods back to her room," She told them.
At the door, Lex paused and turned to look at the older woman again "Watch your back Iversson," She said quietly "Weyland and Danzig: if I had any money I'd bet it all they're hiding something from you."
After Lex had gone, Iversson didn't waste any time in going straight to Weyland's office tower. The hour was late but she imagined that's where she'd find her employer and as she strode down the long corridor she could see a light still on at the window.
She was angry. Really angry.
She'd thought her relationship with Weyland was one of mutual respect, forged from a desire to increase the sum total of human knowledge. Of course Iversson wasn't blind or stupid, she knew that Weyland's primary concern was really the advancement and profit of the Corporation before all else but she'd thought that their two aims could coexist. The events of the last few days had made her realise that her employer did not see her as an equal. In her eyes Iversson was a hired underling or worse, a mere pawn in her malevolent mind games.
"The way she used Isaac to torment the exotic," She thought "And then used the exotic to cause pain to Alexa … and now it seems she's been playing me for a fool all along!"
She reached the lift that gave access to Weyland's office and stood as it ascended, tapping her heel impatiently "So, she thinks she can manipulate me does she?" She thought furiously "I didn't spend all those years holding my ground against some of the most powerful men in the world just to get pushed around by some capitalist Machiavelli!"
As the lift doors opened onto Weyland's imposing office she saw her employer was seated at her desk, tapping away at her computer. Her doll-like features looked ghostly, illuminated from beneath by the cold white glow from the computer screen. As Iversson approached, the chilly blue eyes flickered over her and the laptop shut with a click.
"What are you doing here Professor?" She said curtly "It's rather late."
"I have something to discuss that won't wait." Iversson managed to keep her tone civil, but it was an effort. She noticed that her employer had dropped her usual practise of addressing her by her Christian name and with it the rather phoney familiarity it conveyed.
Weyland sighed and got up from her desk. She selected an ornate bottle from her cabinet. Iversson knew enough about whisky to recognise a Macallan single malt. Her employer poured herself a generous measure without adding ice or water and without offering any to Iversson. Cradling the heavy glass tumbler in her tiny hands, Weyland sauntered back to her desk. She leaned back against it and took a small sip.
I'm already very displeased with you Professor," She said finally "I did ask you not to interfere earlier."
"Nevertheless I must speak with you."
Weyland swished the amber liquid unhurriedly around the glass whilst she turned on Iversson the same look one might give an irritating fly that had just buzzed in through an open window.
"You have five minutes." She said.
"I'm the head of the Life Sciences Division here," Iversson said, fighting to remain calm "That means the exotic and those two boys are under my jurisdiction and the same goes for any other live subjects in the Corporation's custody."
"That's thirty seconds already wasted in stating the obvious."
"Ma'am, do you have other extra-terrestrial life-forms here that I haven't been informed about?"
Iversson was watching Weyland's face and it seemed to her that at this question her expression became curiously wooden "I can't think what you mean."
"Something dangerously hostile," Iversson plunged on, though she could see where this was going "Something to do with your father's expedition to Antarctica? Have you brought some other kind of alien organism here without informing me?"
Weyland put her glass down and folded her arms "Given your increasingly erratic behaviour, I find that I'm rather reluctant to divulge the details of my other projects to you at this moment," She said "I thought scientists were meant to preserve a certain detachment and objectivity from their subjects, but your judgement seems to be clouded by sentiment."
"Because I won't play my part in your twisted little revenge tragedy?"
"This isn't about revenge, this is about money. And I'd be careful when throwing moral judgements around if I were you Professor. After all, who's been telling Isaac you're his mother all these years? I think most of your peers would see something weird and unethical about that, don't you? Never mind the fact that it was your idea to create him in the first place – playing God with human DNA? What would your former employers think about that?"
Iversson didn't even bother to address the dig about the cloning; she knew her employer was in no position to make threats being up to her neck in that particular aspect of things herself. It was the insinuation about her treatment of Isaac that bit deep.
"You think that you can use that little boy as a way to control me," She said finally, when she felt calm enough to speak "You can see I care about him and to you, that's just a weakness you can exploit. You don't feel any kind of responsibility at all for his wellbeing yourself, do you?"
Weyland gave her a pained look "The only responsibility I feel is to make sure that his existence brings in the maximum monetary benefit possible to myself and to this company." She said "If that means I have to sell him to the Defence Department or a rival military power or to whomsoever is willing to pay the price I ask, then that is what I will do. There's not much point in my developing a warm and loving rapport with him."
"You wouldn't even know where to start!"
"Oh do wake up Professor," Diana said, in gently mocking tones "Lex may not see Isaac as a product but I'm afraid that's exactly what he is. He's my product! I paid a great deal of money for him and I intend to treat him as such. In fact the same goes for all four of them, Mommy and Daddy included. If I can make money out of eventually trading them over to whosever wants them – once I get what I want out of them – then so much the better. Those two children are just the start."
"What do you mean by that?"
"Well now," Weyland tapped her perfect nails on the glass "I imagine that the amount of money people would pay for a fully-functioning invisiblity device pales into insignificance compared to what they'd pay for an army of alien hybridised soldiers."
"You're not serious!"
"Why not? I'm sure that we can find just the right mixture of their aggression and superior strength and human intelligence, through trial and error. Now I come to think of it, why hybridise them at all? We have the original; we can just make some copies of him! Of course we'd have to make sure they were trained and … conditioned for total obedience."
Iversson looked into those frigid china-blues and tried to be calm. Having worked for the government for many years she was no stranger to adherents of cold-blooded expediency but what Weyland had said to her chilled her marrow like liquid nitrogen. She really meant to sell Isaac to the highest bidder? Selim too?
"You're just trying to upset me now, it's beneath you. And you're also trying to distract me from the question I asked; do you have other alien life forms here aside from the exotic?"
"I'm not trying to distract you Professor," Her employer said calmly "I don't need to do that. You're on my payroll and I decide what information you're entitled to know about the projects I have in train. If you have a problem with that of course feel free to hand in your resignation but I should make your mind up quickly if I were you. The last flight back to the mainland before the weekend leaves in forty minutes."
Iversson paused. Every instinct was telling her that Lex had been right and that made her extremely uncomfortable. If she was being lied to then she and everyone else on this complex could be in terrible danger but Weyland had called her bluff. Iversson could not go against her unless she was willing to abandon Isaac to her tender mercies.
"That won't be necessary," She said, with as much dignity as she could summon "Glad to hear it. Now if you'll excuse me, I am rather busy."
Danzig was busy in his little sanctuary, as he liked to think of it – relieved to be away from everyone.
It had been a strange night.
The odd scene when Weyland had brought the prisoner down to talk to the exotic. He had found it disconcerting to hear an attractive woman standing there growling and snarling all those weird syllables.
Impossible to tell what either she or the alien were saying to one another, her face was as emotionless as stone. The exotic's expressions were too bizarre and inhuman to decode. They could have been talking about anything – apart from at the end when the alien had got angry and roared at her and she'd all but fled the room.
Secretly, Danzig found himself in agreement with Professor Iversson: he wasn't sure what Weyland thought that was going to achieve and privately he considered her hope that the exotic would reveal the secret of the invisibility devices an unlikely one.
He was not especially impressed by the exotic and his species; clearly they had physical strength but he didn't credit them individually with much intelligence. They seemed to be all brawn and very little brain. The specimen they currently had in custody was living proof that they were just as susceptible to bouts of irrational emotion as humans, perhaps worse.
His species had somehow come up with a superior form of stealth technology but he doubted that this particular individual had the brainpower to understand or explain such a complex feat of engineering – any more than the average man on the street could accurately explain the workings of a particle accelerator.
Unlikely or not, he went along with what Weyland wanted because she'd allowed him a pretty much free hand with his little project.
In contrast to the exotic, he felt, the Hive were greater than the sum of their parts. From what he could tell they represented a gestalt consciousness, all of them functioning together almost like cells or parts of a body all ruled over by the Queen, the brain. Of course they had to be contained – for now anyway.
The glass viewing window was reinforced and there was also a sensor that triggered a burst of flame to discourage them if they got too inquisitive about the glass. If that didn't put them off, the little jets set under the window frame would trigger and spray them with freezing liquid nitrogen.
But now – to his great and lasting elation – he had a more sophisticated way of protecting himself from them, extra insurance in case his control system ever failed; a hormone tag. It was a little piece of genius on his part, a pin on device he could wear from which emanated a convincing synthesis of the chemicals produced by the human body when it had become impregnated by the Hive's larvae.
Wearing it, he could actually move amongst them unharmed. The first time he'd done it he'd been almost crying with fear but it had turned to tears of joy when he realised that – miraculously – his invention actually worked. They were completely taken in by the device; he could not have been more pleased. It was the highest compliment possible from a near perfect organism.
He thought they were coming to know now that he was in charge.
He sometimes could sit for hours just watching them – or at least he would have done if it hadn't been for the fact that he needed to keep their existence a secret from Professor Iversson. Of course he had his own small staff and they mainly stayed down here out of Iversson's way but he had to divide his time between here and his duties on the upper levels so that she didn't suspect. Mostly she was so obsessed with the exotic and her pseudo children that she barely even seemed to question that there was a whole level to Island North that she'd never even been down to. It meant he didn't get a lot of sleep but he didn't mind that. This was where he wanted to be anyway.
Now he was glad he was through with his duties upstairs for the evening. He was expecting some new additions to the Hive tonight and he had set his heart on watching them make their way into the world.
He was called out of his trance-like state by the sound of raised voices in the corridor outside.
Iversson had been angry on her way up to Diana Weyland's office, but as she stepped foot back into the cold and inhospitable atmosphere of Island North she felt positively homicidal.
Suddenly she could see why Alexa had had no trouble in resorting to violence, for once she wished she could do the same. It would have been very satisfying to wipe the self-satisfied expression off Weyland's blanched face.
The long elevator ride down to the lower levels passed in a blur. She knew she ought to go and check on the exotic, he'd seemed extremely agitated after his conversation with Alexa. Unlikely as it might be in his current condition, her fear was that if he was stirred up enough he might somehow find a way to escape.
She knew that's where she ought to be going, but somehow she found herself pushing the button which took her further down, past the level where she normally stepped off to get to the holding cell. A strong suspicion was forming in her mind.
If there were hostile alien lifeforms anywhere in this complex, unknown and unauthorised by her, then she could think of only one place where they might be kept.
She'd never been exactly forbidden to come down to this floor, but Weyland had always made it sound like the lower floors of North were mainly engineering decks, used for the purposes of maintenance.
When the elevator stopped and the doors slid open, she was surprised to see that, rather than the long winding corridors that filled the upper floors there was hardly any distance between the elevator doors and the set of sturdy double doors with guards stationed in front of them.
As she approached the two security stepped forward "I'm sorry Ma'am," This from Marino, Rathbone's first lieutenant "We can't let you go in there. You don't have clearance to be on this floor."
"Don't be ridiculous," She bridled "I am the most senior member of the research team. I'm cleared to go everywhere on this complex."
"Not in here y'ain't, Ma'am." He was unmoved by her indignation.
"Just let me in, Marino!"
"Professor, I'm gonna have to ask you to get back in the elevator."
"I'm not going anywhere until I see what's through that door!"
"Please Ma'am you need to go back upstairs."
"I'm not leaving until either you let me in or whoever's in there comes out God damn it!" She yelled.
Normally Iversson would never behave this way – losing her temper, shouting at a fellow member of staff, even a subordinate – but this whole situation was intolerable. Her nerves were shredded. She had been the pivotal figure in conceiving, designing and building this complex; the whole project had been her baby. Now she was being undercut personally and professionally, and worse still she couldn't imagine what was so awful that they had to keep it down here, a secret even from her.
At the sound of her shouting the doors finally opened and Danzig emerged, his dark brows drawn down low, an irritable frown on his waxy face.
Iversson swivelled away from Marino and impaled her subordinate with a gimlet stare "Danzig!" She said, astonished.
"Professor."
"What are you doing in there?" She said sharply.
He looked almost petrified to see her. Despite the air of superiority he cultivated she knew he found her intimidating. Then he managed to remember not to look like a scared little rabbit and drew himself up "You're not permitted in this area." He said.
"You don't tell me where I can and can't go – I hired you!" She snapped.
"Maybe you did, but that was a long time ago. I've left you behind."
"I was leading a government unit working on matters of national security when you were still squeezing your pimples in high school biology class!"
One of the guards had to stifle a snort of laughter at this. Danzig glared up at her resentfully, having to crane his neck to look her in the eye. She realised she was actually several inches taller than him, even without the heels.
"What are you keeping in there?" She was boiling with fury.
"That's not your concern Professor." His voice was shivery with anger "Why don't you go back to playing brood mother to your crossbreed nursery upstairs?"
"Is it dangerous Danzig?" She said coldly "I hope you're taking it a lot more seriously than you take the work you do for me, because if not you risk putting all our lives on the line!"
"That's not your concern Professor, all you need to know is that I have Ms Weyland's full support."
"You went behind my back?"
"Over your head actually," He gave a sardonic little smile, recovering some of his usual arrogance "She is one hundred percent behind me. I think she feels your attitude is rather… 'old guard'? You've been rendered obsolete."
Iversson was appalled "You're making jokes?" She said "You think this is about some little internal power struggle? I've always suspected you did not really understand the sensitivity required for the work we do, but I've never realised until now how right I was!"
"Oh spare me the grade school morality lecture!" He sneered "Your problem Professor is that you don't even understand the things we can do now with technology! With hormones! I can control things in a way you never could!"
"You can't control living things that way! You're gambling with people's lives!" She all but shouted at him "We have a staff of some forty to fifty people working here, not to mention the children – they're only five years old for God's sake! If you want to play around with dangerous alien lifeforms you can't afford even one error!"
"Oh Professor," He was smiling now, seeing her in distress, thinking he now had the upper hand "You can't make new life without a little bit of collateral damage, I'd have thought you of all people would know that."
There were few things he could have said that would have hurt her more "I don't think I realised before how completely amoral you are."
"'Fear is the mother of morality' Professor, don't you know that? And I'm not afraid anymore."
"You haven't heard the end of this you stupid boy," She whispered "You had better make damn sure nothing gets past you! You had better double and triple check every detail, because if anything goes wrong – if those children get hurt in any way – I'll see to it everyone knows who's to blame. You and Weyland won't get away with this! Even if it means I go down too, I'll take you with me!"