When Hicks arrived in the burned-out corridor he looked as close as Ripley had ever seen him come to panic as his eyes swept the still-smoking human debris left in the wake of the fire. Newt spotted Ripley first, grabbing Hicks' sleeve and pointing before setting off at a run, flinging herself at Ripley so hard she was almost knocked off her feet.
Hicks hung back a little and settled for running his eyes over Ripley, scrutinising her for any damage. 'You alright?' he asked, having finally assured himself she was physically whole.
She nodded, still holding Newt close. 'It got away.'
'Damn it,' Hicks muttered, his jaw clenching. 'Can we try again?'
'It's meant for toxic waste,' Aaron spoke up. 'Once the door's closed it can't be opened again by us.'
Hicks rolled his eyes. 'Great.'
As they made their way to the mess hall, Hicks told her he'd managed to pull together some sort of perimeter alarm system, using spare parts he'd gotten from God knew where. 'Don't know how good it'll be,' he said. 'Tech stuff ain't really my thing.'
'Better than nothing,' Ripley said, seeing Dillon nod. 'Nice work.'
He shrugged. 'We're still blind all over,' he said, raising a hand as though to run it through his hair and stopping abruptly.
It was a much-reduced group that reconvened in the mess. The prisoners, less than ten of them left now, sat in various places around the mess, all their aggression was gone, leaving each man looking smaller than before. Smaller and completely alone.
Ripley remembered this moment aboard the Nostromo. After Dallas had been taken, quiet had descended, even Parker suddenly having nothing to say. She'd tried to concentrate on what they could do, trying to find a logical path that kept them all alive.
Better trained to cope with massive losses, the marines' moment of realisation had been somewhat different. Vasquez convinced until the end that they could find a way to eliminate the threat. Hudson slowly losing his mind but easily recalled to sanity when he had something to do. Hicks reluctantly taking charge much as she had; managing to keep them all afloat with a mix of softly spoken authority and unabashed faith in Ripley's ability to outwit their enemy.
Dillon was once again leading them in prayer, this time focusing on those they'd lost, but Ripley found she was having even more trouble concentrating on what he said than before. The pain in her chest was like a weight now, making her feel heavy and sluggish, the very air feeling thick as she tried to push it through her lungs.
She shot a sidelong look at Hicks, but he was caught up in a mess of wires held in his lap. Taking advantage of his distraction, she sidled up to Aaron, keeping her voice low. 'You have a neuro scanner here?' she asked.
Aaron almost laughed. 'Not a chance.' He thought for a moment. 'Doesn't your EEV have one?'
'It's on the beach,' Ripley reminded him, fighting the urge to snap at the man. The discovery that it was his IQ that had earned him his nickname had depressed rather than surprised her and he seemed keen to showcase his stupidity at every turn.
He shook his head. 'The corporal had us use the oxen to bring it in.'
Ripley glanced over at Hicks, head still bent over whatever it was he was fiddling with. She wanted to question him about that but her chest constricted painfully, robbing her of her breath. 'Where is it?' she managed to gasp.
As her voice rose, Dillon looked over at her. 'Hey, you don't look so good, sister.'
Hicks looked up, his forehead creasing in concern. He handed the wires off to Newt to untangle and rose, pausing in his step when Ripley waved him off. 'I'm fine,' she murmured.
'Who gives a shit how she looks?' Morse growled, wiping sweat out of his eyes. 'What the fuck are we gonna do?'
'Shut the fuck up and stop causing panic!' Aaron snapped, his voice rising.
'Panic? You're so goddamn stupid, you couldn't spell it!' Morse said, squaring up to Aaron. 'Don't tell me about panic! We ought to panic! We're screwed!' He shoved Aaron, sending the other man back a few steps before he surged forwards, stopped only by Hicks stepping smartly between the two.
Ripley walked away, figuring there was only one place they could have put the EEV. When she found it she was worried to see it was in a worse state than she remembered. This must have been where Hicks had gotten his spare parts, she realised, seeing gaps in the panels.
As she stripped down and climbed into the cryotube to initiate the scan, Aaron caught up with her.
'Corporal Hicks asked me to come and see if you need help with what you're doing. He's helping Dillon with the others, it got a bit… heated,' he said, keeping his eyes on the floor to avoid looking at her in her skivvies. 'Uh… what are you doing?'
'I need to use the catscan. Do me a favour and run the keyboard?'
Aaron looked at the keyboard with an expression of mild panic. 'What do I press? I don't know how to work this thing.'
'You want the bio-scan,' Ripley said. 'Should be either B or C.' She heard a quiet click as Aaron pressed one of the buttons. 'Internal bleeding will show up as a dark patch,' she said, watching the scanner start to move.
'I really don't know what I'm-' Aaron said, breaking off abruptly.
'What?' Ripley asked.
'I… I don't know how to tell you this, but…' Aaron swallowed hard. 'You've got one inside you.'
Ripley closed her eyes. Not internal bleeding, then. She should have known. 'Freeze it.'
'What?'
'Freeze the monitor. I need to see it.'
'I don't-'
'Do it!' she ordered, waiting until she heard the click of the keyboard before swinging her legs out of the tube.
She stared at the screen, her head filled with white noise as her eyes tracked over the alien, registering its shape with something akin to recognition. It was different from what she'd imagined, bigger, somehow, the head wider than the one she'd seen erupting from Kane too many times now to count.
This was it, then; after everything, it had won. It was almost a relief. Almost. As Aaron babbled away next to her she tried to assess its development but realised that was impossible. The different shape and the longer gestation seemed to point to one thing: this was a queen. She had no frame of reference for how this was going to go down.
'Lieutenant,' Aaron said, sounding as though he was repeating himself. 'Should I get Corporal Hicks?'
His insistence broke through the rushing noise in Ripley's head, leaving a wide-open space. Hicks and Newt.
'Lieutenant Ripley?' Aaron asked again.
'No,' she said quietly. She reached for her clothes, pulling them on in a daze, her eyes still locked on the frozen image of the alien embryo. 'Thanks for your help,' she muttered, pushing past Aaron and out of the EEV.
Only Dillon remained in the mess, sipping what looked like cold coffee. 'Girl was tired,' he said when he saw her. 'Your soldier took her to Andrews' office. No air conditioning in there,' he added. 'No chance that fucker can sneak up on them.'
'Right,' Ripley said. 'I've been thinking. This place is a leadworks, right?' Dillon nodded. 'I think we can use that,' she said. 'Draw it in there.'
'You want to try trapping it again?' Dillon asked sceptically.
'I want to try killing it,' she corrected. 'Can you get everybody back here in an hour?'
'They ain't gonna like it,' Dillon said.
'I don't need them to like it.' Ripley turned to leave only to find Dillon's hand on her sleeve, his touch surprisingly gentle for such a fearsome man.
'You alright?'
'You care?' she asked.
'If we're gonna fight this thing we need you,' Dillon said, withdrawing his hand. 'You need to keep your shit together.'
'Right,' Ripley said again. 'Excuse me.'
/\/\/\
When she reached Andrews' office she found it empty and panic surged through her for a moment before her eyes fell on a half-open door in the back corner of the room. She closed the office door and locked it, approaching the second door on silent feet and peering through the gap into the gloom beyond.
The anteroom was small, the cot pushed up against one wall and a chest of drawers pretty much filling the space. Newt was laying with her head in Hicks' lap, seemingly fast asleep, one of Hicks' hands held tightly in her own much smaller one and Hicks' jacket laid over her, serving as a makeshift blanket. Hicks glanced up and acknowledged her with a slight smile before turning his attention quickly back to Newt. Ripley watched them from the doorway, feeling her heart stutter against her ribs as Newt screwed her face up, her tiny body tensing as a nightmare took hold. Hicks raised his free hand and ran it over Newt's shaven head gently. Ripley could hear him murmuring softly, his tone comforting even though she couldn't make out the words.
After a moment Newt quieted, her hand loosening around Hicks' as she fell into a deeper sleep. Ripley felt her throat constrict as she watched them, tears she couldn't shed burning her eyes. Her gut twisted painfully, her mind momentarily consumed with the idea that they could so easily have not been here with her. If Hicks had come out of cryo even minutes later that support beam would have run him through and Newt would have drowned, seawater flooding her cryotube as she slept. The treacherous thought occurred that maybe that would have been easier than having to tell the girl this.
Satisfied the girl was calm, Hicks looked up at Ripley, tilting his head to indicate the space beside him. Ripley shook her head, forcing herself to smile back and jerking a thumb over her shoulder, stepping back into the main office.
Moments later, Hicks slipped through the door, closing it behind himself and looking up at her curiously. Close to, she could see he had the beginnings of a bruise on his cheek. Ripley raised an eyebrow at him. 'What happened to you?'
'S'nothin'.'
'Hicks-'
'Conversation with that guy… Morse?' She nodded. 'Got out of hand.' He shrugged. 'I took care of it.'
Ripley's brows knit together but she didn't press. 'Newt okay?' she said instead. 'She's sleeping a lot.'
'Cryo's still messing with her,' Hicks shrugged, adding, 'She's worried about you.'
'Dillon's gathering everyone that's left in the mess in an hour,' she said, ignoring the leading comment and accompanying look in his eyes. 'I've got a new idea.'
Hicks looked curious. 'What idea?'
'Something you said, actually. The leadworks. If we can get it in there I think we've got a pretty good shot at killing it. We've certainly got the bait.'
He looked at her for a moment before realisation dawned. 'You mean us.'
Ripley nodded. 'If we can draw it in we can drown it in lead.'
Hicks looked dubious, crossing his arms over his chest and then hastily uncrossing them, stretching the left out. 'I don't know…' he drawled. 'It's pretty risky.'
'Riskier than doing nothing? We need to kill it before the company gets here; before it kills all of us. I need you to work with Dillon, assign whoever's left along the route.'
He cocked his head, looking at her intently. 'Newt told me what happened in the infirmary. Dillon said it happened again in the fire. It was this close to you and then it just left. What does that mean?'
She couldn't do it, she realised. With him standing there, looking every bit as battered and vulnerable as she felt, she couldn't tell him. So she kissed him, pressing him back into the wall, her fingers finding the hem of his shirt and yanking it upwards, slipping her hand beneath it to find the heat of his skin.
'Hey,' he pulled back and gently took hold of her hand. When she met his gaze he gave her a lopsided smile. 'Not sure this is the right time.'
Ripley gave a hollow laugh. 'This might be the only time.'
Hicks seemed to consider that, his eyes searching her face intently for a moment. Then, slowly, he bent his head and kissed her, hands finding her waist and turning them both so he was the one pressing her into the wall. Absurdly, she suddenly felt safer, as though being trapped between Hicks and the wall could protect her from the monster inside her own body. As his hands moved over her she realised how bruised she was. She'd been so focused on moving forward, on keeping them alive, that she hadn't had time to give much thought to the crash landing.
No time.
Abruptly, Hicks' hands felt too gentle, so she gripped his shirt, yanking his body flush against hers and hearing him grunt softly as the impact jarred the wounds on his chest.
'You sure about this?' he asked, slightly breathless.
She gave him a sardonic look and he grinned, dipping his head to kiss her again, his hands sliding under her oversized shirt. All too soon, he broke the kiss, smirking at Ripley's growl of frustration as he leaned his forehead against hers. 'We're gonna make it,' he murmured.
She met his steady gaze, seeing just how much he believed what he was saying and found she couldn't tell him why he was wrong, the words sticking in her throat. Instead, she nodded, her fingers tightening at the back of his neck, pulling him back to her.
'You, me and Newt,' he said, dropping his head and murmuring the last words against her neck, just below her ear. 'I don't give a damn about the rest of them.'
/\/\/\
Afterwards, she left Hicks to wake Newt and bring her to the mess, saying there was something she needed to do before meeting them all in the mess. Something in her was appalled at her own cowardice in running away from him, but the idea of telling him - of telling Newt - exhausted her more than she'd thought possible. It hurt, and the hurt was a dull ache that even the time they'd spent in quiet desperation in Andrews' office could only hold at bay for so long.
A lifetime ago she'd been brave enough to ask and he'd been brave enough to promise he'd take care of her if this happened but now it came to it she couldn't bring herself to even tell him. She needed him to take care of Newt - he couldn't be the one to do it, no matter how much more merciful it might have been. Luckily, he didn't have to, she realised, the thought forcing a grim smile onto her face.
She couldn't ask him to do it and the fucking alien wouldn't do it, but that didn't matter. Not when they were surrounded by men who took pride in reminding her that they were killers.
Ripley found Dillon in the cellblock, head bent in prayer. 'That ever work?' she asked, peering at him through the bars as she made her way into the cell.
He looked up at her, seemingly unsurprised at her presence, and she figured he must have heard her coming. 'You ever try it?'
'It won't kill me,' she said.
Dillon raised his eyebrows at her change in topic. 'I saw that,' he said.
'It won't kill me because it knows I've got one inside me,' she told him, finding it surprisingly easy to keep her voice steady. 'It's a queen.'
He stood. 'How do you know this thing's inside you?'
'I saw it,' Ripley said, swallowing past a dry throat. 'On the catscan. It's a queen. An egg layer. It can make thousands like the one that's running around out there.' She glanced over her shoulder then looked back at him, her eyes sharp. 'It won't kill me, and I can't do what I should…'
She watched as realisation dawned. Dillon held up his hands. 'No,' he said, glaring at her. 'I took vows.'
'I don't give a shit about your vows.'
'Get your marine to do it.'
'I can't ask him to do that,' she said quietly. 'Please, Dillon. The company wants it but I've seen these things in action. If they get it off-world it'll wipe out the universe.'
He shook his head, his expression set. 'I don't like losin' a fight. Not to nobody, not to nothin'. That damn thing out there's already killed half my men, got the other half scared shitless.' His voice softened slightly. 'As long as it's alive, sister, you're not gonna save any universe.'
'You're not hearing me!' Ripley snapped.
Dillon's head jerked up, his gaze focusing beyond her just as she heard the footsteps. At the sound of Hicks' voice her eyes fell closed.
'Ripley? What's goin' on?'
She turned, seeing he was alone. 'Where's Newt?'
'With Aaron,' he said. 'You wanna tell me what's going on here?' he asked, glancing from her to Dillon.
Ripley opened her mouth but no words came.
'She's got one inside her,' Dillon said.
Green eyes flashed to hers, looking for confirmation before falling shut. 'How?'
'Onboard the Sulaco,' she said, the words easier now. 'I think it's what triggered the evacuation. It came off, got damaged, bled into the floor. It's the only explanation I can-'
'Stop,' Hicks ordered, opening his eyes and locking them on hers.
Ripley shook her head urgently. 'This is happening,' she said, her voice stronger. 'Hicks... Dwayne-'
'Don't,' he cut her off, his voice suddenly hoarse.
'You said you'd help me. If it came to this you said you'd help me.'
'We still have time.'
'For what?' She laughed incredulously. 'There's nothing we can do.'
He glared at her. 'I don't know. Something. The rescue ship-'
'Won't be here for days,' she said, trying to gentle her voice. 'And even then, you know they won't kill it.'
Hicks stared at her, his mouth opening and closing as though he was trying to speak and couldn't. Always quiet, but she'd never had the impression he couldn't find words before now.
Dillon stepped forward, breaking their impasse. 'Nobody's killing nobody until that thing is dead,' he growled. The way you and him tell it, you've survived twice. We need you to help us kill it, sister.' Ripley rounded on him, ready to argue, but he held up a hand, stalling her. 'I wanna get this thing, and I need you to do it. And if it won't kill you, then maybe that helps us fight it.'
She slumped against the bars, resignation washing through her. 'Alright,' she said, straightening. 'We waste this thing, then you take care of me,' she said, keeping her eyes on Dillon and ignoring Hicks' stare.
Dillon nodded. 'No problem. Quick, easy and painless.'
Ripley pushed away from the bars. 'Then let's go get this fucker.'
