The relief that washed over him was so great that Hicks felt lightheaded. Although it had been such a tiny sound, barely audible, there was no mistake in the message or from where it had originated. The small form on the bed was as motionless as before, but the pale lips trembled and he could hear her moan weakly. He had reached her, but if it was because of the use of her birth-name or if she had been lured by the all the shouting, he couldn't tell. It could just as well have been her body starting up by itself when the life-support was disconnected – Hicks didn't know and frankly; he didn't care! The girl was coming to and that was all that mattered.

Bishop looked like he experienced the same kind of relief that Hicks did - Colonel Decker had at least the dignity to look surprised while Dr. Roman was astonished. She stepped closer towards the bed to check on the child, but Hicks would have none of that.

"Get back!" he barked, not wanting to risk anybody ruin the moment of awakening. Roman complied, but with a grim look that would kill the man instantly if she had the power to do so. Decker remained where he stood, watching silently.

Newt's breathing sped up erratically; she coughed, the long time of immobility and pain finally catching up. Hicks stroked her hair, speaking gently to her to calm her down. He knew this would have gone easier had it been Ripley speaking to the child instead of him, but the woman wasn't there, so it was up to him to make the girl feel safe. Somehow, she found comfort with Hicks as she began to relax, her breathing becoming more regular and steady. Slowly she opened her eyes, gazing up to the familiar face. Hicks gave her his warmest smile, greeted her, and then asked how she felt. Her jaw was shaking now, and there was still only a faint whisper escaping her trembling lips. Hicks strained to hear them, as he leaned closer to the young face.

"I… f-feel… terri…b-ble." Although she struggled to make herself heard, her voice could at the moment not become anything more than a very weak whisper. But Hicks was happy that she was able to speak, as well that she was even willing to speak to him at all.

"It's only temporary," he told her. Don't worry Newt; everything is going to be fine. I promise."

"What… happened?" She gazed worryingly at the adult. "Where's… Ripley? Why isn't... she here?"

Hicks' smile fell off his face and he felt heartache as he realized the inevitable outcome of her question. (Which was just a figure of speech since his heart was now artificial.) Didn't he just say that everything was going to be fine? How could he have been so stupid? Just a moment ago he had told Colonel Decker that he wouldn't tell lies to the girl, and yet he had just unintentionally done so. He prayed that she would understand and forgive him later after he found a good way to explain Ripley's death. But finding a way seemed quite impossible. Whatever he would come up with would never ease the unavoidable pain that would come. He clenched his jaw (which gave him a jolt of pain streaming through his cheeks) and he swallowed a large portion of air. This was going to hurt much more than the injuries he'd sustained…

"I'm sorry, Newt. She's… Ripley is…" Hicks choked on the words, he couldn't utter them. But he didn't need to. The little girl understood what he was trying to say, her face fell and the eyes widened as the horrible truth hit her. Her lower lip trembled again, but for a different reason this time.

"…Dead…?" The question was no more than a whisper. The adult nodded slowly and dejectedly in confirmation.

"…How? How can she be dead?" Newt demanded, close to the tears. "She promised that she would…!" Newt stopped as she felt a stab of pain in her chest.

"Take it easy, Newt," Hicks quickly tried to calm her, placing his hand on her small shoulder. "Your chest took quite some damage in the crash. You must remain still to let it heal."

"What crash? What happened? I thought we were going to Earth?" Although the voice was tiny by weakness it was filled with accusation and betrayal. "Ripley promised that she would stay with me! I thought she lo..." She caught herself before finishing the sentence.

Bishop stepped up alongside the bed. "Ripley would never have abandoned you, Newt," the synthetic told her gently, trying to save the trust the child had felt for the woman and which was now beginning to falter. "She loved you very much. I can guarantee you that."

Newt looked up at the android. "Is that… Bishop?"

"I was just as surprised as you, kid," Hicks answered with a smile. Unfortunately the child would not return it. Bishop's new look wasn't enough to deviate the girl's mind from the loss of Ripley and she definitely wasn't prepared to let the matter drop just yet - she looked intensively at Hicks in a way that was far from childish.

"You still haven't told me what happened. Why is she dead?" she demanded again. "How?" The sharp look in her eyes clearly declared that she wouldn't settle with anything less than the absolute truth. It actually frightened the adult. She may have the body of a child, but her mind was far more grown – a development that had been forced upon her witnessing the horrors of life with the slaughter of her people. Hicks wondered if this little girl could ever go back being a child again or if that road had been permanently blocked behind her. He understood that he had to answer her in the ways of adulthood, but he still wanted to try to sugarcoat it a little.

That's when it dawned on him that he actually didn't know the exact circumstances around Ripley's death either. He knew nothing besides the fact that the EEV had crash-landed on Fiorina 161, killing almost everybody aboard. Hicks suddenly felt like a fool. So deeply immersed in his own hospitalized predicament, so busy trying to figure out how to deliver the bad news as gently as possible to Newt that he had forgotten that he himself knew nothing of what had transpired in between from when he had been sedated onboard the dropship back on LV-426 and to this moment. The crew of the Hercules had so far not been very forthcoming, and Bishop had not had the time to tell him anything. Therefore it was as big a shock for Hicks as it was for Newt when Colonel Decker suddenly and straightforwardly told them the real cause for Ripley's death.

"She was infested with an alien. And to prevent the Company from getting their hands on it, she jumped into a vat of molten steel and incinerated herself." He delivered this coldly and without mitigation. No more sounds escaped Newt's mouth, she only became deadly still. Then she closed her tear-filled eyes and turned away, crying silently. Hicks thought of trying to comfort her, but he instinctively sensed that the girl needed to be alone since she'd turned her back to him. And he would respect that. If she needed him, then he would let her approach him on her own terms. Instead Hicks got up slowly from the floor, not averting his hateful glare from Colonel Decker. Bishop moved slowly closer again; preparing to hold the marine corporal back if he decided to go frenzy on the other. Hicks' scarred face wrinkled in rage, but he remained where he stood. The colonel's pose didn't change either; instead he only locked eyes with the lesser-ranked soldier. The atmosphere was tense.

"Have you never heard of being a bit more sensitive?"

"Sensitive?" Decker sneered at the word. "Who do you think you're talking to? Besides, from my point of view you didn't seem to find the words that needed to be said. You should thank me."

"Thank you?" Hicks couldn't believe that the colonel could even say such a thing in a situation like this. "That was cruel! And it was unnecessary! I wanted to try to spare her immediate pain, but you… you only throw it at her without any tactfulness at all! "

"She seems to handle it quite well. And why avoid the truth?"

"She's only a child, damn it! I don't know what you want her for or what you even want with me, but if she's going to stay healthy, you go easy on her! Do you get me?"

"Are you questioning my authority, Corporal?"

"As far as the girl is concerned, yes I do! I'm sure even the good doctor here finds your methods inappropriate." He indicated to Roman, but she did not seem interested in seconding Hicks' opinion.

"Do you think I would care, Corporal?" Decker answered coldly.

Hicks hesitated for a moment. He knew the true answer, and that was what made him mad. "No. You don't care. That's why I hate you. That's why I always hated you!"

Decker didn't change his expression one bit, and Hicks knew that there was no point continuing the discussion. He had lost the argument, knowing that to try to convince the colonel what was right or wrong was futile, as it always had been. Defeated, he moved back to Newt's side. He found her looking almost pleadingly at him, trying to form a word.

"…Water…" she whispered. Roman who had been quiet during the whole argument went over to the sink and fetched a mug that she filled up from the tap. But as she came over with it, Hicks was quick to take it from her. He was still unwilling to let that woman come near the child, especially since she had just disconnected the life-support without even questioning the decision. That had made the medtech untrustworthy in his book. Obviously as a doctor, Roman had neglected to take the oath of saving lives. Hicks brought the mug to Newt's mouth to help her drink the water. She sipped it almost greedily. But suddenly she grimaced in agony and clutched her chest again that had heaved a little too much when she had swallowed.

"It hurts! Why does my chest hurt?" she whimpered, and Hicks' heart began to ache again. It was bad enough with the girl having to deal with Ripley's death; he didn't want to tell her about the autopsy.

"You were badly injured in the crash, honey. You will need to take it quite easy for a while until it heals."

Newt looked at him with her none-childlike eyes once more. "There's something you're not telling me." Hicks almost swore aloud. This little girl could see right through him as if he was but a simple pane of glass. So unlike any child he'd ever met – it was no wonder that Ripley had grown to love her.

"That's because I don't know the whole story myself," Hicks said, giving in. "I don't want to give you any false assumptions with only half the truth, so I rather not say anything at all. If only I knew everything that has happened, then I would tell you."

"Then allow me to tell it," Bishop said. "I know everything." The android actually looked proud under all the metal-plates that reinforced his cranial structure. Hicks wondered if he really was programmed to do that. He decided to worry about that later though - the tale of their present situation was much more important.

"In that case, maybe we should go somewhere else to talk about this, Bishop."

"No!" Newt objected. "I want to hear it too!" There was a determination in her voice that Hicks surrendered to. Motioning Bishop closer, he asked the android to tell them the story.

"I better start from after I had sedated you back on the dropship," Bishop began. "You already understand that Ripley was successful in retrieving Newt from the complex. What you don't know is that they were pursued by a gigantic alien creature."

"A queen," Newt informed Hicks. "We saw it down there. That ugly thing laid eggs all over the place. Guess we somehow managed to anger it."

"It managed to hitch a ride back to the Sulaco," Bishop went on. "She had hidden inside a strut bay and emerged just when we all thought we were safe and sound."

"'Close encounter with an alien hitch-hiker'," Hicks filled in, remembering Bishop's words. "That was when you got damaged."

"That's right. She tore me in two pieces, making me a hapless heap on the deck. Anyway, Ripley took a fight with it with a power-loader."

"With a power-loader?"

"You should have seen it." Even though Newt was struggling to handle the loss, there was a tone of pride when she explained the action that had taken place at that time. "She beat it silly, knocked it down a pit in the floor and threw it out into space like it was nothing but a sack of garbage."

Hicks knew that the girl probably exaggerated a bit, but it was normal coming from a juvenile's memory mixed with some childish fantasy. But he was not about to argue against it; he only nodded in acknowledgment. "I really wish I had seen it, kid."

Bishop resumed the story. "Ripley got rid of it alright, and then we all went to sleep for our journey home. But until now, none of us knew that the queen had unfortunately left behind a 'gift'. During our flight from the planet to the Sulaco, the queen took her time to lay an egg inside the strut bay where she had hidden."

"She what?" Newt gasped.

"The scanning-crew that searched through the Sulaco after its somehow delayed arrival back to Earth confirmed it. It was empty. It had obviously hatched after our departure from LV-426 and the facehugging parasite found its way to the sleeping chambers. It managed to cause some damage, because the flight-recorder contain reports of a fire and a gas-leak which resulted in a potential risk of danger to us. That's why we were ejected from the ship and brought to the closest planet, which happened to be Fiorina 161: the prison planet. Unfortunately the alien came with us and damaged the EEV-unit as well. We came down hard in the ocean… killing the both of you."

Both Newt and Hicks were quiet, absorbing all the events with almost dread.

"You Hicks got impaled by a support strut that had come loose. Newt's tube had somehow been breached opened, enabling seawater to pour in. She drowned. I was smashed beyond repair."

"God…" Hicks breathed out.

Newt looked extremely troubled, as if the knowledge of drowning haunted her somehow. But then she asked carefully: "And… Ripley was really infested with one of… them?"

"Yes," Bishop confirmed solemnly. Newt's eyes began to brim again, and Hicks tried to sooth her while Bishop continued: "There's a real interesting theory going on concerning this particular facehugger… it was automatically scanned by the systems of the Sulaco as well as of the EEV, and the scientists of the Company reviewing the data have concluded that this was of a special brand we haven't encountered before: an advanced type of parasite. It did not carry one, but two embryos for implantation. One was a queen – the other an embryo of a drone that would ensure the safety of the primary organism. Ripley was implanted with the queen embryo… as for the other alien, I don't know how or where it found a host, but suffice to say is it broke loose in the prison-facility and killed just about every inmate save for one. Ripley managed to corner and destroy it, but shortly afterwards she jumped into a vat of molten steel and killed herself to prevent the queen from being born. Colonel Decker was completely truthful about that. Several Company representatives who'd arrived on the scene witnessed it all, Dr. Roman included."

Newt sobbed now and Hicks hugged her, holding her tightly to his body. "Maybe we should stop now," he said to Bishop, wanting to spare her.

"W-wait…" Newt whispered from Hicks' chest where her face was half-buried. "If we died… then how come we are here now?"

"That's right." Hicks realized what Newt wanted to say. "We're here now and alive. So who claims that we were dead?"

"Technically you were. But military protocol had one more trick up its sleeve. Even though the cryotubes were breached, they were still in functioning order. You do know that the human brain survives six minutes after the body has expired, don't you? That's what saved you. The machines registered a complete failure in all of your body-functions and in order to preserve you, the sleeper pods injected a special compound into your brains to keep you from deteriorating. The inmates of Fiorina took you immediately to the morgue where you were put on ice, sustaining your bodies."

"Really? I didn't know about that gimmick."

"You're really lucky that it worked. Our crash became its trial-run. It was kept classified so that no one would neglect the regular security checks when using the sleepers thinking that it would save them."

"T-there's still something I don't get," Newt whispered, still weeping from the shock of her protector's death. "If I only drowned, then why am I hurting so much in my chest?"

Bishop hesitated and Hicks looked troubled by the question. "Newt, don't worry about that now. I'll tell you when you feel bett…"

"TELL ME! I want to know! Please?"

"Ripley had an autopsy conducted on you," Bishop confessed sounding embarrassed, why ever now he should be embarrassed about something he wasn't responsible for.

"What's an autopsy?" she asked with a disturbed feeling evident on her young face.

"An operation doctors perform on dead bodies to determine the cause of death," Bishop said. "Apparently she thought that you were the one that had been infested by the alien."

"She had probably gone quite confused and couldn't think straight after the crash," Hicks immediately intervened. "I know she wouldn't do that to you under any other circumstances. The shock of our deaths made her crazy, isn't that so, Bishop?" Hicks stared at Bishop with a face that was to tell the android to agree with him. Ripley may be dead, but the girl's faith in her didn't need to be destroyed. Bishop on the other hand didn't need to be convinced.

"I have reason to believe that she most likely did suffer a psychological disorder after the crash. From what I have uncovered, she acted quite irrational back on the prison-planet, considering the cremation and all."

"What cremation?" Hicks asked.

"She wanted your bodies destroyed. She insisted on it, even though regulations dictated that your bodies were to be kept on ice and later brought back to Earth. That's an interesting part of the story, actually. I will recite a communiqué that was sent to Weyland-Yutani from the prison:

FURY 16-CLASS C PRISON UNIT, FIORINA

IMPERATIVE TO EMERG. EVAC. RIPLEY, LT.-CO IMMEDIETLY. CIVILIAN CAUSING DISORDER. UNAUTHORIZED AUTOPSY PERFORMED ON DECEASED CHILD, CREMATION OF BODIES REQUESTED AGAINST JURISTICTION.

COMPANY ORDERS STANDS, BODIES SEALED IN VACUUM COMPARTMENTS UNTIL EXTRACTION. MEDICAL REPORT FROM MED. OFFICER CLEMENS ATTACHED.

MUST INSIST ON EVAC OF RIPLEY A.S.A.P.-

AWAIT RESPONSE SUPT. ANDREWS M51021.

"I did a background search of this Superintendent Andrews who was the warden of Fury 16. He was a man who didn't like to make mistakes as he feared it would add to a prolonged service for him on Fiorina. It appears that he and a Dr. Clemens staged a coup to keep Ripley in check."

"You mean they tricked her," Hicks concluded.

"In a manner of speaking," Bishop confirmed. "I will not recite the whole medical report that was attached; this Medical Officer Clemens was not as brief and formal as the warden was. From what I could determine, Ripley requested an autopsy with reason to exclude death of a contagion of cholera. She claimed that the personnel on LV-426 had experimented with all kinds of mutated bacterial and viral strains that had gotten loose and spread. That's why according to her cover story the combat team nuked the colony."

"That's preposterous!" Hicks snapped. "What made her come up with such a ridiculous thing?"

"You have to remember that Ripley didn't want to reveal a thing about the xenomorphs. However Dr. Clemens was thinking in the same line that you do. I did a background on him as well: before he was convicted and sentenced to prison he was part of teams of physical and psychological examiners that evaluated the preconditions of colonists that were to leave Earth to settle on new locations. He knew that no terra-forming colony would ever be subjected to undertake such a research, especially if there were families and children involved with them. Clemens therefore knew Ripley had lied, but his scientific curiosity made him take measures to try to determine what the real story behind her deception was. In agreement with Supt. Andrews who didn't want to overstep his own boundaries, Clemens arranged for your bodies to be sealed inside two vacuum-compartments until pick-up. And to make sure that Ripley wouldn't snoop around and cause more problems, they agreed to her request of cremating your remains. A funeral took place and Ripley saw your two body-bags fall into the molten steel and burn. But the body bags were in reality and unbeknownst to her filled with scrap. Shortly after that the alien broke loose and massacred everybody. Your bodies remained forgotten in the morgue afterwards for three years until now."

"Three years?! Has it been that long?! We weren't picked up until after three years?!"

"I'm afraid we were all deemed non-essential and worthless when the last creature was destroyed. The fact that the drug injected into your brains made it possible to revive you was nothing that even concerned the Company representatives present. I dare to guess that they were so distraught over the loss of the creature that they just left the premises never caring about us all together."

"So why this sudden change of heart then?" Hicks asked, throwing his arms out. "Why did they decide to pick us up now if they don't care about us?"

"I have discovered that the Company…"

"That's enough, Robot!" They all turned to the harsh voice. They had totally forgotten about Colonel Decker who had stood there listening during Bishop's entire story. Decker walked up to Bishop and spoke directly to his face.

"You have stuck your diodes into business that doesn't concern you and it will be my pleasure to report this back to the Company authorities when we get back to Earth. I'll enjoy the moment when they wipe your mind as punishment and reduce you to a simple toaster oven. Now, I couldn't care less about the information you've been spilling to these two so far, that data is not vital to my work. But I will not have you revealing information of this mission to them without my authority! I decide if they have a need to know! Is that clear, Robot?"

"Quite clear, Sir," Bishop complied. But he really wished that the colonel would stop referring to him as a 'robot'. Although damaged and rebuilt, Bishop was still far more sophisticated than a mindless automaton, but Decker made it sound like the synthetic was an inferior even to that with all of his jeering description of the other. Although Bishop wasn't programmed to express attitudes, there were some emotional protocols included in his database to allow him to better fit in with human companions. But ever since his program had been downloaded into the EEV's flight-recorder, his emotional protocols seemed to have taken a more active role within his thought-matrix. Bishop actually felt insulted by Decker's scoffs. And he wasn't the only one who felt insulted…

"And by your definitions, we don't have a 'need-to-know', is that the way it is?" Hicks did not try to hide his contempt. "I'm perfectly fine with being a soldier - but I never could stand those covert-operations or secret objectives! I want to be sure that the missions I am to carry out are for a just cause! I refuse to be part of some dirty games that some sleazy Company executives might come up with; I had enough of that with that slime-ball Carter Burke! We're not pawns to be played with – I demand to know what this is about!"

"You are in position to demand nothing!" Decker retorted with an icy tone. "Secret mission or not: your job is to carry out your duty anyhow! No more, no less!"

"I'm declared dead, Colonel! That means I'm not obliged to carry out any orders! And I'm smart enough to know that you won't just dispose of us after all the trouble you had to get us, that would most likely jeopardize whatever mission this is. Otherwise we wouldn't even be here! So I'm asking again, what's this about?"

"On the contrary Corporal, it is in your best interest to oblige if you ever want to be 'alive' again!"

"So we're down to blackmail now?" Hicks was both outraged and disgusted.

"You would rather call it an ultimatum!" Decker shifted his gaze over towards Newt and then back to Hicks, and finally he laid his arms akimbo over his chest and huffed. "Very well, but only because you would get to know about it later anyway… You have been resuscitated for one reason only: to guide and assist us in our mission back to LV-426, or Acheron as the colonists named it, to gather new specimens of the alien species!"

"You're mad…!" Hicks gasped in shock. Newt's expression in her face told that she was thinking the same thing as him. But Hicks quickly regained his composure.

"You're wasting your time," he explained calmly, even smiling. "The thermo-nuclear explosion obliterated every last one. There are no more that anybody can get any hands on."

"Unfortunately that's not entirely true," Bishop then said in a strangely capitulated tone.

"What do you mean? They were all vaporized when the atmosphere processor blew, weren't they?"

"The ones that resided under the station, yes," Bishop confirmed. "But I tried to tell you that the Company has managed to patch in to the planetary deep-space relay satellite of Acheron. It survived the explosion and it is equipped with a long-range camera to scan the surface from its orbit. It detected that the original source of the species is still intact."

"Original source?" Hicks asked confused. "What kind of a source is that?" But it was Newt who with sudden dread understood what Bishop meant. "The ship!" she gasped out. The downed derelict that her family had found! The one her parents had entered and they had come out of it with that horrible thing on her father's face. Newt shuddered all over as she recalled that memory.

"Wasn't that also destroyed in the explosion?" Hicks asked, feeling some of Newt's dread getting to him as well. It was Decker who answered.

"No, it wasn't," he said flashing one of his rare smiles again. Hicks hated when he did that. "The Company determined that its hull must be of a unique alloy. And if it survived, then there's a good chance that the cargo of alien eggs did also. We're going in there to get them."

"NO! Y-you can't!" Newt shouted. "They'll kill us all!"

"They won't have that chance," Decker said all imperturbable to her outburst. "We have the means to subdue them."

"But they can't be!" Newt argued. "They're too strong to contain! We tried!"

"You tried and failed because you weren't prepared for them," Decker went on still as imperturbable. "But you should know what to expect now, since you survived a long time to learn all that you know about them. Your experience with the aliens will be invaluable to our objective."

Newt sank back under her sheets with a knot in her stomach. Her experience! Knowledge she involuntarily had to pick up after weeks of hiding from the monsters in the complex that used to be her home. It had never occurred to her before, but she was the only person alive now who knew the most about the aliens: behavior, strength, and appearances. Practically she knew just about everything about them from the eye-perspective. She understood that it was this knowledge that had drafted her into this mad plot and there seemed to be no hope of escape. She hated the aliens more than anything else in the whole universe, and now this madman was about to make her face them again. Hicks objected loudly to this.

"You can't force her to go back there! It'll kill her!"

"She's going! And so are you. If you want to be in charge of her protection, then you got it."

"Right, and the best protection for her is back on Earth - without the aliens! We will not participate in any way with this! You hear me, Colonel?"

"You seem to conveniently have suddenly forgotten that you and the brat are officially dead! On Earth you're lives won't be worth spit. As I said: it is in your best interest to oblige. If you don't, you'll never be 'alive' again. You will never even see Earth again, I'll see to that."

"YOU BLOODY…!" Hicks began to shout, but then he silenced. Insulting Colonel Decker would not improve the situation one bit. The risk was greater that it would only make matters much worse than they already were.

"You had better resume your rest, because you will go down there whether you're healthy enough or not! There will be no exception to the rule." Decker's words were a finality to the whole exchange of words and outbursts. Considering the discussion ended, he turned on his heel and left. Dr. Roman had been gone since a long time; no one had seen her leave. Hicks was left beside Newt's bed where he trembled with anger and despair; he couldn't believe that the Company could be so cruel to blackmail them to do this.

But they had no choice. Being dead meant being erased from the records, no social number anymore to give them a decent life on Earth. The Company could recall that, but only if all of them cooperated. Otherwise there was no problem for Colonel Decker to jettison all of them out in space. No one would question his actions because officially they weren't even aboard the Hercules. Decker probably would do it too, if he found anyone of them to be of no further use. Hicks looked over at Bishop: the android looked apologetic. He looked over at Newt: the little girl probably couldn't understand all of what has happened, but he saw that she knew that she was as trapped as he. He sat down at her side, draped an arm around her slim shoulders and hugged her to him. She only stared straight ahead, looking at an invisible spot somewhere in the room. There's was so much he wanted to say to her, try to explain, to reassure her somehow. But there was nothing he could say that ever would do that, nothing could be assured; right now not even their own future. All he could say to her was: "I'm sorry."

"My throat's dry again," She replied quietly.

"I'll get you some more water," Bishop said and went towards the tap. Newt finally raised her head, locking her eyes with Hicks'. No one said anything to the other, but there was a full understanding between the two. They both knew that it would have been better if they had remained dead and abandoned on Fiorina 161.

Author's notes: It is not established how the egg got aboard the Sulaco in the movies – I choose this explanation as it is the one I like best and because I feel the simplest solutions are sometimes the best. And I do think that Ripley was acting quite irrational and was not herself in Alien3, so I adapted that into my story. I'm not really fond of the idea of a 'Queen facehugger' carrying two embryos – but it appears to have been established as canon, so I have given in.