Private Emma Bohr stared out the window of the rising elevator. She could see nothing but a rising skyline of skyscrapers dominating the horizon. The setting sun glinted off the tall buildings, radiating a look that was at the same time both so obviously artificial yet beautifully eclectic. In spite of herself, it took her breath away. This was nothing like what she was used to back in her time. Pollution was on the rise again, and hardly a day went by without the sky being shrouded in a dense layer of haze from a variety of pollutants. But this, this was so different. She smiled to herself. So this is what it looks like when the sun goes down...she thought.

However, the beauty surrounding her was a distraction she could not afford. They had come here – to Weyland Yutani's headquarters – for a purpose. She had to remain sharp just in case one of them slipped up and revealed their true intentions. After all, it must have been plain luck that had got them this far. After they had landed, national immigration authorities had questioned them about their port of embarkation and had also requested their vehicle registration number. Call had replied that they were complete foreigners to earth – giving the explanation that they were born in another system – not earth's. Velko had said that the vehicle registration number had expired so they were in the transition period of acquiring a new one. Bohr had simply remained silent, yet nervous. Miraculously, with little fuss, they had let the three of them go through.

They had spent the past twenty-four hours in transit around the country – their target destination being Weyland Yutani. And finally, they had got there.

Bohr continued to gaze at the ochre-colored sky through the glass. Call caught that look and said, 'Don't think it's always like this - this illusion of beauty. It's all a mask to hide humanity's wounds and scars. The past isn't any better than the future.'

A bell rang softly, indicating that they had reached their chosen floor.

As Call walked out in front of them, Velko shot Bohr a look and whispered, 'Guess she didn't get much sleep either.'

They emerged into a large hall of sorts, with grandiose furniture, elaborate decorations and a thick maroon carpet covering the floor. It all culminated to a large teak counter, behind which were several receptionists, working furiously attending to calls and customers.

Velko looked around him and whistled softly. 'Makes you wonder what a nice company like this wants to do with alien organisms, huh.'

'I nail it down to some seriously screwed up extra-curricular activities.' spoke Bohr.

Call turned around to face them. Her face looked drawn, tired. She looked and behaved as human as any of them. 'Alright, you two. This is where it gets tricky. Don't ask any questions, and just follow my lead. You got that?'

Bohr nodded. Velko didn't say anything. He wondered why Call didn't offer any explanations for what she was about to do – whatever it was. It made him all the more suspicious of her actions. But he could do nothing for the moment except play along.

Call walked up to a receptionist and smiled. Velko was surprised by a marked change in her demeanor. She had made a remarkable transition from the worried do-gooder to the time-restrained professional. Her eyes had lost that tired look, her face had become sharper, more alert and her smile was simply a formality, nothing more. Quite the actress, he thought.

'I've recently signed on to purchase some shares from your company. I'd like some access to my personal account – a computer terminal preferably.' said Call. The way she said it, it didn't sound like a request – more like an order.

'I'm sorry ma'am, but you'll have to get a number, and wait in the queue just like everyone else. This is the only investor relations section in this building that deals directly with customers who buy our shares, so it can get pretty busy. I do apologize for any inconvenience caused.' The receptionist appeared harried. The last thing he looked like he wanted was an unhappy customer.

'I'm sorry, I don't think you understand. I've purchased shares from your organism investigations division.'

The receptionist cleared his throat, and shifted on his feet uncomfortably. 'Ma'am,' he began, 'to my knowledge, there is no organism investigation division. You must have the wrong company. Weyland Yutani only deals with producing different energy sources...'

'I don't think I'm the one who's in the wrong here,' she said curtly. 'Two days ago I bought five percent of your shares from your organisms division,' she waved her hand about in the air, as if she was impatient, 'and now you tell me that you have no such division? What kind of a company is this?' The loudness of her voice grew. People around her were beginning to stare. Velko and Bohr shuffled around awkwardly – the scene Call was causing wouldn't exactly fall under discreet bahavior.

Suddenly, from Call's right, a man – dressed differently from the receptionists stepped forward and intervened. 'What seems to be the problem, Bill?'

The receptionist turned in relief to the gentleman next to Call and spoke in hushed tones to him – apparently explaining the situation. His eyes widened suddenly, and he immediately brushed the receptionist away and began apologizing to Call. 'I'm terribly sorry Ma'am, some of our staff are er...unaware of our business. Through no fault of their training, I assure you.' He lowered his voice. 'You're referring to our research section – of extraterrestrial organisms, of course. We don't exactly call it the organism investigation division, but you came close. These matters – more personal to our firm – are kept higher up in the chain of command.'

'I don't want explanations of your social hierarchy, I want a computer console. I need to access my personal account. In private.'

The man didn't hesitate. It wasn't often when people strolled in and purchased five percent of the company's shares. That was a significant amount – but still, it was strictly business and nothing to be extremely shocked about. But if a customer did so from the organism investigations division – that was a whole other ball game. This division was relatively unknown. And people privileged enough to know about it were very important and valuable to the company. He nodded as he smiled, 'Right this way please.'

He looked surprised when Velko and Bohr followed Call, and was about to say something when Call explained that she went nowhere without her bodyguards. He allowed it.

Velko grinned despite himself. It was quite a brilliant idea of Call's, really – for one thought up in such a small span of time. And she hadn't told the two of them in order to make her charade all the more realistic. He wondered what else she had up her sleeve.

*          *          *

The three of them crowded around the console while Call started familiarizing herself with the system. After half an hour, Call shook her head in frustration. 'I can't plug into this. Their modem receiver's the same model – but with different capabilities and functions. I can get in – but I daren't risk it. It might trigger an alarm. Dammit!' She pounded her fist against the wall.

'Wait a minute,' spoke up Bohr. 'Flyboy here can get us in. He does it all the time.' She nodded in Velko's direction.

Little sneak, he thought. What would Call say to this new piece of news, he wondered?

If Call was surprised, she didn't show it. 'Okay. Velko, you're up – now's your chance to shine.' She gave up her seat and motioned for him to take her place. He did so without a word. She placed a hand on his shoulder. 'And keep it tight. Our friend back there said he'd be back in two hours.'

Velko didn't know what to say. He couldn't refuse. He didn't want to get caught. He had brief – but jarring – ideas of the consequences if they did get found out. They might end up as circus side-show freaks – and be dubbed as "The Futuristic Trio". The image flashed through his mind's eye and he grimaced. Considering the circumstances though, he didn't have much of a choice. He sighed and said, 'I need some breathing space, ladies. Go powder your noses or something.'

He waited expectantly for a retort from Bohr, but got nothing. Instead, they both silently acknowledged his request and walked away to sit down at the other end of the small room. He pulled out his five disks from his bag pack.

'Don't fail me now,' he said as he patted the stack of disks. The pressure was mounting.

*          *          *

He was bleary-eyed as he looked from the screen to his watch. They had half an hour left. Somehow, Velko had managed to pull it off. But it wasn't as easy as he had expected it to be. The security programs were definitely more primitive and older, but as stable as ever. Especially in a company such as this. They probably had cyber-guards keeping tabs on outsider access to the mainframe every minute of the day. He had to reroute some of the connections to his console with the system to other outside servers that were harmlessly interacting with the company's system. This was similar to him playing a previously recorded video in a security video room, so as to make the guards believe that nothing out of the ordinary was taking place. It worked, but not for long. He had half an hour to dig into the company files. And half an hour wasn't enough when you didn't know what you were looking for.

He gestured for Call to come to the computer. 'I'm in. But you gotta tell me where to go next. We have thirty minutes to strike gold, nothing more.'

Call took a deep breath. 'Right. I want you to search for any connections Weyland Yutani might have to the military.'

She waited patiently for five minutes beside him.

He spoke up excitedly. 'Check this out. Weyland Yutani receives a large part of its funding from the UA Marine Corps. As a reciprocator of the military's generosity, it has inserted specific clauses in employee contracts to investigate new life forms should the opportunity arise. These little investigations of theirs are pretty rare though. Only two have occurred in the past hundred years. The second was fifty-seven years ago – but something went wrong.' He looked up at Call. 'This is in another file. Should I open it?'

'Yes.' spoke Call. Her voice was almost inaudible.

'Uh...save for one survivor, the entire crew were killed, and the commercial vehicle was destroyed. The investigations – these were pretty recent - into the case could not explain anything that happened, and were closed several weeks ago. The survivor, warrant officer E. Ripley...' he paused. That was the name Call had saved one of her files under. Could this possibly be the person she was so eager to find?

'Please go on,' she said, her voice urgent.

'...Warrant officer E. Ripley was stripped of her flight officer status and now works down at the cargo docks. Weyland Yutani has also been working on another side project with the military-'

He was interrupted suddenly by Call. 'Where is she now?'

'Ripley? Don't you wanna hear about their other projects?'

'No. Tell me where she is.'

He swallowed nervously, trying not to look surprised at her persistence. 'That appears to be ranked even higher in the realm of classified information.' he told her. Then to himself, 'But not to worry, we can work our way around that...' He punched the keys rapidly. 'Alright. Your friend Ripley seems to be pretty important for a cargo dock operator. She's voluntarily signed on as a consultant to the military.'

'For what?' breathed Call.

'You got me. The document's encrypted in a format I can't crack. Wait a sec let's open this file here,' He paused – as if allowing time for something of vital importance to sink in. What he saw before him – or understood – wiped away any previous misconceptions of General Call. At first, his reaction was that of disbelief. Her story couldn't be true. But it was. Everything, up to this point – about the Company's attempt to secretly acquire the organism, was how she said it would be. The only blank space that remained to be filled was the part about the creature itself. And a sinking feeling in his gut told him that he'd find out pretty soon enough. He didn't take his eyes off the screen. 'Look. There are some familiar lines of code though – and I can understand some key words...see here,' he pointed with his index finger to a part of the screen. 'This reads "time log", but I don't know what it applies to. And the second part reads "disruption",' he moved his finger down the screen, 'the third "grid reference Y59" and the fourth, "unidentifiable life form". And the last bit that I can identify and that makes any sense -'' his heart beat quickened and he suddenly stopped talking.

'What?' said Call. Her voice was shrill with anxiety and impatience.

'They're coordinates. The only reason why I can understand that is because the languages of interpretation of coordinate systems have been in use for centuries...'

'I don't care why, Velko – what're they there for?'

'They're coordinates to LV-426. Wha- how do they...'

She stared into space and spoke. 'We're too late.' said Call. 'She's gone.'