Well its been a while but here at last is a new chapter : ) sorry its taken so long, have had all sorts of deadlines to meet with uni work, cartoons and plain old revision. Right now I'm entering 6 weeks of exams (AGGGHHH) so updates unfortunatly might be abit sporadic. After that though I've got 3 weeks with nothing to do so then we'll get back to updating more regularly. If you're reading this now then thanks for sticking with the story even though its not been updated for over a month...

Dazzler 420: glad you like, all you're questions will be aswered as the story progresses, and I wouldn't want to spoil anything by dropping hints now! I know thats frustrating when you want to know whats going on but hopefully it'll be better finding out through the story than me just telling you now : )

Deep in the ship's interior, the Queen stirred restlessly. While no chains bound her limbs, she was too large to leave this chamber and relying on her offspring's thoughts to gauge her surroundings was beginning to fret on her nerves. She could feel her young sleeping in eggs close by, tended to by only two fully grown drones, who also attended her. She ground her teeth and shook her crested head in frustration, causing the two workers to turn towards her. Sensing their confusion at such actions she stopped, head sagging. Instinct told her this was not how things where meant to be. There should be more drones to care for the eggs, Praetorians to guard them, keep them safe and yet more workers capturing hosts so her children could be born.

This was no hive, she told herself, this was a rabble.

Silently she strengthened the mental signals going to those exploring, telling them to seek creatures with all haste. Only a few had been brought back for impregnation, and all now contained a growing embryo, soon to emerge. Still too few she thought to herself, watching an egg's top flaps opening. Not enough to guarantee this face hugger a target, and the embryo inside it life. She watched it uncoil while mentally informing it there where no hosts nearby. The hugger emerged and skittered towards the Queen, tail twitching as it awaited instructions. Though it upset her to do so, she told it to hunt for a victim rather than stay here and await one. It crawled away into the dark and she felt it leave, blind head turned to its direction. Sadness pulsed through her as she knew she had likely sent it to its death. They were surrounded by vicious beings, and only four face huggers had been successful in laying their egg inside something. Many more had died in the attempt.

She felt the now familiar sensation of pain and fear as another one of her own was killed. The first loss had been awful, and it had taken all the praetorians to console, calm and reassure her that some of her children still lived and that they would all serve her in making this place their safe haven. Thankfully all the casualties had been huggers, not the fully formed adults. She couldn't imagine any of her full fledged children dying, they where so alive, so eager to serve her and the hive, yet she knew it was a possibility. Three more huggers hatched, and she almost failed to make mental links with them, to spare herself the pain when they died, yet sensing their panic she relented, she could not deny them her love and guidance. Sending them away into the unknown, she lower her head once more in shame. What kind of Queen was she when all she could do for her young was send them to their deaths?

Then she felt the excited thoughts of a drone out foraging. It had found a group of creatures, some already injured, which could be captured. Hope stirred in the Queens heart, and she directed half her fully formed work force to the source of the report, and all the huggers currently out in the tunnels.

The two drones faced her way, and one chirped questioningly. The Queen reassured them with happy thoughts of many captives providing plentiful hosts, then hive mates, and the two chattered excitedly together. She pushed her mind towards those approaching the prey, strengthening their resolve and encouraging them, glad that the images she was sending to her children might now actually come to pass.

Through the dark corridors and rooms xenomorphs ran, hastening to do their Queens bidding.

The Queen flexed her mental field, and expanded it to include the area her offspring had now surrounded. She could feel the dull points indicating life forms of some sort, and one bright one. She knew only one creature with such a mind, with mental powers similar to hers, and she quickly threw all her mental abilities at it, dampening its power. Roaring in anger she pushed in on it, and was surprised to feel it give into her assault. Normally the creature was most resilient to her attacks, yet now she was having no problem affecting it. Snarling she pressed harder, remembering the times it had come to taunt her when she was not fully grown. Cutting her with its blades, pounding her then fragile exoskeleton, laughing at her pain. She screamed, instructing her children to be careful with that one, sending them mental images of her childhood tormentor. Yet her spawn's reactions where confused, they could not sense the one their Queen was depicting. None had the same stature, features or scent. Pausing only slightly, she instructed the waiting hunters to be careful, even if the one she knew was not there. As they inched closer, into striking range, she focused on that mind, now she realised it was different, yet similar at the same time. Throwing extra layers of numbness around the individual to be safe, she waited for the attack to begin, and for the means to save her colony come into her grasp.

They where nice enough people, Joanne thought as she watched the couple she'd been talking to. The guy had his arms around his partner, a protective position, and she was resting against his chest, a blood smear running down one of her arms. From their conversation Joanne had gathered they'd been together a while, and a short probing thought told her they had been happy. She thought of Matt, and how she might never see him again, and questioned her logic at choosing a couple to befriend where it would remind her of the one she loved and his absence even more.

"You've really been out there by yourself all this time?" The guy asked, looking at the closed door. Joanne nodded. Mark was his name, and his mind told her that he'd started alone too but found this group before something had found him, and luckily his girlfriend, Kelly, had been a part of it. Kelly had a long cut on her arm but otherwise was fine. Some one had wrapped some material around it to stop the bleeding, and looking at Mark's torn shirt it probably was him.

"What sorta things are there?" Kelly asked, looking at her through large frightened eyes.

"I don't really know." Joanne answered, starting to feel bad about all the lying she was doing, "I've only really come across that black thing that chased me into you guys. What is it?"

"We don't know any more than you do." Mark said, half smiling sadly. "We don't know anything."

"Except people keep dieing and there are monsters all around us." Kelly said, almost to herself as she pressed her head into Mark's shoulder. In response he hugged her tightly to him, putting his face into her hair and running one hand through it. Joanne could feel so much fear coming from them both, fear for themselves, for each other and for what the future had in store for them. They weren't the only ones. Being trapped in this room with danger all around but nothing to do except think was allowing people to go into 'what ifs….'

And this was not a good thing.

If, no when they where attacked they needed to be focused and calm, not panicking over their probable deaths or thinking about the blood shed they'd seen. Once again Joanne felt an urge to move on, yet this time she was part of a group and she had to follow their leader as long as she wanted to stay with them.And she did want to stay with them as going solo had been lonely and exhausting. Here she had even managed to grab a couple hours of sleep, awaking with none of her belongings touched, not even the blaster Jake had coveted.

She tried to send positive feelings to the others in the group without them noticing something was in their heads. It was hard anyway and her tired condition made focusing to do it even tougher. As she concentrated her mind caught something from outside the room. She lightly brushed the area again, so not to be noticed, and she could feel something, several somethings, darting around, looking for entry points. While she might not be adept at wielding her 'gift' Joanne knew that what ever was out there was not human. She told herself that they where safe here, that there was no way in for the things to reach them, then she felt the presence of some on the inside….

She was about to speak up about her discovery when something hit her. It felt like a physical blow yet it wasn't one, and it looked like the air had turned to treacle, with all sound muted out. Something strong pushed at her mind, seeking a way in, and she gasped as it connected with her. Joanne's eyes widened as she felt a primal presence unlike any she'd encountered before, and started to tremble as she felt its rage.

Mark and Kelly where looking at her now, alarmed, their mouths moving but no sound coming out. Waves of, of nothingness poured over Joanne like a shower and she slumped over, eyes still wide as she tried to push the force out of her head. Mark was bent over her, holding her by the shoulders while Kelly stood at his side, watching. Joanne tried to talk, tried to move but couldn't, and she looked into the eyes of the couple she'd s recently befriended, unable to even warn them of the coming danger.

A praetorian lurked in the shadows of the chamber, eyeing up the various targets. It could feel the Queens presence all around the chamber, heartening and tender as she 'felt' the hunt through them all. It could tell all its siblings where ready and in position, waiting for just the right moment to begin. Tail twitching slightly but silently it waited.

Then one of the creatures fell to its side, and others got up to examine it. One crouched down over the fallen figure, exposing its back to the waiting xenomorph.

Perfect.