Hello people reading : ) new chapter time. Exams are fast approaching here, which could put a dent in updates but will have to see.

Greenleaf7: glad you like : )

Enjoy...

Joanne was speechless.
Kelly had spent the last five minutes babbling about her insane plan, and how it was the only thing they could do that might help them survive.
Joanne had to admit, it had a bizarre logic to it, but that did not make it any more appealing or doable.

"You really have no idea what you're asking me to do." Joanne said quietly. "Whatever is in there is not human, I have no idea how much, if at all, I'll be able to control it."

"But its psychic like you are and you said you could feel stuff from that Predator you told me about, what was his name? Cuth chick?"

"Cth'ctchi."Joanne corrected, struggling to pronounce the harsh clicks the name involved herself. It wasn't like she had mandibles.

"Whatever. He's not exactly the same species either but you could understand him ok…"

"Yes but this is, this is different! Predators are intelligent, they have a form of language and some even know English, Cth'ctchi included. What's growing in there, it could be anything, anything ranging from something more intelligent than us, which could recognise an attempt to control its mind and defend itself, to something that doesn't even have a brain, something that's just made up of reflexes that doesn't think, just follows instinct. How could I control something like that? Something that doesn't have a mind to control?"

"Can't you look and find out?"

"I can, but like I said before this is just its larvae stage by the look of it. It might grow into something completely different."

There was a pause as Kelly appeared to think about this.

"What's it like at the moment?" she finally asked.

Joanne sighed, "Probably just the same as the last time you asked, a large wormy thing." She cast a casual thought over the fallen Predator again, the hunters unconscious mind easy to ignore.

"Wait, that can't be right…"

"What?"

Joanne searched the worm out again, properly this time, eyes going wide.

"What Joanne?"

"It has changed! Its got defined jaws now, and its moving a lot more…"

"Moving?"

"Well, just violent twitches really but it's a lot more than it was doing the last time I looked. Its so weird, I've done embryo development at university and nothing grows this fast, not without constant eating anyway! I don't understand how it's doing it…"

"Is it gonna come out right now?"

"I don't know! I don't see how it could, it's got no limbs to pull itself up the wind pipe, or whatever their equivalent is. It looks like the muscles in its tail region are building up, but I don't see how that would help it really, it can't swim out of there."

"If it comes out now we're in trouble."

"I'll keep an eye on it. Besides, it might not come out at all. Maybe the host was meant to stay conscious and alive, while the worm produces eggs that hatch the crab things, which would be secreted from the body at some point."

"That's disgusting."

"Yeah but its how most parasites I know go about living. Well, the ones where we come from anyway. A living body is a well protected environment to live in, and there's always plenty of food around…"

"Yeah but you said it wasn't eating! It has to get out of there or it'll starve."

"It might decide to start eating. Kelly, we know nothing about this creature, NOTHING. We don't know its life cycle, whether it will die when he does, what it might grow up into…"

"It doesn't matter! If it can help defend us, then its worth the risk of hanging around to see if it does come out. If it's useless or too violent or can't be controlled we can always shoot it!"

"Kelly, don't over simplify this…"

"Well why don't you try now? Tell you what. If you try to get into its head now, and you can't do it, then we can shoot the thing like you said, while it's still in his chest, and move on. But if you can control it, then we'll stay here and wait and see what happens. Its still safe isn't it?"

Another quick mind scan, "Yes but look, we've been making a lot of noise and we're surrounded by dead or dying things. There's a lot of blood around here, it could attract…"

"It'll be alright, you'll sense them! Go on Joanne, try!"

"You know for someone who was saying how useless my 'mind tricks' are, you've suddenly got a lot of faith in them. This could all go horribly wrong."

"I just think it's the only option we've got right now. C'mon Joanne it's a baby! How hard can it be?"

Joanne eyed Kelly. "You know, I could just wipe the idea from your mind and you'd be none the wiser."

There was an uncomfortable silence.

"You wouldn't do that." Kelly said finally. "You've already told me how bad you feel whenever you invade someone's head. You won't just erase the idea, you don't have it in you."

"If it stops us from dying over some half baked idea then I might." Joanne replied, but her heart wasn't in it. Damm it, Kelly was right. She couldn't do it unless she had no choice.

"Besides, I can tell you want to try."

Joanne glared at Kelly. Had she been that obvious? Despite all her arguments against doing this she was insanely curious as to whether she could pull it off. As to how far she could stretch her power. She'd never allowed herself to experiment too much before, and here was a chance to see what she was really capable of. Besides, as Kelly said, if she couldn't do it they could shoot the Predator's chest in and be off. No harm done.
She squashed the thoughts of how she might pass out or God knows what else. She wasn't completely new to mind control, although she'd hated herself for using it before.
There was no harm in looking, surely…

"Alright. You keep watch, I don't know if I'll be able to sense anything approaching while I'm doing this. There's nothing anywhere near us at the moment, but it probably won't stay that way."

Kelly nodded, gripping the gun she held a little harder. Joanne looked at the fallen Predator and cautiously approached. She really didn't want to go anywhere near him, in case he stopped being unconscious, but distance made controlling harder, so she sat a little way from the body, close but not too close. She looked into his mind once more, to check he was properly under. She could barely feel his fading mind. Then she took a deep breath and directed her thoughts lower, towards the dormant alien inside.

Cth'ctchi flung himself backwards, but not quite quick enough. D'ram's wrist blades while missing most of Cth'ctchi's head caught one of his outstretched mandibles, slicing it off. Roaring in pain and fury Cth'ctchi punched D'ram repeatedly in the face, outraged that he'd suffered such a humiliating injury. Florescent blood flowed from the wound into his mouth, a sharp bitter taste briefly distracting him from combat; he'd so rarely tasted it before, with his mental powers to defeat foes before they'd even touched him. Suddenly the Queen's presence in his mind exploded in magnitude, causing him to stagger back, ceasing his bombardment of D'ram. D'ram meanwhile found that his head was clear. The Queen had left him alone! He didn't have time to look over at the humans to see if they too had been released, but the one who was screaming had stopped. Worry flitted across his mind; if the Queen had also left Cth'ctchi then he would soon be in deep trouble, yet Cth'ctchi seemed to be worse than ever.

D'ram took the opportunity to get some head punches in himself, all left handed blows. Cth'ctchi had grabbed his right, blade hand with his own, taking the deadly weapons out of the fight for the moment. How long had they been battling now? Impossible to say. Both where too caught up in the here and now to think of such things. Every second full of block, counter, punch, block, kick, thrust, duck…
The fight continued. Both where young and in their prime, and with the Queen's continual intervention they where equals. This battle would not be easily won or lost.

The Queen chittered triumphantly as she felt the psychic one's pain. Her brood was fast approaching the chamber they where in and soon would be upon them. She concentrated on her childhood tormentor, he was the only one who was a true threat to the squad she had sent. The others would be easily mowed down by sheer numbers.
She stretched upwards as far as she could, trying to get nearer to the high room. Some of her more confident drones clambered up her great body, onto the high walls she could not reach. She felt pleased that some of her spawn were still functioning without her constant presence, as most had taken badly to it, crouching below her crying in distress. The squad at least had some connection to her so she could feel what was going on, but it was no where near its usual intensity.
She did not dwell on this though. All would be righted once this one creature had been destroyed.

It was warm. A low thudding regularly resonated through the small creature, but this did not frighten it. It somehow knew that here it could not be harmed.
Here it was safe.
It tried stretching its immature body, yet kept connecting with unseen objects, restricting it, holding it in its curled, secure position. Its blind head swayed to and fro, soft tissue brushing over it, a slow thud resounding through it again, soothing it, calming it, telling it not yet…
Its simple mind knew it was safe, yet also knew something was wrong. It was alone and it should not be.
It could not concentrate, it had no comprehension of such an action and the steady, faint stream of mental signals flowed from it at the same rate, yet it was getting restless. This haven would turn to a prison if it had to remain alone. Its developing mind knew someone should be answering.
And then suddenly, someone did.