Chapter 17 – The Real Nemesis
Valinor

"Hurry!" yelled Eldarion from the top of the staircase.

Anwar ran as fast as her feet could carry her up the stairs. She reached the top just as an alien appeared at the bottom. Her eyes widened as the creature parted its jaws and hissed menacingly. Then the second alien appeared.

Eldarion grabbed her by the wrist and dragged her down the corridor to a heavy door at the very end. He pushed it open, pulled Anwar inside and slammed the door shut. Just as he rested his back up against it, the door started to buckle from the impact of the aliens on the other side.

Anwar let out a scream and backed away.

Eldarion scanned the room as he tried to keep the door from breaking open. Luckily it was made of thick wood. But he knew it would not last long. He spotted a window. "Climb out the window! Quickly!"

Anwar rushed to the window and pushed the glass panels open. The room was on the second floor and the drop to the ground was far. She screeched when she felt something grab her, only to discover that it was Eldarion.

He helped her climb out the window and waited until she scrambled up the side, heading for the roof and using the loose-fitted bricks as hand and foot holds. Just as the door in the room crashed open, Eldarion jumped out and began to climb. At the top was a pile of bricks, stacked neatly in a square. He grabbed one and leaned over the rooftop.

An alien appeared at the window. Just as it turned its head upward, a brick smashed into its face. It let out an ear-piercing screech and nearly toppled out the window.

Eldarion grabbed another brick and threw it as the creature came out of the window. It struck the alien in the head again, causing a gash that started to smoke. The alien screeched again and shook its head, its acid blood splattering out of the gash. Anwar also grabbed a brick and together they threw them at the alien. The multiple hits caused the alien to loose its grip on the side of the building and it fell, crashing through a wooden portico and impaling on a thick post.

When the second alien poked its head out of the window, Eldarion threw another brick. The alien quickly learned to avoid the flying bricks.

Eldarion pushed Anwar forward and they ran to the rooftop of the adjoining building. Beyond that was a narrow stone archway, barely wide enough for them to balance themselves and forcing them to slow their steps to cross over it.

Just then Anwar lost her footing and fell with a scream.

Eldarion caught her wrist as she dangled over the side. "Reach with your other hand!" From the corner of his eye he saw the alien moving toward them. "Come on, Anwar!"

Anwar also saw the approaching alien and reached to grab Eldarion's arm. He quickly pulled her back up on the narrow ledge and together they continued on, occasionally glancing over their shoulders to see the progress of their pursuer.

The alien used its tail to balance itself as it moved across the ledge on all fours. It did not intend to let its prey get away. After the hive had been destroyed, the queen mentally projected deadly force. No one was to be left alive.

Eldarion and Anwar reached the other side of the ledge and hopped onto the next rooftop. After that there was nowhere else to go. The far side of the last building had a smooth surface and there was no way to scale down to the ground. Jumping was not a good option without sacrificing a limb or two. They soon realized they were trapped as the alien reached the rooftop of the building they were on. When Anwar gasped in fear, Eldarion bravely moved to stand in front of her, reaching for a dagger he always carried in his boot.

Anwar turned to her right and noticed something. A chimney. "Eldarion, look!"

Eldarion chanced a quick glance. "Go!" Then he turned back to the cautiously approaching alien, holding his dagger up.

When Anwar rushed over to the chimney and slipped inside, the alien turned its head in her direction and hissed.

Eldarion waved his dagger, attracting the attention of the alien. Then he slowly backed away toward the chimney. Just then Anwar screamed, followed by the sound of crumbling stone. "Anwar!" He could not turn away from the alien. A loud thump echoed up from the mouth of the chimney. "Anwar!" he called out again. When he received no reply, he backed up into the chimney and carefully climbed up.

The alien charged forward as it realized its prey was escaping. It reached the chimney just as the prey disappeared inside.

Eldarion used his hands and feet to scale down the narrow chimney, which was barely wide enough for him. He glanced up and saw the head of the creature, jaws parted and hissing. He ducked away as saliva dripped down on him and then he quickly scrambled further down as a clawed hand reached down to grab him, missing him by inches. The angry alien screeched and hissed, unable to squeeze into the opening. Eldarion looked down the dark shaft. "Anwar?"

"I am here."

As Eldarion crawled further down, the shaft began to widen. "How much further are you?" Then he felt her hand touch his ankle.

"Be careful," said Anwar. "There is an opening in the center which is too small for me to crawl through."

Eldarion glanced down and noticed a bit of light coming through the opening. It led to the fire pit. But as Anwar said, the opening was too small for either of them to crawl through. He glanced up just as several bricks came down from above. He threw himself over Anwar and the bricks struck his back. When he glanced up again, he saw the alien trying to break into the chimney.

"Are you injured?" Eldarion asked.

"Nay, I am fine. What are we going to do?" asked Anwar, her voice full of fear.

Eldarion inspected the brick around the opening. Then he took his dagger and began to chip away at the mortar along the wall. "If I can make this opening larger, we can crawl through."

More bricks came down on them and they ducked and used their arms to protect their heads.

The alien above continued to angrily screech, bent on getting to its prey for the kill.

Glorfindel ran toward the iron gates of Ilmarin. "Open the gates!" He had been running for the last half hour, yet as an Elf, he was not out of breath. When he reached the gates, they slowly parted outward. He waited for them to part enough before he slid himself through.

In the main hall, Freak, Thranduil, Celeborn, Elrond and Gandalf looked over Bishop's shoulder, staring at the screen of the computer where he worked.

"Current number is 286," said Bishop.

"The number has decreased dramatically over the last two hours," commented Gandalf. "And no loss of life among the teams. They are doing well using your modern weapons." He turned briefly to Freak.

Freak raised his eyebrows. "You all realize that I'm going to catch hell if the bureaucrats governing the United Systems find out that I've purposely broken every rule of First Contact."

"They would not discover this from any of us," Thranduil quickly said and looked at the others. "Correct?"

"What is this United Systems?" asked Elrond.

Freak wanted to kick himself for even bringing it up. How could he explain to these people what comprised of the United Systems when they wouldn't even be able to comprehend the number of colonized planets out there in space? Before he had a chance to open his mouth, Glorfindel walked into the room, approaching them in a rush.

The first thought on Thranduil's mind was his son. "Where is Legolas?"

Glorfindel met the Elven king's eyes. The news he had to relay was not good. After he had left Legolas, he thought about what the prince had said. Something was not right, he had said. The thought troubled Glorfindel and he had turned to go back. What he found was an unconscious Legolas on the ground with several men surrounding him. They gathered him up, along with the two Elflings and stepped through a doorway that had appeared out of nowhere. Just as Glorfindel was about to rush forward, the door vanished. Then he noticed the air shifting as if something moved through it. Not only that, but two tracks appeared on the ground and continued moving away.

"Glorfindel," said Elrond, interrupting the Balrog Slayer's thoughts.

Glorfindel sighed heavily. "Legolas was taken by several men." He went on to explain everything he had seen.

"They must have an APC with a stealth device," said Freak when Glorfindel was done speaking. They all stared at him as if he was speaking a different language and he decided it was better to just let it go and not try to explain. He stepped over to the table containing his weapons and began to arm himself.

Thranduil walked up to him. "What will they do to him?"

Freak turned to Thranduil, a serious look on his face. "There's a hellova lot they can do. They'll stick him in a cell with a facehugger, get him impregnated. Then they'll take his blood to clone him. And after all that they'll probably kill him. That's why they set up that research base. For cloning."

The Elven king stared at Freak with is mouth open. They could not possibly do such a thing to his son.

"I question who the real nemesis is," commented Gandalf. "The aliens or the people in that base."

Freak walked over to Bishop. "Where're the Dropships?"

Bishop punched some keys on the keyboard. "Dropship One is at the far east end of the battle zone. Dropship Two is at the far northeast. Both have weapons engaged."

"Goddammit." Freak could have used his team right about now. But he wouldn't pull them from their current task of killing aliens. "I gotta get over to that base right now."

Right at that moment Aragorn and Haldir stepped into the hall, followed closely by Gimli and Frodo.

Gandalf came up behind Freak, who glanced over at Aragorn and the others who had entered. "The King of Gondor and our stout, red-bearded friend are well-suited to aid you."

Freak turned to Gandalf and narrowed his eyes. "No, you don't understand what's going on. The guys that took Legolas are professionals. They probably have visual devices facing outward from the compound. Do you follow me, bro?"

"As far as I would like to," Gandalf said dryly under his breath and then cleared his throat. "And you believe Aragorn and Gimli are not capable of sneaking?"

Freak turned back to Aragorn and Gimli as they walked up.

Aragorn noted the look of panic on Thranduil's face and then turned to Freak. "Has something happened?"

Weyland-Yutani Research Base

Train stood with his hands on his hips, staring at the Elf they had brought in an hour ago. The Elf's wrists and ankles were tied with binding, the kind that tightened further with every move. Then more binding was wrapped around his throat and tied to the back of the chair he sat on. There was a thick piece of metal tape covering the Elf's mouth, preventing him from speaking. He was totally immobile and there was a valid reason for it. During the trip back to the base, the Elf had suddenly awakened and nearly beat the hell out of three of Train's most dangerous men before finally being subdued. Now Train wasn't taking anymore chances with this one. Train turned toward his men. Riggs, Beck and Tucker were covered in bandages from the injuries suffered by the Elf.

Then he turned back to the Elf, who couldn't move a millimeter. "How does it feel now, hotshot?" The Elf stared back at him, pale blue eyes piercing Train down to his core. Train thought he recognized a look of satisfaction and smugness in those eyes.

Legolas fought the urge to move because he quickly realized that every time he did so, the binds around his wrists, ankles and throat tightened even more. The man before him was named Train. Legolas heard one of the other men call him that. Train feared him and so did the others. He felt great satisfaction in knowing he had caused them injury.

"Here it is," said Quinn from across the room where he was seated in front of a computer. "Take a look."

Train stepped away from the Elf and walked over to Quinn, leaning over his shoulder. There was an image on the screen with a digital caption that read: Gateway Station – Visitor Scanning. The image moved every few seconds, revealing people moving beneath a scanning device the size of a doorway. In the next instant someone with long blonde hair and wearing a white jumpsuit passed.

Quinn froze the image. "See?"

Train looked up from the screen and glanced in the Elf's direction. "Roll him over here."

Two of the men moved toward Legolas and pushed the wheeled chair he sat on toward Train.

Train moved the chair further around so that Legolas was facing the screen. "Is that you?"

Legolas stared at the image of himself on the screen. He even recalled exactly when it had happened. Ariedel had been taking him to the Arboretum on Gateway Station, to be with the trees.

"Well? Is it?" Train asked again.

Legolas gave a slight negative shake of his head and looked away from the screen.

Train grabbed a handful of the Elf's hair and pulled hard on it, forcing him to look at the screen again. "Looks like you to me."

Legolas tried to pull himself out of Train's grip and he mumbled angrily into the tape covering his mouth.

"What, you got something to say?" Train gripped the edge of the tape and ripped it off, sneering with satisfaction as the Elf cried out in pain. "What's that you wanna tell me, huh?"

Legolas took a deep breath of air which he had been denied with the tape over his mouth. Then he glared at Train and spoke through clenched teeth. "Medi eru nin." (Eat my shit)

Train exchanged a glance with Quinn. "Didn't sound very nice, did it?"

"No," agreed Quinn. "Not at all." The computer whiz punched several keys on the keyboard and the image on the screen changed to several lines of information. "Legolas Greenleaf, resident of SR-682. Brought to Gateway Station on Earth date March 15th, 2357 for alien extraction. Alien queen extraction, to be exact." Quinn glanced over his shoulder at the Elf in question, then at Train. "I told you it was him."

Train smiled to himself. Things were really starting to get interesting. This was the same Elf that Defense Secretary Rohlwing spoke to him about, the one that could communicate with the aliens. "And he happened to just walk right up to our doorstep. Of all the luck." Train turned to Vaughn. "Go get the nutty professor."

Vaughn quickly left the chamber.

Train smiled again. "He wanted an Elf to try out his new experiment. Well, we've just delivered him the missing fucking link."

Legolas did not like the sound of the man's words. Experiment? "Release me at once."

Train turned to Legolas. "Oh, so we speak English afterall."

"What do you want from me?"

"Me? I don't want anything. But a certain doctor has some serious plans for you."

Several minutes passed before Vaughn returned with Dr Leland in tow.

"What's going on?" asked Leland.

Train stepped aside to reveal the Elf. "I've brought you a gift, Dr Leland."

Leland smiled. "Ah, another Elf. Wonderful."

"No, not just another Elf," reasoned Train. "This is The Elf."

"The one capable of communicating with the aliens," Quinn elaborated.

Leland's eyes widened. "You don't say." He walked over and crouched before the Elf tied tightly to the chair. "So you're the one."

Legolas returned the man's stare, seeing madness in his eyes, sensing the unstable mind behind them. This Dr Leland was hanging on to sanity by a thread. Legolas suddenly sensed his impending doom drawing ever closer. His fate was in the hands of this oppressive man and there was no escape.