Everly looks at the scene in the corridor with numb eyes after Vivian propped her against the wall next to Issac, who fainted. Her hands keep feeling over her abdomen, where there's not even a scar from the attack. Her eyes keep flicking to the glowing green pool of blood that's seeping through the sheet covering the monster. Her eyes snap back to Vivian when a pair of the opera gloves she's been wearing appear out of nowhere, along with a muttered, "Thank you Misky." That's only audible due to the silence in the hallway.
Just before shouts from the rescuers become audible, Vivian takes a strange spear from the corpse and stabs it in one of the open wounds, before throwing it down the corridor. Then she walks over to Everly, who has started to shake, and crouches down.
"Hey Everly, how are you feeling?"
"Cold, what are you?"
Vivian looks over at the doors, "We'll talk about it later. Right now, your adrenaline is wearing off, and you're suffering psychological shock. I'm going to give you a mild sedative, it will help with the floaty feeling." Vivian takes a syringe and medicine bottle out of the air, "Thank you Misky. I'm also going to prescribe 2 weeks sick leave, and I recommend you seek counselling for this."
The doors at the end of the corridor slam open and a couple of armed police officers look around the edges of the door before shouting "Clear!" and lowering their weapons. The next few hours become a whirlwind of activity as most of the surviving staff and patients are evacuated into temporary housing, while Everly, Issac, and Vivian are all sent to the local hospital while the police technician's and the coroners catalogue the trail of carnage that led to 15 dead, including the killer.
After an interview with a government department called UNIT, along with a cat scan of her body, Everly is sent home with a 6 week sicknote.
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Luna carefully makes her way through the school, popping past closed doors when they won't just open for her, until she reaches the Slytherin dorm. Around her hand she has an adoption face hugger, and her quarry is likely to agree to join her hive. As she walks towards the chest burster, that's getting close to it's first molt, a prefect shouts, "Hey, you can't be in here!"
Luna just turns around to face him, her tail lashing from side to side like a cobra, behind her head, "I just want to speak with someone, I won't be long, I promise."
"No, no visitors allowed without prior arrangement. Now, you can wait outside and I will ask whoever it is to come and see you."
Luna cocks her head, "But I don't know who it is, only that they have one of my children."
"If you don't leave right now, I will be forced to stun you."
Luna smiles sweetly, "I wouldn't do that if I were you, as I don't know how I'll react."
Turning around, Luna continues on her merry way, briefly jumping up to the ceiling as she changes into her queen form and a red light shoots beneath her, before landing on the floor again. Behind her, she leaves a sobbing prefect, as another 6th year casts a torniquet spell and picks up his hand.
Eventually, her feet lead her to a dorm room door, where she stops and knocks primly. It takes a few minutes, but eventually the door opens to reveal Millicent Bulstrode, "Yes? Can I help you?"
Luna beams at her, "Hello, I thought I'd visit to say thank you for looking after the chest burster for me. She's been very happy with your care."
Millicent blinks, "Huh? She's one of yours? I thought she'd be one of Arry's."
Luna shakes her head, "No, no, Arry wouldn't be careless enough to leave eggs laying around where just anyone could stumble across them. Too much chance of them being destroyed, like 24 of my children were. On the bright side, one of them survived and was in good hands while I've been so busy with the house elves."
"Oh, um, thanks, I guess." Millicent glances sadly back into the room, "I guess you want her back then."
Luna shakes her head, "Oh, no. Not at all. Not unless you want to give her back of course. It's just she's almost ready for her first moult, and once that's done with she'll be far more mobile. I don't want her to accidentally kill or maim you if you accidentally touch her the wrong way."
Millicent grimaces, "Um, I'll just go and get her then."
Luna holds up the face hugger, "No need, I've got a solution right here. If you accept this, you'll be part of my hive, and you won't need to worry about her misunderstanding you anymore."
"Say I do accept,"
"I do accept, yay!"
Millicent staggers backwards as the face hugger leaps at her face and quickly latches on.
An hour later, Luna is sitting on the side of the bed, stroking the chest burster, who's skin has started to turn white where it's separating from the body inside. She smiles as Millicent starts to come around, "There, that wasn't so bad was it. And just in time, as she's started to moult, see?"
Millicent sits up groggily, "What happened?"
Luna smiles, "You joined my hive, don't worry you didn't forget much as it's only your short-term memory that goes, maybe around 5 minutes of memory at most."
"Huh?"
"Don't worry about it, here's the chest burster back. She's just started moulting, so she'll be a bit grouchy for a bit. Just remember to make sure that food's readily available, and if you have any questions, you're part of the hive so you can ask, or check the memories yourself."
With that, Luna pops out of the room, and to the Main Hall, leaving a confused Millicent holding a moulting xenomorph.
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"Donald, we need to talk about this."
Donald looks up at Theresa, "What's there to talk about, you left. You left for two weeks."
"What do you mean I left? I gave you an hour to give you privacy while you call Henry Granger, and when I came back you'd left, and written a note on the back of the phone number."
"You left for two weeks without telling me, all you told me is that you wanted me to give up being a man."
"You didn't even listen to the whole of what I said did you, do you think I wanted to just leave you? I told you, the whole hive had to leave over easter. And I told you as soon as I could after I knew."
"You're the one that just walked out in tears."
"Because I don't want to hurt you accidentally. Do you have any idea just how fragile you are to me now? I can score glass with my fingernails, what do you think that would do to you?"
"So now you're threatening me? What, are you going to kill me if I don't join the hive."
"Donald, that's not what I said. Why are you doing this?"
"Doing what?"
"This Donald, not listening to me. Not actually talking to me. What happened to the man I remember, the one I married 13 years ago?"
"I'm still here, you're the one that's changed overnight. I've tried to be there for you, but you persist in not remembering our marriage."
"You say it like I have a choice. I don't, I really don't. I've tried so hard to remember, but Vivian thinks I'm only going to get fragments back if I get any more memories. Sally will be back at the end of June, what then?"
"Oh, yay, my disabled daughter that turns into a monster out of a nightmare will be home. Maybe we'll have another round of brain damage lottery, and I'll be the one to forget everything."
"She's my daughter too you know, and you know they're not going to do that again. If for no other reason than I'm magical too now."
"So I'm the only normal person in the household now, is that it? The rest of you are freaks?"
Theresa bursts into tears and disappears with a flash of fire. Moments later Donald's anger is quashed as he realises she's not in the house, and he immediately regrets the last few minutes.
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Bradley is sitting in a booth in the Scotsman and Angel, in Manchester, trying to drown the dysphoria, when the drunk behind him starts crying, "Jace, what did I do wrong? Why did Theresa leave me?"
Jace says something inaudible, probably something about not shouting if the man's next statement is anything to go by, "I'm not shouting, and she wanted me to become a Tranny, did you know that. Give up the wedding tackle for a beaver, probably pop out sprogs too."
Bradley feels his heart skip a beat as the man's companion tries to shush him again, which works to some extent, as Bradley has to strain to hear the next bit, "But she left me because I wouldn't go through it, like the Granger bloke did. Poof, gone in a flash of smoke. First the freaks take her memory, now they've taken her too… No I won't shut up, you don't know what it's like Jace. How does my wife score getting care from Vivian, when I work so hard to pay for everything, and I get ignored?... The one in the news last month… She gave him my number, fat lot of good it would do. I bet he's a freaking Tranny and happy for the changes." A ball of paper goes bouncing across the bar, "There, I don't even have the number anymore, so I couldn't call them even if I wanted to."
Bradley stops listening as he tries to track the ball of paper, before getting up and walking in the general direction it went it, "Sorry, have any of you seen a balled up bit of paper? It's got my girlfriends number on it, and some arsehole just threw it away."
It takes him 15 minutes, but eventually he stumbles out of the pub with the bit of paper gripped triumphantly in his hand, and a black eye from a man who thought he was coming onto him. So worth it. Bradley wouldn't use the number for a few weeks, as that's when he'd get a letter from the Charing Cross Gender Clinic in London refusing her care because she wouldn't wear skirts and blouses.
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Draco is emptying a couple of buckets into the communal trough, when an unfamiliar Yautja walks into the compound as if he owns the place. Draco pays him no mind as he disappears to the river and returns with another two buckets of water. It might be hard, exhausting work, but it pays his way in the village, as it saves everyone else so much time. He's just about to leave for a third trip, when he hears a scream and the Yautja pulls Athe out of her hut by her hair. In the years to come, Draco will never be able to say just why he chose to act in that moment, but all of the rage and frustration of being hunted by younglings boils to the surface. As it does, he just wishes the Yautja would burn for all the suffering he's gone through, and his magic answers.
Athe scrabbles away as the Yautja lets go of her hair, and turns to face Draco, who is starting to look drawn. Identifying Draco as the source of his pain, the Yautja charges with a roar as his wrist blades extend. Even half blind from fire and suffering major burns all over his body, a Yautja is no easy foe. As such Draco only manages to dodge the first wild swing because of almost a year of being hunted by Yautja.
Even still, Draco has nothing to fight back with, so his dodging is just prolonging his death. Even still, he sees the Yautja's combistick is loose in it's sheath, as the fire burned away some of the fastenings. Desperately, he pulls for the stick with all his might, and collapses to the floor in exhaustion. For a moment it doesn't move, and the Yautja moves in for the kill, then the harness gives way and the combistick flies into Draco's hand.
As the Yautja leans down to grab his hair, Draco presses the extension button, causing the spear end to shoot up, while the butt digs into the ground. When he doesn't die, Draco opens his eyes to see the spear going through the head of the Yautja, holding it up like some demented scarecrow.
He's not sure how long he's been lying there staring at the corpse with Athe softly sobbing in relief in the background, but time seems to restart when a familiar Yautja steps up next to him. Draco immediately scrabbles away from the corpse, and abases himself, hoping for a clean death. Instead, the Yautja looks at the corpse for a moment before collapsing the combistick and placing it on Draco's hands, "Do better next time, practice."
Draco can only stare at the stick as the corpse is dragged away.