Its hate was beyond imagination. Seeing the prey in the room, smelling it, sensing it, made its belly jump with a hunger to devour, to tear, to rip, to destroy.
A hunger to take revenge, a brutal revenge twisted in its gut.
But there was something else. Involuntarily, it feared the prey. It knew it was powerless.
The prey stopped, a metre in front of its face, steadily looking at it.
It resisted the urge to gash its teeth and screech, holding the gaze and not moving instead.
Cromwell stopped in front of the creatures head, being careful to stay out of range of those lethal inner jaws.
The Xenomorph had closed its jaw, its thin black lips covering the fangs.
He scrutinized the head of the creature. The long, sleek head, covered by the smooth dome, under which the alien brain was located.
His gaze followed the xenomorph's body downwards, momentarily stopping on the small skin pricks, where the needles had been removed, passing the ribs, the iron collar around the belly, the legs, tail and the feet.
Number 13 was a mid-sized example of its breed, a drone, not a warrior xenomorph.
He closed his eyes again, concentrating on the consciousness so close to him now.
It nauseated him. It held such a hate, and so much fear. The emotions washed over him like big, dark waves, threatening to sweep him away. It consumed him.
His legs buckled beneath him, and he felt his head connect hard with the floor.
Ouch!
He opened his eyes, and rubbed his head. He could already feel his head throbbing with an apocalyptic headache.
Lying flat on his back in the cell, he winced.
The xenomorph's head had followed his fall, and was now looking at him, with a toothy xeno smile on its face.
Cromwell sat up, rubbing his head in pain. "Ouch! What did you do that for?" he exclaimed and looked accusingly at the Xeno.
The big creature just kept its toothy grin, as if to say "Why do you blame me? I didn't do anything"
He got up and waved dismissively at the Xeno. "It's hopeless with you. It just is. If you keep hating everything, I can't help you."
And with these words, he stomped out of the chamber and sealed the door again.
It watched the prey fall. The dull thud of it hitting the floor was like music in its ears. It parted its lips
in a toothy smile. It was wonderful. The prey was hurt, it sensed it.
Slowly the prey got up, rubbing its head. It expected fear to radiate off it, but there was no fear.
There was just displeasure.
It mouthed a few words in its strange language, and then left the room.
This behaviour was new. New prey behaviour interested it.
Maybe the prey would come back. Maybe it could coax reactions from it.
It was intrigued. For the first time in its existence, the prey it loathed so much had not come near it to hurt it. It just had watched.
Why?
Why did I even talk to it? It can't understand me.
The scientist sat on a table in the lab, making notes.
He was bothered, bothered by the way the xenomorph had reacted to his fall. It sure as hell was happy that he hurt himself. At least it had looked that way.
But that meant the alien was able to feel happiness. It could be happy about something, it could fear, it could rage, and obviously hate, but what bothered him most was the reaction he felt after he had slammed the door on it.
It was only a small spike. But it was there.
It hadn't wanted him to leave.
He couldn't make sense of this. What interest, apart from devouring him, could that creature have? Not for the life of him he could figure it out.
Jeez, this wasn't leading anywhere.
He left the lab, and, whilst deep in thought, he headed to the canteen. There had to be a solution.
Taking his meal, and plonking it down on an empty table, he started to chew in silence. The room was not full, a potpourri of nations and professions was sitting here and there, mostly in silence, some in pairs. Two scientists were sitting, not two tables away. They were husband and wife, Cromwell knew so much, as he had worked with those two. A flash of longing pierced his heard.
For too long had he worked on this barren and deserted wasteland that Sigma-44 was. Too long had he not been touched by human hands. Sometimes, he missed the old earth.
The bar, where he went, most Friday nights.
In here, it didn't matter what day it was. There were no bars, and there was no Friday nights. He worked 5 days a week, and the days he didn't want to work, he wandered around the station. Most of the time he, and his old friend Dr. Schulz worked 7 days a week. There was nothing else to do, and work kept the mind busy.
But now even Schulz was gone. He was alone as the head of the xenobiological unit.
A unit Weyland didn't want him to lead.
He gulped down his drink, put the dishes in the washer, and got up again.
There was a lot to do.
Don't lie to yourself you dumbo. There's nothing to do. You're wasting your time. Go up to Weyland's office and tell him to incinerate that dumb creature and ask him for something where you can make actual progress.
Cromwell snorted. He had two months. And he wasn't going to quit quite so soon. He had made some progress...
He now just had to interpret the progress he had made rightly.
Even though he was quite far away from the lab, he could feel the Xenomorph's consciousness lash out to him.
After they had modified the Creature's brain with the drug, it had developed telepathic abilities, causing mostly those of lesser intelligence on the settlement discomfort.
Dr. Schulz had described it as an intense hate, like a snake trying to eat his heart.
He himself was just an assistant at that time, watching the older scientist from the safety of the lab as he administered the drugs, so had not felt the creature as much, but it had been there, tugging at his subconscious mind, giving him nightmares.
As they had sedated the alien mind, all those symptoms stopped.
He opened the door to the laboratory and pressed his nose to the glass.
The Xenomorph was where he left it. Obviously, it couldn't go anywhere else.
Sighing, he grabbed a fiction book he had deposited on the table earlier, and opened the cell door again.
He'd better get results from this…
It saw the prey enter, and sit down in front of it. It carried something in its talon, which it opened, and then, to its utmost surprise, the prey began to speak. It spoke in its strange, sluggish, low tongue.
It hissed at the prey, but the prey continued with what it was doing. Mostly it looked at the thing in its hand but occasionally it looked up.
The grip of fear and hate on its mind was strong, and unrelenting, but deep inside its chest, it felt another urge. A different one, one it had not experienced before.
It wanted to know what the prey was doing. It was sensing calm and stillness within the preys mind, but also a different emotion.
Like the prey expected something to happen.
It went on with its strange language, and curiosity got the better of it. It quit lashing at the prey mentally. That was no use, not with this prey. The old, stale prey that had been here before the sleep was different.
It was afraid, and it should be. Prey should be afraid of the Hunters.
This prey was different. It had lashed against it, but it showed no sign of fear.
It should fear him. It should fear a true warrior, as he was.
He.
That felt good.
He. The curiosity that had awoken in his mind had softly worked its way through the wall of hate, and was now his driving force.
He could devour the prey later, once his curiosity was satisfied.
The prey had noticed the change in demeanour, and was looking up at him, revealing its teeth.
Cromwell had sat down in front of the Alien and started to read to it.
The creature was still afraid, and he felt it still tugging at his mind. Those two overpowering emotions, hate and fear.
But he kept still, and kept reading, keeping his expectancy to himself.
Slowly, he worked himself through the chapters, reading in a slow steady tone.
Around chapter three, half an hour later, he felt the tug of hate release his mind all of a sudden, and retreat away.
Softly, he breathed a sigh of relief. Apparently the creature hat noticed that it was not really effecting him.
That was a lie of course. It saddened him. It saddened him to the bone.
And deep within him, he wanted that feeling to go away.
Shit, Paul, what's wrong with you? Why do you want to make an alien feel happy?
But he went on reading.
The tug of hate was suddenly replaced by something else. The Xenomorph's mind was prodding him. It was prodding him out of curiosity. It wanted to know.
And that was the moment he knew.
Looking up at the hulking figure, he smiled at it.
Then he turned back to his book and went on reading.
If it could control its hate, and even be interested in him, then maybe all was not lost.
No, in fact, nothing was lost. All was gained!
Cromwell kept reading. The Xenomorph's mind probed him, but he felt an underlying danger, a threat even.
He kept reading.
It was cold in the holding cell, and the bare metal held no comforts, but Cromwell was exited. He was making progress. The Alien watched him intently, as far as a creature with no visible eyes could watch him.
He went through half of the book within the rest of the day, but as eight p.m. drew near, he noticed himself continuously losing the line, and stumbling over long sentences. He was getting tired, and hungry.
"I think that's it for today. I will go on tomorrow."
He closed the book and got up.
The Xenomorph hissed at him, and as he turned around, he felt a sting in his mind, quickly replaced by a wave of indifference.
Smiling to himself, he turned around, and, being careful not to get in range of that lethal mouth, patted the alien on the arm.
Then, he scooted outside, closing the hatch, and leaving the laboratory as quick as possible.
Breathing heavily, he entered his quarters, shed his clothes and fell on the bed
Shit.
He had touched a live xenomorph. He had touched his arm.
Christ, you stupid dumbass, you could've died! He's still dangerous, and I doubt he liked it. He will kill you if he gets the chance, he thought.
But some feeling deep inside him told him that maybe, just maybe...
Forget it, Paul. You're just tired.
He had listened to the prey, its singsong voice bubbling against his mind, arousing his curiosity even more.
What was the prey trying to communicate? Before they had sent him to sleep, as he grew, he had watched the prey communicating with each other with the same bubbling tone as this prey here was using. What does that mean?
But then, all of the sudden, the speech of the prey changed, and it reared up on its hind legs.
And before he could know, it had turned and walked towards the exit.
No? He didn't want it to go.
It was weakness. He could not permit weakness. He was a warrior, and this was mere prey he did not care about.
Suddenly, the prey turned around, sped to him, and patted him on his arm.
He had not expected it to do that.
It wasn't something he understood. Why had it touched him? What was wrong in the preys head? It did not fear him, yet it wasn't like the other prey, hurting him. It had done something incredibly stupid. What would have happened if he was angry? It could have died. He could have turned it into a meal. It wouldn't have been hard.
Yet, as the he was thinking about it, he realized that he wouldn't have done it.
So much as the prey was prey, it was interesting.
A diversion, maybe. Maybe for some time. Till he found how to get out. Softly, he turned his head and glared at the arm that had been touched.
Just a diversion.
Or so he told himself….
(Just an information for my dear readers. There will be a few updates in rather rapid sucsession, as I'm already done up to chapter 4, and just am reviewing these. Reviews, both good and critical are highly appreciated.)