Some things never change

by The Fifty

As a maintenance worker on the Pursuit of Knowledge Caleb's life can change in an instant. He could be moved to a new sector, a meteorite could destroy part of the station, the station itself could fall out of orbit, or god forbid he could lose his ID card. But when his life is thrown into chaos he must hold onto what he can and hope that some things really don't change. AvP not me

5. Chapter 5

Authors note: This is the longest chapter so far, it's about 3000 words long. Some serious plot points are swirling about here so pay attention. I love you all so much for the support you have been giving. Thanks to you guys and gals I'm writing daily and I have a plan for at least five more chapters! Enjoy Chapter Five! Happy reading!

Caleb's head swam with thought. A million memories swam through his head all trying to solidify into something more than a flashed image or a blip of speech...it continued like that for some time.

Beautiful woman appeared, "Good bye Caleb, try not to lose yourself up there."

A large man swirled into view, "you can change the world if you just put your mind to it son."

Two sets of bright blue eyes solidified into two young boys waving, "Bye Caleb!" "Watch out for space monsters!"

His mind deteriorated into images again.

...the dull interior of a spacecraft.

...an even duller job description.

...weeks of mindless cleaning and fixing.

...weeks turning into months.

...Sarah...

...several days of small talk that lead to a friendship.

...a friendship that lead to...so much more.

...love...and finally a feeling of hope.

...and then came a letter. Caleb's mind sharpened as he focused on they memory, it happened just a few months ago.

Caleb was walking down the corridor to his old tier five living quarters when he was stopped by his friend Joseph, they had only met a few days prior. "Hey, Sarah said she wanted to speak with you in her office."

'What? Sarah hardly has time to meet with me after work, how could she have time now?'

"I'll get there right away then, thanks Hoseph." Caleb called out as he walked away.

"I told you I hate when you call me that! I will detain you for so long your-", Joseph's voice cut off as the doors to the Bridge of Glass closed.

A few minutes later Caleb reached Sarah's office and stepped inside taking it all in. Onboard the Pursuit of Knowlage scientists where kind of a big deal and Sarah who was apparently a rockstar in the world of science got all the best luxuries they wanted, though it made getting her a present a real bitch. Caleb had been in here once before and it still shocked him how cool this room was, Sarah's desk was beyond antique being made of mohagony and precious metals derived straight from earth hundreds of year ago, the chairs weren't as old but still made of real leather making the whole set worth several million credits. The left wall seemed to be made of glass, revieling beauty of space beyond. The rest of the office was a bit less ornate but more functional all the same, with several projectors both for presenting data and for AIs, a few framed pictures, and a file cabinet no doubt filled with legal papers (the only thing still required to be in paper). On top of the cabinet was something special, a framed iPhone 4s. 'That's something special, it's amazing that any of those made it past the 22nd century.'

"If you're done gaping Caleb", Sarah said, snapping Caleb out of his nostalga, "I have something serious I need to talk to you about."

"Am I in trouble or something", something was wrong and Caleb could tell, "because I know for a fact there were no cameras in-"

"No Caleb...it's just...here look at these," she handed over a bundle of papers. Caleb scrutinized the first paper for a moment before looking back to Sarah confused. "These are inheritance papers, what about it?"

"Well, for starters they are for you. The papers say that you get quite a bit of money from it, however the Weyland corp. has rights on half of it because of your contract." She looked quite depressed by this.

"Well that's fine, you know I'm not too crazy about money. I am the janitor, remember...not exactly aspiring to make serious bank."

"That's not it Caleb, there's no easy way to say this so I'll be blunt. That inheritance...it's from your parents." Caleb's eyes widened at this, he had thought that the inheritance was from his grandmother.

"...well...", Caleb's eyes grew very distant, "I thought I would be prepared for this...but it's just too soon."

Sarah got up from her chair and walked around the desk. Caleb refocused and stood, turning to meet her. Surprisingly she reached out and pulled him into a warm embrace. She looked up ever so slightly into his eyes, "Are you gonna be ok Caleb?"

"...I thought I would be prepared. I told myself before that one day I would come back home to see my family again, but that was a lie. I know the moment I left earth that I would never see my parents again."

"Caleb...", without realizing it Caleb had turned to look out the window, gazing into space. He looked back into Sarah's deep green eyes, and she into his blue ones, "Caleb, I want you to know that I will always by here for you...but only if you do the same."

He looked into her eyes for a moment longer and then pulled her closer, she opened her mouth to say something, but Caleb moved forward and kissed her, quite passionately I might add. It wasn't the overly passionate "I WANT TO SUCK YOUR FACE" kiss, nor was it a mere peck. It held much more meaning than that. It lasted for a few seconds before Sarah drew back. "Forgive me if I seem rude...but I would like if you say that aloud."

Caleb smiled, "Well, in that case I want to say that you are the most beautiful being in the known universe and that I would never even consider leaving you. A million light years of space, a hundred thousand planets, a star fleet, and a black hole would not be enough to keep me from getting to you. The stars in the space try to shine brighter when you are around because you outshine them all, and somehow I cought your eye. I love you more than life itself and I'll do anything to protect you. I swear on all that I am that I will always be there for you...for you are life itself to me and without you I am nothing."

The memory crumbles to nothing.

'Caleb' The voice came from the blackness. 'What?'

'Ah good, your back' it was hades and he seemed to be back to normal, 'Could you come here, you missed quite a lot while you where away.'

'Uhh, how do I do that?'

'Here, let me come get you.'

'How does this even wor-hiiiii!' What Caleb felt next can't be adequately described, the closest coming sensation would be that of a brain freeze...only the brain freeze seemed to pick up his brain and drag through several layers of jello. 'Holy fu-'

'No time for that, look.' Caleb realised his eyes where closed from shock and that he hadn't felt them before, or much of anything for that matter. 'I'll figure that out later.' He opened them and looked around. Immediatly he realised that he was mere inches from the face of some old man.

Before he could determine any specific details a large pain registered in his brain. He hissed sharply and reached to his head. However his hand never made it to his head. Looking down Caleb realised that his entire body was held in place by thick metal restraints. He tested the metal and found that they held firm, he wasn't going anywhere.

"Hmm vell zis is interesting", the smell of turkey told Caleb that the old guy was talking and that apparently he didn't brush his teeth today, "ze subject haz been conscious and restrained for hours and only now considers escape."

'I don't like him.' 'Vas it hiz accent zat tipped you off?' 'Very funny, and yes that was partially it. I don't know, he just has that evil scientist/bad guy vibe to him, it's almost as if some bad writer REALLY wanted this guy to scream bad guy'

"BAD GUY", the old man yelled, "I've told you vonce before and I'll tell you again, my methods in expirimentation don't make me a bad guy."

Before Caleb could point out how ludicrous the situation was the hand of Zeus came down and smote him. One hundred thousand volts of electricity flowed through him, his screams reverberated throughout the room making it seem as if there where twenty Xenomorphs instead of one. Caleb strained against his bonds and thrashed his tail about. If he had enough control of his eyes to open them he could see that electricity was visibly arching off of his body. The old man shut off the power and Caleb went slack. "From merely vone expiriment", the man said while raising his finger, "I have determined three things, vone that the xenomorph is highly conductive to electricity. Two, that he is highly resistant to electric shock, its heart hardly faltered during the procedure. And three, that although it can live through such an ordeal it will hurt. A fair bit by the look of it. It's just too bad that your all bound up, I'm sure you want to kill me. But your just too weak."

"Ah, Dr. Lehmann it's in my personal expirience not best to piss off a xenomorph, especially a kind we know nothing about." This voice came in over the speaker system.

"In in my professional opinion you should trust in ze power of science, zose bonds are made vith carbon nanotubes. Zat shit just von't break."

At that moment all Caleb and Hades could feel was a deep primal rage. This man, this HUMAN, clapped him in irons, shocked him with enough electricity to kill a ten men, and dared to call him weak? Oh he would pay...

As one, they strained against the metal bindings making no headway. "Oh look vat ve have here", the doctor mocked, "ze little xeno vants out? Vell I'll give you some vords of visdom, zose shakles are strong enough to hold a xenomorph tvice your size. Zer is no vay in hell zat you are-" CREAK!

The metal holding their left arm bent and held...before shattering. "Vhat!"

They reached for their other arm and, grabbing hold of the cold metal, wrenched both of their arms forward shattering the restraint like glass. "Nein!" The doctor ran for the door. "Dr. Chekoff! Open ze door!"

"I am, I am, get out of there!" Doctor Nelson Chekoff, who had been recording the entire prosess so far, opened the door and watched as the xenomorph tore away the rest of its bonds lunge across the room with inhuman speed and...he tried to forget what happened next. After the screaming gad stopped it was needless to say the German scientist was no more.

The xeno looked up from its kill and turned...to face directly at Nelson. 'How? The glass is one way, there's no way he should be able to-oh shit! The doors!' Nelson lunged and slammed the button causing the door to slam shut...with the creature just slipping through the opening. "Oh no" Nelson turned to see the angel of death stalking toward him. He dashed for the exit...but only made it three steps before a strong hand wrapped around his neck, stopping him in his tracks and throttling him slightly. Nelson was thrown back toward the chair he had been sitting in, knocking his head on the floor leaving him dazed. He was so disoriented that he thought he was imagining things when the xeno walked over to the exit and shut the door, locking both of them inside.

'We should kill him'

'Hades, we can't kill everyone we meet'

'But he helped the old one hurt us'

'We don't know that, in my eyes everyone is innocent until proven guilty. We need to know for sure' With that caleb walked over to the stunned scientist. Caleb picked him up and set him in the chair, not bothering to be super gentle. Nelson however was a bit more stunned that Caleb realised, he had fallen unconscious.

'Really?' Caleb sighed mentally. 'Hades, would you like to wake up our friend here?' Hades didn't bother to respond and instead roared in the doctors face, waving his arms and tail for added effect.

Nelson awoke instantly as his ears where assaulted. "Holy fucking shit tit cock sucking bitch!" His eyes frantically dashed about before landing on Caleb who was standing, quite menacingly, in front of him. Nelson screamed...and screamed...and screamed some more. Caleb grew tired of this and before long slaped him across the face, Nelson went silent. 'We need to find out where Sarah is and if she is in trouble'

'I'll take this one if you don't mind Caleb, I'm sure you could do it but I have a feeling that this requires a heavier hand.' Hades placed a hand on the cowering "mans" forehead. Where Caleb had been gentle and timid, Hades forceful and precise, though not necessarily mean. The instant he found the barrier he shattered it, causing Nelson to wince. He then stood back as if to admire his craft.

"Ah! W-what did you do that for?", Nelson asked, forgetting momentarily who he was talking to. 'How else was do you think I was to talk to you? It's not as if I know how to speak your language and you never bothered to learn mine. Besides, the better question is why you had us in that cage, and why you think yourself so high as to expiriment on us with no thought of repercussion. It's really quite naïve when you think about it.'

"Um, you...I mean me-we, er..what do you mean us?" Nelson was in a good bit of shock, his mind was racing! 'Gah! Stop that!'

"Stop what?"

'Thinking so fast, it's giving me a headache. Ah! Now your thinking about the implications of a psycic xenomorph! You know what.' Hades' tailblade was instantly at Nelsons neck. 'You think about this and I'll talk. How does that sound?'

"Uhhh...", Nelson was indeed thinking about the tailblade at his neck, "how do I know you aren't just gonna kill me.."

'Let's try this, you're a scientist and we need information, you want to live and we don't nessesarily want to kill you. So here's what we're going to do, we will ask questions of you and you get to ask the same number of questions to us. If you lie, even in the slightest, you will die. Deal?'

"...deal...", Nelson was still trying to get over the fact that he was having a sustained conversation with a Xenomorph, "What do you want to know?"

'Where is Dr. Masalym.'

"Sarah? What does she-" Hades' tail twitched slightly, making a shallow cut on Nelsons neck, "Ok! Ok! She's in the brig, B-Block, I don't know exactly where though."

'Ok, why exactly is she there, Nelson? I suggest you be as descriptive as possible...'

"How about you answer one of my questions first, I get the feeling that Sarah is pretty important to you. It would be a shame if someone forgot to tell you the security measures they took..."

Hades snarled, 'Fine, ask your question.'

"Why don't you tell me about you and your friend?" Nelson smirked. 'What do you mean friend? Don't you see that I'm the only one here.'

"Well then why do you keep refering to yourself as 'we'?" Hades snarled again, 'I am growing tired of your-' 'Hades, I think that's enough, we made a deal and I plan to uphold it.' Hades reluctantly lowered his tail and stepped back a bit. 'Hello Nelson, to answer your question yes, there are two of us in here.' Caleb gestured to his head. 'However we have no idea how it happened or why. Now, what where you saying about the security measures?'

"Well, for the most part everything is normal, there are the same amount of personel guarding the brig as usual, the only difference being a big jump in firepower. I've been seeing more and more security armed with assault rifles, at one point I thought a saw a smartgun." Nelson seemed to relax almost completely, though he was still on edge. But really, who wouldn't be? 'Well that's all we need to know now, unless you have something to add Hades.'

'Yes, I do in fact. So Nelson would you like to be knocked unconscious while the two of us talk? Yes? Splendid!' Before Nelson could talk Hades struck him at the base of his skull with the flat of his tail blade. Nelson slumped without a word. 'Why did you do that? He was cooperating.'

'He suspected your true identity.'

'What? How.'

'He is a lot smarter that we gave him credit for, apparently he read the file on us and pieced together all the irregularities in our actions, particularly everything you did.'

'Well what do we do?'

'Now, I would just kill him. However I assume that you don't want to take that route.'

'Correct.'

'Then we must take him with us.'

AN: dun dun DUUUN! We got a new character everybody! But I have a position opening if you want to take part in making this story. My current editor is my friend Nelson and he has school that doesn't allow him to do his editing all the time, also he's writing his own story. What I'm getting at is I need a beta reader. So if any betas out there have an interest in my story and some time to spend PM me, also if you know any betas who would like my story put my name out there. However regardless of betas the next chapter will be out in a few days, I'm thinking Monday... Anyway, follows, favorites, and reviews are alway apreciated, you are all amasing people, and most inportantly...Happy Reading!