You know the so-called "inner jaws" that Xenomorphs have? The thing that they use to "Head-Bite" people? Well, I've come up with an actual name for them. I've decided to call it... the "Piston Jaw"… because they shoot outward, like pistons. I would have called it a "Skull Hole-Puncher", but that would have been a mouthful.
To "Cross the Rubicon", essentially means to "cross the point of no return". It comes from when Julius Caesar crossed a river of the same name, thus starting a civil war.
Chapter 2: Unwillingly Crossing the Rubicon
Throughout the Xenomorph infestation, fear had been a constant companion to Samantha, in some form or another. She had always been afraid. There was the near-endless, overbearing sense of dread and suspense; forever worried and concerned of her supplies, her whereabouts, and whether or not she had been detected by prying eyes. The sensation that always caused her to look over her shoulder as she walked, and made her work deathly silent in everything she did— so as to not attract the Hive's attention.
And then there was the feeling of adrenaline slamming through her veins; the overpowering urge to move, along with something that made her skin feel like it was on fire. The feeling of a primal urge to flee, such as when she had been chased by those five Warriors, earlier. Oh, yes, she had been forced to run from the Xenomorphs on many occasions. She was very familiar with fear, by this point, and had grown somewhat accustomed to it...
So why was it different now? Despite her fears, she had always been able to act— always able to get out of dangerous situations, and always able to push through her adversities. Here, though, not so much.
What she was feeling now, went beyond mere worry or any fight-or-flight response. Samantha was experiencing the very heights of an emotion called "terror". That sensation of wide-eyed, limb-locking fear that accompanied the realization that the next few moments could very well be her last...
As the Xenomorph stepped out of the shadows, this feeling maximized tenfold. It didn't occur to her that this particular one looked nothing like most that she'd seen. What was coming to mind were the hundreds of possibilities as to what would happen to her, now. Thousands of scenarios bloomed in her mind— many of a gory, painful death, and few of a painless one. Some of being dragged back to the Hive to be Infested, and others of situations that were more ridiculous than plausible, but which provoked disgust and revulsion...
The uncertainty drove the terror deeper. Time seemed to slow down, just for her. As if the universe would like to watch her demise in slow motion— watch her agonize over every suspenseful millisecond before the end, as she wound herself up into mania. The suspense of what was merely a scant few moments felt like an eternity, and in mind, it may as well have been its own kind of Hell. All the while, her dread and terror only increased. Even her body's urge to hack her lungs out from the piercing cold was overridden by fear.
Such as it was, Samantha could not even bring to bear a yelp when the Xenomorph kneeled down and loomed over her. Its barely-concealed fangs filled her vision, and that's when it hit her fully. She realized with perfect, cognizant clarity... that she was going to die. And when she spotted its spear-like tail gliding down from above, as though readying like a guillotine, she knew that it would be here and now. A wash of sweet relief cascaded through her body, all the way from her head to her toes... and for the first time a very long while, she felt a small amount of peace.
Good... no Xeno-babies..., she thought.
With fear no longer clouding her brain, she began breathing deeply, ready to welcome the hand of the Grim Reaper...
Anteros... was about to kill the Human. A simple task, only requiring the briefest contraction of muscle, and he would watch the life and blood ebb away. As usual, he would hear the crack of the Human's skull as his blade punctured through her brain matter. Such a simple, easy thing to do for a creature of his size and strength— something he had done, many times before, with an ease that would come across as comical were it not so disturbing. It should have been easy...
And yet it went so, so, irretrievably wrong...
His life probably would have been so much simpler had this gone to plan. But his life would have also been a lot more shallow, had fate turned another way at this juncture.
He took a deep breathe, resisting the urge to lose control to the Ancestral— to his own instincts. He focused his senses upon the Human girl who had not shown fear, who had kept her cool in the face of her mortality.
He urged his tail to raise up as though tugged by a string...
And he brought his tail down with all his strength and speed of an ornery god and reduced the Human's skull to mere fragments, the spray of blood and... and?...
Hold on…
He swore that he heard the tell-tale snap of bone cracking, but...
Why..., he thought, why am I not moving? His tail clearly hadn't smashed through the Human's skull.
He tried again, trying to make his limb obey him, but something... something is... he couldn't tell what it was that was stopping him and… he immediately started to worry.
What is this? Why am I hesitating?, he asked himself, worriedly, grasping at a proverbial straw. Anteros tested this by removing his tail from its hovering position, returning the limb to his back, and it obeyed him with no issue. He stepped backwards, tentatively, and again, no problem.
Anteros's body twisted at the waist and launched his tail under his arm— toward the Human's head. Once again, for an instant, he thought he'd succeeded and heard the crack of a cranium crumbling... but once again, he realized that he had not heard anything— not felt anything. In fact... his tail-blade was numb, and he couldn't feel it. He could see it move when he urged it to move, but… it stopped within a few inches of her head, as though restrained by a greater force, and yet no such force could have intervened...
An infrasound chirp on his part showed him that it, indeed, had again not killed the girl. It also let him know that she was staring at him in apparent bewilderment. He... didn't understand what was wrong... he could have easily reached her from this distance. Four feet to be exact— no distance at all for his tail to reach and kill from.
He drew his tail back to him as his mind struggled to figure out this phenomenon, utterly confused. Okay, this... this is just plain weird! I don't... what? What the fuck?!
Each time he'd attempted the killing blow... it was uncanny. It was like… it was like trying to push two magnets together by the wrong ends— it just wasn't working! He felt a building pressure in his gut and felt his heart thumping faster than before, but for what reason he could not guess in the slightest!
He was about to try again, and was halfway through coiling his tail and preparing to strike at the Human a third time... but any thought of "trying" anything was immediately dropped when he abruptly entered a world of undiscovered agony.
A thorn-bristled bolt of the most intense, suffocating pain shot through his spine with such speed that it was all he could do to stumble backward with a surprised screech, tripping over himself and falling backwards to the fall. He heard himself shriek in pain, and felt himself flailing about on the floor. An asphyxiating agony strained against the confines of his skull, as the lance of fire in his spine seemed to double in intensity. A strangled-sounding howl shook the walls and echoed through the structure with its volume.
WHAT THE FUCK!? He struggled to get back to his feet, still dealing with what felt like hot knives being plunged into his spinal cord. He hadn't the slightest idea which way was "up".
Okay— scratch "worried", he was terrified, now! Living things don't just "experience pain" for no reason! Especially not at this caliber!
As soon as he staggered and climbed back onto alarmingly shaky legs, he collapsed onto all fours as a new wave of agony smashed into him. Violently. It felt like all the muscle-control in his legs was overridden, and as though he'd been clobbered across the face by a sledgehammer— head ringing and pounding like the world's worst hangover.
STOP DAMMIT… ARGH! WHAT THE HELL'S WRONG WITH ME!?
His head and torso suddenly felt like they were being split in half, down the middle… and in more ways than one. His hands started pawing madly at his own skull, trying to get the pain to fuck off, while only creating more! He was hissing and growling in staccato bursts— shrieking in tortured agony. Sounds that he had never made before in his life— guttural hisses and pitiful keens that could only come from sheer, unadulterated anguish. He could barely think, barely perceive—
Unbeknownst to him, he had started erratically convulsing on the floor— clawing at what he thought was his head. The pain never stopped, never let him breathe, and only seemed to get worse with each moment.
He felt himself beginning to... lose... consciousness...
Am I going to die?, his mind briefly wondered, somewhere amongst the myriad of pained and primal thoughts.
And then...
Then suddenly it... it wasn't just him and his Ancestral instincts anymore. H-he could feel his mind stretch, as his psyche split from two halves, into three th-thirds. He… he could feel a second… thing in his head! In his gut and in his bones! It made him feel nauseous, and all at once, it was though something had taken a chainsaw to his mind and poured lemon-juice on the wounds. He'd never felt like throwing up before, but he was beginning to get a grasp of the notion.
He was nearing oblivion— closer to death than he believed he'd ever been in his life, before...
But then... just like the flip of a switch, the pain fell away in quick, relieving sheets. Finally allowing him to think straight... and leaving him in a pathetic stupor of shock and ache. His body stopped moving and he simply lay there, panting heavily, trying to get his bearings. He eventually dredged himself up onto all-fours, crouched low to the ground... trying to do nothing to provoke another episode of... whatever in the nine, infernal Hells that had been...
What the fuck happened to me?!, he thought, more in anger than shock or surprise.
Breathing in seethed and strained gasps, he searched inward, seeing if his Ancestral instincts had any idea what had happened. And to… see if he could sense that "second presence" he had felt a moment ago.
As he looked into himself, he found that there was him, of course, his personality, his memories; Anteros. Then there were the Ancestral Instincts that were present in all his kind. And then there was… something else. Something… softer; innocent… simpler. It felt almost identical to his instincts, in how it was nothing more than a, uh, "urge". Yet, he could still feel the difference between the two. Right now, the Ancestral was utterly confused and "nervous", and this new… "instinct"…
For the moment, this new entity was simply… Anteros didn't know— asleep? Dormant?
And strangely it seemed to have an… equally large presence in his head, compared to the Ancestral! Anteros... didn't know what to do— this was unheard of. Wait, was it? He mentally looked to the Ancestral, and it was silent.
No… this has never happened before... ever, in the entire history of his ancestors. Whatever had just happened to him was completely unprecedented.
That… this… I don't… what the Hell?, he mentally bumbled, dumbly.
He didn't dare to move; worried that any kind of effort might provoke another "seizure". He emitted multiple infrasound chirps. As the mental images came back to his skull, he couldn't help but orient his head downward. Large pieces of wood and a few splinters. He had apparently fallen on top of a crate, destroying it. Luckily there was nothing inside. And even more luckily: his skin was "splinter-proof".
He scanned in the Human's direction, and there she was, unmoved. She was staring at him as though he had grown a second head.
Well, he thought, mentally grumbling, I might as well have.
As his thoughts came upon the woman, though, and seemingly apropos of nothing: the newly-discovered "second influence" in his mind took that moment to... to well up with joy? The girl? This girl? Until that moment... this Unknown had been utterly passive. Now, though, the oddity of these new feelings flooding his brain made him genuinely freeze on the spot. The flow of... happiness pulsing from this Unknown could only be described as that of... reuniting with a long lost friend...
Which was absolutely, fucking insane! Anteros had never seen this Human before, in his life! And he'd only been alive for barely more thansix months, so he should know! Furthermore, he didn't even know there was a specific emotion tied to meeting someone you know after a while apart, until now! The fact that he was now experiencing exactly that, and so authentically, was also completely bizarre. He never forgot a face, and he didn't remember this woman's... even taking into account all of the Humans he hadn't seen die, specifically...
He shook his head, growling. The Human female, who had calmed down considerably due to her curiosity at his torture, whimpered audibly in response, probably because of his evident agitation. That one noise from her, though, was enough to trigger another oddity. Anteros hunched over, a bit, as the Unknown proceeded to do something even crazier than before. He must have been completely losing his marbles, because for some God-fucked reason: he felt what he could only describe as a desire to submit. As in: a sense of juvenile guilt, like that of having misbehaved and having been caught, which was then accompanied by a servile urge to beg for forgiveness and signal submission to an authority figure.
In response to the Human woman in front of him being frightened...
At this, Anteros lashed his tail and mentally bucked the feeling.
It was one thing to think of her as a friend, and another to feel regret at having scared her... but to feel submissive!? That was borderline sacrilege! What was this Unknown thinking— what was it, for that matter!? If anything, the Human should be submissive to him— he's the one that had her at his mercy! Wait— why was Anteros even having this argument with himself!?
Because this Unknown is so… it's being so stupid!, Anteros thought. What was the deal with this thing? If it were in any way similar to the Ancestral, Anteros couldn't see the resemblance, because all of the emotions it was causing him to feel were so... alien!
Anteros felt a passing desire to kill the girl, just to spite thing and its convoluted desires. Like he should do! The sooner he could leave the Human there as a corpse, the sooner he could head back to the Hive and get something to eat! Though... that might just be the Ancestral talking.
The Unknown seemed to mentally fidget in protest at the notion of the Human dying, and he inadvertently whimpered as the discomfort crawling through his skin.
Oh, shut the fuck up! What's so bloody special about her?! She's just a random human, there are billions just like her! Why this one?! Why now?!, Anteros thought to himself as he tilted his head at the ground and snarled. As if the Unknown was sitting next to him.
Predictably, the Unknown gave no kind of communicable response, just kept pulsing in discomfort and distress. It was a part of his subconscious (apparently), after all, so what did he expect it to do?
Anteros grabbed his own head and shook it, growling and warbling in frustration in a very "Human" gesture. All of this mental buggery was giving him a head-ache. Anteros probably wouldn't have minded the addition of a second instinctual influence on him. He might have been intrigued by it. The Ancestral had never been a problem, so what would be this Unknown in comparison? Except for the fact that this Unknown was a complete tool, apparently! Camaraderie, submissiveness, and protective of a Human!? Here and now, of all times and places?! What kind of idiot would you have to be!? What the Hell was causing him to feel this way?!
The Human woman, as blameless as she was, wasn't his "friend", and by all reasonable measures: couldn't be...
If he were honest with himself, he wouldn't have minded making a real friend. But... the fact that this Unknown was so... naively pushing for it deeply, deeply enraged him. Because he knew it wouldn't happen! It had been the object of his desire for a long time, now, and he knew full-well that it was an impossible dream! That this entity in his head so childishly pined for it, in spite of everything that stood in the way of that rapturous aspiration... it made him genuinely angry. As though he were being teased by a child! A snotty, annoying child!
Anteros pushed up from his sitting position and stood straight up onto his hind legs, snarling to himself. His tail lashed furiously, and his jaws began to open, drool dripping from his teeth. His opinion of this Unknown was not a good one. Contempt and alarm made both him and the Ancestral angry! He focused on the Human, her heartbeat was flashing almost teasingly as a new wave of terror seemed to pass over her. She could tell that Anteros was enraged. His fists actually clenched, in a fit never typically seen in Xenomorphs— he was really tempted to just hand over his self-control to the Ancestral. This Human was troublesome, after all, it seemed! He suddenly didn't think she needed to be remembered as vividly as usual!
Not with the trouble her execution was turning out to be. Not with the amount of pain he just been through.
He took a hostile step forward, crushing a stake of wood under his clawed foot with an echoing snap. His ribcage began vibrating deeply, creating a guttural, rumbling, sound; aggression seizing control. The fearsome noise gave off the same pitch as a motorcycle engine (not that Anteros knew what that was), and filled the corners of the ice-cold room; causing the Human to whine, almost pathetically and shrink in on herself, vainly struggling against the weight on her chest.
The Ancestral would have been violently trembling in anticipation right now. If he kept this up and allowed the "floodgates" to open up, setting the wrath of his ancestors upon the Human, the entire experience, for him, would be over in seconds. It would just be a blur; he'd remember almost nothing.
But... as he registered her expression and scent... he remembered the countless numbers of people he had seen the same countenance of... and he reminded himself that, nevertheless, she was still a thinking, feeling person, whatever was wrong with him at the moment. She deserved to be remembered by at least someone. Letting loose all of his pent up aggression upon her would hardly be fair while she was completely defenseless, anyway. Anteros was well aware that he may never understand what it felt like to be truly helpless, but… he could… sympathize… as difficult as that was for the Ancestral to deal with.
Just… take a moment… and calm down… control must be maintained… put aside the urge..., Anteros told himself, repeatedly, in his head. His lips closed, hiding his bared teeth. His tail began swishing passively off to the side. And his hands relaxed themselves. With control restored, he took another step forward, not nearly as aggressive this time, and he stood over her.
He was about to raise his arm and lop the girl's head off, with his claws alone, Ancestral becoming exited once more, Unknown protesting again. However... Anteros then remembered how well it had worked out the last time he had tried killing her. Not even five minutes ago.
He became concerned whether or not he would have another "seizure" if he attempted to end the Human's life. And all at once, his piss and vinegar dissipated further into nothing, and he took a step back. Unwilling to go through that ordeal, again, whatever it was, he backed away a few more paces, and stopped next to the doorway, behind him.
Somehow... he doubted that the Unknown would appreciate it if he somehow did kill the Human. And seeing as though this "arrangement" would probably last for a while, he didn't want the fuckin' thing to go berserk so early into their new "relationship". If the Ancestral was any indication... his relationship with this Unknown would likely become similarly intimate...
Who knows what it could do… considering it seemed to have a profound affect on him, earlier.
Anteros wondered what the Human must have been thinking through all of this. He inwardly laughed at how completely ridiculous this situation would look from the outside. A cursory infrasonic chirp told him that the female was now practically gaping at him in complete, morbid captivation.
Samantha was really confused, to say the least. The Xeno seemed to... take a few practice-swings at her? And then it... randomly started having some sort of seizure, and destroyed a wooden crate in the process? She had to look away as the splinters went flying. She then stared at it for what seemed like hours before it ceased convulsing. When it got back up and sat unmoving for a while, she wasn't prepared for it to suddenly growl, and she couldn't help but whine a little. Too many bad memories were associated with that sound. Its seemingly "calm" demeanor before could be slipping away on account of whatever the Hell had happened to it. Was it rethinking its decision about killing her, or having her Infested? The creature then sat down, ignoring her for a while, seemingly in… "deep thought".
This... this had never happened before. Was something wrong with it? Or… could she be hallucinating? Was all of this just psychosis?
She shook her head. No, if I was hallucinating, this would have to be the most vivid "tripping" session ever, she resolved. Although... she did receive a knock to the head, recently...
The Xenomorph snarled at something she couldn't see, causing her to flinch again, then stood up and advanced on her. Her eyes widened in fear as a thousand little nightmares sprung to life behind her eyes, at once...
Then the Xeno calmed down, again, its aggression receding. And she got a bit miffed, shedding a tear and huffing from the rollercoaster that was this... bizarre experience.
Is this thing bi-polar or something!? Could it just make up its fucking mind already!?, she thought irritably, quietly sniffling to herself. The creature then did the last thing she expected and backed away... was it going to call for one of its friends? Not going to kill her? Why her, specifically, and not for the hundreds of people she'd seen get torn to ribbons? She was pretty sure this had never happened to any other Humans...
She started thinking that it would just leave her alone and eventually take its leave, when a sound began to reach her ears...
Bang! Bang!
Bang! Bang!
A distant noise reverberated through the room— Samantha could almost feel the vibrations in the metal floor.
She swallowed.
Anteros... had no idea what to do in this situation. The Ancestral was practically nagging him to kill the Human. And the Unknown seemed relieved, yet wary, at his indecisiveness. If he couldn't kill the Human without going all "exorcist", then what was he going to do?
How was he going to explain this to Mother? What? He couldn't kill the Human female because he spontaneously had a seizure, and a new instinctual presence popped into his head!? Even to Mother, that would sound insane!
But then… like divine providence answering his prayers: a saving grace! The thundering footsteps of one of his Hive-Mates… a Soldier, by the sound of it.
Maybe he wouldn't have to come up with an excuse after-all...
The sound of the incoming Soldier's thundering footsteps was music to Anteros's skull. Swinging his head to face toward the sound, Anteros felt the pulsing of his Hive-Mate's powerful heart, diaphragm, and striding limbs strobe across his head. The approaching Soldier was jogging upright instead of sprinting on all fours, as it would normally do. Probably because of the presence of the Human.
Speaking of, said Human was now squirming beneath the weight of the debris she was trapped under. She whimpered, loudly, as the intensity of her fear tripled. She was feeling more and more desperate.
Anteros lowered himself back down to all fours, upon feeling his hind legs start to tremble. His clawed hands had become slightly thicker than that of his Hive-Mates, on account of him constantly walking on them. Anteros stared at the incoming Soldier through the walls, and he tasted the smell of his Hive-Mate's alarmed state through his bared teeth. Why would this newcomer be alarmed? Sure, there was a Human here, but Anteros knew that his Hive-Mates could usually tell the difference between a "deadly" and "defenseless" enemy— even through walls, ceilings, and floors.
Briefly skidding to a stop outside the room, the Soldier made a short leap through the open doorway, landing on her feet, instantly orienting her head in Anteros's direction and hissing quietly. Anteros smelled the pheromones of concern and alarm exuding from the Soldier's dorsal-tubes, a minute amount of oozing liquid dripping from the very organs. As the newly-arrived Soldier turned fully to face Anteros and lowered herself to a crouch when approaching him, the Human girl squirmed even more— in vain. It did not take long for Anteros to figure out why this Soldier seemed to be focusing on him, exclusively.
Being that Anteros was the nearest Scout, all other breeds of his kind had the habit of "reporting" to him, seeing as though his telepathic ability was more powerful than theirs, in order for him to communicate with the Queen from longer distances, and for longer periods of time... and more frequently. Scouts were "scouts" after all, and would have needed to be able to relay any information they find to Mother regularly, and from considerable distances.
A Human might have seen this as Anteros being of a "higher rank", but that wasn't quite the truth of it. All of his kind were equally devoted and important to the Hive's success... well, most of them. Some just happen to have more responsibilities. It wasn't as though any of Anteros's Hive-Mates would have bothered to understand the concept of "ranks", anyway, beyond which individuals have received a mandate from Mother. His species were not selfish or ambitious in the least, he could admit that, for however much it meant.
The Soldier rumbled and lowered her head, chin touching her chest, pushing a mental link through to Anteros's mind. It was then that Anteros noticed that this Soldier was relatively young, the carvings on her skull being smooth-looking; vaguely similar to the patterns on a Human invention called a "tennis ball".
This distinctive cranial marking placed the Soldier at being only two inches bigger than Anteros, above seven feet, six inches tall while fully upright. As this Soldier aged, she would molt about twelve times, until she stood at eight feet. After six months, a Soldier would stop molting and end up with a ridged/carved skull pattern that would have reminded Anteros of the tracks that a motorcycle would leave in the dirt; had he known what exactly that was.
Anteros then felt his skull buzz rhythmically in that old, familiar way as the Soldier transmitted her memories of... apparently, "why she was here", from the looks of it. Anteros's "vision" faded into a slightly murky "recording".
According to what Anteros "half-saw" from the memories being sent to him, the Soldier now standing before him had apparently been walking a regular patrol around the Human complex when she had noticed Anteros's seizure from afar, and had immediately gone to "check on him"— apparently his episode had been intense enough to bleed into the local Hive-Mind. This knowledge may have offered Anteros a sort of warm comfort, a while ago. Though, Anteros doubted this Soldier knew that what had been happening to Anteros was called a "seizure". Anteros shook his head as the memories of the Soldier got to the point approaching the present. Canceling out the transmission, while signaling that he had "heard enough".
Anteros "looked" back up at his young Hive-Mate, seeing the Soldier shake her own head and "look" to Anteros like he just had. Anteros felt a concerned feeling pulse from the Soldier's mind to his.
Oh... she wants to know what happened... uh..., Anteros thought.
"Um, I don't really want to talk about it, love. Maybe I'll tell you later", Anteros spoke mentally in response.
Though Anteros knew that this Soldier didn't know a lick of English, he also knew that the female would be able to sense the feeling of dismissal he projected.
Anteros sensed what felt… almost like curiosity come from his "sister's" mind, but the feeling quickly died away as the Soldier immediately moved on.
Yeah, thought so, Anteros thought, a bit tiredly. The Soldier's reaction to his use of English was completely predictable.
The young Soldier then turned to the Human girl, seemingly noticing her for the first time and immediately hissed, baring her teeth. Anteros could taste the scent of adrenaline and anger wave out of the Soldier's dorsal tubes.
He would have rolled his eyes, if he had any.
Oh, for fuck's sake, what the Hell is there to get worked up about? Just go over there and do it, there's no point in all the theatrics. Yes, you're very scary, missy, but could you please contain yourself and simply do your job without all the fire and fury and melodrama?, Anteros thought to himself, entirely unamused with his sister's painfully-typical behavior.
The young Soldier quivered in barely-hidden rage, body shaking as her tail lashed, growling at the sight of the injured, and harmless Human woman. The young Soldier's had fully transitioned into a rage and adrenaline-induced trance. The Soldier took hostile steps toward the girl, as all reason (however small it may have been) left her mind and turned her into nothing more or less than a killing machine whose only impulse is to kill anything and everything around it.
Anteros calmly watched in a sitting position as his Hive-Mate raised her arm, fingers stiff, ready to slice out the Human's jugular with her claws. He focused all of his senses on the Human's face, and saw that the girl suddenly lost consciousness from... stress? Fear? Whatever. At least this latest addition to his mental archive wouldn't be of a thousandth rendition of fear and horror...
The young Soldier pulled her right arm back and upwards, preparing to end the enemy's life with the speed and accuracy of a wrathful god. The Ancestral seemed to jump in excitement, the Unknown protesting with the ferocity of a cornered animal, as Anteros bit back both influences. Maintaining just enough control. Allowing the Soldier to do his job for him. Anteros did not need to hear either of them— the situation brought him enough trepidation as it is. Anteros wished that he could have closed his eyes before he watched another life be senselessly taken. He continued focusing his sonar upon the girl...
Besides, the issue would be resolved, and nothing would go wrong, probably...
... and that's when shit hit the fan.
Because, it was in that moment — when the Soldier's arm was just about to begin its downward swing — that, all of a sudden... Anteros's lip twitched in anger. He... he could feel his so-well-maintained self-control slip away at an alarming rate.
Something was making him angry. Very, very angry. His hands clapped to his skull in sudden panic. The strongest impulse he had ever experienced took him. Stronger than any urge to hunt and kill Humans— stronger than any previous instinct to carry out his purpose in life. His efforts to keep himself from going, essentially, "apeshit" were ultimately null and void, in the end. Anteros could feel what it was that his sudden spike of fiery rage was about to make him do. He knew that it was a very bad idea, but... deep down, somewhere in him, he could also feel that, to a degree, it was what he wanted.
"No" was all Anteros managed to think before all cognizance "took the back seat". Looking back, Anteros believed that what he felt was quite possibly, one of the only times he had ever been truly enraged on his own, without any of his instincts pitching in. In the moment, it was just terrifying, and confusing. But later on... well... that's a story for another day, isn't it?
The experience felt similar to going into the instinct-driven trance that Anteros would have entered while defending the Hive or attacking dangerous prey, if he allowed the Ancestral to run rampant. But in this instant, rather than becoming a "fuzzy" collection of murky images, afterwards, everything he saw was quite vivid.
There wasn't much doubt as to "what" was shoving his control aside to "take the wheel". Drool gushed from between his teeth. His entire body trembled, spasmed, and twitched in fury. His jaws snapped open releasing a dangerous snarl which, upon release, seemed to increase his body temperature, tenfold— as well as making the searing magma in the back of his head boil at a whole new caliber.
The best way to describe the experience would be... seeing through your eyes but having little to no control over your actions. Like, being caught up in the effects of a narcotic— you just… do things.
Anteros watched in furious astonishment as "he" suddenly leaped forward with more speed than he thought possible. Anteros watched as his clawed hands reached out and violently grabbed the Soldier's shoulder-ridges, squeezing with every ounce of strength in his fingers, drawing blood with his talons. "Anteros" then yanked the young Soldier down and away from the unconscious Human with a snarl, just as the Soldier's arm had swung down to tear out her throat. The whole thing happened so quickly that Anteros couldn't even think before it ended. All he knew was rage.
The Soldier, Anteros's Hive-Mate, craned its head back at Anteros in surprise, shock, and confusion… just as Anteros's Piston Jaw smashed through the side of her head... killing her almost instantly. First, the "crunch" of punching through the exoskeleton, then the soft "squelch" of taking a chunk of the female's gray matter with it, the teeth on the four corners of his extended esophagus biting and snapping multiple times within the confines of the Soldier's head-case.
A spray of acidic blood flew out of the fatal wound and struck the side of a nearby wooden crate; immediately eating through the normally durable material with a loud hiss. The mortally wounded Soldier could only screech in pain, quickly dissolving into quiet hisses of shock. Anteros watched in horror — yet somehow, grim satisfaction — from the "backseat" of his mind, as he saw the trembling, contorting corpse of his dead Hive-Mate be tossed off to the side like garbage, by his own arms. Whatever livid fury that had seized control of him fell away as quickly as it had come. And Anteros was almost too stunned to fully take back the "wheel".
Feeling that he was about to fall over if he didn't regain his balance, Anteros shifted on his feet, returning to a fully lucid state.
At first, Anteros didn't move. Refusing to believe what he had so clearly witnessed.
No... that wasn't... this had better be some sort of convoluted dream!, Anteros begged to himself. The feeling of something dragging itself down his throat attested to the contrary...
He'd... swallowed the flesh he'd bitten off...
He slowly oriented his head toward the corpse of the Soldier he... yes, that he had killed.
The body had ceased quivering in post-mortem spasms, and lay motionlessly, acidic blood streaming out of where Anteros had Head-Bitten the poor lass, to drip soundlessly to floor from the tip of the Soldier's chin, instantly sizzling where it landed. Anteros, still in shock at what had just occurred, absentmindedly moved his feet to trudge over and stand above the corpse of his Hive-Mate.
Every step felt like it weighed a metric ton. Once hovering over the recently-made cadaver, he hunched over. Anteros stared at the body, scanning it with his senses, baring his teeth to let out a breath he didn't realize he had been holding in. He then breathed in a strained inhale and held his breathe once more, concealing his fangs. The Ancestral had become deathly silent, seemingly as stunned as Anteros, and the Unknown... wouldn't exactly be smiling, either.
He continued staring blankly at the lifeless corpse. What had used to be a living, breathing, organism. He had killed before... but this was different.
For a very long moment, Anteros didn't move. Mind, a blank. He was still mentally stalled; trying to find any other possible reality or "answer" to what he had just done. Trying in vain to escape what he knew was the cold, hard fact of the matter.
Bugger..., Anteros eventually thought, a bit dumbly, as his shoulders seemed to slump.
I've just committed fratricide, he thought, just as dumbly. He was still for another long moment.
WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH ME!?, he mentally wailed. He staggered a few steps backward, in the direction of the doorway, clutching and shaking his head in disbelief, as the full gravity of the situation crashed down on him. He began to breathe erratically through gritted teeth. Seething. Out of panic, he tripped over his own feet and fall over onto his back. Unable to remain motionless, he sat up, putting a painful weight on where his tail met his spinal cord.
He let out a long, loud screeching wail to the ceiling in anguish, his claws digging into his head. It echoed mournfully through the halls, and seemed to shake the metal structure surrounding him. A tiny drop of yellow-green blood dripped from a small scratch on the side of his head, made by his outer thumb.
He let go of his face and scrambled back onto all fours, out of an abrupt need to move. He started pacing in circles around the unconscious Human female that he didn't yet acknowledge. His body hung low to the ground, limbs sprawled out to either side, back and tail moving in a lizard-like fashion. As if preparing to leap to the side to evade something. Breathing in gasping snarls, drool dripping from his partially opened jaws from panic and elevated heart rate.
WHY?! WHY DID I KILL HER?! WHAT'S WRONG WITH ME?!, he half whined/screamed within his thoughts.
What could have possibly possessed me to do that?!, he questioned. Even though he hadn't really been in the right state of mind to actually do what he did, it still was his body, and his actions! And no one would believe otherwise!
He stopped pacing and held his breathe suddenly.
The Hive…
They'd... they'd hunt him down and tear him apart... he'd have to run away— to where, though? He had just killed his own Hive-Mate for fuck's sake! The only real consequence was for the rest of the Hive to find him and put him down, immediately! No. No, there was no escape from the Hive, no escape from the wrath of Mother's Soldiers! He was practically a fugitive, and the entire Hive would be under every obligation to find him, take him down, and eat his bloodied corpse!
Anteros honestly felt the need, and wished he could, to cry. He hissed, impotently.
It was over for him.
He was practically dead now.
Anteros proceeded to fall onto his side, arms and legs laying flat on the ground. The cold metal floor stinging his flesh only accentuated his current panic and hopelessness. He stayed in that position for minutes on-end, simply repeating to himself the utter dread he ought to be experiencing. He lay there, occasionally whimpering, his tail haphazardly lashing and limbs randomly thrashing every other minute.
Five minutes... ten minutes... fifteen minutes... his body remained still... and he was left in silence. Silence. That was all he heard, and all that he could focus on, without driving himself into hysterics. Silence. That, he decided, was the sound of true hopelessness.
And pain. Silence is the sound of pain.
Twenty minutes... twenty-five minutes... thirty minutes...
Silence... and... cold. It's really cold, down here...
And dark... and... and... boring.
Eventually, in keeping with his uniqueness from the rest of the Hive, as had happened many times before in his life, he became bored. His anguish at the circumstance could only last so long, and he... sort of just... got sick of being miserable. He couldn't just remain so for hours or days and wait for his Hive-Mates to stop by and kill him. Despite his anguish... he couldn't just sit and wait for death. He... he couldn't just wait here! That would be... stupid and pointless.
The concept of it became more and more absurd as time went by. Anteros came to the conclusion that he would simply have to find some way out of this. He'd at least have to try, dammit! He... he had things to do! Things he wanted to see! To say... and confess.
With somewhat-renewed composure, Anteros stood on his feet and sat down.
Alright... have to think... have to sort this out, he thought, still a hint of worry in his mind.
His "gaze" landed on the dead Soldier, as he began to mentally sift through this situation.
Okay— first things first. He killed a fellow Hive-Mate. Probably the closest thing to a "crime" that his kind had. This would be seen as utterly unacceptable. And he would be hunted down by the Hive and killed on the spot. It was an instinct built up to counter-act any form of "insanity", disease, or mental disorder that some of his species can develop, if you made him guess at its purpose.
Anteros had seen this kind of thing happen before. Only once. A Soldier had received an infection from a bullet wound, and was slain by the closest Sentry when the ailment became apparent. It was clear to Anteros that his kind rarely came down with any kind of disease or illness, but when they did, the effect was undoubtedly devastating; if not to the individual, then potentially to the rest of the Hive. After all, a crazed Hive-Mate with a lust for blood, running rampant through a Hive can be a serious problem.
He briefly wondered if he was insane, but dismissed it, for it would only make him panic again. And he likely became "insane" ages ago — for reasons that shall be revealed, later — anyway.
He then thought about what he could do about this... teeth-shatteringly awful mess he'd got himself into.
He couldn't return to the Hive, for Mother would easily be able to pick up on any thought that he had, search his memories, and instantly label him as a target… at least at that range. He was currently on the outskirts of the Hive's territory, and thus was about 50 kilometers away from the Hive's center, and seventy kilometers away from Mother. At this distance and beyond, the only thing that Mother could do in terms of the Hive-Mind was communicate with him.
If he were to get within a thousand yards of her, she'd be able to read his thoughts. His breed of Scouts had very powerful telepathy, almost comparable to a Praetorian's. They'd have to have an increased empathic capacity because of their higher need to communicate with the Queen, herself. They weren't called "Scouts" for no reason, and thus would report to the Queen constantly to relay information.
Because of his powerful telepathy, Anteros was one of the few that could communicate with the Queen at this kind distance. At least alone. A group of his kind could make for a strong enough "signal" to just about communicate with the Queen at this kind of range. Like an array of satellite dishes.
Okay. So, he couldn't return to the Hive without a death wish... and Mother would most likely call for him to return, at some point. He couldn't very well "run away", Mother would become suspicious, and probably send one of her Praetorians to find him. He may have been given various privileges, but any kind of deviation from normal behavior could easily be seen as some sort of aberration.
Whether the possible cause of the unusual behavior was insanity, a disease, or simply a mere distraction, didn't matter. If you started acting weird, you'd be liable to be scrutinized and/or executed. Couldn't have any "weak-links" in the massive chain that is the Hive, after all. This is where his problem lied. If he couldn't run away to some other Human city or something, and if he couldn't return to the Hive, then… he was stuck between a rock and hard place.
Anteros growled at the corpse as if it had just insulted him.
So, I can't run away, and I can't go back to the Hive, anymore... where does that leave me?, he asked himself...
His head oriented upwards in a habitual show of realization. He was almost certain he would have gone pale, had his skin the ability to change color.
He would have to leave the planet.
It was his only chance of survival, now.
How exactly he would do so was beyond him, but... he might have started nodding at the thought that it could work. All he'd have to do was keep away from the Hive and make excuses to Mother until he found a way to get the Hell off of Guardian-625!
The thought of deserting the Hive and literally leaving his home-world behind didn't really sadden him as much as he thought it would. The thought that he would have to leave Mother was... almost negligible. His apathy at the prospect was surprising, but somewhat expected, in a grim sort of way. He also seemed to recover from his panic attack from earlier rather quickly, too... but... he wasn't ignorant as to where his apathy for his home and people came from. More on that, later.
Anteros stood up on all fours, confident that, while he didn't have a plan, he had an objective. He then hissed as he remembered the matter of what he was to do with... her. He oriented his head in the direction of the Human female, causing the Ancestral to jump into action, reminding him to kill her. And causing the Unknown to swell with happiness at the sight of the girl.
That was just the problem... the fact that attempting to kill this girl had caused him to have a seizure and sprout a second influence in his head was... strange.
Anteros padded over to her now sleeping form and "stared" at her, mulling over what he should do.
His immediate gut reaction was to crack her skull open, born from the automatic kick of his instincts. But rationality dictated that he couldn't do that, for fear of him having a second spastic "episode" in his attempt. Not to mention how the Unknown had reacted to the, now dead, Soldier trying to kill her. Oh, yes. Anteros had no doubt that it was the Unknown that had caused him to lose his control. Who else could it be? Well... in this case "what".
So, his next thought was to just leave her there to die — seeing as though he couldn't do it with his own hands — and tell Mother that the Human perished upon its fall. The Unknown instantly protested this... and a sharp pain lanced its way through his spinal cord.
Not wanting the fuckin' thing to give him a damn heart attack, Anteros scrapped that idea. Well. It seemed "it" didn't like the notion of Anteros condemning her to death via inaction, either.
Anteros shook his head, growling. This was getting more complicated by the second...
He didn't like the fact that this Human had somehow caused him to be mentally affected like she had; the Unknown's appearance was no doubt caused by Anteros's' attempt to kill her. He also really didn't like the fact that the Unknown was somehow powerful enough to wrestle his self-control away from him. Anteros guessed that it was due to the fact that the Unknown was a completely new influence on him, and Anteros hadn't yet figured out exactly "how" to deal with it. He was able to keep the Ancestral at bay because the Ancestral had been with him since his birth.
Both facts made him feel extremely uncomfortable and anxious. Scared of his own mind... shit.
But... another thought occurred to him. What exactly was so special about this girl, for him to have a seizure, develop a second set of mental pathologies, and cause him to kill his Hive-Mate? What could possibly be so different about her that all of this would happen? Least of all, to him. Anteros shivered at the sudden idea that this girl must actually be very important... for some reason. Anteros felt his esophagus clench shut.
If he'd never seen this Human before... then there must be something about her that really demanded study in order to understand something... undoubtedly something important about himself. What exactly could be gleaned from this was beyond him. But, what Anteros did know, so far, was that she was undoubtedly "linked" to him in some way. How else could it be explained, if he was the first in the history of his species to have this happen to him?
His acidic blood ran cold as he realized that she— this Human... was literally the only good thing that he had going for him. With him, practically, no longer a part of the Hive, and his only agenda being to get the Hell out of dodge... she was his only asset. Plus, if he could learn what exactly linked her to him, the possible benefits from such a discovery were unknowable in quality and quantity.
This epiphany caused him to snarl. He had to know why she was so special— how her very presence had caused everything to go so horribly wrong, like it had. He had to know "why"! Anteros was adamant in the assumption that this was important... possibly to both of them.
So... what do I do with her then?, he wondered.
This made his situation even more complicated.
In order to investigate this whole "Unknown/Human woman" phenomenon, he would obviously have to keep her with him. He scoffed at the sensation of the Unknown pulsing with elation at the idea. How would that even work? She would obviously try to run away at the first opportunity from him. And how would he keep the Hive off of his back when he had a Human girl... prey with him? Investigating why the girl was linked to him once they were both off-planet shouldn't be a problem. It wasn't the first time he had to test or experiment. Again, a story for another day.
He began pacing again, around the Human in question's sleeping form— who happened to snore slightly. Not nearly as erratically as he had been pacing before, but with calm, slow, quiet steps.
Anteros pondered how these problems could be avoided or solved...
Well, the Hive was practically fighting a war against the humans; the "Colonial Marines", as they called themselves. So, Mother would most likely have her hands full, busy directing the Soldiers, Workers, Sentries, Rangers, and maybe, the Praetorians to keep the Humans from destroying their species, entirely. And would not check on him for a while, thus, he could find an area where the Hive's patrols seldom went, and hide the girl there until he could find a way off of GD-625.
As he thought this, an idea for a decent hiding spot popped into his head.
The Apartments..., he thought, slowly. The Human dwellings that he knew as "apartments" would be ideal. Since Mother had apparently gone there first while she was still a Worker, she had already captured Hosts from there long ago. Before the Hive had even started. She had once told him, upon being asked, that those Human dwellings had already been seldom-populated at the time, thus she had cleared them out. Anteros felt a small pang of pride for his Queen, at the thought of her capturing over forty Hosts all by her lonesome, as a Worker, no less.
He shook his head, getting back on track.
When Anteros had heard that those apartments were strictly abandoned, he suggested taking all patrols away from that area. His reasoning being that the humans wouldn't be stupid enough to go there, where the Hive could easily find them, and that they needed all the Soldiers they could get to keep up the fight against the Human's military elsewhere. Not to waste on useless patrols.
It had taken Mother about half an hour to say "okay", no doubt due to her instincts dictating that they had to patrol absolutely "everywhere", but Anteros never doubted that logic would triumph.
The Apartments were also slightly further away from the Hive's center. Anteros should still be able to communicate with Mother from there. He didn't want her to become suspicious at his absence from the Hive-Mind.
Okay, hide the girl within the apartment complex until I find a way off-planet, he thought, adding that to the list of shit he had to get done.
As for the Human's inevitable distrust of him... he supposed he should hope to get lucky. Trust is easy to lose, yet hard to earn.
Alright... Anteros had a plan... sort of. It would have to do.
Anteros stopped pacing and padded over to sit near the girl's head. He seemed to ponder for a moment, then rose onto his hind legs. He'd need to get her out from under that rubble.
A large metal plate of flooring lay on the Human's chest, being further weighed down by the ends of a few steel girders, and some broken off slabs of concrete from the room's ceiling. He looked up and snarled at the sight of the blue-ish light from the hole getting dimmer.
Anteros knew that the light was coming from a window in the hallway above, so it must have been getting dark. While not a problem for him, it wouldn't make the girl any safer with the Hive's Soldiers being more active at night. His kind were naturally nocturnal, but could put off sleep for some time should they need to be awake during the day. Having more of his kind's Soldiers around definitely wasn't going to give the Human much of a chance—
He shook his head, stopping that train of thought. He had to stop thinking like that, self-doubt would only make his situation worse. Worse... yeah, being a fugitive to my entire species, on the run, and concealing a Human can get worse?, he asked himself bitterly... apparently so.
He moved his right leg forward to brace himself, clutching the end of one of the girders with both hands. It momentarily hit him just how insane this whole thing had become... and just how likely he was to be crazy. Though, he determined that it would be best to put aside those thoughts and focus. Anteros hissed quietly as a small strain ached through his arm muscles as he lifted a girder about a foot off of the nearly crushed human... and nearly dropped it as he heard as sudden voice in his head.
"Anteros?".
Shite! Mum!, he thought in momentary panic. He was panting from the sudden scare, so he took a moment to calm down and collect his thoughts. Just stay calm, she can't read your thoughts, just... just reply, he told himself.
"Yeah?", he replied, completely casually. He silently thanked the fact that he could manipulate his mental voice in order to contradict the nervousness he was feeling.
A wholesome, warming presence filled his mind after he had answered Mother, essentially "picking up the phone" in telepathic terms, considering he was about so far away from her. He felt the great web of the Hive-Mind flowering in his head, as the connection strengthened.
"Anteros, I've just felt a Soldier disappear from my senses, somewhere near your position. Can you tell me what happened?", Mother asked. Anteros would've mentally chuckled at the monotone, almost robotic, yet feminine voice she had, mostly because she almost barely ever used English.
Despite that she found both the Human language, and the unique naming of individuals, to be pointless considering their kind have no need for either of them, she still spoke to her child in the language he had taught her, and referred to him by the name he had given himself. She might as well use it for something. Plus, calling her favorite reconnaissance Scout by his name seemed to be somehow... more personal than simply referring to him as "child". The young Queen didn't know what exactly to call this feeling, it was apparently completely new to both her and the Ancestral, but she didn't mind. As long as it didn't impair her abilities, she was fine with it.
Meanwhile, Anteros felt himself freeze solid. She's talking about her! He briefly glanced at the corpse of the Soldier— the reason why he had to leave Guardian. The body was slowly slipping into the small hole created by the pooling acidic blood. Creating "hiss" sounds, and wisps of corrosive smoke.
He nonetheless, answered immediately, "oh, yes, a shame that was, I had just killed that Human female that you told me to find, when I noticed a Human 'Smartgunner', nearby. I was about to decapitate the Human from behind, but the Soldier that you felt the disappearance of engaged the man head-on", he explained in a truly sorrow sounding voice.
"Smartgunner?", she questioned, forgetting what he was referring to. Anteros relayed a mental image from the memory of the time that he had encountered a Smartgunner, himself.
He felt distaste, contempt, and hate pulse from his Queen as she was reminded of what the word "Smartgunner" entailed. A heavy-set human with bulky armor, a glass square in front of one of its eyes, while it wielded an extremely large, heavy machinegun. Not that she actually took the time to remember what exactly any of that meant— all she knew was that they were dangerous.
Anteros then felt a wave of, honest-to-God, grief flow from his Queen to him. Despite what many Humans might assume, the Queens of his species always experienced sadness for the loss of any of their children. She was the "Mother", after al..
"That is unfortunate, she was quiet young as I understand?", she asked with what sounded like a small pang of sadness in her tone, although not much.
"Yes, judging from the pattern of her carapace, she couldn't have been more than two months old", Anteros confirmed.
"Month?", she asked.
"Thirty-to-thirty-one days", he replied, a bit irritated, even though it couldn't be helped.
She was about to say something else when her presence partially left Anteros's mind.
Hmm... probably one of the Rangers falling asleep again, Anteros thought. The thought might have made him chuckle every once in a while. It wasn't uncommon for the Rangers of their Hive to be posted on guard of one of the Hive's entrances for days on end, sometimes a week or two. It usually resulted in one or two Rangers "falling asleep on the job", despite their best efforts not to. It might've been funny, if it weren't for his species simply lacking a sense of humor. And the utterly deadpan reaction that these Rangers always displayed could be funny in itself, though, if he thought about it.
Anteros shook his head at the ground, slowly— he was probably the only one in the Hive who had a sense of humor... or even understood humor, in the first place.
Anteros waited for his Queen to speak, still holding the girder above the unconscious human.
Finally, after a minute, Mother came back to Anteros, the same warm presence wholly filling his mind. "Return to the Hive", she said.
Anteros's lips pulled back in a wince, "actually, Mum, I think I may have found something of interest around here, I think I'll stick around for a bit", he said.
The young Queen wasn't surprised, it was expected for Anteros to occasionally run off somewhere in his so-called "studies". She found it slightly odd that Anteros had decided not to return, as he'd normally want to. But, then again, he had completed his task, and answered her questions, so he could do as he wanted as far as she was concerned. Plus, it had never proven any kind of hindrance with his occasional "excursions", as he'd also called them.
"Very well", Mother said, leaving the line of communication silent, the warming presence fleeing from Anteros's mind.
Oh, thank God, he thought to himself in relief, as he slumped a bit. He may not have understood too much about Human religion, but that didn't mean the phrase was any less accurate to express his relief.
He waited a moment, gathering his thoughts, then tossed the girder he had been holding off to his right with a loud "clang".
After removing the debris from the Human girl, he gently draped her unconscious body over his back and shoulder. The Ancestral insisting on the elimination of the girl, and the Unknown seemingly ecstatic at Anteros's plan of taking her with him, commencing.
He didn't take notice of either of them, as he climbed up the walls, and across the ceiling of the storage room, to crawl out of the hole made by the girl's drop. Careful not to drop the Human from his grip on her arm, and not to cause any further collapse of the structure.
He knew this complex like the back of his hand. Getting to The Apartments wouldn't be a problem.
With the Human lying across his back, he set off on the first leg of his, no doubt, insane journey.
Six months ago…
Prometheus awoke…
The tired man in a worn, old coat shot into wakefulness. Nigel Williams struggled to remember what happened, and where he was.
He blinked several times, and squinted, but his sight remained dark. He tried to turn his head, and shift himself, and found that he was restrained by some variety of spongy fibers. There was this... oppressive heat all around, but it was dry. Not humid. He touched the fibers with his fingertips, as his wrists were constrained far out to either side, and it felt leathery— almost smooth, but also squashy. It was quite unlike anything he had ever touched before.
His eyes strained and gray serpents swam through his vision— an ache began to form in his head, as his mind struggled to interpret nonexistent visual stimulus. He shut his eyes and breathed deeply.
The smell of wax and soot and blood suffocated his nostrils. He began to feel nauseous.
And then, perhaps by some stroke of mysterious dramatic irony, he heard an electric fizz and a pale, faint light penetrated his eyelids. He looked and saw... not much. The illumination was very minimal, but enough to prove nearly blinding, after however long he'd spent unconscious.
What little he saw gave him no more understanding of where he was or what had happened...
A light on the ceiling had unexpectedly kicked on. It was a small, sterile bulb, hanging by some exposed wires. It didn't help him see very much, but what little he could glean was not reassuring. He seemed to be in a small conference room— abandoned and empty, with two doorways to either side of him. The substance that restrained him appeared to be some sort of resin, but unlike any he'd ever heard of. Almost organic-looking.
The room had a large conference-table, but the thing looked like it had been smashed by a giant's hammer— splinters of varnished wood all over the place, table legs and plastic shards scattered all over the floor like leaf-litter covering the barely-visible, dark carpet. The doorways to both sides of him were, seemingly, broken— the mechanical pistons and pneumatics torn out and left hanging as though ruined by an angry, giant toddler. The chairs meant for the table were all seemingly strewn against the far wall, sprawled atop one another...
He blinked.
This bodes poorly, I think.
A sound caught his attention, and when he turned his head to look, the reality of his situation struck home in an instant. The doorway to his right had revealed only a concerning, impenetrable blackness... but then the blackness moved.
Almost silent, like some spirit or wraith, a massive Shadow drifted into the room. From his sitting position, it seemed larger than it really was, and as swiftly as it entered, it exited the room through the doorway to his left. And Nigel was left blinking and struggling to process what he'd witnessed.
A long, onyx head that shined like the void of space. Spines and boney protrusions all over. A demonic tail. Like a snake, a skeleton, and a hairless satyr had merged abominably into a creature that put all mythology to shame...
The light hanging just above fizzled out, for a moment, before reigniting— only even dimmer than before.
Ah. "Xenomorphs". Right. That had been a concern... however long ago it was that those suits had interrupted my broadcast. Nigel blinked and sighed through his nose. Bugger, he thought.
He had never known much of the creatures— only that they were the stuff of conspiracy theory and hushed legend. To be frank, they had seemed to him more to be the symptom of a lost and paranoid public zeitgeist than a real threat, and until those government men had barged in and spoken about it, themselves, he'd never given the legend a second thought. What little he knew of the stories suggested that he would soon be ritually-sacrificed in order to bring a newborn demon into the world, or something to that effect.
He tested his restraints with a grunt, and hummed in thought when they would not budge an inch. He had no way of knowing when his supposed end would come, or if escape was even a possibility for him. And he knew that the waiting was probably going to be the worst part of it.
Another sound, to his left, caught his ear. Like a shuffling or a rasping, with faint footsteps. He squinted and tried to look...
A Shadow drifted in, but the shapes didn't flow like they had just minutes ago. There was a lurching gait to it... and a brightness, below, as the Shadow passed him by. Was that a bright yellow he saw? The darkness was swiftly becoming an irritant—
The scent of fresh blood stung him, and in a whisper so faint and frail as to feel impossibly loud, he heard a woman's voice say...
"Help me. Please, God... please, help me..."
And then the Shadow was gone, and apparently, the woman with it.
Nigel Williams blinked, and in his heart, knew that the woman was dead, or soon to be dead.
Oh...
Well, I'm right-fucked, aren't I?
If you're wondering what all of that "head carving" business about the Warrior in this chapter was, it's because this Warrior is meant to look like the "Warrior" Alien skin in the AVP (2010) videogame. I'm using the idea that, with age, a Xenomorph's carapace changes. When a Warrior is under a week old, they'll be nearly indistinguishable from a Done. At under two months old, they'll have the appearance of a Warrior from AVP (2010). When they reach three months of age, they'll adopt the appearance of the Warriors from ALIENS, with the small spines running down the length of their skulls. And after reaching six months, they begin to look like "Carved Warriors" from AVP: Requiem, or the "Ridged" skin from AVP (2010).