Chapter 11: Bonding

"How do you know the Queen is dead?", Samantha asked. That he was aware of his Mother's death from literal miles away was understandably ridiculous. Not that she thought he was lying, merely curious. He found that he enjoyed satisfying her curiosities.

Anteros and Samantha had naught else to do but talk on their way to their destination. And they would have the time. As far as Anteros could estimate, they were about... five floors down from the "surface-roof" of Guardian's megastructure— the hangar would be on the floor just under the roof. It would take a while to arrive.

Anteros spoke to address Samantha's question, "I know that my Mother is dead because her mental presence in my subconscious disappeared for the first time in... forever, really. And now, there's just this big, empty space left over. My species communicates through telepathy, Samantha— and that giant network has to be held up and orchestrated by something. Until just now, the Queen served that purpose... and now she isn't. Which can only mean that she's dead", he explained, paraphrasing and simplifying the situation to an immense degree.

He continued, "when I felt the greater presence of the entire Hive evaporate, I felt my connection to your mind fade, as well. On some level... I suppose that I am somehow able to connect your brain to the Hive-Mind by using myself as a sort of `conduit`... though, I wouldn't quote me on that, if I were you. The point is, when I felt your thoughts and feelings becoming dimmer and harder to hear, I panicked and threw all of my concentration into keeping our link stable. I don't know if your mind being in the collapsing network was what gave you that migraine, or if it was due to me panicking... but I'm willing to bet that it's a bit of both".

Samantha had been staring down the hall as she listened and followed, taking note of the four-way intersection of hallways they seemed to be approaching. She looked at the Scout's shiny head, as she asked, "how can you be sure she's dead, though? Has anything like this happened, before?". She... seemed ambivalent to the explanation regarding the "headache" she'd had. In fact... she'd already forgotten about it.

Anteros responded, "yes, actually".

Surprised, the Human woman raised an eyebrow, "really?".

The alien recounted his evidence, "back before I took an interest in Humans, there was this one battle where something weird happened. Near the end of it, a Praetorian was killed by the explosions of multiple Marine rocket launchers, and I felt something then, similar to what I just felt now. A sudden... void in my head. A similar thing happened whenever any of my Hive-mates were killed, but that was on a tiny scale, compared to when the Praetorian died— and then that was dwarfed, just now, by the Queen's death".

Samantha thought on his logic... and quite quickly came to accept it, but partly because she became curious about something else he'd just reminded her of. She addressed it, deciding that the matter about the Queen dying was put to bed. "What's a Praetorian? I've heard you say that word, before, but I didn't know if it was important. Apparently, they are...", she pointed out, shrugging.

Anteros... had never really had much of an opinion on the Royal Guards. He'd heard the name from the minds of Colonial Marine soldiers. He supposed it was appropriate, though Mother's Praetorians had always spent more time out and about than with their Queen. Directing groups of Soldiers and Rangers and Sentries. To say that he was intimidated by them was fair. More so than he was by other, stronger Hive-mates. He theorized that that was point— that that was "by design". Even the smallest Praetorian stood at almost twice his height, and could easily throttle him without much margin for a fighting chance on his part.

Anteros decided to give his friend the outline of the Praetorian role and purpose, "Praetorians are... basically Xenomorphs `on steroids`. They're tall enough that they'd have to bend in half at the waist in order to fit in this hallway...", he started, allowing the woman the chance to look upwards and imagine what he'd described. The hall they were in was deep enough for Anteros himself to stand upright and have room to jump— three-quarters-again Samantha's height.

He continued, "they're bigger, tougher, smarter, stronger, and meaner than any Warrior you've ever met. I've seen them take shotgun blasts to the face and barely flinch". He was only slightly embellishing. It made drinking in the details more entertaining for her.

"I guess you could think of them as lieutenants to the Queen. Wherever they are, everyone apart from Mother follows their commands. The Praetorians here on Guardian spent most of their time fighting all around the Hive, but from what I've been told, their actual purpose is to serve as bodyguards and mates to the Queen— though I've never witnessed them having to protect her, myself", he finished. Samantha took in the information, but seemed to suddenly fixate on one particular word he'd said...


Now, hang on a tick...

It seemed odd to her that she'd taken everything else Anteros had said at face value, but the moment he said the word "mate", she had to do a double-take.

It was only today that she learned, definitively, about there being such a thing as a "Queen" Xenomorph, which Anteros had talked at length about in the course of telling his tale. She'd heard theories before coming to Guardian about such a concept— something had to lay the eggs in order for there to be Xenomorphs, after all. What's more is: she'd also learned on this day that Xenomorphs are, in fact, beholden to the laws of biological sex. According to Anteros, at least.

However, she had her doubts, even as she acquiesced to the information that Anteros had to offer.

Even after hearing about there being a Queen, Samantha had always assumed Xenomorphs to be, either, genderless or entirely female in a distinctly non-womanly fashion. Like insects or angler fish, or something.

She'd always somewhat doubted Anteros's assertions on this topic, when she'd asked specifically on it. Despite his voice and tone and demeanor, she'd sort of decided in her own head that he wasn't "truly male". That he must be mistaken in some way. That he, being an extraterrestrial, wasn't really at all comparable to anything resembling "male" or "female". And now, she was forced to bring all of that into question due to a very simple revelation that Anteros had just now brought to her attention.

Xenomorphs have sex?!

It was bizarre to think about. More bizarre to imagine. But... apparently, it was the case.

Samantha's face contorted into a frown of concentration, as she kept trying to wrap her head around this entire thing. She looked at the Xenomorph next to her, forcing herself to try and put some words out there. She had trouble, though. Until this moment, she'd eternally thought of Xenomorphs as utterly non-sexual creatures. Entities that had as little to do with sex as an ant has to do with metaphysics. Pure violence and indiscriminate hate. Not Anteros, specifically, but in general.

It was only now that she considered the fact that the entity next to her was in fact a "boy". In that moment, she decided to chalk it up to her own mind overcomplicating things.

Samantha stared at the carpet, thinking of something to say. The pair of them seamlessly turned right at the intersecting hallways they'd walked up to, the Human following the Scout.

"So...", she began to ask, "... Xenos... mate?".

"The Queen and her Praetorians do, yes", Anteros answered.

"The Praetorians... are male?", she asked, again, "... and the Queen is female? In the same way that Humans are?".

"From what little that Mother showed me, the one time that I asked, yes", he said, showing no sign of discomfort at the subject. She didn't know enough to think that he could easily hide it, if he was uncomfortable. Samantha was more than a little curious to find out exactly how "human" Xenomorphs were in the realm of reproduction. Yeah, obviously, they all started out as parasites, but Samantha was suddenly fascinated at the idea of an actual mating ritual having to take place in order for eggs to be laid. She'd always had a fixation on the oddities of biological reproduction— especially in alien species. She couldn't tell you why. Neither could any of the people who knew her.

Samantha paused for a long moment, before prompting, "... and... every other member of the Hive is also of either sex, then?". It was here that Anteros seemed to think on what to say for a moment, or two, his head minutely twitching to the left, as though to glance at her. She paid special attention to that subtle change.

He responded, "... technically, yes". He seemed to put emphasis on the "technically" part. The woman took his word for it, and didn't ponder on it very much.

The two of them were silent for a few minutes, after that, as Samantha seemed satisfied at having gotten the information she wanted. Samantha Carman Quinn, it could be said, now viewed Xenomorphs in an entirely new light. She didn't know why the idea of the species having actual intercourse suddenly seemed to contextualize the Xenomorph race in a different paradigm, for her, but it did.

All of a sudden... these creatures seemed a lot less like demonic monsters with only the urge to kill everything they saw, and more like the way she saw dangerous, wild predators, or actual parasites. Just... animals, trying to survive. That subtle change in the "Xeno life-cycle" seemed to make it easier for her to compare the species to any other creature in the universe. It was... interesting. And, more so than before, she wanted the opinion of the Xenomorph next to her. Admittedly, she was making a lot of assumptions, here, but that was nothing new.

He could tell that she was readying to ask another question, and he (for the first time since he'd met the girl) had to double-check that he was hearing her thoughts correctly, because the question she was about to ask was utterly absurd, to him.

She looked to the Scout and asked, as though he'd already hinted at it (which he hadn't), "have you ever mated with any others, before?". But it wasn't just the question that gave him pause, but the thoughts in the woman's head that prompted them. She, in an entirely clinical and nonchalant way, was imagining him mounting a female Hive-Mate and... well...

Yuck, he thought.

The quadruped stopped in his tracks and froze. The woman stumbled a bit, not expecting him to freeze, and stood next to him, perplexed. He was honestly aghast at how... seamlessly the woman dived into the concept, as though she were talking about the weather. Listening to and watching her thoughts, it was like watching a caricature-parody of his species. For the first time (a lot of "firsts", today— a lot of "firsts" for the past two days) he was... almost offended. On behalf of his kin! The Ancestral was genuinely confused by the images in the Human's mind, even. It took a lot to make The Ancestral confused! He was three steps from shocked at it, himself...
For the briefest of moments, at least. After that instant of bewilderment, he then found the entire thing utterly hilarious! He realized how unclear he'd been— how he was the one that put those ideas in the woman's head, inadvertently. He should have seen this coming, really— Samantha was no ordinary Human being. It did him good to see what being flustered felt like, though. This was certainly a new experience, if nothing else. Which he relished.

You silly, silly bitch, he mentally remarked, affectionately. He imagined that he might have had to effortfully contain a laugh, were he a Human with a diaphragm, at the moment.

After a moment or two of thinking on how to handle this debacle, the Xenomorph finally responded to her question, calm-as-can-be and only minutely stern: "nope— never. Never even considered it".

Samantha hadn't been expecting one response over any other, and as her deeper subconscious revealed: that was half the point. To a small degree, the woman was simply looking for things to bond with him over— topics that the two could talk about and speak frankly on. It was a touching sentiment. The question was a genuine attempt to get to know him better, whatever the result. What she hadn't considered was the possibility that he had already told her everything of importance, over their long talk, earlier.

It was nice to know that she considered him a friend, though— enough to make a real effort at building a rapport with him. Anteros might argue that they already had plenty of rapport, but in any case...

The woman, as he'd predicted, quickly asked "why not?", still completely un-beguiling. At which point, Anteros decided to have fun with it...

Anteros replied, "oh, I think you already know", coyly. She only had time to do a double-take at him before his tail swayed upwards to lightly tap the back of her head with the flat of its blade. She yelped and sputtered, impulsively smacking the limb away from her, but taking care not to drop the first-aid kit in her hand. Anteros bounded ahead a few meters before stopping and turning about to face her, as though in anticipation of playful retaliation. She didn't consciously think of it, but her subconscious compared his behavior to that of a dog's invitation, to another, to play.

She gave him a skeptical look. Taking it for the joke that it was, she squinted in faux suspicion, before saying, "no, I don't think I do. Spill it". She began walking nearer to catch up.

"Well, how do you tell a male Xenomorph from a female one?", he asked, pointedly standing up to his hind legs and facing her square-on.

She raised an eyebrow. "You can't?", she answered. "Or, well— a Human can't, anyway".

Anteros's head nodded, "uh-huh. And why is that?", he followed up.

Samantha's mind worked to follow his logic, as she stopped right in front of him. Perhaps instinctively, or as a result of his question, her eyes briefly darted to below his waist, but then began to stare. And her previously coy expression melted into something resembling blank surprise.

"Oh...", she croaked, suddenly sheepish.

He doesn't have a penis, her mind concluded, crudely, before her thoughts quickly turned analytical. Or... anything at all— not even a cloaca? There's just nothing. Which means...

She then got his point, and Anteros chuckled warmly as he promptly dropped back down to all-fours and continued to lead the way. She made a show of blankly staring into space for a moment or two, before shaking her head and laughing at herself. She jogged to catch up to him, and said, "okay, point taken. It was a bit of a dumb question now that I think about it".

"`Have you ever fucked, before?`, she asks", he remarked. Another chuckling sound reverberated through the woman's head, and she found herself laughing with him. "Not bloody likely, no!", he quipped.

"Yeah, yeah, laugh it up", she rolled her eyes.

"I mean, I'm flattered that you'd assume my love-life is that good, but frankly, even if I could have done that, I don't think it would have ended well. Or that it would have been much fun", he said, a bit more seriously.

She snorted, and joked, "what, are Xeno-girls not much for cuddling? Or pillow-talk?".

"Not typically. If anything like that were possible, I'd assume it would be strictly `casual`. If I'm using that word correctly", he answered. "But it's not, and probably for the best".

She hummed, before readdressing the topic.

"So, just to be clear: all Xenomorphs are of either sex, but only the Queens and Praetorians actually have any genitalia?", she asked.

"From everything I've seen, yeah, pretty much", he replied.

"Huh. How does it work, exactly?", she asked, squinting to herself.

"How does what work?", he said, already knowing what she meant.

"How do the Queens and Praetorians do it?", she asked. Half of her was genuinely interested for scientific reasons, and the other half simply wanted to keep the banter flowing. He found it rather funny that she could ask these sorts of things with no shame, whatsoever.

"Based on what little I witnessed of the event, the answer is: `very carefully`", he joked. "'Lotta spikes. And claws. And maneuvering. Oddly enough, it was actually more difficult when Mother was younger and closer to their size— nowadays she's bigger than a t-rex. Apparently, getting to twice their stature made it easier for all involved. Even then, the whole affair looked like a big hassle...".

"Damn!", Samantha whisper-yelled, snorting to herself, "dunno why I expected Xenomorphs to fuck normally, or normal compared to other animals, anyway. Do they ever do anything the simple way?".

"No. No, they do not", Anteros replied, secretly immensely pleased that she used the word "they", instead of lumping him in with others of his kind. Yet more, she didn't need to remind herself to do so, either. Were he a Human, he would be grinning uncontrollably, right about now...

The pair of friends continued to banter back and forth, walking side-by-side. Unbeknownst to her, it felt good to have a companion trotting alongside her, again. And very much known to him, the Unknown filled his guts with happiness and contentment— like that of reliving a very pleasant memory...


Meanwhile...

The Queen... was dead.

"Dead".

The very idea was wrong. It couldn't be true— it shouldn't be true. Yet it was. Why? How? What had gone wrong? Why did this happen? How was mother dead?

The Sentry paced in circles— snarling and lashing her tail as she went. Her gunmetal gray dome and obsidian-black carapace caught none of the light shined onto her by the painfully bright spotlights in the ceiling of the chamber. She repeatedly stopped her pacing and slammed a fist onto the metal floor— swung her claws at nothing, thrust her tail at the sky, and screeched a deafening cry of distress. She was frightened. Frustrated. Unsure. And not just because the Queen was dead...

She, along with a dozen or so other Sentries, had been sent on an excursion from the heart of the Hive— far, far away to the very edges of the territory. Their task had been to locate and scout a gap in the defenses of the Human blockade surrounding them— a path through the prey's offensive lines, such that the Hive could strike at the prey and flank them.

She had been given this task fifteen days ago... and it was only as she and her siblings were on their way back that mother had died.

Now... she and an ocean of her siblings had gathered together in the chamber where their mother now lay— dead and broken. The Hive-Mates around her clambered over one another to surround the corpse of their progenitress. All around, were the sounds of mourning and fear— screeches and snarls of uncertainty. Every square meter of available space— across the vast floor, walls, and ceiling, there was at least one Hive-Mate. A large group had scrambled up onto their mother's corpse and were searching every inch of her— every spare crevice being smelt and fondled through. They were frightened, like she was— desperate to find their mother alive, again, or to find some solution.

She knew it was pointless. Mother was dead. Nothing would change that. And she felt every bit as much despair as her siblings, but...

She was also bothered by something else... something... dark. Growing within. A desire— a... need for violence. For dominance. She had been feeling this sensation for the past two days— felt it building in her gut. But now... it was reaching a fever pitch.

And all at once... the Sentry felt the need to kill, like never before. To subjugate— dominate and pacify.

She turned about herself, looking for a suitable target amidst the vast swarm of her family. As she looked upon all the males around her, however... her urge to kill waned— the males... were not her target. They could never be. They were... allies. Family. Consorts? Yes— consorts. They would be hers to command when... when what? When she... when she did what? Why was she so angry, right now?!

She snarled to herself, raising up to her hind legs and turning about on the spot— her maw beginning to drool. A myriad of scents flowed into her jaws and dorsal-tubes— and all at once, she found herself focusing on one smell in particular. That of another female— one of her sisters. She strode forth, her brothers staggering and moving out of her way, as the scent of her aggression touched the air around her. She didn't know why— couldn't understand why... but the smell of the other females was... driving her into a special kind of rage.

The scent became stronger, and as another female (a Soldier) emerged from amidst the horde... she knew, now, what she had to do.

As she stepped ever closer to her unsuspecting sibling, her brothers and future confidants making the path clear for her, she no longer saw a sibling in the female Soldier before her. All she saw, now... was competition! A rival! To be beaten and subdued— killed even! An obstacle to be pushed aside and overcome!

She will become Queen! She must become Queen!

She crouched and leapt forward, toward her rival with a roar. Not having expected the attack, the Soldier was knocked off its feet with a startled cry. The Soldier, though shocked, was pushed to retaliate when the Sentry's fist came down onto its head, and bodily kicked its attacker off of it, sending her tumbling a ways. Already, in a scant few moments, a wide circle of space had been cleared for the pair to fight in, as the surrounding horde backed away, barking in hisses of fear and excitement. In any other circumstance, they would have attacked the aggressor and put an end to this. But, for reasons that none of them could precisely understand, they were compelled to stand by... and allow the fight to continue.

The Sentry, not hesitating for the slightest moment, scrambled back to her feet and launched herself forward, again, tackling the Soldier as it was starting to stand. A desperate, messy wrestle ensued; the Sentry thrusting her weight onto her opponent, repeatedly slashing at the female's face, head, and throat— bringing her fists down onto its head, while the Soldier tried to push its attacker away and kicked at her. All was silent but for the pair's snarls and screeches, and as the minutes wore on, the crowd around them watched.

Eventually, the Soldier managed to get to its feet after successfully throwing the Sentry off of it, only to be met with a third pounce— the Sentry flying forward, directly toward the Soldier's head, with the speed of a bird mid-dive. This time, however, the Soldier raised both arms and answered the lunge by bringing both of its fists down onto the Sentry's shoulders. She dropped to the ground, face-first, like a rock, her front incisors breaking and falling from her mouth, but she only snarled and rolled to the side just in time to avoid the Soldier's tail-blade, allowing it to puncture the metal floor. She scrambled backwards and hissed, maliciously, back arching and body turning to the side like a territorial cat.

Any other Xenomorph would have simply charged, once again... but she, however, noticed, that the Soldier's tail-blade had become stuck in the floor... and it was struggling to yank its limb free— repeatedly twisting itself and trying to pull itself from its entrapment.

Though it may have come as little more than an impulse, she capitalized on the advantage she now knew she possessed, and rose to her feet. She lurched forward, twisted herself, and thrust forth her tail. Too preoccupied with its own tail, the Soldier could do naught but snarl as her tail-blade cut a deep gash lengthways, on the side of its face and head. The Soldier recoiled at the blow, and surged forward with an angry growl, only to be stopped short of reaching the Sentry by its tail still being caught in the metal flooring. At first ignorant of its own predicament, the Soldier was helpless to stop the Sentry's tail from thrusting towards it again, this time puncturing the soft flesh of the Soldier's abdomen and sinking in all the way to the base.
The Soldier swung its claws and gnashed its teeth, desperately, hopelessly out of reach of the Sentry as she leisurely pulled her tail from its gut and thrust it forward a third time— smashing through the Soldier's armored chest and sinking halfway before being stopped by ribs, shards of the toughened chitin being thrown free of the grievous wound.
Blood spewed everywhere and caked the female Soldier's front and stomach, dribbling down its legs and spraying outward in rhythmic spurts, and yet still, it lunged forward to attack, struggling against its still-immobilized tail. It was only as the Sentry yanked free her blade from her rival's chest that the Soldier's tail finally came free with a loud "skatch" noise, only for the Sentry to drop to all fours and crawl sideways, allowing the exhausted Soldier to face-plant onto the floor.

As the female Soldier was about to get to its feet, the Sentry pounced atop its back and laid herself atop it, pinning its arms to the ground. Why she felt the need to stop and wait, at this point, she wasn't sure, but there was something she wanted before a kill. She snarled low and long, her drool dripping onto her victim's back. A tense moment passed, and as the Sentry continued to wait for whatever it was she felt she wanted to see, she started growling, louder and louder. She was waiting for a signal— a sign of submission. An admittance of defeat. She wanted submission. She needed submission!

However... it wasn't to be... as the Soldier's now-unconfined tail whipped up and over, stabbing into the Sentry's lower back, as the Soldier began to snarl anew and struggled beneath her. Having been shown no sign of what she'd wanted, she snarled a final time, before diving down and sinking her jaws into the back of her sister's neck. Her teeth punctured the skin, severed arteries, and as she bit down, harder... crushed the spinal cord.

When the Soldier finally stilled, and when both opponents fell quiet... the Sentry got up off her defeated sibling, stood to her hind legs, and roared to the sky— reveling in the feeling of having proven worthy. Having proven more worthy than her sister. Having achieved dominance. Or, at least, a portion of it.

Her brothers who still surrounded her were silent, and did nothing... up until a second roar echoed across the space to answer her own.

A second female, this time another Sentry, strode through a widening path of its siblings, toward her.

The Sentry bared her teeth... and turned to meet the next challenger.


The nature of Guardian's labyrinthian pathways and infrastructure made a simple trip to the grocers a veritable trek for most people, given the sheer magnitude of the megastructure and the fact that each District was organized by what each was designed for. The blueprints and planning for The Apartments was utterly different in paradigm than that of The Industrial or Commercial sectors— each close together, geographically, but all of which being very deep, and only somewhat connected together through very select paths.

As such, at a walking pace, once could find themselves endlessly strolling through uniformly constructed and decorated hallways, occasionally taking an elevator, if where you needed to go was on a different floor. They had maps, of course, but you had to buy them in the form of a pamphlet. No tourist or guide boards.

It made migrating to Guardian if you hadn't grown up there a very unattractive prospect. Thus, the governance on the planet had to take particularly hard measures in ensuring that the population's replacement-level stayed up, which was part of the reason why there was a planet-wide P.A system, and a somewhat communistic "command-economy lite", which… for some tastes, strayed a bit too close to socialism.

Very... old-fashioned. But, if you were willing to tolerate all of that... it was a decent place to live... excluding the possibility of Xenomorph Infestations, of course.

All of this, Anteros was learning from Samantha's wandering thoughts, even now. Each new branch of every new thought on every new concept would spawn many, many more concepts and ideas for him to learn about. He enjoyed every morsel of it.

However, he had to somewhat pick and choose which of Samantha's thoughts he wanted to hear about. Those thoughts — about Guardian and the people who lived here — were in the background. Samantha was predominantly pondering over their conversation. Which was fair.

The Human tossed the apple core that she'd been nibbling on over her shoulder, and looked down at her tiger-sized companion. She seemed to think for a moment, and posited, "so, I know this is a weird question, but do you not have any sex-drive? Like, any kind of libido? I mean, if none of the workers or soldiers of the Hive have actual genitalia, I would assume they also wouldn't have any hormones of that sort".

Anteros responded, "nope. No libido. Not even a little".

"Huh. So, wait— assuming Praetorians aren't just born normally, to become a Praetorian: you'd have to undergo some sort of metamorphosis, right?", she guessed.

"Precisely, yes", he said, "and we do. At multiple points in our typical life-cycles, we spin cocoons for ourselves. That's where I'd guess we grow the necessary appendages, in the transformation from Worker or Soldier to Praetorian or Queen". Samantha smiled to herself at having gotten it right.

"Man... how do you think that kind of reproductive cycle could have evolved?", she asked. "What purpose could it serve?". Anteros had no idea where to start on that question.

He said, "I don't know. S'not as though my species trends toward typicality, as far as the animal kingdom goes".

She thought on his response, before hitting on something else, "wait, how do you know what a libido is if you've never felt anything like it?".

"Well, other than getting a pretty good idea of it from your own memories, I know what sex-drives are usually like because I've spent a bunch of time shadowing squads of Marines around the territory and listening to their thoughts. So much as one woman in a group, and at least half the brain-activity from everyone else is dominated by... well, you know", he explained. "About a ninth as much of it from the women's end, in that case, come to think of it. The point is, I've never felt anything resembling a libido, at all. I can get a sense of what it's like, by proxy, but I can't say that I've ever experienced it".

Samantha mulled over his response, and eventually concluded, "fair enough". She then frowned to herself, and realized something, adding with a blush, "sorry that I keep going on about this one topic, by the way... Anteros. I have degrees in biology and xenobiology, and... I haven't really had much use for it, until now. And, you know. It's not every day that I get to talk to an alien...". Anteros had been wondering when, if ever, she would feel self-conscious about something.

Oddly enough, in the deepest corners of her mind, this very instance brought to memory numerous times in her childhood and teenage years where she had put off many of her peers by becoming visibly fixated on some esoteric subject and failing to read the room. A small amount of anxiety, even, thumped in her chest, at this very moment. It was rather... "cute" of her, if he understood the word correctly. Or was a better word "endearing"?
He projected a warm chuckle into her mind...

"It's fine, Sam. I don't mind it. I just wish I had more concrete answers for you", he replied. "Your curiosity is always welcome, and you don't need to worry about offending me. If there's ever an actual problem, I promise that I'll tell you before you wind up with your foot in your mouth".

Something odd happened, then. She smiled, and he could feel by proxy what she felt— a feeling that was equal parts relief, gratitude, and affection. It seemed she was genuinely touched by him saying that— it was something she'd never been told before, but which she had yearned to hear in some form or another, for decades. A small commitment not to write her off for things she couldn't control...

"Thanks, Ant'ros", she mumbled, "I appreciate that".

"Anything for you, darling!", he quipped, cheerfully. It drew from her a forceful exhale through her nose.

"You, too, sweetie", she quipped back, rolling her eyes at herself. She sighed.

"I've probably told you all there is to know about me, by this point. I'd love to hear about where you came from, if that's alright", Anteros suggested.

She hummed in thought.

Her Xenomorph companion abruptly halted, and seemed to freeze up. She didn't think much of it, and simply stood by as she thought of what to talk about. It was a decent twenty-four seconds of Anteros swaying his head back and forth. She thought he may have been getting his bearings, or that he might have thought he heard something. By the time he continued to trot forth, she spoke...

"I grew up in New Anchorage, on Earth. Classic vignette, really. A mom, a dad, two brothers, an older sister", she said, "dad is a big-time doctor and scientist, mom was a small-fish politician before she retired. We could have lived like millionaires, but dad wanted us to grow up modestly— he believed it would be best for our mental health, that way..."

"When were you born?", he asked.

She snorted, "asking a lady her age, are we?".

"Oh, I wouldn't dream of it. I'm just asking what your birthday is", he

She chuckled to herself, "September seventeenth, twenty-one-fifty-six".

"Almost twenty-seven, then", he remarked.

She brushed her hair out of her face, and joked, "yeah, I know— I'm such a hag".

"I'm just wondering if all people your age are as healthy and strong as you are", he complimented.

Samantha laughed, "ha! Well, most people half my age aren't quite as fit as I am, no".

"How come? I've seen quite a few people who seemed... physically troubled", he asked. In fact, he'd encountered many civilians in the Hive who spent more than a few hours lamenting over having never attained the peak of what their bodies could have been. Nigel once quoted an old philosopher— "no man has the right to be an amateur in the matter of physical training. It is a shame for a man to grow old without seeing the beauty and strength of which his body is capable".

"Well, I spent more than a few years putting the work in to get to this point", she said, "and I have to work to maintain it. Some people just don't".

"But... if anybody can be like you, why don't they do it?", he asked. "If nothing else, I'd have to think it would make confidence come a lot easier".

That remark drew from her a rueful smirk— a small part of her mind whispered, "if only". And Anteros understood, then, that despite all her work on herself: confidence was always a matter of practice, more than fact.
She took a few moments to think of an answer.
"Well, for one, a lot of the time, people simply stay in their old habits, even if they know they shouldn't. You can list off the dangers of alcoholism all day, and list all the benefits of abstaining, but it won't stop a drunk from indulging anyway. For a lot of people, it has to get to the point of the pain outweighing the pleasure— they have to reach rock-bottom in order to commit to changing".

"But... you never got to a point like that, right?", he surmised. He particularly enjoyed this topic. Her mind bloomed with all sorts of interesting information— anecdotes, studies, philosophy, psychology. He kept being surprised at how much information was packed into her head— and it only took a bit of coaxing to draw it out of her. Like a buffet of knowledge that never stopped refilling its platters.

She canted her head from side to side, as though debating with herself whether she had. "No, not really. The other half of the equation is that, sometimes, people are just born with better genes for stuff like health and fitness. Some people simply don't have to work very hard, and some people simply grew up unhealthy and therefore never had a frame-of-reference for how healthy they could be. We all seem to have that one annoying friend who can eat like fucking boar, all day every day, and keep on having a slim, taut waist".
She shrugged, "in my case, I was never particularly unfit, but I simply started doing sports I enjoyed early on, and I found that I enjoyed getting better at them, so I just never stopped. And now, I'm here".

Anteros abruptly halted, once again, just like before. He stood frozen for a decent while, and this time she took greater notice.

"Something wrong?", she asked. He didn't respond, and simply waved his head back and forth, even pirouetting on the spot, apparently scanning for something. There was definitely something off.

"Anteros?", she prompted. She heard him chuff, and watched him bare his teeth, still scanning.

Eventually, he padded forward again, and resumed his earlier trot. "I thought I sensed something, nearby", he said, "but it was probably nothing".

"How reliably could you see someone coming, exactly?", she asked, looking behind her and scanning for movement down the hallway.

"I should be able to feel anything that gets within a twenty-meter radius of us. I can just about feel someone's bio-electricity through three meters of solid steel, if my estimates are correct. Although, it gets a lot more difficult if the substance is denser, like lead or tungsten. I can feel low-pitch vibrations and high-pitch noises from up to hundreds of meters away, depending on the medium. The carpets around here don't help, much, though".
"I don't exactly have
eyes, but I think I must have something similar to them on the front of my head— whatever it is, it lets me perceive the distance and depth of whatever's in front of me, within line-of-sight, from up to fifteen meters away, without having to echo-locate. In open air with no obstacles, I can spot something's heartbeat from about forty-five meters. Of course, I could smell them from a lot further, but there's very little wind-flow around here to take advantage of, for that", he explained, at length.

"Wow", she said, "how the Hell can anybody hide from Xenomorphs, then? It seems like it should be impossible...".

"It's actually a lot more feasible than you might expect", he said, "for one, if you simply stay very, very still and hunker down or press yourself up against something big, our longer-range echolocation can mistake you for an inanimate object. For another, if you remain motionless and stay as calm as possible, you'll create a fraction of the bioelectric emissions as if you were, say, walking or running. Or hyperventilating..."
"Even if a Xenomorph is in the room with you, and is actively searching for you, it's not entirely hopeless. If there are numerous sources of electricity nearby, and especially in the room in question, it
can throw off our senses just enough for your heartbeat to be mistaken for background noise. Combine that with a decent hiding-spot, staying calm, and controlling your breathing, and it can work, especially if the Xenomorph searching for you is particularly agitated or angry— you're at much greater risk of being caught if the Xeno is completely calm and takes its time to be thorough. There's also the fact that, sometimes, we simply miss things that should be obvious— we can be distracted or not focused enough to catch crucial details".

Samantha paid rapt attention, and it was entertaining to him to see her mentally-constructing an imaginative model of how Xenomorph senses work. It was fascinating to see that she had long ago hypothesized much of it, already, and it evidently pleased her that she was proven correct.

"For instance, an average Xenomorph will typically use echolocation and infrasound to search around a location— it may even vocalize and roar to try to scare any prey in the area out of hiding or to try to pick up any bioelectrics. However: by doing that, the Xenomorph might be drowning out the sounds of your breathing or heartbeat with its own noises. If it just stood still and went silent, it might hear you, but not all Xenos will think to do that. It even happened to me", Anteros explained. "Generally, the older and more experienced the individual, the lesser the chance of it making mistakes like that. Fortunately for you Humans, Mother and the Hive seemed to prioritize keeping the eldest members nearer to the center of the territory, and usually sent the fledglings out to do all the patrolling".

"Nothing's guaranteed, of course, but that aquarium tank you were hiding in was honestly ingenious, for example. We can't `see` through glass, the chlorine masked your scent, and there was enough electricity around the place that even a Xenomorph nearby wouldn't be tipped off by your heartbeat", he said.

Samantha, soundly lost in her own little world of contemplation, only grunted in response to his explanations. Anteros found it fine to let her think, and the pair trekked in silence for a while. It was just as well, since he needed to be on the lookout, anyway. He hadn't lied when he said it was "probably nothing", but it was twice now that he'd sensed something move on the edge of his senses...

It didn't take long for his concerns to be proven well-founded.

Samantha was still mulling over everything she'd learned. Many of the hairier situations she'd been in, throughout the Infestation, now made infinitely more sense to her, and her having managed to evade and escape death however many dozens of times was put in a new light. She was practically asleep on her feet, visualizing those same situations from the points of view of the Xenomorphs she'd encountered, before...
And so she did not suspect any danger, in the moment.

Anteros, completely out-of-the blue after about fifteen minutes of silent walking, suddenly sprinted far ahead of her. She blinked at him, nonplussed, and stayed put as he ran about ten yards ahead. Before she could wonder for very long what he was doing, the alien skidded to a halt in front of a derelict elevator shaft, on the right side of the hall. She could tell it was broken because there was no door, and probably no elevator, either. It was likely stuck on a random floor, or something, leaving the vertical tunnel inactive and empty. She had come across many of these, before.

Her mind noted that they must have just traveled around two kilometers since the start of their trip, since most elevator shafts were evenly spaced out in two kilometer intervals. Her mind also noted that Anteros was sticking his head into the elevator and seemed to be looking downwards. She frowned harder, cocking her head. Both of his hands were gripping the edge of the "pit". His tail was unnaturally still, laying on the ground, and his shoulders were lowered.

What's he doing?

Samantha walked slowly forward, toward her alien friend. Her pace was unhurried but determined, she repeatedly the left to see if she could peek into the dark void of the elevator shaft, as she approached. When she eventually stepped up to Anteros's side, barely a foot away from one side of the metallic elevator "doorframe", she whispered carefully, "what's up?".

And that... was when she received one of the worst scares of her life.

A shape swung around the elevator's door-frame, dark from dark.
Her eyes were filled with the ebony teeth and claws of a Xenomorph Warrior, lunging to bite at her head and neck.
Color fled from her vision, sound ceased to register as the beast roared in her face, drool and spittle flying everywhere. Her legs collapsed underneath her, and in that millisecond, every single encounter she'd ever had with other Xenomorphs flashed before her eyes.

And just as she fell backward, a massive, rust-colored hand swept up and snatched the Warrior's neck, wrenching it away from her, just as its pharyngeal jaw snapped outward at her face. In the bullet-time of her adrenaline, she watched the small teeth of the killing appendage flex mere inches from her nose—

Samantha fell onto her ass, heartbeat pounding in her ears, everything going cold and numb.

Before her wide, frozen eyes, an Amber blur and a dark-gray mass clashed mere meters away. Chain-link tails lashed and thrust, limbs flew. The speed, the power, the ferocity on display only brought to mind yet more of her prior close calls; even as she watched the pair of monsters continue to tangle, moving further away, down the hall, visions of teeth and blades and the sounds of Hell fulminated in her head.

Amber dragged and shoved the Gray further ahead, they wove around each other, slashing claws and fists— tails gouged wounds into the walls and ceiling, the light fixtures above flickered on and off, searing fluid sprayed this way and that. She could feel each vibration through the floor. A punch, a kick, a shove— each impossibly intense, even from so far away...

The Amber Demon tackled the Gray Shape to the ground, and her senses only then began to return to her, as she watched the victor rain blow after blow down onto the swiftly-very-dead beast.

She spaced out, then, as a pain in her lower-back came to her attention and she started to breathe, properly, again. She felt a swift headache coming on... and she laid back onto the floor.


Anteros had spotted the Soldier on the lower floor and ran to the elevator ahead of them. He fully intended to intercept this Hive-Mate before Samantha had the chance to even see it, but when he came up to the elevator shaft, he didn't know how to properly do so without possibly taking a fall, potentially hundreds of feet down, into the depths. He had been racking his brains, trying to figure out how best to handle the crisis, even as the Soldier had been clawing its way up the shaft. And that was when Samantha had sidled up to him...

He probably should have been paying attention to what she was doing, since the surprise he experienced at her sudden intrusion allowed the Soldier to burst out of the shaft, clinging onto the wall, and come dangerously close to harming her.

All thought fled from him, then. The fuse was lit.

Anteros became very, very angry. More angry than he'd ever been when fighting Marines— more angry than he'd been when Samantha had been accidentally shot. Molten magma seemed to explode in the back of his head and cascade down his spine. A new, special kind of rage took him and strained against the very bones of his skull— bursting and crackling under his skin. He could feel his arms and legs shake, even as his limbs sprung into action, ahead of him.

All he heard was his own roar before his memory lapsed.

All was a blur. Anteros found himself pinning the Soldier to the ground and relentlessly bringing down his hands upon the helpless Xenomorph's head, over and over and over. His switched, intermittently, between claw and fist— slicing, bludgeoning, cutting, and smashing.

A shard of exoskeleton tossed into the air. A tooth rolling across the carpet, dislodged by a punch. His own hands ripping the Piston-Jaw from its throat. Every impact— every attack he executed never seemed to be fast enough. Never seemed to be strong enough. It was irritation— he was irritated that none of his strikes did as much damage as he wanted them to. And he just kept bringing down his fists over and over and over— trying incessantly to put more force into the strike than the last. Even as he beat his victim to death, quite handily, he still felt a sense of impotence that it wasn't easier than it was...

All he could think, if he was thinking anything at all, was the desire to kill, and every shred of skin that he tore off of his prey with his talons— every bone that he felt and heard crack under his fists gave him... enormous satisfaction!

He was utterly lost in a blood-frenzy that he couldn't rightly describe. He was blind and deaf to the world around him— all he wanted was to feel the life under him be snuffed out; all he could think to desire was to hear the cries of agony and fear from his victim! Torture! Rend! Decimate!

If he hadn't somehow managed to tear the Soldier's mangled and mutilated skull from its neck during his frenzied assault... he believed that he could have continued tearing apart its corpse for far longer...

When he finally found himself coming back to reality... he was confused. He was straddling the waist of a Hive-Mate... who's neck was nothing but a bloodied, sizzling stump. There were... fragments of skull and brain matter smattered all about the walls and carpet. All around him, the hallway was... basically destroyed. He... must have dragged the Soldier quite a way's away from the elevator, because about fifteen feet to his left was the derelict shaft in question... and Samantha right next to it.

There were gashes all over the dead Soldier's chest and shoulder. Shards of exoskeleton that had splintered apart and broken off from the rest of the body. There wasn't a single inch of the Soldier's upper body that wasn't damaged in some way. All of it, either slashed to ribbons or... simply broken. He noted that its tail was missing... and he saw the seven-foot-long, chain-like limb laying on the floor some feet away.

I... tore off her tail..., Anteros thought, dumbly.

His hands were drenched in acidic blood, as was his mouth. Drool and spittle that had been pouring from his maw intermingled with the caustic fluid and cascaded down his front. He may have stayed in that position, thinking on what he'd done, but a loud, clanging groan shook the structure all around him, and he quickly jumped away and to the left, off of the corpse. He managed to roll close enough to the elevator shaft that he avoided being dragged down with the rest of the collapsing floor and hallway.

When all became quiet and still, Anteros sat before a gigantic hole in the ground that opened up to another hallway just below, it also drenched in boiling blood. The ceiling and walls were being eaten away, as well. Everything sizzled and burned, in front of him. It was a mess. The corpse of the Soldier was still spewing acid... it probably wouldn't stop for quite some time.

Not knowing what else to think or do, Anteros spent a good few minutes thoroughly rubbing the acid from his hands, lips, chest, stomach, and cheeks on the untouched carpet and walls, leaving scorch marks and rotted stains wherever he cleaned.

When he was done with that... he felt... empty. Of feeling, of motivation, of energy. Nothing seemed quite real, at the moment. He detected no other movement— no other threats, at least.

Samantha was conscious, and unharmed, but in a state of shock. Not knowing what else to do, Anteros approached her slowly. But, not knowing if touching her or trying to speak to her would exacerbate her panic, he simply sat nearby and waited for her to recover...

After about two minutes, the woman finally blinked and shook her head. She sprang upwards into a sitting position and her wide eyes fell upon him, sitting on his haunches in front of her...

He thought to speak to her... but her mind stalled. Yet more memories, yet more near-death experiences flashed through her mind. He felt... anxiety. He wasn't sure why, at first, but he was sure that he didn't like the way she was looking at him. The way so many others had...
He chose to try to do something to put a stop to it...

He slowly stood, and padded toward her, lowering himself to a crawl, like a dog seeking forgiveness from a disciplining owner. This action drove her to track his movement, and upon seeing his posture, her mind swiftly spun up its engines—
Falling down the pit.
Meeting the Amber Demon
Waking up.
Running away.
Getting shot.
Waking up again.
Anteros speaking to her.
Arguing with him.
Making up with him.
Making a friend.
No longer drifting.
No longer alone...

The Human woman leaned forward, and slowly reached out a hand. Part of her thought she was dreaming— everything felt like it was too far away, every sensation felt muffled, even as strained and silent tears ran down her face. It all felt like a vision— or as though she were piloting someone else's body...
But when her palm flattened against his forehead, the dam broke. Color returned to the world, she felt present in her skin again, and she no longer heard her own heartbeat.

A pitiful wheeze escaped through her gritted teeth, and she shook as though injured, movements ratcheted and unstable. Sobs demanded release from her chest, but she simply didn't have the energy to voice them. She sat up straighter and stared off into space, her thumb and fingers absent-mindedly stroking Anteros's "face".

She whisper-wheezed his name, closing her eyes and wiping them with her free hand. She was scared, relieved, afraid, and still in shock, all at the same time. She felt her own blood rushing all around her body— it felt like every inch of her skin had been "asleep", and that blood-flow had only just been restored.
The Unknown yearned for her to be happy again, and filled Anteros with an odd, misplaced guilt over her current distress.

"I... I'm okay", she croaked.

"Are you sure?", he asked.

Samantha swallowed with great difficulty, and took a deep breath. "Yeah. Yeah, I'm... I'm here. I'm good", she whispered, through a shaky breath. Her hand shook as she wiped her hair out of her face. That knot of discomfort twisted in Anteros's gut, and he felt compelled to help...

"Do you... want a hug?", he asked, uncertain. To his surprise, it only took her two seconds of thought for her to nod and open her arms. He scooted forward into a crouch and embraced her. She took deep breaths, shivering with each as she held onto him. He was... genuinely impressed at how well she was holding herself together— he'd seen dozens of others break down from far lesser scares. He wasn't sure what part of him found it so humbling to see such strength despite so much fear, but he wasn't going to question it...

After a good five minutes of silent crying, Samantha eventually calmed down. The bad memories faded away, her heart stopped pounding her ribcage, and the tears stopped. A hollowness remained in her guts, but that was to be expected. The longer they spent holding each other, the more certain she was that that was almost certainly the closest she had ever been to being killed, in all these months of fear and pain...
To her own shock, that very realization caused her to start grinning like a maniac. She wasn't sure why, at first. But as small, manic giggles bubbled up her throat, an inexplicable euphoria slithered up her spine. She found her repeatedly mouthing the words "thank God", "thank fuck", "thank fucking God", "holy fucking shit", and so on and so forth. Her subconscious kept marveling at how close a call she'd just had...
She, and Anteros along with her, could only surmise that she was euphorically happy to still be alive and breathing.

And it was thanks to him.

Samantha held Anteros tighter, and almost felt like crying all over again, only this time in gratitude. She couldn't stop reliving the last ten minutes, over and over— the sight of him defending her from certain death, putting himself in harm's way for her without any hesitation. She couldn't stop reminding herself that she was alive. Awake, alive, and safer than she had been, in months... thanks to Anteros.

Dignified, kind, reliable, understanding, fascinating, smooth-talking Anteros.

If she wasn't certain before, she was now. Her own, continued heartbeat was evidence enough.

He was her best friend, in the entire galaxy, bar none...