"All clear!"

It took a moment but two kids shadowed by a bipedal alien came around the corner. When they were close enough some of the young soldiers leaned away as A'luet passed, particularly the Latino kid, Jimenez.

The laboratory was oddly quiet, auxiliary lights leaving the room in a soft blue glow. It didn't take A'luet long to locate his biomask, caster and gauntlet locked in a electrified box.

"It's electrified." Jessie sounded disappointed.

That didn't deter A'luet as he swiped the box off the table and with a heavy stomp, the metal crumpled enough for him to pull the rest of the pieces apart. He felt his anxiety begin to wane as the gauntlet's microscopic teeth closed into his skin and the caster calibrated itself. The soldiers watched in awe as the biomask went on next.

"Is it working?" Jessie asked.

"Yeah." A'luet responded, internally happy they no longer had to resort to drawing out their conversations.

"It can talk?"

"He." Jessie corrected again, her tone heavy with annoyance. "And yes, he's using a translator."

"What's the closest exit out of here?" A'luet stepped up to the nearest kid, his eyes zeroed in on a label on the uniform, his mask automatically translating the human's alphabet into something he could read. Booker.

The soldier hesitated.

"Nos llevará por la jaula del diablo escalado…" The sentence was soft, yet A'luet heard it loud and clear. The biomask flickered information across his eyes.

"What?"

Jimenez fell silent, unable to hide guilt but A'luet wasn't going to let the human off so easily.

"N-nothing…"

"You said diablo…that's Spanish for devil. We'd be going by what devil?" He was thankful for the translator, with its confident agender tone it hid any chance of the humans knowing he was less knowledgeable than he actually was; so he ignored the shining admiration from Jessie.

The four young soldiers grew uncomfortable.

Ricky narrowed his eyes. "What aren't you telling us?"

The one named Stein, chewed his cheek. "There's a-he said-"

"Who said?" A'luet snapped.

"H-him…Jimenez said there's another-" He stopped mid-sentence.

"Another…?" Jessie pressed. "What? Alien? Like him?" She looked at A'luet. "Do you think they caught P'sy?"

"No, I don' know." The Latino kid spoke up again. "Is that someone who looks like him because this thing is four-legged and got two-mouths-"

Shock widened Ricky and Jessie's eyes as she looked to A'luet for his reaction. He took a step forward, not knowing what he was going to say or do. There was a kainde amedha in the building with them?

"Not like him." A new voice entered the conversation as the overhead lights snapped on and flooded the room in white brightness. The woman who sat in on Jessie's interrogation was back, flanked by too many military garbed soldiers. "But pretty damn close in evolutionary beauty." She descended the stairs and showed no fear, going right up to A'luet who watched her come. "A sort of close cousin to your race."

Her words instantly brought anger to the yautja. "Those shitbags are not a sort of cousin to me and get out of my face lady before I compromise my morals of hitting women."

His words only brought amusement. "You are perfect."

A'luet didn't know what he was perfect for but he decided he instantly hated the woman. She didn't react to the three red dots that formed a triangle on her forehead.

….

Outside Lake City

500 ft below Station Eleven outpost

"Jesus Christ."

"Oh quit complaining." Kelly reached down and pulled Dallas up the incline. "P'sy's not bitching."

"P'sy has more fucking stamina than me Kel….I've been vacationing in the El Dorado Correctional Facility for the last year and a half. We only got one hour max in the yard for exercise a day."

Kelly scoffed. "Somehow I fail to the connection between those two statements."

"Hey."

She glanced up to the next ledge to see P'sy's hand hovering by her head, she took it and let him haul her up. "Come on Dallas."

Dallas grunted when the rough-skinned fingerless gloved hand reached for him and yanked him up with less grace he suspected than Kelly got. He had a sneaking suspicion the alien liked the woman more than he let on.

"That it?" P'sy asked, half pointing.

Ahead sat a concrete door, not unlike a bunker built into the side of a hill.

"Looks like an Armageddon bunker or a nuke waste cellar."

"That's the point." Kelly said.

"And we're going to get in that how?"

Kelly chewed her lip, studying the heavy concrete. "I'm not sure yet."

"-the fuck…."

The curse was unexpected. "What's wrong?"

"Humans…. Not knowing when to keep their fucking arrogant, ignorance out of shit they don't understand."

It had been a while since P'sy showed any anger in their presence. Kelly found herself shocked to silence, wondering if she did anything to set him off. It must have showed on her face because his next choice of words the tone of words were different.

"I don't mean you." He closed the distance between them, pulling off his mask and holding it out to her. "Take it."

"It'll work?" She took it carefully, surprised at how light-weight the metal was, it seemed like it would be so much heavier.

"Most functions will be lost but you can still see what I mean."

She brought it to her face, the faint red glow distracting until she forced herself to ignore it. Across her eyes ran symbols horizontally and vertically, information she could only assume meant more to P'sy than it would ever mean to her.

Peripherally, she saw P'sy glide two fingers across his gauntlet, as he did the scene flipped through several different filters.

"What is that?"

She blinked through the eye strain due to the different filters flickering until P'sy stopped on the one he wanted her to see.

"What is it?" Dallas asked.

"Are those claw marks?" Kelly ignored the question.

"Come on." P'sy took back his mask and jumped down.

A wreck nearby stopped them in their tracks, the twisted remains of a large containment vehicle laid in ruin, burnt almost beyond recognition, but the rented metal could only have been sliced in half from something very sharp trying to escape from the inside. From the looks of the wreckage it appeared the thing might have succeeded in escaping.

"Your government has a queen here."

"A queen what?"

"Kainde amedha… like those little runts we were fighting back in Gunnison only a lot fucking taller and harder to kill." P'sy walked up to the vehicle remains.

"Little runts?" Dallas echoed. "Are we remembering the same creature? They sure looked huge to me."

P'sy and Kelly ignored him.

"Like an ant queen?" Kelly asked.

"She pumps out her offspring like ants, yes." P'sy ran his hand over the distinct claw marks. He shook his head, still fuming.

"We don't keep those bitches as pets." He paced in front of the concrete door, his gaze never leaving its pocked-marked face. "The worst we do is farm their eggs so our young have something to learn to fight against."

"How big is big?"

P'sy paused, his mask tilting, dreads sliding from one shoulder to the other. "Bigger than this door and taller."

…

You are perfect.

Those words made him want to remove her spine from her body in a similar fashion to what he had heard about the infamous Guatemala trip. The yautja hadn't made it back to Prime, but the stories came soon enough and circulated. A visionary tale of strength and cunningness on the alien's part. A'luet paused.

He hadn't felt this murderous since he killed Gwieth, the traitorous elder who tried killing his father almost a year ago. This is what she's looking for. You to be an uncivilized rampaging machine. He wasn't going to give her what she wanted. With great reluctance he powered down the caster, the dots forming a triangle disappearing from the lady's forhead.

"What do you want lady?" Jessie demanded.

The woman barely paid her any heed as she began to slowly circle A'luet, eyes missing nothing. It brought back painful memories of Kainde, his first mentor, the yautja had done the same to him; studying his physique. Where at the time, sixteen-year-old him, was intimidated by the elder and was afraid to move, twenty-year-old him was less than impressed with this skinny bitch and orbited with her, never taking his eyes off her. Kainde had been allowed to display such behavior as the old yautja became one of the most important people in his life.

Jessie would not be ignored so easily. "Hey! I'm talking to you!" She closed the distance between herself and A'luet, her gaze hard on the woman.

An uneasy feeling thread through A'luet. By no means was he attracted to the ooman girl and he was sure she wasn't attracted to him, not in that way. But since meeting, he couldn't deny there was a connection, comradery, bonding by trauma, friendship.

Would I die for her?

He wasn't so sure in the beginning. Like P'sy said, the oomans were baggage, pawns, means to an end. But now?

He paused.

Yeah, I suppose I would.

The current situation was not the time to show how strong their comradery was. Looking at Jessie, he could see she didn't have the capacity to lie about relationships. And that inability to do so was giving the woman all the information she needed to know.

The lady smiled-leered. She held up a phone dramatically, comparing something to the girl in front of her. "Jessica is it?"

"Yeah?" Such venomous attitude. Another time A'luet might have been amused.

"You've given me inspiration." She spun on a heel, a finger jabbing towards the four young soldiers, Stein, Booker, Jimenez and Perreca. "Those four, take them back to their bunks now. Her." She jerked a chin, a silent command. As a result two burly men grabbed Jessie and Ricky. Simultaneously five high powered weapons aimed at A'luet's head, guns he knew would easily punch through his biomask. It may not kill him right away, but it would fuck him up bad enough to wish the shots killed him instantly.

"Let's go."

They didn't have long to ponder where they were being led, in A'luet's case, and dragged, in Ricky and Jessie's case.

The lady was smiling wide.

"Introductions have not been properly made. I am Yutani Furuta and I am the eyes, the ears and the brain, here."

"Is that supposed to make you sound more important than you actually are?" Ricky snapped. "Because I'm not impressed."

Yutani Furuta barely batted an eye.

Ricky snorted loudly. "Listen bitch, we aren't stupid. We know you answer to someone else and frankly, with the two weeks I've had, you can tell your superiors they can shove their evil plans up their asses." He jerked against his captors. "You don't need him! Give him his fucking ship back you pyscho, delusional, morally bankrupt shitbag!"

Yutani Furuta's eyes drifted up and around before returning quickly to his face. "No." She smiled again like they were having a conversation about the weather. "You've spent some time in the company of this creature…it's hard for humans to not gravitate towards such power, such-" She glanced at A'luet. "-exotic beauty." She stepped into Jessie's face. "But-has he gravitated to you I wonder?"

She snapped something in a foreign language.

In response, Jessie was shoved towards the wall where a soldier pulled back a hidden panel.

"What-?" She tried to fight to no avail and planted her feet on either side of the hole in the wall. Her struggles didn't last long as she disappeared inside with a scream. For a long moment no one moved but then-

"You're next." Yutani Furuta's eyes glittered as the floor dropped out from under A'luet.

…..

Jessie found the hard ground unforgiving as she slammed into it, her head pounding she sat up slowly. "Ow….fucking bitch." The room was dark and clammy, she got up and felt for a wall. She found it and followed it blindly, hoping there'd be some sort of light, anything to help her see.

There was a heavy metallic taste in the air as she moved. She paused, sure she heard something but then continued onward. Chain dragged.

She froze in her tracks, wildly looking around as she shrunk back into the wall, the hairs on her neck standing on end.

Something big took a long, loud sniff, the suction of air pulling her hair forward. She flinched. What in the fuck was that?

Low lights snapped on, bathing the cavern in dark shadows but Jessie wasn't focused on any of that.

The legs were black and oddly emaciated looking but yet at the same time boasted of supreme prowess, especially the talons on the end of curved digit digging into the broken concrete. An elongated face with an impressive carapace jutted away from the skull, a shiny metallic black. A deep growl rippled lips, shrunk back from large transparent teeth, thick gooey saliva raining out of her mouth, slapping around Jessie's feet.

A thud echoed to the left, the xenomorph queen twitched hard to see the yautja that had landed lithely on his feet, and roared.

…..

A'luet didn't wait for the xenomorph to attack as he aimed his caster, white plasma shots exploding in the bitch's face, knocking her away from the ooman. One metallic hand planted against the cavern wall before enraged, the queen raked her claws across the rock, a chalkboard-like screech following in the wake of the nails.

"Move!"

A'luet was next to Jessie in less than a second and yanked her with him. He'd worry about her being injured from his superior strength later when they weren't faced with death.

"What is that!"

"A queen."

"A queen?" Her mouth fell open, her eyes widening as the xenomorph turned in their direction.

A'luet looked around for some leverage, any leverage. Very few yautja went up against a queen and lived. There was a flash of anger in his stomach. He survived the slaughtering of his clan and the attack of the U'darahje, he also survived the attempted invasion of his planet, even coming out on top of the Hishi commander who had made it his life mission to kill A'luet. He be damned if this queen was going to be the end of him.

His eyes landed on the enormous bulbous sac, only half complete in its craftmanship. Her ovipositer.

The queen wouldn't risk destroying that.

"Come on." He pulled her to the sac. "Get as far back as you can."

"Why? What about you?" She refused to let go of his arms. "A'luet? Don't leave me, please."

"I'm not leaving you. She won't attack this, it's too important. Go!" He pushed her in the right direction, hoping she'd take the hint.

The queen's growling grew louder. In one bound she was across the cavern and on them. Jessie lost her breath as a hard shove sent her sprawling under the pulsing sac.

A barbed hard exoskeletal tail whipped and she saw A'luet slam against the opposite wall, crumpling to the ground. He didn't move.

"Get up!" Jessie screamed. "A'luet!"

The queen's tail sliced upwards, the barb glinting in the light. Something whacked her dome, not hard enough to hurt but enough to get her attention. Twisting around the xenomorph pinpointed the ooman standing with an object, an odd smelling thing. A shoe.

Beneath xenomorph, A'luet stirred, his jarred vision sharpening on an odd object. Still winded he closed his hand around the shoe. "-the hell?" He pushed to his knees, seeing Jessie across the way readying to throw her other shoe at the queen.

He honestly didn't know whether to call her stupid or not. Brave….brave, but stupid. He shook his head, trying to clear it. Then he got an idea.

The queen noticed her prey was awake and grabbed for him, missing as he tumbled away from her. He landed on his feet, aiming his caster again. This time he got her face.

"The shoe laces!"

His yell startled Jessie.

"What?"

"I need the shoe-!"

Claws clamped around his chest, crunching ribs. The roar deafened him as the sound overloaded his biomask sensors. Defiant, he kicked out, managing to clip the side of her mouth. In the struggle he felt his caster knock loose.

"Pauk you!"

In the corner a real fear took over Jessie as she watched the xenomorph tightening her grip around A'luet's chest. Despite him still fighting she could see he was suffering injury even if he didn't show it. Then she saw the caster fall.

She blinked.
That gun thing P'sy took back from the government people who attacked them, he had called it a caster at one point. It had been stationed over his left shoulder like A'luet's before its mount was broke. He turned it into a hand held gun after that.

She dove for it.

"How the fuck-?!" She cried, trying to pull it off the mount.

The queen noticed her and slapped her away like a fly.

"Oof." She hit the wall. Looking up painfully she saw the xenomorph had helped her out, the caster had separated from the mount.

Familiar symbols were blinking.

She grabbed it.

"HEY!"

The other shoe hit the xenomorph in the side of the head. The queen tilted her head towards the annoying pest.

The ooman was standing, a surprising feat seeing as she hit that wall pretty hard. In her tiny hands she held a metal weapon. The caster.

"I'LL BLOW IT, I SWEAR!"

Very good ooman.

The girl was pointing the caster at the ovipositor. Unease flickered across her face as the queen's telepathic words took meaning.

But you don't have the balls to pull the trigger.

"The fuck I don't!" Jessie brushed the trigger, knowing how sensitive it was. A white blast shot out, burying itself dangerously close to the pulsing egg sac. "Let him go!"

Amusement filled her head that was not her own. Interesting fondness you have for this yautja. She turned, slapping A'luet into the rock wall, pinning him there. Usually yautja don't give two shits about fleas such as yourself child. This one is different though.

"I gave you a chance."

Jessie turned and aimed, the white ball of plasma sinking into the ovipositor

The effect was instant as the queen screamed in rage, dropping A'luet. Forcing himself to ignore the pain he stumbled to his feet, yanking the shoe string loose from the shoe, destroying them in the process. Somehow he doubted Jessie would give a shit. In seconds he made short work of the other one too. The queen was barreling down on Jessie who raised the modified caster at her, firing, though it did little good to stop the infuriated alien.

A'luet ran, using the cavern wall as a springboard and launched himself up and over the queen's dome. The ooman's shoelaces were tiny and almost insignificant, but if it was one thing P'sy taught him, a xenomorph's throat was lined with extremely sensitive membrane, the only area on its entire body that had any exoskeletal sensory weaknesses. But he'd have to time it right, too high or too low, the bitch wouldn't care.

He pushed off a bony collarbone and swung under and around. Again his biomask was overloaded by the screech but he got the results he hoped for.

The queen's claws were quick grabbing for him and then for the offending string across her throat. Acid spewed as A'luet somersaulted on top of Jessie, shoving her down and away from the corrosive blood.

The screams of rage and pain echoed, reverberating off the rocky walls as the normal scrapes of xenomorph claws wouldn't have been fatal to herself if her rage hadn't made her sloppy. In only seeking revenge against the yautja filth in her midst, her third talon swiped deep, severing important tendons and sinew.

YAUTJA!

The telepathic howl was agonizing, ringing through A'luet and Jessie's head, blooming the worst migraine headache.

Jessie prayed it would end as the pain continued, continued until her consciousness left her.