A/N: 09/29/2024 Man I suck at updating across all platforms. Sorry about that.
Disclaimer: I do not own Aliens.
Chapter eleven: Jonesy~
She does, in fact, get a call back for the power loading job.
She's to start tomorrow, and as she sits across from her caseworker in his tiny office, it really can't get here fast enough.
"Any word on my daughter?"
Burke's expression grows fidgety, muscles twitching nervously all over his face. She already knows what answer she's going to get - another goddamned excuse for why he still hasn't done the thing he'd promised wouldn't take but a few days - but she still enjoys watching him squirm like the company worm that he is.
"Well," he begins. "Uh…I- I'm having a little trouble locating her. But there is progress-" he stops to reach into his desk drawer for a yellow folder and hands it to her. "So far, I've found her background and work history, but…anything after that…"
She stops listening to him as she pores through her daughter's files, absorbing as much as she can from each page. There is a printout of a news article with details of her own disappearance, and a picture of Amanda's face - a mere 10 years old, just how she'd remembered her - distraught and crying in full color.
"She was a celebrity for a while."
Ellen's face jerks up at this information, then back down to continue reading with a furrowed brow. Burke goes on. "You both were. After your ship disappeared, it garnered a lot of news attention. The whole world knew who that little girl was for a while. A- and the company immediately reached out to help; put her through school, full healthcare, the works. They even bailed her out of jail a couple times as a teen."
Ellen doesn't feel the need to point out that Weyland-Yutani most definitely 'reached out' to avoid bad press themselves, but she is glad that at least someone was able to provide for her. Moving on from the article, she finds a more professional account in the form of a Weyland-Yutani document, signed, stamped, and sealed with approval, of Amanda's acceptance into their workforce. Upon further inspection, she finds that her daughter had been made multiple offers throughout her late teens to join on with the company, but she'd refused.
Good for her, she thinks.
It's not until years later, when she's a full-fledged engineer, that she accepts to take up work with them, and she quickly finds out why: she got to work in the very same sector the Nostromo had vanished. Damn that company; they'd dangled the carrot.
"She was looking for me…"
She whispers it mostly to herself, but Burke, being ever so helpful, chimes in, "Apparently, that was her main motivation for working with the company. It didn't sit well with her that there was so little information about your disappearance. She wanted to find an explanation for herself."
Ripley turns a few more pages, but her yearning to know more is quickly crushed when she is met with paragraphs upon paragraphs of thick black lines. The rest of Amanda's file is redacted, the last available line about her person being simply: 'Chad McClaren'.
She points to the name. "Who is this?"
"I'm not for sure, Kiddo," he says. "But I think it may be her husband. She married at some point after…well, all of that." He gestures to the redacted pages, which now lay limp in Ripley's lap. "I do know that all of the classified information in there is related to her work with the company, so maybe…I don't know, maybe she was working on some top-secret engineering thing…I don't know."
A sour feeling blooms in the pit of her stomach, and she knows. She knows this company has somehow polluted her daughter's life too. She can only hope it wasn't in the same way they had ruined her own.
"Find out more. I want to know what happened to her. Where she is." She unclips the photo of Amanda's company ID picture from the front of the portfolio and stuffs it in her breast pocket. "I'm keeping this."
She slaps the folder back down onto his desk and rises, to which Burke visibly stresses over her request - no, order - to know more. "I- do you- you realize how hard it was for me to get a hold of what I did? I mean, that's…a lot of man hours right there." His hands go from his hips to his gut, then up to his chin as he starts fidgeting with his fingers. The corner of Ellen's mouth tugs up at the sight; if nothing else, it really was worth it to watch this little man squirm.
"Well, you're a company man, aren't you, Burke? You'll do what you have to."
She turns and strolls out, not bothering to lower her voice as she adds, "and not a damn thing more."
SESSION 02.
Hello again, Ripley.
Hello.
So; how are things?
About as well as they were last week.
Is that so?
Yep.
I heard you may have gotten a job.
That's right.
Care to elaborate on that?
Not really. It's a power-loader position on the docks. Not really much else to say.
Are you excited?
To work again? (Pause) I suppose so, yes.
That's good.
(Ripley nods)
Are you ready to begin?
Always.
Over the next two weeks, she's trained on safety, teamwork, and all the other useless bullshit that everyone knows doesn't actually matter in the workplace - least of all one such as this - and finally, once her team lead decides she's ready, is set loose on the bays.
In the beginning, she had desperately hoped that her enthusiasm alone would help to secure her place here before they changed their minds, but once she was shown how to work the power loader, her worries melted away. By day's end, she is more energized than exhausted; she had thought she'd go insane in that tiny apartment, with nothing to do but drink coffee and read the same magazines front to back and go to her shrink and bug Burke about Amanda, and then the company hicks would be right, she was crazy and she did need to be stuck in an asylum somewhere nobody would think about her.
Joke's on them now.
Ellen carefully moves the joysticks on either side of the control panels as she rotates the forks of the bright yellow power loader she's manning. She picks up the cargo box and tugs up on her feet, the legs of the loader moving as well as she carefully makes her way over to loading dock 5.
"Good job, Ripley, keep it up."
Her supervisor, Dean, stands off to the side as he critiques her handiwork, something he does quite often these days. At first, it had made her nervous - as the only woman working amongst a crew of warehouse men, Ellen would be lying if she'd said she wasn't the least bit intimidated - but as the days went by and she grew accustomed to the people, the work, the general process, she felt almost as at home as she had among her crew on the Nostromo.
She places the cargo neatly down and steps one mechanical leg at a time over to her designated station, powering down and unstrapping herself from the machine that had just a couple weeks ago intimidated her. She steps down and Dean comes to meet her, datapad in one hand and a dying cigarette in the other. He flicks it at a receptacle, misses, and a cleaning bot sweeps by to pick it up.
"You hear me back there? You're doing good."
Ripley nods, grateful for the affirmation. "Thanks."
"Only piece of advice I'd give you now is to double check yourself when you're turning. Don't want anybody gettin' sideswiped. Too much paperwork."
She laughs, though it sounds like more of a scoff, and nods again. "Yessir."
Dean marks something off on his datapad and gently pats her shoulder. "If any of the guys start giving you problems, you come to me. Got it?"
There is a certain air to the way that he says this that makes Ellen hesitate, but she chooses to disregard her instincts for the time being as she again nods her head. "Got it."
"Good. I'll see you tomorrow."
He turns and walks off, all quiet confidence, to another part of the docks, and Ellen, with nothing more to say or do, takes out her badge from her pocket and inserts it into the clock-in machine. Having done her time for the day, she makes her way to the elevator and pushes the button for the residential district.
She's happy enough as it is, and well enough satisfied with the day, but when she gets home, and Bishop comes knocking, and she pushes the button and unlocks the door and he's standing there holding Jonesy in his arms, fat and happy as any cat can be, her day gets even better.
"We had to keep him for a lot longer than anticipated," Bishop explains as she greedily takes him from his arms and cradles the long-lost feline. "The extended hypersleep left him underweight with a lingering sickness. He's perfectly fine now. I have his vet report here if you'd like to see."
She finds it hard to focus on the paper he presents her, as she is too focused on the orange fur-ball in her arms. "Set it over there on the table. I'll look at it in a minute."
He does as she asks, and Ripley coos at Jonesy and bounces him around in her arms like a little infant. She'd missed a lot, that much she knew, but she hadn't realized just how badly she'd ached for her feline friend's presence until now, having him here against her chest. She continues to cuddle him, and it's only when she twirls around and sees Bishop standing quietly by the table he'd set the vet report on, staring at her, that she remembers he's there again.
"Something wrong?"
The man shakes his head. His expression is calm as ever, but he seems slightly out of sorts, though she can't even begin to imagine why. "No. Not at all. I've just...never seen you smile."
Said smile falters at the observation, and although innocent in intent, it still makes her feel...a little less jovial. And she's not sure why this bothers her so much.
Seeming to sense this, Bishop's face turns remorseful, dare she say panicked, and he hurries to add, "It looks good on you. I'd like to see it more often."
Hugging Jonesy closer to her cheek, which earns her a bemoaned meow, Ripley gives him a funny look. "What, is that supposed to be a compliment?"
"I was merely stating an observation, but...I suppose it could fall under a compliment."
She scoffs, but it is humorous. "Ouch."
"Oh, no, I didn't mean-"
"Bishop," she smiles again, giving him a look. "Stop."
He pauses a moment, takes the cue, and relents. "Right...sorry."
Ellen sits in the single chair that had been provided in her little cubicle, Jonesy happy to make himself comfortable in her lap. She reaches over to look at the vet report, her smile growing wider as she sets sights on the inky paw print in the corner. She's not sure why, but the thought of them taking Jonesy's prints just strikes her as especially funny in the moment. Jonesy is reported to be healthy, a perfect picture of feline wellbeing. There is a small note about his averse attitude towards being bathed and having his nails clipped, should she decide to bring him back and get him groomed, but other than that, there are no complaints. Once she is done reading, she pushes the paper away and Bishop takes his opportunity to speak.
"How did your day go?"
"Well, actually." she says, though her tone is clipped. She's back to being the Ripley that Bishop has grown accustomed to. She instinctively reaches for her mug, which is usually filled with coffee, but it's not there. It's over on the counter, washed and ready to be refilled, but with Jonesy on her lap, she's not too worried about going over and getting it.
"Your supervisor has nothing but good things to say about you," he goes on to say, anticipating her needs and stepping over to the kitchenette to fix her the desired cup. She opens her mouth to stop him, but falls short as he moves aside in such a way as to let her see every detail of what he's doing, probably to make her more comfortable and less suspicious of what he's putting in her drink. He's right, after all; it does calm her nerves. "In fact, I detected a hint of attraction from Dean in his appraisal of you."
Ripley makes a face, which he catches just in time. "Is that of no interest to you?"
Hardly willing to talk about her love life - or lack thereof - with an android, Ripley simply states, "My 'interest' lies in finding my daughter and getting the hell out of here."
Bishop nods. "Fair enough."
Finished, he presents her a fresh cup of coffee, handle turned towards her so she can easily take it from his scald proof hands. She finds it a little disturbing that he can make it just the way she likes - Irish cream, no sugar - after having only observed her making her own once, but she supposes it's better than the alternative of having to throw out something she doesn't like.
"Do you want me to get anything for you? Fresh magazines? Something for Jonesy, perhaps?"
She takes pause, realizing that she doesn't have so much as a litter box for the pudgy cat. "I should get a litter box. And some food. Maybe a toy."
Done with being petted, Jonesy leaps from her lap down onto the floor to inspect his new surroundings. Ellen bends over to give him one last stroke when something falls out of her breast pocket, and before she realizes what it is, Bishop bends down to retrieve it for her before she can.
"Oh, what a lovely photo. Is this your daughter?"
Nerve struck, Ellen swipes it from his hand, stuffing it back into her breast pocket and making sure the clasp is closed. Bishop is taken aback, and she just knows that he's already calculating whatever chances he has at smoothing things over.
"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to pry."
Her hard expression doesn't change. "Just get my things, Bishop. It's what you're for, isn't it? To serve?"
The mention of his first and foremost principles installed into his being seems to sober him, or at least remind him that he is a robot first and a companion last as far as she is concerned. His expression remains pleasant, but noticeably dulled, and he nods his acquiescence.
"Of course. I'll return shortly."
Jonesy picks that moment to begin rubbing up against his leg, tail curling round his calf, and both look down at the feline's sudden interest in him. Bishop looks quickly at her to gauge her reaction and then back down at Jonesy, carefully removing his leg from the cat's attentions. He meows, whether in protest or not, neither know, but Ripley is quick to snatch him away as Bishop moves to the door and exits.
She clutches at Jonesy, staring at the space the android had occupied for longer than she would have liked to admit.