Alien, page 24
“Run from here,” the woman whispered. “Save yourself.”
“Are there any other survivors?” Siobhan asked. “I can get you help…” The woman shook her head as vigorously as she was able.
“I’m dying. Leave me. Take this and go. Tell them. About Vaughn. The Engineers. Deep Vo—” she coughed, and more blood leaked from her lips, “—Void.”
“I—I don’t understand,” Siobhan said, but she took the small drive that the general offered, and pocketed it.
“Terrorists—Deep Void. Shadow government.” She wheezed. “The signature. The bombs. On that drive. You have to—have to—” The wheezing and coughing overtook her, her whole body spasming with the effort.
“I will,” Siobhan reassured her. “I will.”
That seemed to be what the woman needed to hear. She settled back to the floor and closed her eyes. With a final, shuddering breath, her lopsided chest sank a final time and she went completely still.
25
Siobhan couldn’t bear to stay in the room with General Koslowski’s body. It wasn’t the fact that the woman was dead, but what she had said before she died. Siobhan had so many questions. She’d never heard of Deep Void, but maybe it was their signature that research had uncovered behind the bombs. And what about the Engineers?
Some believed they were mystical mumbo-jumbo, like the old religions of Earth. Others cited them as responsible for the origins of life itself on Earth. Much of the information about them was vague, and even more was lost to time and space. Were they connected to the pathogen bombs? She felt the drive in her pocket, wondering what, exactly, was on it. Somehow, she’d make sure the right people, the people who needed that information to broker peace, would get it.
She had nearly reached the central conference room before she realized where she was. The double doors to the room were lying on the hallway floor. In one, a large acidic hole spanned most of its width, the edges black and irregular. Out here—and, so far as she could tell, inside the chamber—it was silent.
Siobhan gripped the flamethrower and crept toward the open doorway.
Despite all she had seen over the last week, the scene inside shocked her. There was blood everywhere—on the walls, the carpet, even the ceiling. Chairs were overturned and broken, their pieces littering the room. The large wooden table in the center was bigger than those in other rooms, as the room was much bigger. It formed a heavy square of light-colored wood with a smaller cutout in the center, so that it basically formed a square frame.
Its surface was slick in places with blood. Uniformed bodies were folded in unnatural ways over its edges and splayed out across blood-soaked paperwork. The smell was heavy, a coppery animal smell that assaulted her nose and throat, making her recoil. Here were the remnants of the summit peace talks—government representatives from the UA, the UPP, and the ICSC, the Joint Chiefs, and their assistants, reporters, and official secretaries to log the minutes and record the talks for posterity.
Other bodies lay near the doors and were lined up along the wall. All were marines, and all had their chests exploded outward. They must have managed to make their way to the conference center, to report what had happened aboard the Alexiares, likely under a misguided delusion that they had somehow escaped the biodrone attack on their ship.
Beyond the table, against the back wall in the right corner of the room, the comms machines were set up on a long wooden counter. The distress message they had heard while orbiting the planet had no doubt come from there, but how? Had a marine sent it when all other hope seemed lost? Maybe the Grant code was the only way to get a message out beneath the heavy security of the facility.
But who had sent it? Had anyone survived this massacre?
Someone had tried to call for help, and when it was evident no help would come, someone—possibly General Koslowski—had shut the door on whoever had still been left alive in the room, in an effort to keep the biodrones contained so they wouldn’t get out and kill more people.
It had failed. It had all so miserably failed, and now, the fate of colonies across the galaxy was uncertain at best. Governments would find someone to blame—another government, a false flag scapegoat that would suit their needs—and the poor farmers and miners and scientists and colonists in all those colonies, all over space, would be in mortal danger.
That hate, that anger that she had felt for the Xenomorphs, was bolstered by a new hate—for the people responsible for these monstrosities in the first place, and for the people who would recklessly use them to hurt other people.
She would see to it that everyone knew. Everyone.
As she made her way around the table to the comms machines, she recognized a number of faces of the dead, military higher-ups with financial and family ties to the corporations. Companies had used those ties to destroy more than they had ever created, to take more than they had ever given. Their money gave them positions, and those positions gave them power.
There was a body lying face-up that she recognized as General Gifford Michael Hadley, whose family had, a long time ago, financed the doomed colonization of Hadley’s Hope. The general had deep gashes across his face and chest. She saw General Edgar B. Fordham, who had family on the board of directors for the Jùtóu Combine, which had established one of the largest mining operations in the galaxy on the planet Shānmén. Most of Fordham’s intestines were spilled out across his hips and the floor.
She also thought she recognized another body—although it was difficult to be sure with half of her face missing—as General Alexis B.K. Lloyd, who came from one of the more prominent and wealthy families of New Albion. General Samuel Matthew Canon, often called “Loose Canon,” had been torn in half, and General Broaddus J. French’s limbs had been disarticulated and his head had been turned backward. Both had been on the prison committee that had established Fiorina 161’s class-C work correctional unit for double-Y chromosome convicts.
Dead, all of them.
Disgusted, she shook her head and continued to the comms machines. She drew the drive from her pocket and plugged it into the side of one of the transmissions slots. A prompt appeared.
UPLOAD? Y – N
She tapped “Y.”
With a soft whir, the system began retrieving the contents of the drive. A moment later, it asked her what she wanted to save the file as. After a moment’s thought, she typed Pathogen Bomb Signature Information. The words appeared on the screen as she spoke them aloud, and with another small buzz, the file was saved. Then she opened a message and attached the file. More prompts popped up on-screen.
RECORD – PLAY – PAUSE – STOP – REWIND – FAST FORWARD
She was about to tap on the “RECORD” prompt when a searing pain in her shoulder made her cry out. Siobhan was lifted into the air and could feel the grip on her shoulder dig in deeper. Then the room blurred as she was thrown to the floor. Holding tight to the flamethrower, she rolled over onto her back and sat up, muzzle pointed forward.
The room had filled both quickly and quietly with biodrones, at least two dozen of them. One stood by the comms machine, behind where she had been standing. That one, she guessed, had thrown her to the floor.
It roared at her, and she found herself roaring back, unleashing all the pain and sorrow and anger and fear at once. She turned the flamethrower on a biodrone creeping up to her right, and the fire skimmed over its shoulder.
“Damn it,” she muttered. “Damn it!” She pressed the trigger again, and this time the flames hit the monster full in the face. It clawed at where its eyes should have been, screeching as the fire ate into its head. Then she turned back to face her attacker, only to find that it had closed the distance between them.
“Oh shit,” she whispered.
The drone loomed over her, jaws slavering, its claws and the curve of its head gleaming in the flickering overhead lights. Its saliva dripped on the floor by her feet. It raised a massive hand to swipe at her.
In the next instant, the drone flew to the right. Siobhan flinched, crying out, and the biodrone crashed against the wall.
Standing nearby was the Xenomorph Queen, fully grown—at least three times the size of the drones she had seen on BG-791.
The Queen! She had found them!
Siobhan wasn’t sure if she should be relieved or terrified.
The Queen towered over the other nearby biodrones, her exoskeleton so dark a gray that it was almost blue-black in the flickering light. Her long, arcing head was somehow as magnificent as it was terrifying, with an enormous crown of bony ridge fanning from the back and extending to just above the rictus snarl of her jaws. Her body was similar to those of the drones, although larger and more powerful, and her back spikes were more like a spread of long blades, akin to the pictures of ancient swords she’d seen as a kid.
Each leg had an extra segment that allowed the first joint to bend forward while the second bent back. Her huge feet each had three taloned toes in front and another in back. Her hands, with their massive claws, sliced the air at the downed biodrone, who squealed in her direction. She let loose with a shriek so loud that it hurt Siobhan’s ears.
The other biodrones, stunned into silence, cowered away from her.
Siobhan scrambled backward, taking the best shelter she could find under the nearby corner of a desk. From her vantage point, she could see the legs of the creatures charging the Queen, and a series of shrieks as she fought off their onslaught. Siobhan inched toward the edge of the desk and peered out, but jumped when a biodrone smashed against the floor.
It seemed to notice her, issuing a low, guttural sound from the recesses of its throat. Then the Queen’s foot came down on its head, bursting it open. The creature’s blood sprayed in all directions, and Siobhan shielded her face with an arm, shrinking against the massive legs of the table. She felt a burn starting on her forearm and in a panic ripped the sleeve off, tossing it away.
After a moment, she moved toward the edge of the desk again, to better see what was going on.
The biodrone that the Queen had shoved out of the way tried to get up; she whipped her spiny, segmented tail in the biodrone’s direction, as if warning to it to stay where it was. Another came up behind her, and she barely glanced at it before her tail snapped back and speared it through the chest. As the tail withdrew, the biodrone’s blood poured from the wound, spattering and eating through the carpet even as the body fell.
The blood smoked on the tip of the Queen’s tail, but it didn’t seem to penetrate its hard shell.
Buoyed by terror and exhilaration, Siobhan felt a flare of hope. The Queen could fight these creatures in a way the humans couldn’t.
So long as they didn’t overpower her…
Siobhan had to help.
Crawling out from under the desk, avoiding contact with human and biodrone corpses, she stood in full view of the monsters in the room. A trio of creatures was flanking the Queen, and she swung the flamethrower around so its muzzle pointed at them. While they were still a good five meters away, she moved closer and torched them. They squealed and shuddered, leaping to the wall, then the ceiling, then down the far wall before collapsing to the ground.
Wheeling around, she found another biodrone that had leaped onto the conference table’s far edge. It crouched and howled at her, but turned its attention when the Queen issued an ear-splitting shriek. Focused on the greater foe, it launched itself into the air. Her tail whipped around and smacked it to the floor, then plunged into the side of its head.
Another biodrone vaulted onto the Queen’s back, digging its claws deep into her bony shoulder. She shrieked in protest, reached up over her good shoulder, latched onto the creature’s neck, and yanked it over her head, slamming it down on the closest desk. Holding the wriggling biodrone by the neck, she tore the curving shell off the top of its head and tossed it. It slid to a stop near Siobhan’s feet.
Then the Queen plunged her claws into the biodrone’s chest and raked them down, shredding its torso. Finally, she flung it out of the way as the puddle of blood on the desk dissolved the wood into smoking, pulpy sludge.
Two more biodrones stalked toward their massive opponent, issuing a strange, low, throaty growl. She returned it; the sound was deep and windy, like a storm brewing inside her. It caused every muscle in Siobhan’s body to tense. Three more on the far side of the room leaped onto the segment of desk there, tails lashing back and forth as they clawed the wood. The Queen pounded across the floor to the closest two, swinging her claws at them.
She missed the first one, which latched onto her arm, but she connected with the second attacker, sinking the claws of her other hand into the side of its face.
Seeing an opening, the first biodrone opened its mouth wide. Its inner jaw shot out, puncturing the Queen’s forearm. With a shriek, she charged the wall, slamming the biodrone into it over and over until the wall cracked and crumbled.
Still, the biodrone hung on.
She grasped its head, pulling up, and Siobhan could hear the tearing of the meat beneath the exoskeleton as the monster’s jaw broke at the hinges. She tore off the top of its head and then flung its carcass at one of the three creatures making their way toward her. The corpse knocked it off the desk and out of view.
The biodrone closest to Siobhan moved in while she was distracted, and as she turned it leaped into the air. She crouched, flamethrower pointed upward, but the thing was above her, and before she could pull the trigger the Queen’s tail speared it through the side. Thinking quickly, Siobhan grabbed the shell at her feet and held it up like a shield. She heard the biodrone’s blood pattering down on the carapace, but felt nothing.
The creature’s body thudded to the ground beside her.
Siobhan rose slowly, feeling more confident. Now she had a protective measure against whatever accidental crossfire of blood she might encounter. Opening fire with the flamethrower, she doused the third biodrone with a stream of fire that engulfed it instantly. It howled, dropping to the floor and racing from the room.
That left no more than ten surviving biodrones, Siobhan estimated. Screeching in unison, they charged the double doors, intent on fleeing, but it was too late. The Queen leaped across what remained of the desk into the open square in the middle, then jumped through the door to tackle three of the fleeing creatures.
Her claws flew. Her tail whipped and stabbed and snapped. Dispatching her first opponents, she chased down another pair. A short distance down the hall, she tore one in half, then another just a few feet farther.
Turning sharply, a biodrone slid under her swiping claws and galloped back into the main chamber. Another dodged her by leaping to the wall and galloping toward the double doors. They were coming back.
Siobhan ran toward the doors and blasted each of the biodrones as they tried to enter. For a moment, they were nightmares, spiny shapes of flame squealing and tearing across the ceiling. They dropped together, and the flame was enough to catch the carpet in the center of the desk square.
Fire caught near the far wall, as well. Growing flames burned their way toward the comms machines.
Siobhan couldn’t leave the burning room, not yet—not until she called for help. Sprinting past the fire to reach the console, she tapped the screen, calling up the list of messages. A loud, high-pitched roar thundered from outside the room. It sounded to Siobhan like a victory roar—the Queen must have killed the last remaining biodrones.
Somewhere in the back of her mind, she wondered how long it would be before the Queen came after her next. Though they had fought a common foe, and she had defended the creature more than once, the monster was not on her side. She would consider Siobhan a threat, especially in her state of heightened aggression—thanks to Fowler’s damned serum. And if she didn’t go after Siobhan, she’d be going after the marines at the ship.
Alec.
Siobhan couldn’t focus on that now, though. She checked the message she’d started, to see if the attachment was still there.
It was.
So were the prompts, waiting for her.
RECORD – PLAY – PAUSE – STOP – REWIND – FAST FORWARD
Flames crackled, far too close. The heat was uncomfortable, but the smoke was worse—it made her eyes water.
She tapped the “RECORD” prompt and said, “This is Dr. Siobhan McCormick, formerly assistant research director at the Seegson Pharmaceuticals lab on BG-791. I am currently stranded on LV-846, at the Pushan Conference Center with two badly injured Colonial Marines. There are no survivors from the Joint Chiefs summit, and no survivors from the USCMC security detail. Attached is evidence of the pathogen bomb signatures and origin, as well as evidence of ACG Vaughn’s—”
She coughed as the smoke grew thicker.
“—her involvement in the incidents here, including what was done to the crashed ship Alexiares.”
She coughed again, the smoke so thick it nearly obscured the screen.
“Please send help. Hurry. McCormick out.”
She tapped the button to stop recording. Her head hurt. So did her lungs and the forearm where the biodrone blood had eaten through her sleeve and singed the skin. Her shoulder throbbed, as well.
Her vision swam.
The comms system prompted again.
CHANNELS?
She tapped the checkboxes.
MILITARY
UA GOVERNMENT
UPP GOVERNMENT
And then, to be on the safe side, also chose “OTHER.” She wasn’t sure where that would send the message, but the more ears, the better.
When it asked her if she was sure, she confirmed. When it asked if she wanted to override the security, she confirmed again. For a moment, she was sure it would ask for authorization to send the message—authorization she didn’t have.
The smoke burned her eyes, but after a moment she saw the prompt appear.
She took the drive and pocketed it, then tapped “SEND” and sank to the floor. She didn’t—couldn’t—wait to see if the transmission went through. The flames were licking up the side of the comms counter. The smoke was choking her.
