Alien vs. Predator: Armageddon, page 5
Yaquita nodded at the datapad, and Palant switched it to display-only mode. “Keep it talking,” the Yautja said.
“Where do you come from?” Palant asked.
“Rage,” Oscar said.
“How did you get the Cooper-Jordan?”
“The Rage found it. Filled with fresh fruit.”
Palant remembered that fresh fruit—humans sent to sleep centuries before in the hope that, upon waking, they would be somewhere else they could call home. The original crew and passengers.
“You need to tell us everything,” she said.
“Everything? No one knows everything. Not even me.”
“Who’s your leader?”
“Ah,” Oscar said, and his eye seemed to glaze as if looking into a distance, and a future, she could not see. “Perhaps there’s someone who knows everything.”
“What’s their name?”
“Rage.”
“What is their purpose?”
Oscar looked around, as far as he could. He took in the blue containment field, the huge Yaquita motionless on her wheeled platform, and the wide room beyond.
“The Yautja know more than you,” he said. Palant noted his use of the plural.
“We’re now allies,” Palant said. It was a bold statement, and she glanced at Yaquita as the datapad translated. She seemed not to react. In fact, her attention seemed to be elsewhere.
Glancing at the sphere that Yaquita had conjured from the floor, she saw several displays across its upper surface, out of Oscar’s line of sight.
“It’ll do you no good,” Oscar said. “Humans are weak and foolish. Yautja are beasts.”
“And yet it’s you lying there with your guts hanging out,” Palant said.
“It’s war. There are losses.”
“You’re happy being one of them?”
“I’m happy being Rage.”
“Tell us what comes next.”
Oscar looked from Palant to Yaquita, and back again.
“You want her, don’t you?” he said. “Those fingers. That slick skin.”
“You have no idea—”
Yaquita made a noise—a cross between a roar and a shriek of surprise. Palant hadn’t heard its like before, certainly not from a Yautja.
The response was immediate. Across the room Halley and her crew came dashing out, sidearms drawn. Palant held up her hands, signaling that she was okay.
“With me,” Yaquita said. She rolled forward and ripped the device from Oscar’s head. He issued a wet, gurgling sound from his mouth. It might have been pain.
The Yautja deactivated and passed through the containment field. Palant followed. Yaquita kept moving toward the far end of the room, shifting past pedestals bearing things known and unknown, mundane and amazing. By the time they reached Halley and the others, Palant could hear Yaquita’s breath coming in short, sharp bursts.
“What is it?” Palant asked, switching the datapad back to audio.
Yaquita answered. The datapad paused, as if processing the sounds for longer than usual. As if even it, too, was scared. Then it spoke one single word.
“Drukathi.”
“What’s that?” Palant asked.
Yaquita sighed, an incredibly human sound.
“This changes everything,” she said.
4
GENERAL ALEXANDER
Close to Space Station Hell
December 2692 AD
In his dreams, the android calling himself General Alexander was burning. He watched his body melting away, flesh consumed by the blue-white flames and turned to heat and gases and ruin. His blood boiled and evaporated, sizzling into a thick haze. His skeletal structure stretched, hardened and began to snap, and his organs shriveled beneath the heat. Inside his chest cavity, the heart pumped its last.
Yet Alexander still lived. He would only die when his brain was fried, circuits and bio-junctions scorched to nothing.
He would not allow that.
Mistress Maloney also would not allow that. She stood before him, furious, reaching for him through the flames and smoke and blindingly hot gases, ready to grab and wring his purpose from his molten core.
I haven’t finished yet, he thought. I’m still moving, still chasing and following, and if you’ll give me one more chance…
Another white-hot agony burned in from afar. Mistress Maloney vanished into a darkness lit by occasional flowers of flame, fires curling and dancing in zero gravity. Alexander knew that, were he so inclined, he might have found such a sight beautiful. He understood the concept of beauty, because although he and his fellow generals were built with functionality in mind—strong, powerful, yet with few nods to aesthetics—their programming was full, wide, and inclusive.
But he had never found a cause or purpose for beauty. Now the flames that bloomed around him were heat, pain, and destruction. They were another hurdle between him and the successful accomplishment of his mission, and he could not allow them to triumph.
The general struggled to bring himself fully back online. All systems and contacts between him and his flagship had been interrupted. He reached, adjusted his broadcast frequencies, attempting to bypass any glitches in communications. He seemed to be broadcasting into nothing, and to be searching for return signals that no longer existed.
He accessed his immediate memory stores and replayed the past sixty minutes. The pursuit to the human space station, unleashing his army, Liliya’s mocking tone when she broadcast from a ship powering away from the battle. The chase, and then the ambush.
He should have been more aware. Should have seen it coming. He would never have believed that Yautja and humans would work and fight together, yet clearly he should have considered the possibility. The attack by the Rage had changed many things around and within the Human Sphere, and many more changes were afoot.
The Yautja had uncloaked and launched a blistering assault on his flagship and its escorts. They had fought back, but the attack had been rapid and without pause or mercy. Alexander had automatically been sucked into a survival pod, once the ship’s bridge was compromised and blasted into fragments by the roaring nuclear fire.
Around the protective chamber, his ship burned.
And now… Alexander thought.
The memories continued, bleeding into his current awareness, and as he made contact with some elements of his ship, the scope of his predicament became apparent.
His vessel was a ruin. Its hull was smashed in a dozen places, back broken, atmosphere vented, weapons holds open to space. His army was destroyed. His mighty, unstoppable army was gone, some of them even now fighting and killing back on the human space station, the rest mostly sucked out into space or burned to nothing in the nuclear fires that had consumed much of the ship. He felt the pain of their demise, a thousand deaths burning white hot… and then simmering into the deepest, darkest void beyond existence. His connection to them was forever, and even though most of them were dead and gone, the agonies would remain.
If he had been anything other than android, these experiences would have driven him mad.
The vessel rolled and spun, its structure in a constant state of flux as the disintegration continued. Soon it would come apart fully, and then Alexander would also be lost to space. Spat out of the wrecked craft like just another dead thing.
But I’m not dead yet! he thought. Defiance burned brighter than any flame. He might float in space forever, his mind still active and afire, his mission still bright.
Or he could take control and forge ahead.
There would be a way. There had to be.
Alexander went through a superficial diagnostic check of his personal systems. He was a mess. His body was useless, smashed and burned, and much of what remained lost and still leaking. Where limbs had been lost, only phantom sensations remained. His head was mostly whole, although his skull plate had been pulverized on one side, leaving his brain and associated systems open to the void. At any other time he might consider his position useless.
His self-destruct mechanism was still whole. One signal, one wish, and he would take the remnants of the ship with him into the void.
No more pain, no more agonies shared with his decimated army.
But there was still hope.
The Watcher remained with him. It pulsed and exuded its strange energies, constant as ever. Events did not appear to have troubled its strange mind. Perhaps it had not even noticed the destruction and chaos, focused as it was on its one single purpose—find and follow Liliya.
Alexander reached out with his one good hand and almost touched this arcane fragment of the Faze. Almost. He had never laid hands on it before, and something told him that to do so would be to change himself irrevocably. It was an alien intelligence beyond the understanding even of Beatrix Maloney. What right did he have to touch it?
Instead, he returned to the immediate task of making himself whole again. Once that was done, he would concentrate on the next step. And the next…
Liliya was still close. Still within his reach.
Alexander flexed his one remaining hand and grabbed hold of a chunk of floating wreckage. He issued commands for the pod door to open. Nothing happened, and he was not surprised.
So he opened the door manually, turning the mechanism, metal grinding on warped metal until there was a gap large enough for him to wriggle through.
The Watcher followed. As ever, it knew his purpose and intention.
Outside, parts of his dead crew floated around the almost unrecognizable bridge. They were in pieces. Weak, human, flesh and blood shreds and dregs, they were no use to him. He moved on.
The passage of time was strange, and difficult to judge. His mind was damaged, after all, and he was glitching. Senses focused in and out, his awareness uncertain. He experienced blank spots, periods when his quest through the terrible ruin of his ship did not register, the moments lost forever to the void.
Yet he saw enough, and when he came across what he sought, his resurrection began.
The Xenomorph soldier had died from explosive decompression, its internal systems shocked and freezing. As such, its programmed instinct to melt down had not been realized. Alexander grabbed one of its heavily spiked limbs and pulled it close, then he set to work on its left forearm. It took a while to detach it, and longer to mold its tattered end so that it might fit well against his own shattered shoulder.
He knew the pain to come, but knew also that what he was attempting was possible. On his journey through the ship he’d visited the medical bay—he must have, though he had no memory of it. Even in that blackout zone he had been working hard toward success. Attached to a belt around his torn waist were a dozen vials, each of them containing a dose of the nanotech that might yet save his life.
He injected one into the Xenomorph limb, another into his wrecked shoulder, and then pressed them close together.
As the soldier’s acid joined his own bloodstream, his systems burst alight, and his core processor shut him down.
* * *
When Alexander came online again, the limb was attached. The tech in his flesh and that which coursed through the donor limb were doing their job. The arm already felt a part of him. He couldn’t yet clench and unclench, flex and point, but awareness of his own body had grown. No longer a phantom, it was real again, and soon it would be stronger and deadlier than the arm he had lost.
He moved quickly, harvesting parts where he could find them, transplanting, injecting, passing out and waking. The further he went, the less human-like and more Xenomorph he became, but he was still Alexander. His mission remained whole.
As he grafted a curve of carapace across the wound in his skull, he could not help finding humor in the moment. It hadn’t been intentional, yet it fit perfectly. Across his head, part-human, part-Xenomorph, the word “Alexander” reminded him of who he was.
Feeling whole and strange, he pushed rapidly through the airless wreck toward the holds. If there was a vessel left intact—an attack ship or even one of the smaller emergency escape craft—that might be his only way out. The chance was remote, but he would not allow pessimism. However unlikely, this might yet be a step forward.
When he arrived at the main hold, and saw that it was blasted open to the void, he took pause to consider his next move.
But then fate dealt him a hand.
A ship approached, matched speed and attitude, and then drifted slowly into the chaotic space, blasting large drifting chunks of wreckage with a laser cannon, knocking aside countless smaller pieces with its hull.
The ship was Yautja.
It paused and powered down, and moments later a door materialized in its hull. Light shone from inside. A shadow was cast across the vented hold.
Alexander’s sharp, chitinous limbs flexed and pointed.
The Yautja had not seen him. Its targeting laser played around the hold, illuminating the shape and formation of the damaged structure and relaying it back to the alien’s suit computer. Alexander had not fought a Yautja before, and this was the first time he’d seen one in the flesh. He had heard about them, though. He knew their capabilities and powers, their skills at fighting.
Looking forward to testing his new capabilities, he pushed off from the shadowy doorway. Powering down all but his repair systems, he drifted across the hold toward the ship.
The Yautja did not notice him. The heat he gave off was negligible compared to the residual radiation resulting from the attack. His ship still burned, and the expanding wreckage would be sizzling with radiation for centuries to come.
As he drew closer to his enemy, Alexander felt a growing sense of excitement.
The ship was long, sleek, and a deep gray, reminiscent of most Yautja vessels. Two weapons blisters were the only protuberances, the shiny black globes quiet and innocuous. Their firepower would be staggering, he knew. He was also aware that the Yautja could control the ship from its suit computer, and that they were often inclined to suicide, should the occasion arise.
That could not be permitted. His mission still burned bright in his android heart, and he needed this vessel.
Drifting alongside a piece of melted and reformed wreckage, Alexander grasped it and rolled, keeping it between him and his opponent, his weight subtly changing its trajectory.
Closer… closer…
The Yautja sensed the altered movement. It pushed off from the doorway, floating and turning at the same time, its shoulder blaster unleashing a fusillade of shots that smashed into the wreckage. It was blown apart and Alexander shoved himself aside, impacting the Yautja’s ship, pushing off again instantly.
Before the Yautja warrior could use its suit’s small retros to turn and face him, he was on it.
The interface between his mind, damaged body, and the newly grafted Xenomorph parts was surprisingly effective. He had expected some lag time between his mind’s signals and the new body’s responses, but already his movements were lightning-fast.
One slash and the Yautja’s suit was ripped open.
Another, and its helmet was smashed.
A jagged portion spun away, green blood spewing in flexing globules that spread around them.
Its shoulder blaster fired again and missed, impacting against a bulkhead far behind.
Its hand came around, a spike protruding from the wrist armor. Alexander hacked it off.
As the beast struggled, a slash from his new, better right arm parted its head from its body. He sent the body drifting away, to join his ruined ship for eternity.
* * *
Inside the Yautja vessel, with the door closed and atmosphere already adjusting to his android demands, Alexander sat in a seat that extruded from the floor. It molded to him perfectly.
Thanks to the actions of the Watcher, the ship already recognized its new master.
As mysterious and unknowable as ever, the Watcher interfaced with the ship’s computer and projected a new course.
Once again, and against all odds, Alexander was hunting Liliya.
5
GERARD MARSHALL
Charon Station, Sol System
December 2692 AD
For Gerard Marshall, his posting on Charon Station, the Colonial Marines’ main base, was only supposed to be short term.
He hated being in space. Nothing artificial could replicate the feel of solid ground beneath his feet. He even imagined that artificial gravity felt different from the real thing, in the same way the manufactured foodstuffs on the station weren’t quite the same as they would be on Earth. Same ingredients, same constituent parts, identical chemical makeup, yet different. Fake.
Gravity on the station was exactly that of Earth, yet Marshall sensed the difference every minute of the day.
Now everything was going to hell, and he figured he’d be there for a long, long time.
He’d once believed in God. It was a belief he’d kept secret from Weyland-Yutani, because a company so driven by the acquisition and use of science had no place for such superstitions, especially among its ruling Thirteen. He had nursed a private faith, though, comforted by it yet never allowing it to intrude on his work or disturb his growing influence. As he’d moved upward in the hierarchy, and eventually found himself as one of the ruling elite, his faith had become something less overt and more internalized.
Eventually his beliefs had withered and died, and sometimes he was sad that he hadn’t even noticed it happening.
Now he was tempted to pray to God once more, although Marshall doubted that He would hear, much less listen.
General Paul Bassett had come to Marshall’s cabin to issue his latest report. Usually Bassett summoned Marshall to his own main control center, but the center was abuzz with activity. So the General had seized this opportunity for a brief escape. To recharge his batteries, stretch his limbs.
Even so, the General had two Marine aides with him, both of them perpetually connected to datapads, frowning and listening to reports via their ear implants.
“So is there any good news?” Marshall asked. “Not a shred? Nothing?”
Bassett shrugged, his expression remaining impassive.
