Damp, fetid air stirred throughout the darkness of the hive. It was pitch black within, and little could be seen beyond the foot directly in front of the viewer. Not that anyone would come to a place as harrowing as this hive. It wasa place that seemed to suck out the warmth and goodness of life, and left behind only the cold dampness of evil. Then again, everything has to have a home.
Within the murky darkness, something stirred with a creak of chitinous limbs, a movement of black on black. The thing was immense compared to anything within comparable distance, but since nothing close to it lived long enough to compare, it was just over seven feet tall. It would have stood upright, walking on it's hind legs and killing and maiming with it's arms. It would have done that, nomally, except for at that moment it was curled in a fetal position, resting in a peaceful repose, long tail curled about it as it slept.
It's enlongated skull glistened wetly in the dark, the curve of it's head interrupted at regular intervals by shallow dips and grooves. It's cranium narrowed to the front, revealing wicked teeth and a maw of dripping saliva. Its whole body dripped and secreted a viscous slime.
Slowly, it stirred again, and again the creaking of limbs came. This time it did not stop, as the beast unfolded itself from it's perch in the wall and lowered itself to the uneven floor of the hive. Hissing to itself, it opened it's fang-filled maw and stalked off, traversing deeper into the hive, towards the birthing chambers and the throne room.
It was nameless. If it were capable of having a name, it would be the hive. It was not individual, but rather part of the collective entity that was the hive. To the farthest extent of individualism, it was an alpha. It was the pack leader, and controlled a certain amount of command over the rest of the collective.
It stalked silently through the dark passageways, it's tail weaving behind it with each stride it took. More and more slime dripped to the floor of the hive with each passing foot-fall. The scenery around it became increasingly more disturbing as it traversed deeper into the hive.
It stopped, turned, and slowly raised its head up to the walls around it. This was the source of the fetid air that clung to everything inside the hive. Through clumps and strands of the alien resin, the human figures moaned and stirred softly, that is, those that could moan or stir. They had been effectivly glued to the walls of the hive, their entire body covered by the resin. The only parts of their bodies that were not covered were their chests and heads, left open for the xenomorphs soon to be born.
Those were the ones that were alive though. The others did not stir, for they were already dead. They hung on the wall, intermingling with those that were alive. They had been dead for quite some time, from the looks of their bodies and the stench that they radiated.
The Alpha did not care, though. If it were capable of intelligent thought, the smell would have been sweet, the smell of new life. Again, the Alpha resumed it's onward journey, traveling deeper and deeper into the hive, towards the queen and her drones.
The queen hissed slowly and raised her head as the Alpha passed through. The queen did not notice him for long though, for she soon lowered her head and fell back into her restful stupor as she continued to lay eggs.
The bulbous things were deposited carefully onto the ground by her massive ovipositor, then to be taken away by awaiting drones and deposited in front of awaiting hosts. The queen again stirred softly, dreaming alien dreams of survival and terror. The Alpha stood before her, gazing up at her in all her splendor, stepping forward to sniff at her massive form, then running off before she awoke again.
Again, the Alpha was out in the corridors when an overwhelming hunger overcame it. It turned in midstride and bounded down another dark passegeway, heading towards the feeding chambers.
At the hives beginning, it was formed inside a massive, human structure. At that time, the Alpha could have gone out to hunt the beings that had inhabited the structure. But as time passed all of the original inhabitants had been taken away, for use as hosts or food. So now the feeding chambers were used.
As the Alpha neared them, the activity became more noticable. More and more of it's brothers passed him, on there way to some unknown region of the hive. As he walked, a smaller weaker xenomorph fell into step behind him. Twirling about, the Alpha reared back and hissed wildly at the smaller xeno, who was now crouching close to the ground, hissing in submission as it sheltered it's enlongated head with it's sickly arms. Slowly, the Alpha lowered it's whiplike tail from it's striking position and turned, resuming its path to the feeding room.
The cowering xeno looked up slowly and upon seeing the Alpha stalking off down the corridor, again started off towards the feeding chamber.
The feeding chamber smelled even worse than the rest of the hive. Its ceiling was a good three feet higher than the other chambers, and the scene in side it was much more disturbing than anything else. Swaying softly from the brush of xenos, humans hung from the ceiling like hunks of meat.
They were concooned, hanging by thin strands from the ceiling. The cocoons were tinted slightly green, covering almost all of the body. The areas of the body that were not covered were mangled terribly, skulls broken open, skin hanging off in flaps, blood long since leaked out of the open wounds. They were now just empty husks, awaiting the aliens to fully consume them.
The Alpha looked up at the hanging bodies, and sniffed the air. Lithely moving forward, it swiftly went to the farthest hanging body. Reaching up, it sunk it sharp talons through the soft cocoon, ripping it away to reveal more unexposed, unmarked flesh. More and more saliva came to its awaiting maw as it pulled away chunks of the ripe meat, the smell assulting its sense.
Taking the meat to the back of the room, it hunkered down before its feast, resting on its back legs as it drooled over the meat held in its spindly arm. Raising the meat to its open mouth, it bit savagely into it, pulling back its head to rip away the tougher strands of gristle held between its teeth. It swallowed the portion contained in its mouth and drove its teeth again into the meat, biting away huge clumps in one mouthful. As it raised its head again to chew the meat withheld in its mouth, the Alpha noticed the smaller xenomorph again.
This time, the Alpha got a better look at the sickly creature. It was not yet fully grown, the still smooth crown covering its cranium evidence of that. It was seriously undersized, a runt that had survived thus far through luck. The way its ribs ware more pronounced than those around it were evidence that it rarely came across a meal, probably beaten back from the hanging carcasses of the feeding room by larger xenos. It was obviously an Omega, the scars all over its body probably caused by other xenos, taking out their frustration on the weakling.
Normally, the same treatment would have been expected of the Alpha, but from the way the Omega sniffed weakly at the food and the way it bobbed its smooth black skull in submission, the Alpha thought again. It was instinct for the Alpha to take care of the other members of his pack, of the hive, so this case was no different, despite the fact that the xeno in front of him was an Omega, an inferior.
Hissing approvingly, the Alpha extended the food in its talons to the Omega, and dropped it at the feet of the awaiting xeno. Hissing in glee, the Omega hunkered down on the spot and feasted. Staring a moment longer at the Omega, the Alpha returned to its meal, ripping and tearing at the meat.
* * *
The planet glowed softly in space as the massive warship approached it. In big, black letters, the name U.S.S. Maximus appeared on it's port side. With the sun reflecting off of its rear, one of the air docks on the massive ship's bottom opened up, admitting a dropship into the void beneath it.
Turning gracefully, the dropship tipped its nose down and accelerated towards the atmosphere. It plunged through the atmosphere, pulling up as it neared the tops of the lush forests covering the planet below.
Opening up its afterburners, the dropship burned through the air, heading straight for the settlement at the edge of the scanners. Inside, a crack-team of colonial marines prepped their equipment, readied smart-guns and plasma rifles, adjusted body armor, and awaited their arrival at the settlement.
It lay nestled in a clearing just at the edge of a large stretch of humid forest. All main lights had dimmed to conserve energy, while outside, the tops of the compund flashed their red emergency beacons. Slowly the dropship circled, allowing a clear veiw to all within the dropship. It landed then, and the marines fanned out from beneath it, about to breach the hive.
* * *
Intruders Come! Prepare!
The Alpha's enlongated cranium jerked to attention at this . Beside it, the Omega also noticed the communication, and it too jerked awake. Then the two were off, the Omega quickly falling behind the Alpha as it sped off towards the hive antechamber. Already more were running at full speed straight to the enterance of the hive. They would be ready for the intruders. More food, more hosts.
They swarmed into the antechamber, scaling the walls and clinging to the ceiling as they located dark crevices and holes with in which to conceal themselves. The Alpha did not follow the others, though. It sensed danger in that course of action and decided to hang back, opting to hide itself in one of the tunnels that branched off the antechamber.
It pulled its slime dripping body up the tunnel's wall and concealed itself in the resin encrusted pipes close to the ceiling, pulling itself as far back into the darkness as possible. Below it, more and more of its brothers swarmed into the open antechamber and crawled about on the walls and ceilings, no where left to hide, so the only option being to mill about above the entrance of the hive and drop down on the first of the intruders.
A shaft of light appeared in the darkness of the antechamber. The main doors to the complex were opening, groaning in protest as the xenomorph resin slowly cracked and shattered under the strain. With a final squal, the doors were open, admitting sunlight into the hive. With a slight scitter of nails on plastacrete, and a bark of animal nature, a pack of five dogs trotted unwillingly into the settlement's dark interior. With inhuman roaring and mad hissing, the foremost aliens dropped from the ceiling just inside the door. They were only xenos, so they did not see the error of their ways.
With the dogs as bait for the unknowing xenos, the human marines outside opened fire on the aliens, mowing down half a dozen in one brief firefight. The aliens inside hissed insanely at the outrage, and stupidly sprang out their hiding place, charging the well armed and prepared marines. a dozen more were mowed down, but this time the marines lost two of their number, leaving eight more to be dealt with.
The Alpha hissed wildly and thrashed his tail about his hiding place, but wisely stayed hidden. Its instincts told it the importance of gathering hosts, and to gather hosts, it must be stealthy. In the antechamber, the eight marines came forward, setting fire to any of the Alpha's still moving brothers.
The humans with guns came to the branching tunnels, and split into groups. The Alpha watched silently as they passed below it, and when the humans could no longer be heard by the Alpha's keen hearing, it turned and scurried into a air shaft close to its hiding place.
It flew like lightening down through the air shafts, leaving a trail of slime in it's wake. With each foward movement, more and more saliva dripped from it's hungry mouth. It traveled only fifty feet when it came to an intersection and ran right into one its brothers.
Pulling up short, the recognition passed, and they began to communicate. A series of clicks, hisses, and hand movements were traded between the two. The Alpha explained its simple plan to the other xeno and soon the two split ways, both heading to cut-off the humans.
The alpha looked upward and started off, scaling the walls of the vertical shaft, its talons puncturing the walls of the air duct as it pulled itself upward. Then, the shaft ended, and it turned left. It stopped short a few more feet on down the shaft. Below it, it heard the approaching voices of the intruders. It also heard the second alien move into position. All was ready.
With out a sound, the xeno dropped down the air duct, landing in a ready crouch on the floor of the tunnel. In front of it, the marines continued forward. One gave a shout as the Alpha was noticed, then the Alpha's brother made it's appearence, jumping straight out of an air duct on the wall and slamming into the first marine. The human went down in a spray of red gore as its throat was ripped out and head cracked open simultaneously. Dead on impact and torn to shreds, the second dropped the dead marine and didn't hestitate. In the span of three seconds, it grabbed another marine and pulled itself back into the vent.
At the same time, the Alpha also made it's move, grabbing the rear-most marine and leaping straight up into the vertical air-shaft, closely followed by a spray of bullets. The marine in its clutches fought uselessly, its puny gun spraying bullets back down into the tunnel as it tried to shoot the Alpha.
Gripping the side of the vertical air-shaft tightly, the Alpha reared back the marine held in its clutches and slammed it into the side of the duct, silencing its struggles. Then, it struggled back upwards and made its way deeper into the duct system, making its way back to the hive.
The hive was a flurry of motion, drones hurrying about, trying to protect the queen as the sentries ran past, alerting the queen of the movements of the marines. The Alpha dropped down out of the air duct, its solid landing slinging globs of slime onto the floor to slowly dry among the resin.
Ahead of it, a group of drones milled about the hatchery, mindless in the confusion. Walking forward with the marine dragging behind it, the Alpha pulled the unconcious human to the feet of the group of drones. With a hiss of pleasure, the drones fell upon the marine, picking it up and sticking it to the wall, regurgitating the resin that would harden into the marine's prison.
More Intruders Come
The communication set the Alpha running, heading back out towards the fighting. The intruders had advanced further now, approaching the interior of the hive, getting closer and closer to the queen. Ahead of him, the Alpha heard hisses of pain as more and more of it's brothers were cut down in hails of blood and gore.
Then the Alpha was there, but did not remain. With a boost of speed, the Alpha jumped down a side passage, using the momentum of the jump to cling to the wall. It scaled up to the ceiling, heading for an open air duct.
It climbed inside, climbing straight up and over, now directly above the fighting. Then it found the vertical shaft down, and saw the intruder standing beneath it.
Hissing in anticipation, the Alpha dropped feet first down the shaft, landing on the humans shoulders, tail already stabbing and cutting into the human's head and back. Each time it stabbed, the deeper the point of the Alpha's tail went, each time it pulled the tip out, the more gore and blood that came with it.
Already, though, the Alpha's presence amongst the humans was noticed, and gunfire tracked towards it. Jumping away, it again landed on the wall, scurrying forward, claws grasping for another human, this one it did not stay to revel in, simply sliced through the back of its head and sprang away.
The Alpha hit the oppisite wall and scurried up to the ceiling, remaining long enough to locate it's next target and drop down to the floor, talons slicing threw fabric and the soft flesh beneath. The third human dropped, dead before it hit the floor, and the Alpha twirled about, seeking it's last target.
Hissing madly, the Alpha found it. It cowered in a dark corner, puny weapon forgotten on the ground in front of it. It cried out gibberish as the Alpha slowly stalked forward, inner jaws extended and drooling in anticipation. Then the Alpha attacked, tearing into the human's legs, making sure it could not run from the drones. Hearing a drone approach even then, the Alpha left the crippled body and sprinted off down the corridor, searching for more intruders.
The remaining humans had retreated to the antechamber, the surving member of the first squad now joined up with the second squad, of the remaining in the second squad. Six left, with now place except the dropship to retreat to.
You must prevent their escape. You must stop them!
The Alpha's head perked up at this, suddenly running faster, this time to the side of the complex, towards the secondary entrance. It passed none of its brothers, all of them now up at the antechamber, fighting off the marines.
Then the Alpha was there, pulling out of it's sprint, it's sleek, slime covered body pulling upright as it took in its surroundings.
The door in front of it was inaccesible, thoroughly coated in the hive's resin. It hissed softly to itself, swinging it's head about as it searched for another exit. Then it spotted the air duct leading directly outside.
It sprang up, tail curling close to its body as it clung to the wall, crawling slowly to the air vent. It reached up and pulled the air duct, dropping the grate to the floor with a clang.
Hissing wildly, it slithered into the duct, and then it was outside. The dimming light of the sun reflected off it's black carpace, its red light growing dimmer as it fell away beneath the trees.
Out in the open, the Alpha was even faster, free of the confines of the dark tunnels and uneven floor. Ahead in its path, the green dropship gleamed dully in the silver moonlight. It was massive, dwarfing the lone Alpha as it ran across the landing pad. In two seconds, the Alpha was there.
It head straight for the landing gear, spiraling upward as it climbed into the innards of the dropship. Finding a bare patch of bulkhead, the alien made its entrance. The Alpha's gleaming teeth parted as it opened it's drooling jaws. A greenish substance shoot straight out, striking the bulkhead in front of it, leaving a sizzling burn mark in its wake. The sizzling became louder and more intense as more and more of the bulkhead was eaten away, leaving a gaping hole in the once solid bulkhead.
The Alpha hissed softly as it slunk forward, staying low to the ground as it made its way up a narrow corridor, approaching the front of the ship. Ahead of it, the low mumblings of the ship's two pilots could be heard.
Outside the dropship, the stillness of the night was broken as a wet smack was heard from the cockpit, blood spraying it's clear surface. With a scream of impossible horror, the remaining pilot lurched foward, clawing uselessly at the the glass of the cockpit windshield.
He screamed silently, his face distorted in pain as he pressed himself against the clear shield. The red blood smeared off in the palms of his hand, painting them a sickening red as his arms flailed uselessly against the hard material of the glass.
Silently, the Alpha rose behind him, the moonlight shining through windsheild and striking it's gleaming head, coated in red from the first pilot. It hissed, causing the pilot to glance back, then turn back to the windshield flailing with renewed vigor. Slowly, it stalked towards the screaming human, stepping over the mangled body and crossing over the cockpit in one step.
The Alpha was behind the human now, fairly tasting the blood of the new human in its mouth. The human screamed louder now, then the thought finally came to it to try and turn to run. Lightning quick, The Alpha lashed out its tail, impaling the human through the small of its back, sending gouts of blood and internal organs cascading to the metallic floor of the cockpit. The Alpha brought the dead human closer to it open maw, sniffing and nudging it with its snout.
Then the Alpha turned, and began to flail the dead human against the control panel, hissing in pleasure as sparks and arcs of electricity leapt up into the air, touching occasionally on the dead and bloody body, barely regonizable from the flailing against the cockpit controls.
Satisfied that the unfamilar craft would no longer fly, it fled from the cockpit as fires began to flame up from the sparking control panels. It ran down the lowered ramp of the dropship, running on all fours, close to the ground, making it back to the complex just as the dropships gleaming exterior exploded into a burst of light, sending flaming chunks of metal across the landing pad.
Back inside, it halted as the queen once again communicated with the hive.
They have breached my throne. Come to me.
With a startled hiss, he took off running faster than ever, with a speed born of desperation. The Alpha was fearless, didn't have enough intelligence to know fear, but it felt something, something that it couldn't recognize. It was one thing for itself to die, but the queen was the entire hive, simultaneously the strongest and weakest link of their entire society.
Unknowingly, the strange fear pushed the Alpha even faster. The queen was in danger! The Alpha sped past the feeding and birthing chambers, into the queens chamber, and pulled back, hissing madly at what it saw.
The lone marine held a gernade launcher to his shoulder. Light trickled down from from unknown source and struck off his helmet, reflecting light onto the eggs that lay about his feet. The odor of his sweat reached the Alpha's keen snout, making it crinch at the unfamiliar smell. Then time slowed for the Alpha as the trigger was pulled in slow motion.
Then the Alpha ran forward. Ran in absolute desperation and fury, hissing at its looming death. It was about to leap when it was shoved down, sideswiped by something running faster . The Alpha screamed at his failure, looking for the cause of his fall.
Then it saw the Omega. The sickly small xeno leapt upwards into the air, his thin body like a twig launched into the air. Drool dripped to the floor of the hive from the Omega's open mouth. It leapt straight into the path of the incoming gernade, sheilding the queen from it.
Then the gernade was there, right in front of the Omega's snout, and he was there, snapping his head forward and biting down onto the gernade. With an audible clink of teeth on metal, the gernade exploded in the Omega's mouth. The Alpha stopped its screams of terror. The threat to the hive was over, except fot the marine standing in front of The Alpha.
The marine was down on his knees, cradling its face in its hands, its empty and useless weapon lying before it on the ground. It cried over its own imminent death, then pulled a knife from somewhere on its puny body, meaning to kill itself. The Alpha screamed from its crouch behind the human, and its tail flashed out, slicing off the human's arm.
Then the Alpha closed in, taking its time.
The stillness of the dark again closed in on the hive. The Alpha resumed its rest in another crevice of the wall, blending in perfectly with the biomechanical appearence of the walls. The saliva and slime stopped its slow dripping as the The Alpha resumed its hibernation. Curled in its comfortable fetal position it dreamed, like a dog dreams, of small things with soft flesh and warm blood.
[Rage]Garet_Jax
17 days?! Hey Man, I hate to rain on your parade, but we ain't gonna last 17 hours! (Back to Home)
